Page:Lyrical ballads, Volume 2, Wordsworth, 1800.djvu/17

9 The trees were grey, with neither arms nor head;

Half-wasted the square mound of tawny green;

So that you just might say, as then I said,

"Here in old time the hand of man has been."

I look'd upon the hills both far and near;

More doleful place did never eye survey;

It seem'd as if the spring-time came not here,

And Nature here were willing to decay.

I stood in various thoughts and fancies lost,

When one who was in Shepherd's garb attir'd,

Came up the hollow. Him did I accost,

And what this place might be I then inquir'd.

The Shepherd stopp'd, and that same story told

Which in my former rhyme I have rehears'd.

"A jolly place," said he, "in times of old,

But something ails it now; the spot is curs'd.