Page:Lyrical ballads, Volume 2, Wordsworth, 1800.djvu/216

208 From such, and other causes, to the thoughts

Of the old Man his only Son was now

The dearest object that he knew on earth.

Exceeding was the love he bare to him,

His Heart and his Heart's joy! For oftentimes

Old Michael, while he was a babe in arms,

Had done him female service, not alone

For dalliance and delight, as is the use

Of Fathers, but with patient mind enforc'd

To acts of tenderness; and he had rock'd

His cradle with a woman's gentle hand.

And in a later time, ere yet the Boy

Had put on Boy's attire, did Michael love,

Albeit of a stern unbending mind,

To have the young one in his sight, when he

Had work by his own door, or when he sate

With sheep before him on his Shepherd's stool,

Beneath that large old Oak, which near their door