Page:Peter Bell (Wordsworth).djvu/60

44 The Ass looks on—and to his work

Is Peter quietly resign'd;

He touches here—he touches there—

And now among the dead man's hair

His sapling Peter has entwin'd.

He pulls—and looks—and pulls again,

And he whom the poor Ass had lost,

The man who had been four days dead,

Head foremost from the river's bed

Uprises—like a ghost!

And Peter draws him to dry land;

And through the brain of Peter pass

Some poignant twitches, fast and faster,

"No doubt," quoth he, "he is the master

"Of this poor miserable Ass!"