Page:Poems by William Wordsworth (1815) Volume 1.djvu/138

78 —Before those hermit doors, that never know

The face of traveller passing to and fro,

No peasant leans upon his pole, to tell

For whom at morning tolled the funeral bell;

Their watch-dog ne'er his angry bark foregoes,

Touched by the beggar's moan of human woes;

The grassy seat beneath their casement shade

The pilgrim's wistful eye hath never stayed.

—There, did the iron Genius not disdain

The gentle Power that haunts the myrtle plain,

There might the love-sick Maiden sit, and chide

Th' insuperable rocks and severing tide,

There watch at eve her Lover's sun-gilt sail

Approaching, and upbraid the tardy gale,

There list at midnight, till is heard no more,

Below, the echo of his parting oar,

There hang in fear, when growls the frozen stream,

To guide his dangerous tread, the taper's gleam.

Mid stormy vapours ever driving by,

Where ospreys, cormorants, and herons cry;

Where hardly given the hopeless waste to cheer,

Denied the bread of life the foodful ear,