Page:Poems by William Wordsworth (1815) Volume 1.djvu/254

194 The Owlets through the long blue night

Are shouting to each other still:

Fond lovers! yet not quite hob nob,

They lengthen out the tremulous sob,

That echoes far from hill to hill.

Poor Betty now has lost all hope,

Her thoughts are bent on deadly sin:

A green-grown pond she just has past,

And from the brink she hurries fast,

Lest she should drown herself therein.

And now she sits her down and weeps;

Such tears she never shed before;

"Oh dear, dear Pony! my sweet joy!

Oh carry back my Idiot Boy!

And we will ne'er overload thee more."

A thought is come into her head:

"The Pony he is mild and good,

And we have always used him well;

Perhaps he's gone along the dell,

And carried Johnny to the wood."