Page:Poems of Nature and Life.djvu/335

 THE MO UNTA IiV JO URXE Y 325

And from the precipice's brink

Oft threatened 'neath thy feet to sink.

Sometimes before thine eyes uprose

Majestic slopes, dark robed in firs, Which on all sides the prospect close

In stately amphitheatres, While down their sides each cataract pale Glows like some distant comet's tail.

No poisonous shrub of sickly hue -+

Mounts from the plain to meet us here,

But gold and red and heavenly blue Smiling along the path appear.

Surely thou saw'st, with deep surprise,

The road so fair to reach the skies !

But, passed the pine and birchen grove,^5

The scene begins to grow less gay ; The trees that swept the skies above

Now dwindle, and next die away ; Till, of all other growth bereft, The stunted firs alone are left.

A squalid, straggling, rigid band

Of aged dwarfs around thee stood. Such as of old, in fairy-land.

Oft dwelt beneath the enchanted wood, Some seen from caves sly peeping out, While some the hillside strolled about.

But soon in line the dwindling host Stands right across thy path, thick set,

Where each, firm planted at his post, Receives thee with fixed bayonet.

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