Page:The Excursion, Wordsworth, 1814.djvu/389

363 Counsel is given; contention they appease

With healing words; and in remotest Wilds

Tears wipe away, and pleasant tidings bring;

Could the proud quest of Chivalry do more?"

"Happy," rejoined the Wanderer, "They who gain

A panegyric from your generous tongue!

But, if to these Wayfarers once pertained

Aught of romantic interest, 'tis gone;

Their purer service, in this realm at least,

Is past for ever.—An inventive Age

Has wrought, if not with speed of magic, yet

To most strange issues. I have lived to mark

A new and unforeseen Creation rise

From out the labours of a peaceful Land,

Wielding her potent Enginery to frame

And to produce, with appetite as keen

As that of War, which rests not night or day,

Industrious to destroy! With fruitless pains

Might One like me now visit many a tract

Which, in his youth, he trod, and trod again,

A lone Pedestrian with a scanty freight,

Wished for, or welcome, wheresoe'er he came,