Page:The Poets and Poetry of the West.djvu/615

 1850-GO.] ALBERT SUTLIFFE. 599 BEYOND THE HILLS. Within the hills, my little world Lies green beneath the summer suns ; Slow-curving down the easy slopes, A mufiied streamlet runs. Beyond the horizon's wavy line The clouds come up, and pause, and go, Calm-pleasured in the depths of blue, And sailing onward slow. Upon the hills the shadows lie. Dim westward trails when comes the light. Firm-purposed, eastwtu'd traveling. And fading into night. All fair, beyond conception fair, When climbing unto yonder peak, Where leans the silver birch-tree forth. And quivers as to speak Unto its brethren o'er the vale. Adhering to the scanty soil. Upholding seeming fruitless lives Against the winds with toil. How fair, beyond conception fair. The sequent range of cultured farms. The golden fields in firm embrace Of the fair river's arms ! And all my world that lies within Tliese hills, and yon green line of woods, O'er which in prime of summer time The warmed heaven broods. But far beyond the intrenched hills My yearning soul takes eager wing, Keeping imagination's flowers Sweet with eternal Spring. I trace a mighty river on. Past cities bathing weary feet. And millions grimed with toil and dust And fainting in the street ; Estates innumerous, and wilds. Vine-vailed from summer heats intense. Dim groves of orange, sunny-bathed In tropic indolence, Until the deep unending sea In sultry summer sweetly smiles. Swelling and falling ceaselessly About its thousand isles. Before me stretch the leagues of coast. The lifting mist, the white-sailed ships ; And past its towers of fleecy cloud The blue sky calmly dips. I spread my sails ; away ! away ! My native shores grow dim ; are gone ; Night chases day, day chases night. Until some sudden spice-blown dawn, To left and right the island palms Nod golden in the coming light. And slowly westward, dragon-plumed, Retreats the dusky night. The great sea swallows up its isles ; The waving palms go westward down ; Through zones of light and shadow on, Bright noons and twilights brown. Until the shores of fabled Ind From low-laid cloud take gradual shape, And gliding o'er some glassy bay, Beyond a pleasant cape, I hear the muezzin's call to prayer Across the noonday waters still, And past the town, and fields of rice, The pagod crowns the hiU. The banyan's cool and dim arcades Retire to cooler, dimmer deeps. The parrot flashes through the shades, Tiie vine in endless net-work ci'eeps :