Page:The Prelude, Wordsworth, 1850.djvu/267

BOOK IX.] No fear had they of bad becoming worse,

For worst to them was come; nor would have stirred,

Or deemed it worth a moment's thought to stir,

In any thing, save only as the act

Looked thitherward. One, reckoning by years,

Was in the prime of manhood, and erewhile

He had sate lord in many tender hearts;

Though heedless of such honours now, and changed:

His temper was quite mastered by the times,

And they had blighted him, had eaten away

The beauty of his person, doing wrong

Alike to body and to mind: his port,

Which once had been erect and open, now

Was stooping and contracted, and a face,

Endowed by Nature with her fairest gifts

Of symmetry and light and bloom, expressed,

As much as any that was ever seen,

A ravage out of season, made by thoughts

Unhealthy and vexatious. With the hour,

That from the press of Paris duly brought

Its freight of public news, the fever came,

A punctual visitant, to shake this man,

Disarmed his voice and fanned his yellow cheek

Into a thousand colours; while he read,

Or mused, his sword was haunted by his touch