And that, unknowing what he did,
He leaped amid a murderous band,
And saved from outrage worse than death
The Lady of the Land;

And how she wept, and clasped his knees;

And how she tended him in vain,

And ever strove to expiate

The scorn that crazed his brain;

And that she nursed him in a cave;
And how his madness went away,
When on the yellow forest-leaves
A dying man he lay;

His dying words-but when I reached
That tenderest strain of all the ditty,
My faltering voice and pausing harp
Disturbed her soul with pity!

All impulses of soul and sense.

Had thrilled my guileless Genevieve;

The music and the doleful tale,
The rich and balmy eve;

And hopes, and fears that kindle hope,
An undistinguishable throng,

And gentle wishes long subdued,

Subdued and cherished long!

She wept with pity and delight,

She blushed with love, and virgin shame; And like the murmur of a dream,

I heard her breathe my name!

Her bosom heaved, she stepped aside,
As conscious of my look she stept,
Then suddenly, with timorous eye,
She fled to me and wept.

She half inclosed me with her arms,
She pressed me with a meek embrace;
And, bending back her head, looked up,
And gazed upon my face.

'Twas partly love, and partly fear,
And partly 't was a bashful art,
That I might rather feel, than see,
The swelling of her heart.

I calmed her fears, and she was calm,
And told her love with virgin pride;
And so I won my Genevieve,

My bright and beauteous Bride.

SOMETHING CHILDISH, BUT VERY NATURAL.

1798-9.

WRITTEN IN GERMANY.

If I had but two little wings,

And were a little feathery bird,

To you I'd fly, my dear!

But thoughts like these are idle things,
And I stay here.

But in my sleep to you I fly:

I'm always with you in my sleep!

The world is all one's own.

But then one wakes, and where am I?
All, all alone.

Sleep stays not, though a monarch bids;
So I love to wake ere break of day:
For though my sleep be gone,
Yet while 'tis dark, one shuts one's lids,
And still dreams on.

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

1770-1850.

STRANGE fits of passion have I known:

And I will dare to tell,

But in the Lover's ear alone,

What once to me befell.

When she I loved looked every day

Fresh as a rose in June,

I to her cottage bent my way,

Beneath an evening moon.

Upon the moon I fixed my eye,

All over the wide lea;

With quickening pace my horse drew nigh

Those paths so dear to me.

And now we reached the orchard-plot;

And, as we climbed the hill,

The sinking moon to Lucy's cot

Came near, and nearer still.

In one of those sweet dreams I slept,

Kind Nature's gentlest boon!

And all the while my eyes I kept

On the descending moon.

My horse moved on; hoof after hoof
He raised, and never stopped:
When down behind the cottage roof,

At once, the bright moon dropped.

What fond and wayward thoughts will slide
Into a Lover's head!

"O mercy!" to myself I cried,

"If Lucy should be dead!"

1799.

1799.

She dwelt among the untrodden ways
Beside the springs of Dove,

A maid whom there were none to praise,
And very few to love:

A violet by a mossy stone,

Half hidden from the eye;

Fair as a star, when only one
Is shining in the sky.

She lived unknown, and few could know
When Lucy ceased to be;

But she is in her grave, and O,

The difference is to me!

I travelled among unknown men,
In lands beyond the sea;
Nor, England! did I know till then
What love I bore to thee.

'Tis past, that melancholy dream!
Nor will I quit thy shore.
A second time; for still I seem

To love thee more and more.

1799.

Among thy mountains did I feel

The joy of my desire;

And she I cherished turned her wheel
Beside an English fire.

Thy mornings showed, thy nights concealed,
The bowers where Lucy played ;

And thine too is the last green field
That Lucy's eyes surveyed.

She was a Phantom of delight

When first she gleamed upon my sight;
A lovely Apparition, sent

To be a moment's ornament;

Her eyes as stars of Twilight fair;

Like Twilight's, too, her dusky hair;
But all things else about her drawn
From May-time and the cheerful Dawn;
A dancing Shape, an Image gay,
To haunt, to startle, and waylay.

I saw her upon nearer view,

A Spirit, yet a Woman too!

Her household motions light and free,
And steps of virgin liberty;

A countenance in which did meet

Sweet records, promises as sweet;
A Creature not too bright or good

For human nature's daily food;
For transient sorrows, simple wiles,

Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles.

And now I see with eye serene

The very pulse of the machine;
A Being breathing thoughtful breath,

A Traveller between life and death;