BOOK FIRST COL.COLL. LIBRARY THE WANDERER. 'Twas summer, and the sun had mounted high: Southward the landscape indistinctly glared Through a pale steam; but all the northern downs, In clearest air ascending, shew'd far off A surface dappled o'er with shadows flung From many a brooding cloud; far as the sight Of some huge cave, whose rocky ceiling casts A twilight of its own, an ample shade, Where the wren warbles; while the dreaming Man, With side-long eye looks out upon the scene, Upon that open level stood a Grove, The wished-for port to which my steps were bound. Spread by a brotherhood of lofty elms, That stared upon each other! I looked round, And to my wish and to my hope espied Him whom I sought; a Man of reverend age, But stout and hale, for travel unimpaired. There was he seen upon the Cottage bench, An iron-pointed staff lay at his side. Him had I marked the day before — alone And in the middle of the public way Stationed, as if to rest himself, with face Turned tow'rds the sun then setting, while that staff Afforded to his Figure, as he stood, Detained for contemplation or repose, Graceful support; the countenance of the Man At such unthought-of meeting. For the night - We parted, nothing willingly; and now He by appointment waited for me here, Beneath the shelter of these clustering elms. Childhood up We were tried Friends: I from my |