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(From Rokeby)
STERN Bertram shunned the nearer way, | |
| Through Rokeby’s park and chase that lay, | |
| And, skirting high the valley’s ridge, | |
| They crossed by Greta’s ancient bridge; | |
| Descending where her waters wind | 5 |
| Free for a space and unconfined, | |
| As ’scaped from Brignall’s dark-wood glen, | |
| She seeks wild Mortham’s deeper den. | |
| There, as his eye glanced o’er the mound, | |
| Raised by that Legion long renowned, | 10 |
| Whose votive shrine asserts their claim, | |
| Of pious, faithful, conquering fame, | |
| “Stern sons of war!” sad Wilfrid sighed, | |
| “Behold the boast of Roman pride! | |
| What now of all your toils are known? | 15 |
| A grassy trench, a broken stone!”— | |
| This to himself; for moral strain | |
| To Bertram were addressed in vain. | |
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| Of different mood, a deeper sigh | |
| Awoke, when Rokeby’s turrets high | 20 |
| Were northward in the dawning seen | |
| To rear them o’er the thicket green. | |
| O then, though Spenser’s self had strayed | |
| Beside him through the lovely glade, | |
| Lending his rich luxuriant glow | 25 |
| Of fancy, all its charms to show, | |
| Pointing the stream rejoicing free, | |
| As captive set at liberty, | |
| Flashing her sparkling waves abroad, | |
| And clamoring joyful on her road; | 30 |
| Pointing where, up the sunny banks, | |
| The trees retire in scattered ranks, | |
| Save where, advanced before the rest, | |
| On knoll or hillock rears his crest, | |
| Lonely and huge, the giant oak, | 35 |
| As champions, when their band is broke, | |
| Stand forth to guard the rearward post, | |
| The bulwark of the scattered host,— | |
| All this, and more, might Spenser say, | |
| Yet waste in vain his magic lay, | 40 |
| While Wilfrid eyed the distant tower, | |
| Whose lattice lights Matilda’s bower. | |
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| The open vale is soon passed o’er, | |
| Rokeby, though nigh, is seen no more; | |
| Sinking mid Greta’s thickets deep, | 45 |
| A wild and darker course they keep, | |
| A stern and lone, yet lovely road, | |
| As e’er the foot of minstrel trode! | |
| Broad shadows o’er their passage fell, | |
| Deeper and narrower grew the dell; | 50 |
| It seemed some mountain, rent and riven, | |
| A channel for the stream had given, | |
| So high the cliffs of limestone gray | |
| Hung beetling o’er the torrent’s way, | |
| Yielding, along their rugged base, | 55 |
| A flinty footpath’s niggard space, | |
| Where he who winds ’twixt rock and wave | |
| May hear the headlong torrent rave, | |
| And like a steed in frantic fit, | |
| That flings the froth from curb and bit, | 60 |
| May view her chafe her waves to spray | |
| O’er every rock that bars her way, | |
| Till foam-globes on her eddies ride, | |
| Thick as the schemes of human pride | |
| That down life’s current drive amain, | 65 |
| As frail, as frothy, and as vain! | |
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| The cliffs that rear their haughty head | |
| High o’er the river’s darksome bed | |
| Were now all naked, wild, and gray, | |
| Now waving all with greenwood spray; | 70 |
| Here trees to every crevice clung, | |
| And o’er the dell their branches hung; | |
| And there all splintered and uneven, | |
| The shivered rocks ascend to heaven; | |
| Oft, too, the ivy swathed their breast, | 75 |
| And wreathed its garland round their crest, | |
| Or from the spires bade loosely flare | |
| Its tendrils in the middle air. | |
| As pennons wont to wave of old | |
| O’er the high feast of baron bold, | 80 |
| When revelled loud the feudal rout, | |
| And the arched halls returned their shout; | |
| Such and more wild is Greta’s roar, | |
| And such the echoes from her shore; | |
| And so the ivied banners gleam, | 85 |
| Waved wildly o’er the brawling stream. | |
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| Now from the stream the rocks recede, | |
| But leave between no sunny mead, | |
| No, nor the spot of pebbly sand, | |
| Oft found by such a mountain strand; | 90 |
| Forming such warm and dry retreat, | |
| As fancy deems the lonely seat, | |
| Where hermit, wandering from his cell, | |
| His rosary might love to tell. | |
| But here, ’twixt rock and river, grew | 95 |
| A dismal grove of sable yew, | |
| With whose sad tints were mingled seen | |
| The blighted fir’s sepulchral green. | |
| Seemed that the trees their shadows cast | |
| The earth that nourished them to blast; | 100 |
| For never knew that swarthy grove | |
| The verdant hue that fairies love; | |
| Nor wilding green, nor woodland flower, | |
| Arose within its baleful bower: | |
| The dank and sable earth receives | 105 |
| Its only carpet from the leaves, | |
| That, from the withering branches cast, | |
| Bestrewed the ground with every blast. | |
| Though now the sun was o’er the hill, | |
| In this dark spot ’t was twilight still, | 110 |
| Save that on Greta’s farther side | |
| Some straggling beams through copsewood glide; | |
| And wild and savage contrast made | |
| That dingle’s deep and funeral shade | |
| With the bright tints of early day, | 115 |
| Which, glimmering through the ivy spray, | |
| On the opposing summit lay. | |
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