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(From The Bridal of Trierman)
HE rode till over down and dell | |
| The shade more broad and deeper fell; | |
| And though around the mountain’s head | |
| Flowed streams of purple and gold and red, | |
| Dark at the base, unblest by beam, | 5 |
| Frowned the black rocks and roared the stream. | |
| With toil the king his way pursued | |
| By lonely Threlkeld’s waste and wood, | |
| Till on his course obliquely shone | |
| The narrow valley of St. John, | 10 |
| Down sloping to the western sky, | |
| Where lingering sunbeams love to lie. | |
| Right glad to feel those beams again, | |
| The king drew up his charger’s rein; | |
| With gauntlet raised he screened his sight, | 15 |
| As dazzled with the level light, | |
| And, from beneath his glove of mail, | |
| Scanned at his ease the lovely vale, | |
| While ’gainst the sun his armor bright | |
| Gleamed ruddy like the beacon’s light. | 20 |
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| Paled in by many a lofty hill, | |
| The narrow dale lay smooth and still, | |
| And, down its verdant bosom led, | |
| A winding brooklet found its bed. | |
| But, midmost of the vale, a mound | 25 |
| Arose, with airy turrets crowned, | |
| Buttress and rampire’s circling bound, | |
| And mighty keep and tower; | |
| Seemed some primeval giant’s hand | |
| The castle’s massive walls had planned, | 30 |
| A ponderous bulwark, to withstand | |
| Ambitious Nimrod’s power. | |
| Above the moated entrance slung, | |
| The balanced drawbridge trembling hung, | |
| As jealous of a foe; | 35 |
| Wicket of oak, as iron hard, | |
| With iron studded, clenched, and barred, | |
| And pronged portcullis, joined to guard | |
| The gloomy pass below. | |
| But the gray walls no banners crowned, | 40 |
| Upon the watch-tower’s any round | |
| No warder stood his horn to sound, | |
| No guard beside the bridge was found, | |
| And, where the Gothic gateway frowned, | |
| Glanced neither bill nor bow. | 45 |
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