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NOW couch thyself where, heard with fear afar, | |
| Thunders through echoing pines the headlong Aar; | |
| Or rather stay to taste the mild delights | |
| Of pensive Underwalden’s pastoral heights. | |
| Is there who mid these awful wilds has seen | 5 |
| The native Genii walk the mountain green? | |
| Or heard, while other worlds their charms reveal, | |
| Soft music o’er the aerial summit steal? | |
| While o’er the desert, answering every close, | |
| Rich steam of sweetest perfume comes and goes. | 10 |
| And sure there is a secret Power that reigns | |
| Here, where no trace of man the spot profanes, | |
| Naught but the châlets, flat and bare, on high | |
| Suspended mid the quiet of the sky; | |
| Or distant herds that pasturing upward creep, | 15 |
| And, not untended, climb the dangerous steep. | |
| How still! no irreligious sound or sight | |
| Rouses the soul from her severe delight. | |
| An idle voice the sabbath region fills | |
| Of deep that calls to deep across the hills, | 20 |
| And with that voice accords the soothing sound | |
| Of drowsy bells, forever tinkling round; | |
| Faint wail of eagle melting into blue | |
| Beneath the cliffs, and pine-wood’s steady sugh; | |
| The solitary heifer’s deepened low; | 25 |
| Or rumbling, heard remote, of falling snow. | |
| All motions, sounds, and voices, far and nigh, | |
| Blend in a music of tranquillity; | |
| Save when, a stranger seen below, the boy | |
| Shouts from the echoing hills with savage joy. | 30 |
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