A Pastoral Poem If from the public way you turn your steps Up the tumultuous brook of Green-head Ghyll, You will suppose that with an upright path Your feet must struggle; in such bold ascent The pastoral mountains front you, face to face. But, courage! for around that boisterous brook The mountains have all opened out themselves, And made a hidden valley of their own. No habitation can be seen; but they Who journey thither find themselves alone With a few sheep, with rocks and stones, and kites That overhead are sailing ...

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The Voice of song from distant lands shall call To that great King; shall hail the crownèd Youth Who, taking counsel of unbending Truth, By one example hath set forth to all How they with dignity may stand; or fall, If fall they must. Now, whither doth it tend? And what to him and his shall be the end? That thought is one which neither can appal Nor cheer him; for the illustrious Swede hath done The thing which ought to be; is raised above All consequences: work he hath ...

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'Tis eight o'clock,—a clear March night, The moon is up,—the sky is blue, The owlet, in the moonlight air, Shouts from nobody knows where; He lengthens out his lonely shout, Halloo! halloo! a long halloo! —Why bustle thus about your door, What means this bustle, Betty Foy? Why are you in this mighty fret? And why on horseback have you set Him whom you love, your Idiot Boy? Scarcely a soul is out of bed: Good Betty, put him down again; His lips with joy they burr at you; But, Betty! what has he ...

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