September, 1802

O Cambrian Tempe! oft with transport hail’d, I leave thee now, as I did ever leave Thee, and thy peerless mistresses, with heart Where lively gratitude and fond regret For mastery strive, and still the mastery gain Alternate. Oft renew’d must be the strife When, far from this loved region, and from all That now its ancient witchery revives; Revives, with spells more potent erst than knew Your white-rob’d Druids on their Deva’s bank Aweful to frame; when the loud mystic song, And louder clang of their unnumber’d harps, Drown’d e’en the river’s thunder, where she throws All, all her waters in one rocky chasm, Narrow, but fathomless, and goads them on Roaring and foaming, while Llangollen’s steeps Rebellow to the noise. Ye, who now frame Your talismans resistless, O! receive, Ye mild Enchantresses, my warm adieu!

Time, that for me hath pass’d full many a year On broad and withering pinion, may have quench’d By the rude wafture of his dusky wing, Fancy’s clear fires;—Enthusiasm may waste In her own fruitless energies, and pine, Vainly may pine for the exhausted powers Of bankrupt language, bankrupt of the skill To please, with varied praise, the taste made coy By riot of encomium; but yet The benediction of increasing love, Bless’d pair, receive with no ungracious ear!

When first your Eden in this hallow’d vale Stole on these eyes; its solemn graces first Imprest my senses, pliant to their wish, The muse of landscape came, and to my hand Her pallet, glowing in ideal hues, With smiles extended. Straight my doubtful pen Eager I dipt, and, not unfaithful, rose Some features of the scene. Yet, even then, In Friendship’s primal hours, my soul perceiv’d Feelings, that more defied expression’s power To speak them truly, than to paint the charms Of those distinguish’d bowers;—their mountains vast, Here pale and barren, and there dark with woods; Yon mural rocks, whose surface still defies All change of seasons, though they deign to yield, At intervals, their grey and wannish hue Purpling to orient suns, and catching oft The occidental amber; sylvan glades, Bright fields, and shadowy lawn, whose concave bound No beam of noon can pierce. Far to the left, Beyond those walks which the tall branching trees O’er-arching, darken; past the sunny field On whose warm breast they open, lo! the shed On mossy pillars propt, and its screen’d seat Beneath its slant, thatch’d roof: Ah! pause we there, For there we wander to the latest verge Of a lone clamouring brook, which down its slop’d And craggy channel struggles; for the stones, Pointed and huge, ceaseless impede and vex Its passage to the base of the rude mound That rises opposite this shelter’d seat, And instant rises. Dark the mound and rude, But not inflexible. Its rocky steep No longer spurns, as it had often spurn’d, The mountain shrubs and trees, when infant roots, O’er balanced by exterior boughs, possest No strength to penetrate that rocky steep, And wind its darkling fissures; till at length, Art, with unwearied hand, had form’d a shield Against the brook, that undermines when calm, When violent, tears; ’gainst the repellant cliff, And force it to receive in its rude breast Each stranger-scion;—so, with lucky skill, The guardian sisters wove their net-work firm With tough, yet pliant withy, from the base To flood-mark rising; upright and transverse Bars, crossing each the other, forming each Their vacant inch dividual. Therefore now Nor waters mine the root, nor tear the branch; Nor cliff, so late impenetrable, checks Th’ insinuating fibres on their course, Their thousand arms diverging far and wide, And to the centre piercing; while the boughs Bend their green heads o’er the chaf’d brawling stream, Around the huge stones eddying; fearless now, Conscious of deep-struck root, e’en when thick rain, Heavy and loud, has, ’mid the tempest’s roar, Fall’n vertical; and when the madden’d brook No longer meets from tranquil human eye The gaze contemplative. Appall’d we shrink From the tumultuous flood, that tumbles down Fearfully deep, and often hurling up The yeasty billow, while the tide below Thunders and groans. Remorseless in its rage, But quickly spent, while under calmer skies, Or ’mid the balmy drop of quiet rain, Shallow it rushes, and innoxious raves. Innoxious, said I? Pardon, clamorous brook! Thy general course, rage madly as thou may, Beneath a storm’d horizon, kind is found And ministrant to man, for pass we yet A little way along thy turfy bank, And we shall view, well pleased, thy useful waves Leap o’er a clattering mill-wheel, high above In the brook’s hilly channel, ’mid whose brakes, Thick and entangled, gleams the snowy foam.

See, higher yet on the still rising slope, Another hub-bub tenement obtains Ability from this oft violent stream To yield the first, best nutriment we gain.

Haste to the scene, benignant powers of life, Mild Lachesis, and gay Hygeia, haste, From day to day propitious!—on that bank, Mossy and canopied with gadding boughs, Spin firm the vital thread! and brim the cup With juice salubrious! breathing soft, the while, Dear Eleanora, and her Zara’s name.