Samuel Coleridge - The Complete Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (Illustrated Edition)

Sir Walter walk’d all round, north, south and west,

And gaz’d, and gaz’d upon that darling place.

And turning up the hill, it was at least

Nine roods of sheer ascent, Sir Walter found

Three several marks which with his hoofs the beast

Had left imprinted on the verdant ground.

Sir Walter wiped his face, and cried, “Till now

Such sight was never seen by living eyes:

Three leaps have borne him from this lofty brow,

Down to the very fountain where he lies.”

I’ll build a Pleasure-house upon this spot,

And a small Arbour, made for rural joy;

Twill be the traveller’s shed, the pilgrim’s cot,

A place of love for damsels that are coy.

A cunning Artist will I have to frame

A bason for that fountain in the dell;

And they, who do make mention of the same,

From this day forth, shall call it Hart-leap Well.

And, gallant brute! to make thy praises known,

Another monument shall here be rais’d;

Three several pillars, each a rough hewn stone,

And planted where thy hoofs the turf have graz’d.

And in the summer-time when days are long,

I will come hither with my paramour,

And with the dancers, and the minstrel’s song,

We will make merry in that pleasant bower.

Till the foundations of the mountains fail

My mansion with its arbour shall endure,

— The joy of them who till the fields of Swale,

And them who dwell among the woods of Ure.

Then home he went, and left the Hart, stone-dead,

With breathless nostrils stretch’d above the spring.

And soon the Knight perform’d what he had said,

The fame whereof through many a land did ring.

Ere thrice the moon into her port had steer’d,

A cup of stone receiv’d the living well;

Three pillars of rude stone Sir Walter rear’d,

And built a house of pleasure in the dell.

And near the fountain, flowers of stature tall

With trailing plants and trees were intertwin’d,

Which soon composed a little sylvan hall,

A leafy shelter from the sun and wind.

And thither, when the summer days were long,

Sir Walter journey’d with his paramour;

And with the dancers and the minstrel’s song

Made merriment within that pleasant bower.

The Knight, Sir Walter, died in course of time,

And his bones lie in his paternal vale. —

But there is matter for a second rhyme,

And I to this would add another tale.

PART SECOND.

The moving accident is not my trade.

To curl the blood I have no ready arts;

’Tis my delight, alone in summer shade,

To pipe a simple song to thinking hearts,

As I from Hawes to Richmond did repair,

It chanc’d that I saw standing in a dell

Three aspins at three corners of a square,

And one, not four yards distant, near a well.

What this imported I could ill divine,

And, pulling now the rein my horse to stop,

I saw three pillars standing in a line,

The last stone pillar on a dark hill-top.

The trees were grey, with neither arms nor head;

Half-wasted the square mound of tawny green;

So that you just might say, as then I said,

”Here in old time the hand of man has been.”

I look’d upon the hills both far and near;

More doleful place did never eye survey;

It seem’d as if the spring-time came not here,

And Nature here were willing to decay.

I stood in various thoughts and fancies lost,

When one who was in Shepherd’s garb attir’d,

Came up the hollow. Him did I accost,

And what this place might be I then inquir’d.

The Shepherd stopp’d, and that same story told

Which in my former rhyme I have rehears’d.

”A jolly place,” said he, “in times of old,

But something ails it now; the spot is curs’d.”

You see these lifeless stumps of aspin wood,

Some say that they are beeches, others elms,

These were the Bower; and here a Mansion stood,

The finest palace of a hundred realms.

The arbour does its own condition tell,

You see the stones, the fountain, and the stream,

But as to the great Lodge, you might as well

Hunt half a day for a forgotten dream.

There’s neither dog nor heifer, horse nor sheep,

Will wet his lips within that cup of stone;

And, oftentimes, when all are fast asleep,

This water doth send forth a dolorous groan.

Some say that here a murder has been done,

And blood cries out for blood: but, for my part,

I’ve guess’d, when I’ve been sitting in the sun,

That it was all for that unhappy Hart.

What thoughts must through the creature’s brain have pass’d!

To this place from the stone upon the steep

Are but three bounds, and look, Sir, at this last!

O Master! it has been a cruel leap.

For thirteen hours he ran a desperate race;

And in my simple mind we cannot tell

What cause the Hart might have to love this place,

And come and make his deathbed near the well.

Here on the grass perhaps asleep he sank,

Lull’d by this fountain in the summer-tide;

This water was perhaps the first he drank

When he had wander’d from his mother’s side.

In April here beneath the scented thorn

He heard the birds their morning carols sing,

And he, perhaps, for aught we know, was born

Not half a furlong from that selfsame spring.

But now here’s neither grass nor pleasant shade;

The sun on drearier hollow never shone:

So will it be, as I have often said,

Till trees, and stones, and fountain all are gone.

Grey-headed Shepherd, thou hast spoken well;

Small difference lies between thy creed and mine;

This beast not unobserv’d by Nature fell,

His death was mourn’d by sympathy divine.

The Being, that is in the clouds and air,

That is in the green leaves among the groves.

Maintains a deep and reverential care

For them the quiet creatures whom he loves.

The Pleasure-house is dust: — behind, before,

This, is no common waste, no common gloom;

But Nature, in due course of time, once more

Shall here put on her beauty and her bloom.

She leaves these objects to a slow decay

That what we are, and have been, may be known;

But, at the coming of the milder day,

These monuments shall all be overgrown.

One lesson, Shepherd, let us two divide,

Taught both by what she shews, and what conceals,

Never to blend our pleasure or our pride

With sorrow of the meanest thing that feels.

There was a Boy, ye knew him well, ye Cliffs

And Islands of Winander! many a time,

At evening, when the stars had just begun

To move along the edges of the hills,

Rising or setting, would he stand alone,

Beneath the trees, or by the glimmering lake,

And there, with fingers interwoven, both hands

Press’d closely palm to palm and to his mouth

Uplifted, he, as through an instrument,

Blew mimic hootings to the silent owls

That they might answer him. And they would shout

Across the wat’ry vale and shout again

Responsive to his call, with quivering peals,

And long halloos, and screams, and echoes loud

Redoubled and redoubled, a wild scene

Of mirth and jocund din. And, when it chanced

That pauses of deep silence mock’d his skill,

Then, sometimes, in that silence, while he hung

Listening, a gentle shock of mild surprize

Has carried far into his heart the voice

Of mountain torrents, or the visible scene

Would enter unawares into his mind

With all its solemn imagery, its rocks,

Its woods, and that uncertain heaven, receiv’d