Our pathway led us on to Rotha's banks;
And when we came in front of that tall rock
Which looks towards the eaft, I there ftopped fhort, And traced the lofty barrier with my eye
From base to fummit; fuch delight I found
To note in fhrub and tree, in ftone and flower,
That intermixture of delicious hues,
Along so vaft a surface, all at once,
In one impreffion, by connecting force
Of their own beauty, imaged in the heart.
-When I had gazed perhaps two minutes' space,
Joanna, looking in my eyes, beheld
That ravishment of mine, and laughed aloud.
The rock, like something starting from a sleep,
Took up the lady's voice, and laughed again :
That ancient woman feated on Helm-Crag
Was ready with her cavern: Hammar-Scar,
And the tall steep of Silver-How, sent forth
A noife of laughter; fouthern Loughrigg heard,
And Fairfield answered with a mountain tone :
Helvellyn far into the clear blue sky
Carried the lady's voice-old Skiddaw blew
His fpeaking trumpet :-back out of the clouds
Of Glaramara fouthward came the voice;
And Kirkstone toffed it from his misty head.
-Now whether (faid I to our cordial friend,
Who in the hey-day of astonishment
Smiled in my face) this were in fimple truth
A work accomplished by the brotherhood
Of ancient mountains, or my ear was touched
With dreams and vifionary impulfes,
Is not for me to tell; but fure I am
That there was a loud uproar in the hills:
And, while we both were listening, to my fide
The fair Joanna drew, as if she wished
To shelter from some object of her fear.
-And hence, long afterwards, when eighteen moons
Were wasted, as I chanced to walk alone
Beneath this rock, at funrise, on a calm
And filent morning, I sat down, and there,
In memory of affections old and true,
I chifelled out in those rude characters
Joanna's name upon the living stone.
And I, and all who dwell by my fire-fide,
Have called the lovely rock, JoAnna's Rock.”
T was an April morning: fresh and clear,
The rivulet delighting in its ftrength,
Ran with a young man's fpeed; and yet the voice
Of waters which the Winter had fupplied,
Was foftened down into a vernal tone.
The fpirit of enjoyment and defire,
And hopes and wishes, from all living things
Went circling, like a multitude of founds.
The budding groves appeared as if in hafte
To fpur the steps of June; as if their shades
Of various green were hindrances that stood
Between them and their object: yet, meanwhile,
There was fuch deep contentment in the air,
That every naked afh, and tardy tree
Yet leaflefs, feemed as though the countenance
H
With which it looked on this delightful day
Were native to the Summer.-Up the brook
I roamed in the confufion of my heart,
Alive to all things and forgetting all.
At length I to a fudden turning came
In this continuous glen, where down a rock
The ftream, fo ardent in its course before,
Sent forth fuch fallies of glad found, that all
Which I till then had heard, appeared the voice
Of common pleasure: beast and bird, the lamb,
The shepherd's dog, the linnet and the thrush,
Vied with this waterfall, and made a fong
Which, while I listened, seemed like the wild growth,
Or like fome natural produce of the air,
That could not cease to be. Green leaves were here;
But 'twas the foliage of the rocks, the birch,
The yew, the holly, and the bright green thorn,
With hanging islands of refplendent furze :
And on a fummit, diftant a short space,
By any who fhould look beyond the dell,
A fingle mountain-cottage might be seen.
I gazed, and gazed, and to myself I said,
"Our thoughts at least are ours; and this wild nook,
My EMMA, I will dedicate to thee."
Soon did the spot become my other home,
My dwelling, and my out-of-doors abode.
And of the fhepherds who have seen me there,
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