 | Vigil and vision |  |
15
THE FIRST OF THE ALPS.
THE train fled, hurtling, through the summer-night,Across the still flat plains of slumbering France,
And I, I waited, in a waking trance,
For that which was to come with coming light:
And with the first faint streaks of morning-white,
The plains began, meseemed, to heave and dance
On either hand; it was the first advance
Of the hill-host that soared upon my sight.
Then, as the day drew on and light waxed wide,
The hills to mountains swelled on every side
And in the distance, like a giant ghost
Of the world's morning, 'gainst the sapphire sky,
The first fore-runner of the Titan host
Of the snow-summits hove and towered high.
| Vigil and vision | |