 | The Poems of Robert Bloomfield |  |
Ten hours were all we could command;
The boat was moor'd upon the strand;
The midnight current, by her side,
Was stealing down to meet the tide;
The wakeful steersman ready lay,
To rouse us at the break of day:
It came—how soon! and what a sky,
To cheer the bounding traveller's eye!
To make him spurn his couch of rest,
To shout upon the river's breast,
Watching by turns the rosy hue
Of early cloud, or sparkling dew.
These living joys the verse shall tell:
Harry, and Monmouth, fare-ye-well.
The boat was moor'd upon the strand;
The midnight current, by her side,
Was stealing down to meet the tide;
The wakeful steersman ready lay,
To rouse us at the break of day:
It came—how soon! and what a sky,
To cheer the bounding traveller's eye!
To make him spurn his couch of rest,
To shout upon the river's breast,
35
Of early cloud, or sparkling dew.
These living joys the verse shall tell:
Harry, and Monmouth, fare-ye-well.
On upland farm, and airy height,
Swept by the breeze, and clothed in light,
The reapers, early from their beds,
Perhaps were singing o'er our heads.
For, stranger, deem not that the eye
Could hence survey the eastern sky;
Or mark the streak'd horizon's bound,
Where first the rosy sun wheels round.
Deep in the gulf beneath were we,
Whence climb'd blue mists o'er rock and tree;
A mingling, undulating crowd,
That form'd the dense or fleecy cloud;
Slow from the darken'd stream upborne,
They caught the quickening gales of morn;
There bade their parent Wye good day,
And, tinged with purple, sail'd away.
Swept by the breeze, and clothed in light,
The reapers, early from their beds,
Perhaps were singing o'er our heads.
For, stranger, deem not that the eye
Could hence survey the eastern sky;
Or mark the streak'd horizon's bound,
Where first the rosy sun wheels round.
Deep in the gulf beneath were we,
Whence climb'd blue mists o'er rock and tree;
A mingling, undulating crowd,
That form'd the dense or fleecy cloud;
Slow from the darken'd stream upborne,
They caught the quickening gales of morn;
36
And, tinged with purple, sail'd away.
The Munno
join'd us all unseen.
Troy House, and Beaufort's bowers of green,
And nameless prospects, half defined,
Involved in mist, were left behind.
Yet as the boat still onward bore,
The ramparts of the eastern shore
Cower'd the high crest to many a sweep,
And bade us o'er each minor steep
Mark the bold Kymin's sunny brow,
That, gleaming o'er our fogs below,
Lifted amain, with giant power,
E'en to the clouds his Naval Tower ;
Proclaiming to the morning sky
Valour, and fame, and victory.
Troy House, and Beaufort's bowers of green,
And nameless prospects, half defined,
Involved in mist, were left behind.
Yet as the boat still onward bore,
The ramparts of the eastern shore
Cower'd the high crest to many a sweep,
And bade us o'er each minor steep
Mark the bold Kymin's sunny brow,
That, gleaming o'er our fogs below,
Lifted amain, with giant power,
E'en to the clouds his Naval Tower ;
37
Valour, and fame, and victory.
| The Poems of Robert Bloomfield | |