 | Lucile |  |
III.
One lodges but simply at Serchon; yet, thanksTo the season that changes for ever the banks
Of the blossoming mountains, and shifts the light cloud
O'er the valley, and hushes or rouses the loud
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The dark evergreen slopes to the slumbering town,
And the torrent that falls, faintly heard from afar,
And the blue bells that purple the dapple-gray scaur,
One sees with each month of the many-faced year
A thousand sweet changes of beauty appear.
The châlet where dwelt the Comtesse de Nevers
Rested half up the base of a mountain of firs,
In a garden of roses, reveal'd to the road,
Yet withdrawn from its noise: 'twas a peaceful abode.
And the walls, and the roofs, with their gables like hoods
Which the monks wear, were built of sweet resinous woods.
The sunlight of noon, as Lord Alfred ascended
The steep garden paths, every odour had blended
Of the ardent carnations, and faint heliotropes,
With the balms floated down from the dark wooded slopes:
A light breeze at the windows was playing about,
And the white curtains floated, now in, and now out.
The house was all hush'd when he rang at the door,
Which was open'd to him in a moment or more
By an old nodding negress, whose sable head shined
In the sun like a cocoa-nut polish'd in Ind,
'Neath the snowy foularde which about it was wound.
| Lucile | |