University of Virginia Library

“This mountain-group, before my window ranged,
Is noble company to have in sight,
To sit down with at any hour of day,—
To meet their faces looking toward the east
At the sunrising, wrapped in soft noon-mist,
Or outlined keen upon the auroral night,
Or sinking into sunset deeps of heaven,
Unutterably glorious. Yet sometimes,
As one may weary of too great a throng
Of noble guests, and call them each apart
For closer conference, I move my seat
Little by little, so that only one
Is for the time in sight.
“Green Ossipee,
With Bearcamp River singing at its base,
A vast, long-terraced wall of fir and pine,

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Shuts in our southern meadows. Where that ends,
Just where the sun sets in October days,
Mount Israel stands and guards his villages,
And hides the secret of a windy pass
To Thornton, and the Haystacks of the Notch.