And from the shore their course they take, But soon they move with softer pace; Or as the wily sailors crept To seize (while on the Deep it slept) With sound the least that can be made, "Lei-gha-Lei-gha"-he then cried out, "Lei-gha-Lei-gha"-with eager shout; Thus did he cry, and thus did pray, And what he meant was, "Keep away, And leave me to myself!" Alas! and when he felt their hands- Or melt it into air: So all his dreams-that inward light With which his soul had shone so bright- As he had ever known. But hark! a gratulating voice, And then, when he was brought to land, And in the general joy of heart But most of all, his Mother dear, She led him home, and wept amain, Tears flowed in torrents from her eyes; Thus, after he had fondly braved And in the lonely Highland dell Note. It is recorded in Dampier's Voyages, that a boy, son of the captain of a Man-of-War, seated himself in a Turtle-shell, and floated in it from the shore to his father's ship, which lay at anchor at the distance of half a mile. In deference to the opinion of a Friend, I have substituted such a shell for the less elegant vessel in which my blind Voyager did actually entrust himself to the dangerous current of Loch Leven, as was related to me by an eye-witness. [This eye-witness was George Mackrath, for many years parish-clerk of Grasmere. The vessel was in reality a washing-tub, which the little fellow had met with on the shore of the Loch.] See Life, I., 209. THE FEMALE VAGRANT.* "By Derwent's side my father dwelt—a man To lisp, he made me kneel beside my bed, A little croft we owned-a plot of corn, A garden stored with peas, and mint, and thyme, Plucked while the church bells rang their earliest chime. My hen's rich nest through long grass scarce espied ; The staff I well remember which upbore The bending body of my active sire ; His seat beneath the honied sycamore Where the bees hummed, and chair by winter fire; *This is an extract from a poem written in 1793, and published entire in the later editions of the Author's works, under the title of "Guilt and Sorrow, or Incidents on Salisbury Plain." The first twelve stanzas given here were not in the Edition of 1815, but they are prefixed to give completeness to the narrative. When market-morning came, the neat attire With which, though bent on haste, myself I decked; Our watchful house-dog, that would tease and tire The stranger till its barking-fit I checked; The red-breast, known for years, which at my casement pecked. The suns of twenty summers danced along,— He from his old hereditary nook Must part; the summons came ;-our final leave we took. It was indeed a miserable hour When, from the last hill-top, my sire surveyed, There was a Youth whom I had loved so long, 'Mid the green mountains many a thoughtless song |