A LITTLE cultivated space Amid the rocky wilderness,—
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It was not so conspicuous seen, Where every mountain‐top was green; But that a little hamlet lay,
With its enclosures, ʼmid the array Of the dark pines, most peacefully: And a few cattle strayed along, Browsing the grass the rocks among, Ringing their bells; and here and there,
Poised on rock‐pinnacles iʼ the air, Looked out from his round glassy eye The mountain‐goat suspiciously. And, drop by drop, a little spring Down the smooth crag came glistering,
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With a sweet, tinkling sound, and fell Into a mossed receptacle,— The long trunk of an aged fir. You scarce could see the water there, So clear it ran, and sparkled round,
Then gurgled oʼer the grassy ground, Marking its course by the fresh green Of the grass‐blades it danced between. I drank, and rested, and would fain Have stopped to gaze, and gaze again,
And rest awhile the wearied eye, Wearied with wild sublimity. No! on! the peaceful bourne is past; The rocks around are closing fast: Higher and higher towʼrds the heaven
Betwixt the cliffs our road is riven; Or twining round the hillside bare With many a bend,
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where the high air ʼGan to blow cold, and damp, and keen, But sharp, and pressureless. The green,
Though fresh upon the mountain‐side, Was now more thinly scatterèd. Now might you see, in sheltered nook, The snow‐arch oʼer the icy brook, With strange, white, delicate, bridgy curve
That the green light shot through above. And round, beneath, beside, there grew The Alpine roseʼs heathery hue,
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That blushed along the mountain‐head. Was never flower so regal‐red!
It climbed the scathed old rocks along,— Looked out, the cold, white snow among, And, where no other flower would blow, There you might see the red rose grow.