THE RIVER DUDDON.

A SERIES OF SONNETS.

THE RIVER DUDDON.

A SERIES OF SONNETS.

The Birthplace of the Duddon.

NOT envying Latian shades—if yet they throw
A grateful coolness round that crystal Spring,

Bandusia, prattling as when long ago

The Sabine Bard was moved her praise to sing ;
Careless of flowers that in perennial blow
Round the moist marge of Persian fountains cling;
Heedless of Alpine torrents thundering

Through ice-built arches radiant as heaven's bow-
I seek the birth-place of a native Stream.
All hail, ye mountains! hail, thou morning light!
Better to breathe at large on this clear height,
Than toil in needless sleep from dream to dream :
Pure flow the verse, pure, vigorous, free, and bright,
For Duddon, long-loved Duddon, is my theme!

Child of the Clouds.

HILD of the clouds! remote from every taint
Of sordid industry thy lot is cast;
Thine are the honours of the lofty waste;
Not seldom, when with heat the valleys faint,
Thy handmaid Frost with spangled tissue quaint
Thy cradle decks ;—to chant thy birth, thou hast
No meaner Poet than the whistling Blast,
And Desolation is thy Patron-saint!

She guards thee, ruthless Power! who would not spare
Those mighty forests, once the bison's screen,
Where stalked the huge deer to his shaggy lair
Through paths and alleys roofed with sombre green;
Thousands of years before the silent air
Was pierced by whizzing shaft of hunter keen!

bow sball I paint thee?

HOW shall I paint thee?-Be this naked stone
My seat, while I give way to such intent ;
Pleased could my verse, a speaking monument,
Make to the eyes of men thy features known.
But as of all those tripping lambs not one
Outruns his fellows, so hath Nature lent
To thy beginning nought that doth present
Peculiar ground for hope to build upon.
To dignify the spot that gives thee birth,
No sign of hoar Antiquity's esteem
Appears, and none of modern Fortune's care;
Yet thou thyself hast round thee shed a gleam
Of brilliant moss, instinct with freshness rare ;
Prompt offering to thy Foster-mother, Earth!

Cradled Mursling of the mountain.

TAKE, cradled Nursling of the mountain, take
This parting glance, no negligent adieu !
A Protean change seems wrought while I pursue
The curves, a loosely-scattered chain doth make;
Or rather thou appear'st a glistering snake,
Silent, and to the gazer's eye untrue,

Thridding with sinuous lapse the rushes, through
Dwarf willows gliding, and by ferny brake.
Lo! from a distant steep the undaunted Rill
Starts instantly enrobed in snow-white foam;

And laughing dares the Adventurer, who hath clomb
So high, a rival purpose to fulfil ;

Else let the dastard backward wend, and roam,
Seeking less bold achievement, where he will!

SOL

Sole Listener, Duddon.

OLE listener, Duddon ! to the breeze that played
With thy clear voice, I caught the fitful sound
Wafted o'er sullen moss and craggy mound-
Unfruitful solitudes, that seemed to upbraid
The sun in heaven !--but now, to form a shade
For Thee, green alders have together wound
Their foliage; ashes flung their arms around;
And birch-trees risen in silver colonnade.
And thou hast also tempted here to rise,

'Mid sheltering pines, this Cottage rude and grey;
Whose ruddy children, by the mother's eyes
Carelessly watched, sport through the summer day,
Thy pleased associates: light as endless May
On infant bosoms lonely Nature lies.