e: [M]
In him, while he was wont to trace
Our roads, through many a long year's space, 805
A living almanack had we;
We had a speaking diary,
That in this uneventful place,
Gave to the days a mark and name
By which we knew them when they came. 810
--Yes, I, and all about me here,
Through all the changes of the year,
Had seen him through the mountains go,
In pomp of mist or pomp of snow,
Majestically huge and slow: 815
Or, with a milder grace [68] adorning
The landscape of a summer's morning;
While Grasmere smoothed her liquid plain
The moving image to detain;
And mighty Fairfield, with a chime 820
Of echoes, to his march kept time;
When little other business stirred,
And little other sound was heard;
In that delicious hour of balm,
Stillness, solitude, and calm, 825
While yet the valley is arrayed,
On this side with a sober shade;
On that is prodigally bright--
Crag, lawn, and wood--with rosy light.
--But most of all, thou lordly Wain! 830
I wish to have thee here again,
When windows flap and chimney roars,
And all is dismal out of doors;
And, sitting by my fire, I see
Eight sorry carts, no less a train! 835
Unworthy successors of thee,
Come straggling through the wind and rain:
And oft, as they pass slowly on,
Beneath my windows, [69] one by one,
See, perched upon the naked height 840
The summit of a cumbrous freight,
A single traveller--and there
Another; then perhaps a pair--
The lame, the sickly, and the old;
Men, women, heartless with the cold; 845
And babes in wet and starveling plight;
Which once, [70] be weather as it might,
Had still a nest within a nest,
Thy shelter--and their mother's breast!
Then most of all, then far the most, 850
Do I regret what we have lost;
Am grieved for that unhappy sin
Which robbed us of good Benjamin;--
And of his stately Charge, which none
Could keep alive when He was gone! 855

* * * * *

VARIANTS ON THE TEXT

[Variant 1:

1819.

The Night-hawk is singing his frog-like tune,
Twirling his watchman's rattle