265

"On a fair prospect some have looked
And felt, as I have heard them say,
As if the moving time had been
A thing as steadfast as the scene
On which they gazed themselves away. 270

"Within the breast of Peter Bell
These silent raptures found no place; [24]
He was a Carl as wild and rude
As ever hue-and-cry pursued,
As ever ran a felon's race. 275

"Of all that lead a lawless life,
Of all that love their lawless lives,
In city or in village small,
He was the wildest far of all;--
He had a dozen wedded wives. 280

"Nay, start not!--wedded wives--and twelve!
But how one wife could e'er come near him,
In simple truth I cannot tell;
For, be it said of Peter Bell,
To see him was to fear him. 285

"Though Nature could not touch his heart
By lovely forms, and silent [25] weather,
And tender sounds, yet you might see
At once, that Peter Bell and she
Had often been together. 290

"A savage wildness round him hung
As of a dweller out of doors;
In his whole figure and his mien
A savage character was seen
Of mountains and of dreary moors. 295

"To all the unshaped half-human thoughts
Which solitary Nature feeds
'Mid summer storms or winter's ice,
Had Peter joined whatever vice
The cruel city breeds. 300

"His face was keen as is the wind
That cuts along the hawthorn-fence;
Of courage you saw little there,
But, in its stead, a medley air
Of cunning and of impudence. 305

"He had a dark and sidelong walk,
And long and slouching was his gait;
Beneath his looks so bare and bold,
You might perceive, his spirit cold
Was playing with some inward bait. 310

"His forehead wrinkled was and furred;
A work, one half of which was done
By thinking of his '_whens_,' and '_hows_';
And half, by knitting of his brows
Beneath the glaring sun. 315

"There was a hardness in his cheek,
There was a hardness in his eye,
As if the man had fixed his face,
In many a solitary place,
Against the wind and open sky!" 320

* * * * *

One night, (and now my little Bes