--all the
work of the poet's hand:--

{p.177} "The sun upon the Weirdlaw Hill,
In Ettrick's vale, is sinking sweet;
The westland wind is hush and still--
The lake lies sleeping at my feet.
Yet not the landscape to mine eye
Bears those bright hues that once it bore;
Though evening, with her richest dye,
Flames o'er the hills of Ettrick's shore.

"With listless look along the plain
I see Tweed's silver current glide,
And coldly mark the holy fane
Of Melrose rise in ruin'd pride.
The quiet lake, the balmy air,
The hill, the stream, the tower, the tree,--
Are they still such as once they were,
Or is the dreary change in me?

"Alas! the warp'd and broken board,
How can it bear the painter's dye!
The harp of strain'd and tuneless chord,
How to the minstrel's skill reply!
To aching eyes each landscape lowers,
To feverish pulse each gale blows chill;
And Araby's or Eden's bowers
Were barren as this moorland hill."

He again alludes to his illness in a letter to Mr. Morritt:--

TO J. B. S. MORRITT, ESQ., M. P., ROKEBY.

ABBOTSFORD, August 11, 1817.

MY DEAR MORRITT,--I am arrived from a little tour in the
west of Scotland, and had hoped, in compliance with your
kind wish, to have indulged myself with a skip over the
Border as far as Rokeby, about the end of this month. But my
fate denies me this pleasure; for, in consequence of one or
two blunders, during my absence, in executing my new
premises, I perceive the necessity of remaining at the helm
while they are going on. Our masons, though excellent
workmen, are too little accustomed to the gimcracks of their
art, to be trusted with the execution of a _bravura_ plan,
without constant inspection. Besides, the said laborers lay
me under the necessity {p.178} of laboring a little myself;
and I find I can no longer with impunity undertake to make
one week's hard work supply the omissions of a fortnight's
idleness. Like you, I have abridged my
creature-comforts,--as Old Mortality would call
them,--renouncing beer and ale on all ordinary occasions;
also pastry, fr