As we left the walls of merry däyle 1
And towrds the long hill ridges wound
That ramparted the plain around
That greener growing as we neared
At length with meadows decked appeared
Fair as our fields in May; and then
We entered on a little glen
Those miniature Alps among, 2
All smiling with a morning sun
Grassy and woody, and most sweet
As ever fairy her retreat
Formed for her midnight dances, a Through
Tracing, in mazy winds anew,
The spots it had passed oer, as fain
To run its sweet course oer again,—
Flowed a small tributary stream
That the Rhine levied all between 3
The frontlets of the fair fresh hills b
Smiling in silver as they sprang,
And merry were the notes they sang,
For they were joyful at their birth
From the cold prisons of the earth
To the warm sun and open sky,
And their song was all of liberty
But the dell narrowed as we went
Till, twixt the promontories pent
It upward ran, and the clear stream
Now forward shot its banks between,
Fast flashing, till from the obscure
Emerged we on a lofty moor,
Open, and shelterless, and bare,
And gently undulating far 4
With here and there a patch of pine
Breaking the smoothness of its line,
Toward the south horizon! c
cultivated, and beautifully wooded, and bounded by magnificent
mountain ranges, here fading away, faint and blue & cloudlike
toward the south, 5 there distinct and near and lofty, with the
green cultivation climbing up their broad flanks. I had read, that
the snowy summit of the Mont Titlis, was visible from Strasburg,
the consequence of which marvellous information was, that I metamor‐
phosed every cloud I saw into a mountain, strained my eyes
with looking for that which was out of sight, 6 and had at last,
very nearly argued myself into a conviction, that blue hills
were white ones until our entrance into the narrow dell above
mentioned, precluded all farther observations upon the clouds.—
it has modelled the Tivolian villas of—Highgate and Hamp
stead, 7 the mock waterfalls of and crocodile stools of the Coliseum 8
have extended its fame, and much it delighted me when first
the wide projecting wooden roof and carved galleries and external
stairs looked out to greet us from among the dark pines— What
a host of associations and recollections tumbled in upon me.
Mountains avalanches, glaciers, cottages, Hannibal, vinegar, 9 Tell, Alps
apples, tyrants and crossbows, came crowding into my brain jumbled
together in most admired disorder, I thought of nothing connected
the whole day