In our dejection do we sink as low,

To me that morning did it happen so;

And fears, and fancies, thick upon me came;

Dim sadness, & blind thoughts I knew not nor could name..

I heard the Sky-lark singing in the sky;
And I bethought me of the playful Hare:
Even such a happy Child of earth am I;
Even as these blissful Creatures do I fare;
Far from the world I walk, "and from all care;
But there may come another day to me,
Solitude, pain of heart, distress, and poverty.

My whole life I have liv'd in pleasant thought,
As if life's business were a summer mood;
As if all needful things would come unsought
To genial faith, still rich in genial good;
But how can He expect that others should

Build for him, sow for him, and at his call

Love him, who for himself will take no heed at all!

I thought of Chatterton, the marvellous Boy,
The sleepless Soul that perish'd in its pride;
Of Him who walk'd in glory and in joy
Behind his plough, upon the mountain-side:
By our own spirits are we deified;

We Poets in our youth begin in gladness;

But thereof comes in the end despondency and madness.

Now, whether it were by peculiar grace,
A leading from above, a something given,
Yet it befel, that, in this lonely place,
When

up and down my fancy thus was driven, And I with these untoward thoughts had striven,

I saw a Man before me unawares :

The oldest Man he seem'd that ever wore grey hairs.

My course I stopped as soon as I espied
The Old Man in that naked wilderness:
Close by a Pond, upon the further side,

He stood alone: a minute's space I guess
I watch'd him, he continuing motionless:
To the Pool's further margin then I drew;
He being all the while before me full in view.

As a huge Stone is sometimes seen to lie
Couch'd on the bald top of an eminence;
Wonder to all who do the same espy

By what means it could thither come, and whence;
So that it seems a thing endued with sense:

Like a Sea-beast crawl'd forth, which on a shelf

Of rock or sand reposeth, there to sun itself.

Such seem'd this Man, not all alive nor dead,
Nor all asleep; in his extreme old age:
His body was bent double, feet and head
Coming together in their pilgrimage;

As if some dire constraint of pain, or rage
Of sickness felt by him in times long past,
A more than human weight upon his frame had cast.

Himself he propp'd, his body, limbs, and face,
Upon a long grey Staff of shaven wood:

And, still as I drew near with gentle pace,
Beside the little pond or moorish flood

Motionless as a Cloud the Old Man stood;
That heareth not the loud winds when they call;
And moveth altogether, if it move at all.

At length, himself unsettling, he the Pond
Stirred with his Staff, and fixedly did look
Upon the muddy water, which he conn'd,
As if he had been reading in a book:

And now such freedom as I could I took;
And, drawing to his side, to him did say,

"This morning gives us promise of a glorious day."

A gentle answer did the Old Man make,

In courteous speech which forth he slowly drew:
And him with further words I thus bespake,

"What kind of work is that which you pursue!

This is a lonesome place for one like you.”

He answer'd me with pleasure and surprize;

And there was, while he spake, a fire about his eyes.

His words came feebly, from a feeble chest,

Yet each in solemn order follow'd each,

With something of a lofty utterance drest;

Choice word, and measured phrase; above the reach Of ordinary men; a stately speech!

Such as grave Livers do in Scotland use,

Religious men, who give to God and Man their dues.

He told me that he to this pond had come
To gather Leeches, being old and poor:
Employment hazardous and wearisome!
And he had many hardships to endure:

From Pond to Pond he roam'd, from moor to moor,
Housing, with God's good help, by choice or chance:
And in this way he gain'd an honest maintenance.