THE OLD WATER-MILL.
No lustre resplendent, its brilliancy shed,
But the wood fire blazed high, and the board was well spread;
Our seats were undamask'd, our partners were rough,
Yet, yet we were happy, and that was enough.
But the wood fire blazed high, and the board was well spread;
Our seats were undamask'd, our partners were rough,
Yet, yet we were happy, and that was enough.
And here was the Mill where we idled away
Our holiday hours on a clear summer day;
Where Roger, the miller's boy, loll'd on a sack,
And chorus'd his song to the merry click-clack.
Our holiday hours on a clear summer day;
Where Roger, the miller's boy, loll'd on a sack,
And chorus'd his song to the merry click-clack.
But lo! what rude sacrilege here hath been done!
The streamlet no longer purls on in the sun;
Its course has been turn'd, and the desolate edge
Is now mornfully cover'd with duck-weed and sedge.
The streamlet no longer purls on in the sun;
Its course has been turn'd, and the desolate edge
Is now mornfully cover'd with duck-weed and sedge.
The Mill is in ruins. No welcoming sound
In the mastiff's gruff bark and the wheels' dashing round;
The house, too, untenanted—left to decay—
And the miller, long dead: all I loved pass'd away!
In the mastiff's gruff bark and the wheels' dashing round;
The house, too, untenanted—left to decay—
And the miller, long dead: all I loved pass'd away!
This play-place of childhood was graved on my heart
In rare Paradise colours that now must depart:
The old Water-mill's gone, the fair vision is fled,
And I weep o'er its wreck as I do for the dead.
In rare Paradise colours that now must depart:
The old Water-mill's gone, the fair vision is fled,
And I weep o'er its wreck as I do for the dead.
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