So, many months passed on: and once again There is a comfort in the strength of love; 'T will make a thing endurable, which else Would break the heart :-old Michael found it so. I have conversed with more than one who well Remembered the old man, and what he was Years after he had heard this heavy news. His bodily frame had been from youth to age Of an unusual strength. Among the rocks He went, and still looked up upon the sun, And listened to the wind; and as before Performed all kinds of labour for his sheep, And for the land his small inheritance. And to that hollow dell from time to time Did he repair, to build the fold of which His flock had need. 'Tis not forgotten yet The pity which was then in every heart For the old man-and 't is believed by all That many and many a day he thither went, And never lifted up a single stone. There, by the sheep-fold, sometimes was he seen Sitting alone, with that his faithful dog, Then old, beside him, lying at his feet. The length of full seven years from time to time Three years, or little Survive her husband: at her death the estate The cottage which was named the Evening Star Is gone-the ploughshare has been through the ground Beside the boisterous brook of Greenhead Ghyll. |