Crown the pale year weak and new ; In the deep east, dim and blind, And the multitudinous Where the earth and ocean meet, BYRON Converse with Nature то sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell, To slowly trace the forest's shady scene, Where things that own not man's dominion dwell, And mortal foot hath ne'er or rarely been; Converse with Nature's charms, and view her stores unroll'd. But midst the crowd, the hum, the shock of men, To hear, to see, to feel, and to possess, And roam along, the world's tired denizen, bless; Minions of splendour shrinking from distress! None that, with kindred consciousness endued, If we were not, would seem to smile the less, Of all that flatter'd, follow'd, sought, and sued; This is to be alone; this, this is solitude! More blest the life of godly eremite, Such as on lonely Athos may be seen, Watching at eve upon the giant height, Which looks o'er waves so blue, skies so serene, That he who there at such an hour hath been Will wistful linger on that hallow'd spot; Then slowly tear him from the 'witching scene, Sigh forth one wish that such had been his lot, Then turn to hate a world he had almost forgot. Dear Nature is the kindest mother still, Where nothing polish'd dares pollute her path: Though I have mark'd her when none other hath, And sought her more and more, and loved her best in wrath. Clear placid Leman! thy contrasted lake, To waft me from distraction; once I loved It is the hush of night, and all between There breathes a living fragrance from the shore, Of flowers yet fresh from childhood; on the ear Drops the light drip of the suspended oar, Or chirps the grasshopper one good-night carol more: He is an evening reveller, who makes All silently their tears of love instil, Weeping themselves away, till they infuse Deep into Nature's breast the spirit of her hues. All heaven and earth are still-though not in sleep, But breathless, as we grow when feeling most; Where not a beam, nor air, nor leaf is lost, Of that which is of all Creator and defence. Then stirs the feeling infinite, so felt The soul and source of music, which makes known Eternal harmony, and sheds a charm Like to the fabled Cytherea's zone, Binding all things with beauty ;-'twould disarm The spectre Death, had he substantial power to harm. There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is society, where none intrudes, By the deep Sea, and music in its roar : I love not Man the less, but Nature more, From these our interviews, in which I steal To mingle with the Universe, and feel What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal. DE QUINCEY Wandering in North Wales THERE were already, even in those days of 1802, numerous inns, erected at reasonable distances from each other, for the accommodation of tourists and no sort of disgrace attached in Wales, as too generally upon the great roads of England, to the pedestrian style of travelling. Indeed, the majority of those whom I met as fellow-tourists in the quiet little cottage-parlours of the Welsh posting-houses were pedestrian travellers. All the way from Shrewsbury through Llangollen, Llanrwst, Conway, Bangor, and then turning to the left at right angles through Carnarvon, and so on to Dolgelly (the chief town of Merionethshire), Tan y Bwlch, Harlech, Barmouth, and through the sweet solitudes of Cardiganshire, or turning sharply back towards the English border through the gorgeous wood scenery of Mont |