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Title: Though narrow be that Old Man's cares, and near
Author: William Wordsworth [
More Titles by Wordsworth]
... "_gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name_."
Though narrow be that Old Man's cares, and near
The poor Old Man is greater than he seems:
For he hath waking empire, wide as dreams;
An ample sovereignty of eye and ear.
Rich are his walks with supernatural chear;
The region of his inner spirit teems
With vital sounds, and monitory gleams
Of high astonishment and pleasing fear.
He the seven birds hath seen that never part,
Seen the SEVEN WHISTLERS in their nightly rounds,{1*}
And counted them: and oftentimes will start--
For overhead are sweeping GABRIEL'S HOUNDS,
Doom'd, with their impious Lord, the flying Hart
To chase for ever, on aerial grounds.
Footnote 1:
"Seen the Seven Whistlers, &c." Both these superstitions are prevalent in the midland Counties of England: that of "Gabriel's Hounds" appears to be very general over Europe; being the same as the one upon which the German Poet, Burger, has founded his Ballad of the Wild Huntsman.
-THE END-
William Wordsworth's poem: Though narrow be that Old Man's cares, and near
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