Sunrise on the Hills

I stood upon the hills, when heaven's wide arch / Was glorious with the sun's returning march, / And woods were brightened, and soft gales / Went forth to kiss the sun-clad vales. / The clouds were far beneath me; bathed in light, / They gathered mid-way round the wooded height, / And, in their fading glory, shone / Like hosts in battle overthrown. / As many a pinnacle, with shifting glance. / Through the gray mist thrust up its shattered lance, / And rocking on the cliff was left / The dark pine blasted, bare, and cleft. / The veil of cloud was lifted, and below / Glowed the rich valley, and the river's flow / Was darkened by the forest's shade, / Or glistened in the white cascade; / Where upward, in the mellow blush of day, / The noisy bittern wheeled his spiral way.

I heard the distant waters dash, / I saw the current whirl and flash, / And richly, by the blue lake's silver beach, / The woods were bending with a silent reach. / Then o'er the vale, with gentle swell, / The music of the village bell / Came sweetly to the echo-giving hills; / And the wild horn, whose voice the woodland fills, / Was ringing to the merry shout, / That faint and far the glen sent out, / Where, answering to the sudden shot, thin smoke, / Through thick-leaved branches, from the dingle broke.