And here he paused, and against the trunk
  Of a tall gray linden leant,
When the broad clear orb of the sun had sunk
  From his path in the frosty firmament,
And over the round dark edge of the hill
A cold green light was quivering still.

And the crescent moon, high over the green,
  From a sky of crimson shone,
On that icy palace, whose towers were seen
  To sparkle as if with stars of their own;
While the water fell with a hollow sound,
’Twixt the glistening pillars ranged around.

Is that a being of life, that moves
  Where the crystal battlements rise? 
A maiden watching the moon she loves,
  At the twilight hour, with pensive eyes? 
Was that a garment which seemed to gleam
Betwixt the eye and the falling stream?

’Tis only the torrent tumbling o’er,
  In the midst of those glassy walls,
Gushing, and plunging, and beating the floor
  Of the rocky basin in which it falls. 
’Tis only the torrent—­but why that start? 
Why gazes the youth with a throbbing heart?

He thinks no more of his home afar,
  Where his sire and sister wait. 
He heeds no longer how star after star
  Looks forth on the night as the hour grows late. 
He heeds not the snow-wreaths, lifted and cast
From a thousand boughs, by the rising blast.

His thoughts are alone of those who dwell
  In the halls of frost and snow,
Who pass where the crystal domes upswell
  From the alabaster floors below,
Where the frost-trees shoot with leaf and spray,
And frost-gems scatter a silvery day.

“And oh that those glorious haunts were mine!”
  He speaks, and throughout the glen
Thin shadows swim in the faint moonshine,
  And take a ghastly likeness of men,
As if the slain by the wintry storms
Came forth to the air in their earthly forms.

There pass the chasers of seal and whale,
  With their weapons quaint and grim,
And bands of warriors in glittering mail,
  And herdsmen and hunters huge of limb. 
There are naked arms, with bow and spear,
And furry gauntlets the carbine rear.

There are mothers—­and oh how sadly their eyes
  On their children’s white brows rest! 
There are youthful lovers—­the maiden lies,
  In a seeming sleep, on the chosen breast;
There are fair wan women with moonstruck air,
The snow stars flecking their long loose hair.

They eye him not as they pass along,
  But his hair stands up with dread,
When he feels that he moves with that phantom throng,
  Till those icy turrets are over his head,
And the torrent’s roar as they enter seems
Like a drowsy murmur heard in dreams.

The glittering threshold is scarcely passed,
  When there gathers and wraps him round
A thick white twilight, sullen and vast,
  In which there is neither form nor sound;
The phantoms, the glory, vanish all,
With the dying voice of the waterfall.