I feel almost at times as I have felt
  In happy childhood; trees, and flowers, and brooks,
  Which do remember me of where I dwelt
  Ere my young mind was sacrificed to books,
  Come as of yore upon me, and can melt
  My heart with recognition of their looks: 
  And even at moments I could think I see
  Some living thing to love—­but none like thee.

  VIII.

  Here are the Alpine landscapes which create
  A fund for contemplation.—­to admire
  Is a brief feeling of a trivial date;
  But something worthier do such scenes inspire: 
  Here to be lonely is not desolate. 
  For much I view which I could most desire,
  And, above all, a lake I can behold
  Lovelier, not dearer, than our own of old.

  IX.

  Oh that thou wert but with me!—­but I grow
  The fool of my own wishes, and forget
  The solitude which I have vaunted so
  Has lost its praise in this but one regret;
  There may be others which I less may show;—­
  I am not of the plaintive mood, and yet
  I feel an ebb in my philosophy
  And the tide rising in my alter’d eye.

  X.

  I did remind thee of our own dear lake,
  By the old hall which may be mine no more,
  Leman’s is fair; but think not I forsake
  The sweet remembrance of a dearer shore: 
  Sad havoc Time must with my memory make
  Ere that or thou can fade these eyes before;
  Though, like all things which I have loved, they are
  Resign’d for ever, or divided far.

  XI.

  The world is all before me; I but ask
  Of nature that with which she will comply—­
  It is but in her summer sun to bask,
  To mingle with the quiet of her sky,
  To see her gentle fare without a mask,
  And never gaze on it with apathy. 
  She was my early friend, and now shall be
  My sister—­till I look again on thee.

  XII.

  I can reduce all feelings but this one: 
  And that I would not;—­for at length I see
  Such scenes as those wherein my life begun. 
  The earliest—­even the only paths for me—­
  Had I but sooner learnt the crowd to shun,
  I had been better than I now can be: 
  The passions which have torn me would have slept: 
  I had not suffered, and thou hadst not wept.

  XIII.

  With false ambition what had I to do? 
  Little with love, and least of all with fame;
  And yet they came unsought, and with me grew,
  And made me all which they can make—­a name. 
  Yet this was not the end I did pursue;
  Surely I once beheld a nobler aim. 
  But all is over—­I am one the more
  To baffled millions which have gone before.

  XIV.

  And for the future, this world’s future may
  From me demand but little of my care;
  I have outlived myself by many a day;
  Having survived so many things that were;
  My years have been no slumber, but the prey
  Of ceaseless vigils; for I had the share
  Of life that might have filled a century,
  Before its fourth in time had passed me by.