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And every step with cautious terror makes;

For not alone that infant in her arms,

But nearer cause, her anxious soul alarms.

With water burthen'd, then she picks her way,

Slowly and cautious, in the clinging clay;

Till, in mid-green, she trusts a place unsound,

And deeply plunges in th' adhesive ground;

Thence, but with pain, her slender foot she takes,

While hope the mind, as strength the frame, forsakes: