That moonlight, like a duck's egg, green,

Outside the enfolding curtains lay.

But hearth-bound by maternal choice,

The fire-side's eremite, I know

The nightfall less by sight than voice—

How wake the huffing winds, and how

More full the flooded stream descends,

In unarrested race of sound,

The lasher where the river bends

To circle in our garden ground.