And more to me than wisest books can teach
The wind and water said; whose words did reach
My soul, addressing their magnificent speech,—
Raucous and rushing,—from the old mill-wheel,
That made the rolling mill-cogs snore and reel,
Like some old ogre in a fairy tale
Nodding above his meat and mug of ale.
How memory takes me back the ways that lead—
As when a boy—through woodland and through mead!
To orchards fruited; or to fields in bloom;