And the high crags recede into the clouds....
O’er jagged heights and icy fragments rude
Thus climb they mid the mountain solitude;
And from the rocky summits, haggard, show
Their half-wild visage, clotted thick with snow.
Continual drizzlings of the drifting air
Scar their rough cheeks and stiffen in their hair.
Now poured from craggy dens, a headlong force,
The Alpine hordes hang threatening on their course;
Track the known thickets, beat the mountain-snow,