VIII

Thunders on thunders, doubling and redoubling

Doom o'er the mountain, while a sharp white fire

Now shone, now sheared its rusty herbage, troubling

Hardly the fir-boles, now discharged its ire

Full where some pine-tree's solitary spire

Crashed down, defiant to the last: till—lo,

The motive of the malice!—all aglow,

Circled with flame there yawned a sudden rift

I' the rock-face, and I saw a form erect