'Peals the strong, voluminous thunder!'
And how incomparable is the termination of this song!—
'Bright was her soul as Dian's crest
Showering on Vesta's fane its sheen:
Cold looked she as the waveless breast
Of some stone Dian at thirteen.
Men loved: but hope they deemed to be
A sweet Impossibility!'
Here are two beautiful lines from the Grecian Ode:—
'Those sinuous streams that blushing wander
Through labyrinthine oleander.'
This is like Shakespeare:—
'Yea, and the Queen of Love, as fame reports,
Was caught,—no doubt in Bacchic wreaths,—for Bacchus
Such puissance hath, that he old oaks will twine
Into true-lovers' knots, and laughing stand
Until the sun goes down.'
And an admirable passage is this, too, from the same poem,—'The Search after Proserpine':—
'Yea, and the motions of her trees and harvests
Resemble those of slaves, reluctant, cumbered,
By outward force compelled; not like our billows,
Springing elastic in impetuous joy,
Or indolently swayed.'
"There!" exclaimed Landor, closing the book, "I want you to have this. It will be none the less valuable because I have scribbled in it," he added with a smile.