Hath a toothless mastiff bitch;
From her kennel beneath the rock
She makes answer to the clock,
Four for the quarters, and twelve for the hour;
Ever and aye, moonshine or shower,
Sixteen short howls, not over loud:
Some say she sees my lady’s shroud.
Is the night chilly and dark?
The night is chilly, but not dark.” Pp. 3,4.
‘It is probable that Lord Byron may have had this passage in his eye, when he called the poem “wild” and “original”: but how he discovered it to be “beautiful,” is not quite so easy for us to imagine.