[HE] The reference is to the sonnet on Malham Cove (see p. 185), and the Fenwick note to The Excursion.—Ed.
VIII
IN A CARRIAGE, UPON THE BANKS OF THE RHINE
Amid this dance of objects sadness steals
O'er the defrauded heart—while sweeping by,
As in a fit of Thespian jollity,[HF]
Beneath her vine-leaf crown the green Earth reels:
Backward, in rapid evanescence, wheels
The venerable pageantry of Time,
Each beetling rampart, and each tower sublime,