Yield to the Music's touching influence;
And joys[515] of distant home my heart enchain.
"Thursday, Aug. 24.—... On the banks of the infant Ticino, which has its source in the pools above, within a few hundred yards of that which gives birth to the Reuss, D. and I resolved to reject all political boundaries, and thenceforth consider ourselves in Italy. With the pure stream we descended; but first were joined by Mr. R., J. M., and Wm., with a young German, whom Mr. R. had picked up in the morning; a Heidelberg student, travelling on foot to Rome. He sang and played to us upon the flute, airs from Rossini, the Swiss Cow Song, etc. Then on we went, wending our way over the grass between the paved road and the brook wherever we could. The Brook dashing down its stony channel, now over rocks, now under shelving snow, and its banks seen clothed with underwood and pines. Passed by its first wooden bridge, leading to the cottages, not unmindful of our own Duddon; and presently did it grace such an assemblage of rocks, dells, and woods, forming waterfalls, pools, and all the various charms that a mountain stream can show." (Mrs. Wordsworth's Journal.)
"Thursday, 23rd August. Hopital.—I found Mary sitting on the lowest of a long flight of steps. She had lost her companions (my Brother and a young Swiss who had joined us on the road). We mounted the steps, and, from within, their voices answered our call. Went along a dark, stone, banditti passage, into a small chamber little less gloomy, where we found them seated with food before them, bread and cheese, with sour red wine—no milk. Hunger satisfied, Mary and I hastened to warm ourselves in the sunshine; for the house was as cold as a dungeon. We straightway greeted with joy the infant Ticino which has its sources in the pools above. The gentlemen joined us, and we placed ourselves on a sunny bank, looking towards Italy; and the Swiss took out his flute, and played, and afterwards sang, the Ranz des Vaches, and other airs of his country. We, and especially our sociable friend R. (with his inexhaustible stock of kindness, and his German tongue) found him a pleasant companion. He was from the University of Heidelberg, and bound for Rome, on a visit to a Brother, in the holidays; and, our mode of travelling, for a short way, being the same, it was agreed we should go on together: but before we reached Airola he left us, and we saw no more of him." (From Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal, vol. ii.)—Ed.
VARIANTS:
[514] 1837.
. . . how others love this simple Strain,
Even here, upon this glorious Mountain (named
[515] 1827.