Ay, there, indeed, your memory is a friend
That does not play you false.--On that tall pike
(It is the loneliest place of all these hills)
There were two springs that bubbled side by side,
As if they had been made that they might be
Companions for each other; the huge crag
Was rent with lightning--one hath disappear'd;
The other, left behind, is flowing still.[2]----
For accidents and changes such as these,
We want not store of them;--a waterspout
Will bring down half a mountain; what a feast
For folks that wander up and down like you,
To see an acre's breadth of that wide cliff
One roaring cataract!--a sharp May-storm
Will come with loads of January snow,
And in one night send twenty score of sheep
To feed the ravens: or a shepherd dies
By some untoward death among the rocks;
The ice breaks up and sweeps away a bridge--
A wood is fell'd:--and then for our own homes!
A child is born or christen'd, a field plough'd,
A daughter sent to service, a web spun,
The old house-clock is decked with a new face;
And hence, so far from wanting facts or dates
To chronicle the time, we all have here
A pair of diaries--one serving, Sir,
For the whole dale, and one for each fireside--
Yours was a stranger's judgment: for historians,
Commend me to these valleys!