I come from haunts of coot and hern,
I make a sudden sally,
And sparkle out among the fern,
To bicker down a valley.
By thirty hills I hurry down,
Or slip between the ridges,
By twenty thorps, a little town,
And half a hundred bridges.
Till last by Philip's farm I flow
To join the brimming river;
For men may come, and men may go,
But I go on forever.
I chatter over stony ways
In little sharps and trebles;
I bubble into eddying bays;
I babble on the pebbles.
With many a curve my banks I fret
By many a field and fallow.
And many a fairy foreland set
With willow-weed and mallow.
I chatter, chatter, as I flow
To join the brimming river;
For men may come, and men may go,
But I go on forever.
I steal by lawns and grassy plots,
I slide by hazel covers,
I move the sweet forget-me-nots
That grow for happy lovers.
I slip, I slide, I gloom, I glance,
Among my skimming swallows;
I make the netted sunbeams dance
Against my sandy shallows.
I murmur under moon and stars
In brambly wildernesses;
I linger by my shingly bars;
I loiter round my cresses.
And out again I curve and flow
To join the brimming river;
For men may come, and men may go,
But I go on forever.
_Tennyson_.
[Illustration:]
* * * * *
HAUNTS, places of frequent resort.
COOT and hern, water fowls that frequent lakes and other still
waters.
BICKER, to move quickly and unsteadily, like flame or water.
THORP, a cluster of houses; a hamlet.
SHARPS and trebles, terms in music. They are here used to
describe the sound of the brook.
EDDYING, moving in circles. Why are "eddying bays" dangerous to the
swimmer?
FRETTED BANKS, banks worn away by the action of the water.
FALLOW, plowed land, foreland, a point of land running into the sea
or other water.
MALLOW, a kind of plant.
GLOOM, to shine obscurely.
SHINGLY, abounding with shingle or loose gravel.
BARS, banks of sand or gravel or rock forming a shoal in a river or
harbor.
CRESSES, certain plants which grow near the water. They are
sometimes used as a salad.
* * * * *
_37_
wits
hale
borne
suit' ed
prop' er ly
sit u a' tion