At noon, the coach[176] had yet twelve leagues to run:
The air grew chilly, and dark clouds begun
To form a leaden mass: entirely hid
Was he,[177] who in the morn ’rose round and red:
A dreadful storm was evidently near;
And distant rumblings fell upon the ear:
Yon wary sheep were gath’ring in a hav’n,
A shelter’d nook: the wind had now aris’n,
And boist’rously swept o’er the open-plain:
The sullen-featured clouds dispersed their rain
Tempestuously, and all around was gloom:
Increasing murm’rings in th’ ethereal room,
And the first streak, shot thro’ the sombre-rent,
Disturb’d an inside lady-occupant,
Who sought for sympathy from those without:
Th’ affrighted horses fain would turn about;
But there’s no help, no refuge from the storm
Until they gain’d “old Antrobus’s farm—”
About three miles: when there the drenching-drops
Combin’d the gale, and bent the grainéd-crops:
Fork’d flittings quiver’d through the mournful vast;
Th’ inured coachman even sat aghast;
For Heaven’s artill’ry now had vollied forth
A deaf’ning roar,—which shook the stable earth.
At length the storm subsides; the clouds disperse;
The welcome orb afresh begins t’immerse
The varied herbage, and the waving folds;
Encompassing the furze and heathery wolds:
And all was calm again—save one poor soul,
Whose head still rang with the last thunder-roll.
[176] Which passed through the village of Westonbury, (situated about two
miles from the “Hall,”) where Arnold had “book’d” himself for his journey
home.
[177] The Sun.