Therefore farewell, ye hills, and ye, ye envineyarded ruins! Therefore farewell, ye walls, palaces, pillars, and domes! Therefore farewell, far seen, ye peaks of the mythic Albano, Seen from Montorio's height, Tibur and Aesula's hills! Ah, could we once, ere we go, could we stand, while, to ocean descending, Sinks o'er the yellow dark plain slowly the yellow broad sun, Stand, from the forest emerging at sunset, at once in the champaign, Open, but studded with trees, chestnuts umbrageous and old, E'en in those fair open fields that incurve to thy beautiful hollow, Nemi, imbedded in wood, Nemi, inurned in the hill!-- Therefore farewell, ye plains, and ye hills, and the City Eternal! Therefore farewell! We depart, but to behold you again! Canto IV. Eastward, or Northward, or West? I wander and ask as I wander; Weary, yet eager and sure, Where shall I come to my love? Whitherward hasten to seek her? Ye daughters of Italy, tell me, Graceful and tender and dark, is she consorting with you? Thou that out-climbest the torrent, that tendest thy goats to the summit, Call to me, child of the Alp, has she been seen on the heights? Italy, farewell I bid thee! for whither she leads me, I follow. Farewell the vineyard! for I, where I but guess her, must go; Weariness welcome, and labour, wherever it be, if at last it Bring me in mountain or plain into the sight of my love. I. Claude to Eustace,--from Florence. Gone from Florence; indeed! and that is truly provoking;-- Gone to Milan, it seems; then I go also to Milan. Five days now departed; but they can travel but slowly;-- I quicker far; and I know, as it happens, the home they will go to.-- Why, what else should I do? Stay here and look at the pictures, Statues and churches? Alack, I am sick of the statues and pictures!-- No, to Bologna, Parma, Piacenza, Lodi, and Milan, Off go we to-night,--and the Venus go to the Devil! II. Claude to Eustace,--from Bellaggio. Gone to Como, they said; and I have posted to Como. There was a letter left; but the cameriere had lost it. Could it have been for me? They came, however, to Como, And from Como went by the boat,--perhaps to the Spluegen,-- Or to the Stelvio, say, and the Tyrol; also it might be By Porlezza across to Lugano, and so to the Simplon Possibly, or the St. Gothard,--or possibly, too, to Baveno, Orta, Turin, and elsewhere. Indeed, I am greatly bewildered. III. Claude to Eustace,--from Bellaggio.