Stretch far, and all those dancing shadows make. And now we walk--now smaller parties seek 290 Or sun or shade as pleases--Shall I speak? Shall I forgiveness ask, and then apply For----O! that vile and intercepting cry! Alas! what mighty ills can trifles make-- An hat! the idiot’s--fallen in the lake! What serious mischief can such idlers do? I almost wish the head had fallen too. No more they leave us, but will hover round, As if amusement at our cost they found; Vex’d and unhappy I indeed had been, 300 Had I not something in my charmer seen Like discontent, that, though corrected, dwelt On that dear face, and told me what she felt. “Now must we cross the lake, and as we cross’d Was my whole soul in sweet emotion lost; Clouds in white volumes roll’d beneath the moon, Softening her light that on the waters shone: This was such bliss! even then it seem’d relief To veil the gladness in a show of grief. We sigh’d as we conversed, and said, how deep 310 This lake on which those broad dark shadows sleep; There is between us and a watery grave But a thin plank, and yet our fate we brave. ‘What if it burst?’ ‘Matilda, then my care } Would be for thee: all danger I would dare, } And, should my efforts fail, thy fortune would I share.’ } ‘The love of life,’ she said, ‘would powerful prove!’-- ‘O! not so powerful as the strength of love.’-- A look of kindness gave the grateful maid, That had the real effort more than paid. 320 “But here we land, and haply now may choose Companions home--our way, too, we may lose: In these drear, dark, inosculating lanes, The very native of his doubt complains; No wonder then that in such lonely ways A stranger, heedless of the country, strays; A stranger, too, whose many thoughts all meet In one design, and none regard his feet. “‘Is this the path?’ the cautious fair one cries; } I answer, ‘Yes!’--‘We shall our friends surprise,’ } 330 She added, sighing--I return the sighs. } “‘Will they not wonder?’ ‘O! they would, indeed, Could they the secrets of this bosom read, These chilling doubts, these trembling hopes I feel! The faint, fond hopes I can no more conceal-- I love thee, dear Matilda!--to confess The fact is dangerous, fatal to suppress. “‘And now in terror I approach the home Where I may wretched but not doubtful come; Where I must be all ecstasy, or all-- 340 O! what will you a wretch rejected call? Not man, for I shall lose myself, and be A creature lost to reason, losing thee. “‘Speak, my Matilda! on the rack of fear Suspend me not--I would my sentence hear, Would learn my fate--Good Heaven! and what portend