So confident is he of the beauty and virtue of the three fair girls hidden amongst the recesses of the hills, that he boasts of their worthiness to match even the noblest of gods or heroes. And then he invokes them to appear, whilst a youth expectant at his side, and breathless as they, “Looks to the earth and to the vacant air; And with a wandering air that seems to chide, Asks of the clouds what occupants they hide.” And now the poet will fulfil his promise, and show the golden youth this beautiful triad of Graces. “Fear not a constraining measure! --Yielding to the gentle spell, Lucida! from domes of pleasure, Or from cottage-sprinkled dell, Comes to regions solitary, Where the eagle builds her aery, Above the hermit’s long-forsaken cell! --She comes!--behold That figure, like a ship with silver sail! Nearer she draws; a breeze uplifts her veil; Upon her coming wait As pure a sunshine, and as soft a gale, As e’er, on herbage-covering earthly mold, Tempted the bird of Juno to unfold His richest splendour,--when his veering gait, And every motion of his starry train, Seem governed by a strain Of music, audible to him alone.” And then we have a picture of the lady:-- “worthy of earth’s proudest throne! Nor less, by excellence of nature, fit Beside an unambitious hearth to sit Domestic queen, where grandeur is unknown; What living man could fear The worst of fortune’s malice, wer’t thou near, Humbling that lily stem, thy sceptre meek, That its fair flowers may brush from off his cheek The too, too, happy tear? --Queen, and handmaid lowly! Whose skill can speed the day with lively cares, And banish melancholy By all that mind invents, or hand prepares; O thou, against whose lip, without its smile And in its silence even, no heart is proof; Whose goodness, sinking deep, would reconcile The softest nursling of a gorgeous palace, To the bare life beneath the hawthorn roof Of Sherwood’s archer, or in caves of Wallace-- Who that hath seen thy beauty could content His soul with but a _glimpse_ of heavenly day? Who that hath loved thee, but would lay His strong hand on the wind, if it were bent To take thee in thy majesty away? Pass onward (even the glancing deer Till we depart intrude not here;) That mossy slope, o’er which the woodbine throws A canopy, is smooth’d for thy repose!” The next lady that he invokes before the astonished youth is his own daughter--sweet Dora--the previous one was Miss Southey.