And in that gracious region bland, Where with clear-rustling wave The scented pines of Switzerland Stand dark round thy green grave,-- Between the dusty vineyard-walls Issuing on that green place, The early peasant still recalls The pensive stranger’s face,-- And stoops to clear thy moss-grown date Ere he plods on again; Or whether, by maligner fate, Among the swarms of men,-- Where between granite terraces The blue Seine rolls her wave, The Capital of Pleasure sees Thy hardly-heard-of grave,-- Farewell! Under the sky we part, In this stern Alpine dell. O unstrung will! O broken heart! A last, a last farewell! _OBERMANN ONCE MORE._ (COMPOSED MANY YEARS AFTER THE PRECEDING.) _Savez-vous quelque bien qui console du regret d’un monde?_ OBERMANN. Glion? Ah! twenty years, it cuts[28] All meaning from a name! White houses prank where once were huts; Glion, but not the same! And yet I know not! All unchanged The turf, the pines, the sky! The hills in their old order ranged; The lake, with Chillon by; And ’neath those chestnut-trees, where stiff And stony mounts the way, The crackling husk-heaps burn, as if I left them yesterday. Across the valley, on that slope, The huts of Avant shine; Its pines, under their branches, ope Ways for the pasturing kine. Full-foaming milk-pails, Alpine fare, Sweet heaps of fresh-cut grass, Invite to rest the traveller there Before he climb the pass,-- The gentian-flowered pass, its crown[29] With yellow spires aflame; Whence drops the path to Allière down, And walls where Byron came;[30] By their green river, who doth change His birth-name just below, Orchard and croft and full-stored grange Nursed by his pastoral flow. But stop! to fetch back thoughts that stray Beyond this gracious bound, The cone of Jaman, pale and gray, See, in the blue profound! Ah, Jaman! delicately tall Above his sun-warmed firs,-- What thoughts to me his rocks recall, What memories he stirs! And who but thou must be, in truth, Obermann! with me here? Thou master of my wandering youth, But left this many a year! Yes, I forget the world’s work wrought, Its warfare waged with pain: An eremite with thee, in thought Once more I slip my chain,-- And to thy mountain chalet come, And lie beside its door, And hear the wild bee’s Alpine hum, And thy sad, tranquil lore. Again I feel the words inspire Their mournful calm; serene, Yet tinged with infinite desire For all that _might_ have been,-- The harmony from which man swerved Made his life’s rule once more; The universal order served, Earth happier than before.