Active as lambs, and overcome with joy. They try all frolic motions; flutter, plunge, 550 And beat the passive water with their wings. Too distant are they for plain view, but lo! Those little fountains, sparkling in the sun, Betray their occupation, rising up, First one and then another silver spout, 555 As one or other takes the fit of glee, Fountains and spouts, yet somewhat in the guise Of play-thing fire-works, that on festal nights Sparkle about the feet of wanton boys. --How vast the compass of this theatre, 560 Yet nothing to be seen but lovely pomp And silent majesty; the birch-tree woods Are hung with thousand thousand diamond drops Of melted hoar-frost, every tiny knot In the bare twigs, each little budding place 565 Cased with its several beads, what myriads there Upon one tree, while all the distant grove That rises to the summit of the steep Shows like a mountain built of silver light. See yonder the same pageant, and again 570 Behold the universal imagery Inverted, all its sun-bright features touched As with the varnish, and the gloss of dreams; Dreamlike the blending also of the whole Harmonious landscape; all along the shore 575 The boundary lost, the line invisible That parts the image from reality; And the clear hills, as high as they ascend Heavenward, so piercing deep the lake below. Admonished of the days of love to come 580 The raven croaks, and fills the upper air With a strange sound of genial harmony;[371] And in and all about that playful band, Incapable although they be of rest, And in their fashion very rioters, 585 There is a stillness, and they seem to make Calm revelry in that their calm abode. Them leaving to their joyous hours I pass, Pass with a thought the life of the whole year That is to come, the throng of woodland flowers, 590 And lilies that will dance upon the waves. Say boldly then that solitude is not Where these things are. He truly is alone, He of the multitude whose eyes are doomed To hold a vacant commerce day by day 595 With objects wanting life, repelling love; He by the vast Metropolis immured, Where pity shrinks from unremitting calls, Where numbers overwhelm humanity, And neighbourhood serves rather to divide 600 Than to unite. What sighs more deep than his, Whose nobler will hath long been sacrificed; Who must inhabit, under a black sky, A City where, if indifference to disgust Yield not, to scorn, or sorrow, living men 605 Are ofttimes to their fellow-men no more