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done. I do not pretend to explain the process. My purpose is 
rather to illustrate it, to show by these ‘local glimpses’ how 
nature seems ever to lead us to something beyond nature, ‘as 
far as the incommunicable.” This short piece is an attempt to 
say only what a certain river said. I give it to you, here, as 
nature gave it to me—there. 
BY THE RIVER. 
I walked in a lonely place 
Where ferns and mosses grow, 
Where with a wild and pendulous grace 
The tall sedge droopeth low, 
Over the brim of the river. 
I lay beneath the trees 
And heard the low winds sigh 
For the far, forgotten centuries 
Whose summer suns went by, 
Over the brim of the river. 
I saw on either side 
The woods shut in the scene, 
And the evening clouds above them glide, 
And the moon look down between, 
Over the brim of the river. 
T heard the cuckoo mock 
The echoes of the hill; 
The throstle from below the rock 
The vale with music fill, 
Over the brim of the river. 
7 
I waited till the moon 
Grew brighter, and the air 
Still, save for a mystic rune 
The low wind murmured there, 
Over the brim of the river. 
Save for the peaceful sound 
Of the water as it rolled, 
Filling the air above, around, 
As it had done of old, 
Over the brim of the river. 
I waited till afar, 
So lonely and serene, 
Looked large and bright the evening star, 
Adown the dark ravine, 
Over the brim of the river. 
I waited, lingering still, 
In that enchanted dell, 
And the thoughts that did my spirit fill 
My tongue can never tell, 
As I walked by the lonely river. 
