THE VOICE OF THE PINE 183 



Across the rumpling waves the hoot-owFs bark 

 Tolls forth the midnight hour upon the dark. 

 What mellow booming from the hills doth come ? 

 The mountain quarry strikes its mighty drum. 



Long had we lain beside our pine- wood fire, 

 From things of sport our talk had risen higher. 

 How frank and intimate the words of men 

 When tented lonely in some forest glen! 

 No dallying now with masks, from whence emerges 

 Scarce one true feature forth. The night-wind urges 

 To straight and simple speech. So we had thought 

 Aloud; no secrets but to light were brought. 

 The hid and spiritual hopes, the wild, 

 Unreasoned longings that, from child to child, 

 Mortals still cherish (though with modern shame) 

 To these, and things like these, we gave a name; 

 And as we talked, the intense and resinous fire 

 Lit up the towering boles, till nigh and nigher 

 They gathered round, a ghostly company, 

 Like beasts who seek to know what men may be. 



Then to our hemlock beds, but not to sleep 



For listening to the stealthy steps that creep 



About the tent, or falling branch, but most 



A noise was like the rustling of a host, 



Or like the sea that breaks upon the shore 



It was the pine-tree's murmur. More and more 



It took a human sound. These words I felt 



Into the skyey darkness float and melt: 



