DOVE DALE REVISITED 51 



" Painter. I declare to you it is all a bewitch- 

 ment : my tongue is ever ready to praise every 

 next turning of the river more than the other ; 

 and I scarcely know which to like best, this 

 angling or the landskips. Look you ! There 

 again are rocks springing up like steeples 

 on this side and on that ; it is all full of sur- 

 prises. 



" Angler. Those Rocks are called ' The Tiss- 

 ington Spires,' for that retired village lies but 

 the distance of a walk to the left. ... So now 

 I have brought you within a view of Thorpe 

 Cloud. 



" Painter. Is that Thorpe Cloud ? Well, he 

 is more changeable than Proteus ; for here he 

 looks like a beheaded cone. 



"Angler. And now, brother, you are come 

 towards the end of the Dale. 



" Painter. Tell me not this sad news ! . . . 

 or if we must needs depart, let us first ' sit down 

 by the wafers, and hang our harps upon the Wil- 

 lows, and weep." 



Now I too must say adieu to Dove Dale 

 and its sweet stream, and close my account 

 of this my short and last visit with these 

 lines from "The Retirement," by Charles 

 Cotton : 



" Oh, my beloved nymph, fair Dove ! 

 Princess of rivers ! how I love 



Upon thy flow'ry banks to be ; 



