William Wordsworth

Extract from 'The Prelude' by William Wordsworth (19th c Romantic)


        And in the frosty season, when the sun
        Was set, and visible for many a mile
        The cottage windows blazed through twilight gloom,
        I heeded not their summons: happy time
        It was indeed for all of us--for me
        It was a time of rapture! Clear and loud                   430
        The village clock tolled six,--I wheeled about,
        Proud and exulting like an untired horse
        That cares not for his home. All shod with steel,
        We hissed along the polished ice in games
        Confederate, imitative of the chase
        And woodland pleasures,--the resounding horn,
        The pack loud chiming, and the hunted hare.
        So through the darkness and the cold we flew,
        And not a voice was idle; with the din
        Smitten, the precipices rang aloud;                        440
        The leafless trees and every icy crag
        Tinkled like iron; while far distant hills
        Into the tumult sent an alien sound
        Of melancholy not unnoticed, while the stars
        Eastward were sparkling clear, and in the west
        The orange sky of evening died away.
        Not seldom from the uproar I retired
        Into a silent bay, or sportively
        Glanced sideway, leaving the tumultuous throng,
        To cut across the reflex of a star                         450
        That fled, and, flying still before me, gleamed
        Upon the glassy plain; and oftentimes,
        When we had given our bodies to the wind,
        And all the shadowy banks on either side
        Came sweeping through the darkness, spinning still
        The rapid line of motion, then at once
        Have I, reclining back upon my heels,
        Stopped short; yet still the solitary cliffs
        Wheeled by me--even as if the earth had rolled
        With visible motion her diurnal round!                     460
        Behind me did they stretch in solemn train,
        Feebler and feebler, and I stood and watched
        Till all was tranquil as a dreamless sleep.