Nor did you kill that you might eat,
And ease a doggish pain,

For him, though chased with furious heat,
You left where he was slain.

Sir, when I flew to seize the bird
In spite of your command,

A louder voice than yours I heard,

And harder to withstand.

You cried-Forbear!'-but in my breast

A mightier cried- Proceed!

'Twas Nature, sir, whose strong behest Impell'd me to the deed.

"That, Father! will I gladly do: 'Tis scarcely afternoon

The minster-clock has just struck two,
And yonder is the moon!'

At this the Father raised his hook,
And snapped a faggot-band;
He plied his work;-and Lucy took
The lantern in her hand.

Not blither is the mountain roe:
With many a wanton stroke
Her feet disperse the powdery snow,
That rises up like smoke.

The wretched parents all that night
Went shouting far and wide;
But there was neither sound nor sight
To serve them for a guide.

At day-break on a hill they stood
That overlooked the moor;

And thence they saw the bridge of wood,
A furlong from their door.

They wept-and, turning homeward, cried,
'In heaven we all shall meet!'
-When in the snow the mother spied
The print of Lucy's feet.

Then downwards from the steep hill's edge
They tracked the footmarks small;
And through the broken hawthorn hedge,
And by the long stone wall;

And then an open field they crossed:
The marks were still the same;
They tracked them on, nor ever lost;
And to the bridge they came.

They followed from the snowy bank
Those footmarks, one by one,

Into the middle of the plank;
And further there were none !

-Yet some maintain that to this day

She is a living child;

That you may see sweet Lucy Gray

Upon the lonesome wild.

O'er rough and smooth she trips along,

And never looks behind;

And sings a solitary song

That whistles in the wind.

WORDSWORTH.