Source of the Watts river.

Original Poetry 1888

At the source of the Watts river.


An unexpected magnificence

Valley dark, and moist, and mossy;
Stream, and trickling boulders glossy;
Waters leaping, gliding, curling.
With soft chromatic purling;
Beechen forest far extended.
Woven leaves and branches blended
In a mighty - vaulted ceiling.
Scarce the zenith-blue revealing!
Here, oh here, my willing steps I stay
Take me, oh take me to thyself for this one day.

Oh the wealth of graces lavish
Scents that sooth, and sights that ravish.
Scattered in these wilderness:
See the long, the emerald tresses
Pendent from the trees; the bosses
Softly round and delicate mosses!
Luscious tints of green an golden
Thing of joy that, one beholden.
Sink, yes sink, into innermost being;
In visions nestle there for the soul's secret seeing.

Mighty forest logs decaying
To the boom of waters swaying,
Span the river, sometimes dipping.
Sometimes splashed, but ever dripping.
Each is wrapped with mossy cushion,
Fernlets nod in sweet profusion;
While upon the steep bank mounting
Tree-ferns rise beyond all counting
Here, oh here, my willing steps I stay,
​Here let me rest beneath their softly - tustling sway.