But O! that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!
A savage place! as holy and enchanted

As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon-lover!

And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,

As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,

A mighty fountain momently was forced:
Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,
Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail :
And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and ever
It flung up momently the sacred river.

Five miles meandering with a mazy motion
Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,
>Then reached the caverns measureless to man,
And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:
And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war!

The shadow of the dome of pleasure
Floated mid-way on the waves;

Where was heard the mingled measure
From the fountain and the caves.

It was a miracle of rare device,

A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!
A damsel with a dulcimer

In a vision once I saw :

It was an Abyssinian maid,

And on her dulcimer she played,

Singing of Mount Abora.

Could I revive within me

Her symphony and song,

To such a deep delight 'twould win me

That with music loud and long,
I would build that dome in air,
That sunny dome! those caves of ice!
And all who heard should see them there,
And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread,
For he on honey-dew hath fed,

And drunk the milk of Paradise.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

DER FISCHER

AS Wasser rauscht', das Wasser schwoll
Ein Fischer sass daran,

DAS

Sah nach der Angel ruhevoll,

Kühl bis ans Herz hinan.

Und wie er sitzt und wie er lauscht,

Teilt sich die Flut empor;

Aus dem bewegten Wasser rauscht
Ein feuchtes Weib hervor.

Sie sang zu ihm, sie sprach zu ihm:
"Was lockst du meine Brut

Mit Menschenwitz und Menschenlist
Hinauf in Todesglut?

Ach wüsstest du, wie's Fischlein ist

So wohlig auf dem Grund,
Du stiegst herunter wie du bist,
Und würdest erst gesund.

"Labt sich die liebe Sonne nicht,
Der Mond sich nicht im Meer?
Kehrt wellenatmend ihr Gesicht
Nicht doppelt schöner her?

Lockt dich der tiefe Himmel nicht.
Das feuchtverklärte Blau?

Lockt dich dein eigen Angesicht
Nicht her im ew'gen Tau?"

Das Wasser rauscht', das Wasser schwoll,
Netzt ihm den nackten Fuss;

Sein Herz wuchs ihm so sehnsuchtsvoll
Wie bei der Liebsten Gruss.

Sie sprach zu ihm, sie sang zu ihm;
Da war's um ihn geschehn:

Halb zog sie ihn, halb sank er hin,
Und ward nicht mehr gesehn.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

FISCHERKNABE SINGT IM KAHN

ES

S lächelt der See, er ladet zum Bade, Der Knabe schlief ein am grünen Gestade,

Da hört er ein Klingen

Wie Flöten so süss,

Wie Stimmen der Engel

Im Paradies.

Und wie er erwachet in seliger Lust,
Da spülen die Wasser ihm um die Brust,
Und es ruft aus den Tiefen:

Lieb Knabe, bist mein!

Ich locke den Schläfer,

Ich zieh' ihn herein.

Friedrich von Schiller

SONG

FROM Comus

ABRINA fair,

SABRIN

Listen where thou art sitting

Under the glassy, cool, translucent wave,
In twisted braids of lilies knitting
The loose train of thy amber-dropping

hair;

Listen for dear honor's sake,

Goddess of the silver lake,
Listen and save.

Listen and appear to us
In name of great Oceanus,

By th' earth-shaking Neptune's mace
And Tethy's grave majestic pace,
By hoary Nereus' wrinkled look,
And the Carpathian wizard's hook,
By scaly Triton's winding shell,
And old sooth-saying Glaucus' spell,
By Leucothea's lovely hands,
And her son that rules the strands,
By Thetis' tinsel-slippered feet,
And the songs of Sirens sweet,
By dead Parthenope's dear tomb,
And fair Ligea's golden comb,
Wherewith she sits on diamond rocks
Sleeking her soft ailuring locks,
By all the nymphs that nightly dance
Upon thy streams with wily glance
Rise, rise, and heave thy rosy head
From thy coral-paven bed,

And bridle in thy headlong wave,
Till thou our summons answered have.
Listen and save.

SABRINA SINGS

Y the rushy-fringed bank,

osier dank,

My sliding chariot stays,

and the

Thick set with agate, and the azure sheen
Of turkis blue, and emerald green

That in the channel strays;
Whilst from off the waters fleet
Thus I set my printless feet
O'er the cowslip's velvet head,
That bends not as I tread;
Gentle swain, at thy request
I am here.

John Milton

THE FORSAKEN MERMAN

OME, dear children, let us away;
Down and away below!

Now my brothers call from the bay,

Now the great winds shoreward blow,
Now the salt tides seaward flow;

Now the wild white horses play,

Champ and chafe and toss in the spray.
Children dear, let us away!

This way, this way!

Call her once before you go,

Call once yet!

In a voice that she will know,

"Margaret! Margaret!"

Children's voices should be dear

(Call once more) to a mother's ear; Children's voices, wild with pain,—