Poetry > Lady of the lake

Canto I.
THE CHASE.
X.
Then through the dell his horn resounds,
From vain pursuit to call the hounds.
Back limp’d, with slow and crippled pace,
The sulky leaders of the chase;
Close to their master’s side they press’d,
With drooping tail, and humbled crest;
But still the dingle’s hollow throat
Prolong’d the swelling bugle-note.
The owlets started from their dream,
The eagles answer’d with their scream,
Round and around the sounds were cast,
Till echo seem’d an answering blast;
And on the Hunter hied his way,1
To join some comrades of the day;
Yet often paused, so strange the road,
So wondrous were the scenes it show’d.
XL
The western waves of ebbing day
Roll’d o’er the glen their level way;
Each purple peak, each flinty spire,
Was bathed in floods of living fire.
But not a setting beam could glow
Within the dark ravines below,
Where twined the path in shadow hid,
Round many a rocky pyramid.
' [MS.—“And on the hunter hied his pace,
To meet some comrades of the chase.'*]