Lillian and Other Poems - 1852 Author:Winthrop Mackworth Praed Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: THE RED FISHERMAN. Oh flesh, flesh, how art thou fishified! Romeo and Juliet. The abbot arose, and closed his book, And donned his sandal shoon, And ... more »wandered forth, alone, to look Upon the summer moon : A starlight sky was o'er his head, A quiet breeze around ; And the flowers a thrilling fragrance shed, And the waves a soothing sound : It was not an hour, nor a scene, for aught But love and calm delight; Yet the holy man had a cloud of thought On his wrinkled brow that night. He gazed on the river that gurgled by, But he thought not of the reeds : He clasped his gilded rosary, But he did not tell the beads; If he looked to the heaven, 'twas not to invoke The Spirit that dwelleth there ; If he opened his lips, the words they spoke Had never the tone of prayer. A pious priest might the abbot seem, He had swayed the crosier well; But what was the theme of the abbot's dream, The abbot were loth to tell. Companionless, for a mile or more, He traced the windings of the shore. Oh, beauteous is that river still, As it winds by many a sloping hill, And many a dim o'erarching grove, And many a flat and sunny cove, And terraced lawns, whose bright arcades The honeysuckle sweetly shades, And rocks, whose very crags seemed bowers, So gay they are with grass and flowers! But the abbot was thinking of scenery, About as much in sooth, As a lover thinks of constancy, Or an advocate of truth. He did not mark how the skies in wrath Grew dark above his head; He did not mark how the mossy path Grew damp beneath his tread; And nearer he came, and still more near, To a pool, in whose recess The water had slept for many a year, Unchanged and motionless; From the river stream it spread away ...« less