;
His humid front the cive, anheling, wipes,
And dreams of erring on ventiferous ripes.

How dulce to vive occult to mortal eyes,
Dorm on the herb with none to supervise,
Carp the suave berries from the crescent vine,
And bibe the flow from longicaudate kine!

To me, alas! no verdurous visions come,
Save yon exiguous pool's conferva-scum,--
No concave vast repeats the tender hue
That laves my milk-jug with celestial blue!

Me wretched! Let me curr to quercine shades
Effund your albid hausts, lactiferous maids!
Oh, might I vole to some umbrageous clump,--
Depart,--be off,--excede,--evade,--erump!

--I have lived by the sea-shore and by the mountains.--No, I am not
going to say which is best. The one where your place is is the
best for you. But this difference there is: you can domesticate
mountains, but the sea is ferae naturae. You may have a hut, or
know the owner of one, on the mountain-side; you see a light
half-way up its ascent in the evening, and you know there is a home,
and you might share it. You have noted certain trees, perhaps; you
know the particular zone where the hemlocks look so black in
October, when the maples and beeches have faded. All its reliefs
and intaglios have electrotyped themselves in the medallions that
hang round the walls of your memory's chamber.--The sea remembers
nothing. It is feline. It licks your feet,--its huge flanks purr
very pleasantly for you; but it will crack your bones and eat you,
for all that, and wipe the crimsoned foam from its jaws as if
nothing had happened. The mountains give their lost children
berries and water; the sea mocks their thirst and lets them die.
The mountains have a grand, stupid, lovable tranquillity; the sea
has a fascinating, treacherous intelligence. The mountains lie
about like huge ruminants, their broad backs awful to look upon,
but safe to handle. The sea smooths its silver scales until you
cannot see their joints,--but their shining is that of a snake's
belly, after all.--In deeper suggestiveness I find as great a
difference. The mountains dwarf mankind and foreshorten the
procession of its long generations. The sea drowns out humanity
and time; it has no sympathy with either; for it belongs to
eternity, and of that it sings its monotonous song forever and
ever.

Yet I should love to have a little box by the seashore. I should
love to gaze out on the wild feline element from a front window of
my own, just as I should