The Ascetic

"It was a day of sombre heat:     The still, dense air was void of sound     And life; no wing of bird did beat     A little breeze through it,"

"Who are these strange small folk,     These that come to our homes as kings,     Asking nor leave nor grace,     Bending our necks to their yok"

"The sun burns fiercely down the skies;     The sea is full of flashing eyes;     The waves glide shoreward serpentwise     And fawn with foamy"

"The day and its delights are done;     So all delights and days expire:     Down in the dim, sad West the sun     Is dying like a dying fire."

"Here morning in the ploughman's songs is met     Ere yet one footstep shows in all the sky,     And twilight in the east, a doubt as yet,     S"

"The Text is taken from Percy's Reliques (1765), vol. i. p. 71, 'given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.' Herd had a very similar bal"