Loin

“ HOME FROM THE HILL.
"Home is the sailor, home from the sea,
⁠And the hunter home from the hill."
—R. L. S.
Let the weary body lie
⁠Where he chose its grave,
'Neath the wide and starry sky,
⁠By the Southern wave;
While the island holds her trust
⁠And the hill keeps faith,
Through the watches that divide
⁠The long night of death. ”

“ Once upon a time the air, the mountain, and the sea lived undisturbed upon all the earth. The mountain alone was immovable; he stood always here upon his rocky foundation, and the sea rippled and foamed at his feet, while the air danced freely over his head and about his grim face. It came to pass that both the sea and the air loved the mountain, but the mountain loved the sea.
"Dance on forever, O air," said the mountain; "dance on and sing your merry songs. But I love the gentle sea, who in sweet humility crouches at my feet or playfully dashes her white spray against my brown bosom." ”

“ Lonely are you and I,
Heart of my heart.
Lonely the mountain-top
Stands in the sky.
Sunder’d as peak and sea
Are you and I.
The mountain cannot move,
The sea must stay.
Ruled is the world. We too,
We must obey. ”

“ We came down from the hill—each spot of earth was a hill just then; an unseen hand lifted our souls on high above the dark vapour-circle, and they looked down as if from alps, seeing nothing save gleaming peaks of other mountain ranges—for all the mean, all that was not the high, all graves, petty goals, and life careers of humanity, were veiled in heavy mist. ”

“ In the lone recesses of the hills and in that wild mountain, they had nothing to fear from savage man or beast. The land in here was as desolate and barren of everything but snow and ice as that worn-out world, the moon itself. ”

“ But we'll still be together, this road and I, Together, wherever the long road goes. The wind chases by us, and over the corn Pale shadows flee from us as if from their foes. Like a snake we thresh on the long, forlorn Land, as onward the long road goes. ”

“ Few are alive who report, and few are alive who remember,
More of him now than a name carved somewhere on the sea.
"Where is he lying?" I ask, and the lights in the valley are nearer;
Down to the streets I go, down to the murmur of men.
Down to the roar of the sea in a ship may be well for another—
Down where he lies to-night, silent, and under the storms. ”

“ I own I had no desire to linger longer in this land: we had continued for so many days among ravines, defiles, and narrow valleys, peering up at the sky from the depths between mountains, that the eye grew eager for a view of heaven, and yearned to behold a more extensive horizon. When the bourne of a journey lies beyond, the desire to linger, even in beautiful scenery, is weak. ”

“ The whole length of this land in sight was the very symbol of distortion. Pendent from an even line that stretches along the heavens was a ridge of mountains. 'Life hangs upon a little thread,' but what think you of mountains hanging upon a thread? ”

“ Afar and agleam, like a valley of dream,
Still mocks you a Land of Beyond.
Thank God! there is always a Land of Beyond
For us who are true to the trail;
A vision to seek, a beckoning peak,
A farness that never will fail ”

“ In the hills of life there are two trails. One lies along the higher sunlit fields where those who journey see afar, and the light lingers even when the sun is down; and one leads to the lower ground, where those who travel, as they go, look always over their shoulders with eyes of dread, and gloomy shadows gather long before the day is done.
This, my story, is the story of a man who took the trail that leads to the lower ground, and of a woman, and how she found her way to the higher sunlit fields. ”

“ We stand on a mountain pass in the midst of whirling snow and blinding mist, through which we get glimpses now and then of paths which may be deceptive. If we stand still we shall be frozen to death. If we take the wrong road we shall be dashed to pieces. ”

“ Our road lay over a vast plain, seemingly boundless, for the lofty mountain-ranges that surrounded it on all sides were so distant and cloud-like, and so lifted from the horizon by the deceptive mirage, that the eye did not recognize their connection with it. ”

“ I, too, am a wanderer, driven like thee;
I, too, am seeking a distant land
To be lost and gone ere I reach the strand
For the land I seek is a waveless shore,
And they who once reach it shall wander no more. ”

“ How under our feet the long, white road Backward like a river flowed, Sweeping with it fences and hedges, Whilst farther away, and overhead, Paler than I, with fear and dread, The moon fled with us, as we fled Along the forest's jagged edges! ”

“ Horizon after horizon loomed over the shoulder of its fellows as the gray-draped hills rose one beyond the other and tiptoed softly away into the yonder world,—so softly that you could not tell where the earth ended and the heavens began. ”

“ We are in the region of that eternal silence which wraps the summit of the ‘everlasting hills.’ A hush of dreamy repose broods over this lofty peak, which still retains the last rays of the setting sun, while over the world below twilight has fallen. ”

“ Spans the wide sweep of shore and sky,
Yet other hosts are gathering near,
Yet other hills of foam appear;
And onward o'er the deep they roar,
To seek their brethren on the shore—
Like them to thunder, and be seen no more! ”

“ It was getting dusk, and the moon rising, when we reached the confines of the plain and began to descend a hill, or rather a steep rocky road leading right into the hills themselves, and which at every instant grew steeper and rougher. ”

“ As a distant journey is begun by our first footstep and goes on for months and years, as a high mountain has its beginning in the dust of its base and at length rises aloft and extends across the sky like the clouds of heaven, so gradual must have been the rise of poetry. ”

“ I am one of you no longer; by the trails my feet have broken,
⁠The dizzy peaks I've scaled, the camp-fire's glow;
By the lonely seas I've sailed in—yea, the final word is spoken,
⁠I am signed and sealed to nature. Be it so. ”

“ Easy is the way for strangers:
Thou must journey through the forest,
Hasten to the river-border,
Travel one day, then a second,
And the third from morn till even,
To the north-west, thou must journey. ”

“ Let us probe the silent places, let us seek what luck betide us;
⁠Let us journey to a lonely land I know.
There's a whisper on the night-wind, there's a star agleam to guide us,
⁠And the Wild is calling, calling . . . let us go. ”

“ By your bones they will follow behind you, till the ways of the world are made plain.
Bid good-by to sweetheart, bid good-by to friend;
The Lone Trail, the Lone Trail follow to the end.
Tarry not, and fear not, chosen of the true;
Lover of the Lone Trail, the Lone Trail waits for you. ”

“ That she hath received of the Lord's hand Double for all her sins.
3Hark! one calleth: 'Clear ye in the wilderness the way of the Lord, Make plain in the desert A highway for our God. 4Every valley shall be lifted up, And every mountain and hill shall be made low; And the rugged shall be made level, And the rough places a plain; 5And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, And all flesh shall see it together ”

“ The sheer mountains, on some days, seem to be the creation of my own lean terrible thoughts, and I am glad: the soft, wooded hills below and behind seem the creation of the pampered luxurious thought which I have left in the world of many men.... ”

“ But the distant finishing which nature has given to the picture, is of a very different character. It is a true contrast to the foreground. It is as placid and delightful, as that is wild and tremendous. For the mountain being cloven asunder, she presents to your eye, through the cleft, a small catch of smooth blue horizon, at an infinite distance in the plain country, inviting you, as it were, from the riot and tumult roaring around, to pass through the breach and participate of the calm below. Here the eye ultimately composes itself; and that way too the road happens actually to lead. ”

“ His voice was low as the whisperings of the woods when the wind is asleep, and the visions of Heaven unfold their visitation. "Parting is hard, and death is terrible; I seem to walk through a deep valley, far from the light of day, alone and comfortless! ”

“ And often, academically, perhaps a little wistfully, as one talks of something to be dreamed of but never enjoyed, we spoke of how fine it would be to ride down into that land of mystery and enchantment, to penetrate one after another the cañons dimly outlined in the shadows cast by the westering sun, to cross the mountains lying outspread in easy grasp of the eye, to gain the distant blue Ridge, and see with our own eyes what lay beyond. ”

“ But who can count the countless hosts, that fled to and lay dead and unnoticed in every part of the wide earth and sea, on the fields and plains, in forests and woods, on land and water, on mountains and dales, on shores and coasts and on the hills and cliffs. ”

“ And seek for the lands no foot has trod and the seas no sail has known:
For the lands to the west of the evening and east of the morning's birth,
Where the gods unseen in their valleys green are glad at the ends of the earth
And fear no morrow to bring them sorrow, nor night to quench their mirth. ”

“ Turning our eyes from the terrible fascinations of the precipice to the apex of the hill now in full view, a strange sight there met our eyes—a sight so strange that we venture to say the reader no more anticipates it than we did, at the moment when we looked from the yawning precipice to what we expected to be a solitary mountain-top. ”

“ Instead of descending toward a deep, dark valley we stand, in fact, before a delectable mountain, from the summit of which, if we can only reach it, we can view the world in a clearer light and in truer perspective than the race has yet attained. ”

“ Deep in its caverned heart the forest sings
Of mysteries unknown and vanished lore;
Old wisdom; dead desire;
Dreams of the past, of immemorial springs....
The wind is rising cold from the river: close the door. ”

“ As silently we turned the eastern flank
Of the mountain, where its shadow deepest sank,
Doubling the night along our rugged road:
We felt that man was more than his abode,—
⁠The inward life than Nature's raiment more ”

“ Yet the mountain has the unrivalled advantage of silence. We accustom ourselves so quickly to the murmur of the torrents that roll at the bottom., and even that murmur is like the hidden refrain that accompanies a day-dream. ”

“ While the sun sleeps on the mountain, 10
Wild-hearted lover and loved one,
Safe in Pan’s keeping?
XXX Love shakes my soul, like a mountain wind
Falling upon the trees,
When they are swayed and whitened and bowed
As the great gusts will. ”

“ At the crest of the hill I shall hail the new summits to climb.
The demand of my vision shall beggar the largess of time.
For I know that the higher I press, the wider I view,
The more's to be ventured and visioned, in worlds that are new. ”

“ While we are ascending the hill of life, little obstructions or aids seem of great importance; but when we reach the summit, if the Sun of Glory beam there, the whole journey appears but as one path of light. ”

“ Then came I to a land I knew no man had ever seen,
A haggard land, forlornly spanned by mountains lank and lean;
The nitchies said ’twas full of dread, of smoke and fiery breath,
And no man dare put foot in there for fear of pain and death. ”

“ Often have I travelled eagerly to the summit of some neighbouring hill, where the clouds seemed to mark the limits of the world I lived in, my mind filled with an indescribable expectation that I would there meet with something to realise my wild ideas, some enchanted scene or other ”

“ Through many a desert range and over many a chain of hills, violet in the distance, alluring and remote; past many a sacred well or hill marked by a cross, hard by the paths worn by the generations of bare or sandalled feet we may pass ”

“ Like birds of air they flew with might in lengthened lines from heaven's high ridges to the borders of the sky. The steeds who carry them, as Gods and mortals know, have caused the waters of the mountains to descend. ”

“ There are mountains ahead and mountains behind, purple with distance and radiant with sunshine, and the sky bends over them and seems to touch their crests. But here, on the spot where we stand, life seems flat and mean, and far away from the heavens. ”