I told where he was--I trusted them both,
Sounding the depths of their souls in their eyes;
The man was too honest to need an oath,
And the woman too tender not to be wise.
They were ready to help with hand and heart
(And a kindness no balancing prudence bounds),
Fed me and petted me, let me depart,
And lent me at parting five hundred pounds.
We started as if for an airing gay,
No coachman or footman, not even Jane;
The husband drove us the whole of the way,
And saw me safe in the Liverpool train.
The tears of my friend lie wet on my cheek,
I pointed onward, and wistfully smil'd;
Her husband smil'd too, though he did not speak
And kiss'd me as if I had been his child.
Never a slumber the whole of the night,
Never a slumber with day in the skies;
Nature assumes preternatural light,
Set in sharp outlines that dazzle my eyes.
Blackness and whiteness--no colour there is--
Terrible contrast of lustre and shade--
Yet no surprise thrills my spirit at this
Wonderful world into silhouettes made.
Countries and cities rush hastily by,
Hedgerows and forests excitedly fly;
Rapidly earth pirouettes through the sky;
All things are madly in motion, but I--
If they would stop for one minute, but one,
Thought might return from spheres distant and dim;
Thought has forsaken me; I am alone,
With but one consciousness--nothing but _him_.
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