56
THE GOLDEN VIOLET.
She reach'd that glen; not till then she took
One moment's breath, or one moment's look.
When paused she in awe—'twas so lone, so still;
Silence was laid on the leaf and the rill,—
It was stillness as that of the tomb around,
The beat of her heart was the only sound.
On one side bleak rocks the barrier made,
As the first great curse were upon them laid;
Drear and desolate, stern and bare,
Tempests and time had been ravaging there.
And there gather'd darkly the lowering sky,
As if fearing its own obscurity;
And spectre like, around the vale,
Pale larches flung their long arms on the gale,
Till the sward of the glen sloped abruptly away,
And a gloomy lake under the precipice lay.
