20
WINTER.
The following is a translation of the opening lines of a poem entitled a Satire on Winter.
Winter, icy, dark, and slow!
Ram that batterest the wood!
Never was there such a foe
To the damsel fair and good,
As the father of the snow,
Fiercely rambling to and fro,
’Mid the hamlets of our land!
Little mercy at his hand
Would that maiden’s truth requite,
Who for poet’s love would dare,
’Mid the snows and harrowing air,
And icicles of night.
*****
THE MIST.
At dawn, as to my love I sped,
A treacherous fog my steps misled;
Long through its labyrinths I strayed,
Then thus reviled the child of shade:—
