Williams, Hugh W.: Select views in Greece (Band 1) (London, 1829)

THE VALLEY OF THE PLEISTUS,

FROM DELPHI, MOUNT PARNASSUS.

" Above, the mountain rears a peak,
Where vultures whet the thirsty beak,
And their's may be a feast to-night,
Shall tempt them down ere morrow's light.
Beneath, a river's wintry stream
Has shrunk before the summer beam,
And left a channel bleak and bare,
Save shrubs that spring to perish there.
Each side the midway path there lay
Small broken crags of granite gray,
By time or mountain lightning riven,
From summits clad in mists of heaven }
For where is he that hath beheld
The peak of Liakura* unveiled V

Giaoue, 553.

There have been bright and glorious pageants here,
Where now gray stones and moss-grown columns lie;
There have been words, which earth grew pale to hear,
Breath'd from the cavern's misty chambers nigh :-=-
There have been voices, through the sunny sky,
And the pine woods, their choral hymn-notes, sending,
And reeds and lyres, their Dorian melody,
With incense-clouds around the temple blending,
And tlirongs, with laurel boughs, before the altar bending.

* Parnassus.