| OF the old house, only a few crumbled | |
| Courses of brick, smothered in nettle and dock, | |
| Or a squared stone, lying mossy where it tumbled! | |
| Sprawling bramble and saucy thistle mock | |
| What once was firelit floor and private charm | 5 |
| Where, seen in a windowed picture, hills were fading | |
| At dusk, and all was memory-coloured and warm, | |
| And voices talked, secure from the wind's invading. | |
| |
| Of the old garden, only a stray shining | |
| Of daffodil flames amid April's cuckoo-flowers, | 10 |
| Or a cluster of aconite mixt with weeds entwining! | |
| But, dark and lofty, a royal cedar towers | |
| By homely thorns: whether the white rain drifts | |
| Or sun scorches, he holds the downs in ken, | |
| The western vale; his branchy tiers he lifts, | 15 |
| Older than many a generation of men. | |