He takes the open path at dawn,
With golden lures to lead him on, —
The truant wind's low murmurings,
The surge of southward-sweeping wings.
He sees the gentian by the brook
Cast back at him an azure look,
And marks above the soft green sod
A pirouetting butterfly,
Like a blown shred of goldenrod,
Go drifting by.

He tastes the brew that Robin Hood
Once quaffed within the ancient wood, —
The aromatic essences
Of beechen and of balsam trees;
And feels an ardor run along
His veins, and stir his lips to song, —
A simple strain of reedy mirth,
Echoes of airs Arcadian,
Full of the ecstasy of earth,
The joy of Pan.

He thrills to hear the crickets croon
Beneath the arches of the noon,

When the red harvest-promise smiles
From all the fruited orchard aisles;
And gleans more glory from the hues
That on the hill slopes flame and fuse, —
Senses in them a stronger spell
Than in the radiant dyes that glow
On canvases by Raphael
And Angelo.

And if the dusk and dewfall find
Him still unhoused, he knows them kind,
Like the light touch of tender hands;
And through the quiet autumn lands,
Accompanied by dreams, he goes,
His spirit filled with sweet repose;
Then on the bosom of the west
A fair beam beckons from afar,
A guerdon, and a guide to rest, —
One pilgrim star!