Trehill Well

There stood a low and ivied roof,
    As gazing rustics tell,
In times of chivalry and song
    'Yclept the holy well.

Above the ivies' branchlets gray
    In glistening clusters shone;
While round the base the grass-blades bright
    And spiry foxglove sprung.

The brambles clung in graceful bands,
    Chequering the old gray stone
With shining leaflets, whose bright face
    In autumn's tinting shone.

Around the fountain's eastern base
    A babbling brooklet sped,
With sleepy murmur purling soft
    Adown its gravelly bed.

Within the cell the filmy ferns
    To woo the clear wave bent;
And cushioned mosses to the stone
    Their quaint embroidery lent.

The fountain's face lay still as glass--
    Save where the streamlet free
Across the basin's gnarled lip
    Flowed ever silently.

Above the well a little nook
    Once held, as rustics tell,
All garland-decked, an image of
    The Lady of the Well.

They tell of tales of mystery,
    Of darkling deeds of woe;
But no! such doings might not brook
    The holy streamlet's flow.

Oh tell me not of bitter thoughts,
    Of melancholy dreams,
By that fair fount whose sunny wall
    Basks in the western beams.

When last I saw that little stream,
    A form of light there stood,
That seemed like a precious gem,
    Beneath that archway rude:

And as I gazed with love and awe
    Upon that sylph-like thing,
Methought that airy form must be
    The fairy of the spring.

Helston, 1835.