Chapter XLV: =Mablethorpe=

[Published in _Manchester Athænaum Album_, 1850. Written, 1837. Republished, altered, in _Life_, vol. I, p. 161.]

How often, when a child I lay reclined,
I took delight in this locality!
Here stood the infant Ilion of the mind,
And here the Grecian ships did seem to be.

And here again I come and only find
The drain-cut levels of the marshy lea,--
Gray sand banks and pale sunsets--dreary wind,
Dim shores, dense rains, and heavy clouded sea.