# Poems (Wordsworth, 1815)/Volume 1/Ruth

XV.
RUTH.
When Ruth was left half desolate Her Father took another Mate; And Ruth, not seven years old, A slighted Child, at her own will Went wandering over dale and hill, In thoughtless freedom bold.
And she had made a Pipe of straw, And from that oaten Pipe could draw All sounds of winds and floods; Had built a Bower upon the green, As if she from her birth had been An Infant of the woods.
Beneath her Father's roof, alone She seemed to live; her thoughts her own; Herself her own delight: Pleased with herself, nor sad nor gay, She passed her time; and in this way Grew up to Woman's height.
​There came a Youth from Georgia's shore— A military Casque he wore With splendid feathers drest; He brought them from the Cherokees; The feathers nodded in the breeze, And made a gallant crest.
From Indian blood you deem him sprung: Ah no! he spake the English tongue, And bore a Soldier's name; And, when America was free From battle and from jeopardy, He 'cross the ocean came.
With hues of genius on his cheek In finest tones the Youth could speak. —While he was yet a Boy The moon, the glory of the sun, And streams that murmur as they run, Had been his dearest joy.
He was a lovely Youth! I guess The panther in the wilderness Was not so fair as he; ​And, when he chose to sport and play, No dolphin ever was so gay Upon the tropic sea.
Among the Indians he had fought; And with him many tales he brought Of pleasure and of fear; Such tales as, told to any Maid By such a Youth, in the green shade, Were perilous to hear.
He told of Girls, a happy rout! Who quit their fold with dance and shout, Their pleasant Indian Town, To gather strawberries all day long; Returning with a choral song When day-light is gone down.
He spake of plants divine and strange That every hour their blossoms change, Ten thousand lovely hues! With budding, fading, faded flowers They stand the wonder of the bowers From morn to evening dews.
​He told of the Magnolia, spread High as a cloud, high over head! The Cypress and her spire, —Of flowers that with one scarlet gleam Cover a hundred leagues, and seem To set the hills on fire.
The Youth of green savannahs spake, And many an endless, endless lake, With all its fairy crowds Of islands, that together lie As quietly as spots of sky Among the evening clouds.
And then he said "How sweet it were A fisher or a hunter there, A gardener in the shade, Still wandering with an easy mind To build a household fire, and find A home in every glade!
​"What days and what sweet years! Ah me! Our life were life indeed, with thee So passed in quiet bliss, And all the while," said he, "to know That we were in a world of woe, On such an earth as this!"
And then he sometimes interwove Dear thoughts about a Father's love, "For there," said he, "are spun Around the heart such tender ties, That our own children to our eyes Are dearer than the sun.
"Sweet Ruth! and could you go with me My helpmate in the woods to be, Our shed at night to rear; Or run, my own adopted Bride, A sylvan Huntress at my side, And drive the flying deer!
"Beloved Ruth!"—No more he said. Sweet Ruth alone at midnight shed A solitary tear: ​She thought again—and did agree With him to sail across the sea, And drive the flying deer.
"And now, as fitting is and right, We in the Church our faith will plight, A Husband and a Wife." Even so they did; and I may say That to sweet Ruth that happy day Was more than human life.
Through dream and vision did she sink, Delighted all the while to think That, on those lonesome floods, And green savannahs, she should share His board with lawful joy, and bear His name in the wild woods.
But, as you have before been told, This Stripling, sportive, gay, and bold, And with his dancing crest So beautiful, through savage lands Had roamed about with vagrant bands Of Indians in the West.
​The wind, the tempest roaring high, The tumult of a tropic sky, Might well be dangerous food For him, a Youth to whom was given So much of earth—so much of Heaven, And such impetuous blood.
Whatever in those Climes he found Irregular in sight or sound Did to his mind impart A kindred impulse, seemed allied To his own powers, and justified The workings of his heart.
Nor less to feed voluptuous thought The beauteous forms of nature wrought, Fair trees and lovely flowers; The breezes their own languor lent; The stars had feelings, which they sent Into those gorgeous bowers.
Yet, in his worst pursuits, I ween That sometimes there did intervene Pure hopes of high intent; ​For passions linked to forms so fair And stately needs must have their share Of noble sentiment.
But ill he lived, much evil saw With men to whom no better law Nor better life was known; Deliberately and undeceived Those wild men's vices he received, And gave them back his own.
His genius and his moral frame Were thus impaired, and he became The slave of low desires: A Man who without self-control Would seek what the degraded soul Unworthily admires.
And yet he with no feigned delight Had wooed the maiden, day and night Had loved her, night and morn: What could he less than love a Maid Whose heart with so much nature played? So kind and so forlorn!
​But now the pleasant dream was gone; No hope, no wish remained, not one,— They stirred him now no more; New objects did new pleasure give, And once again he wished to live As lawless as before.
Meanwhile, as thus with him it fared, They for the voyage were prepared, And went to the sea-shore; But, when they thither came, the Youth Deserted his poor Bride, and Ruth Could never find him more.
"God help thee, Ruth!"—Such pains she had That she in half a year was mad And in a prison housed; And there, exulting in her wrongs, Among the music of her songs She fearfully caroused.
Yet sometimes milder hours she knew, Nor wanted sun, nor rain, nor dew, Nor pastimes of the May, ​—They all were with her in her cell; And a wild brook with cheerful knell Did o'er the pebbles play.
When Ruth three seasons thus had lain There came a respite to her pain, She from her prison fled; But of the Vagrant none took thought; And where it liked her best she sought Her shelter and her bread.
Among the fields she breathed again: The master-current of her brain Ran permanent and free; And, coming to the banks of Tone, There did she rest; and dwell alone Under the greenwood tree.
The engines of her pain, the tools That shaped her sorrow, rocks and pools, And airs that gently stir ​The vernal leaves, she loved them still, Nor ever taxed them with the ill Which had been done to her.
A Barn her winter bed supplies; But till the warmth of summer skies And summer days is gone, (And all do in this tale agree) She sleeps beneath the greenwood tree, And other home hath none.
An innocent life, yet far astray! And Ruth will, long before her day, Be broken down and old. Sore aches she needs must have! but less Of mind, than body's wretchedness, From damp, and rain, and cold.
If she is pressed by want of food, She from her dwelling in the wood Repairs to a road-side; And there she begs at one steep place, Where up and down with easy pace The horsemen-travellers ride.
​That oaten Pipe of hers is mute, Or thrown away; but with a flute Her loneliness she cheers: This flute, made of a hemlock stalk, At evening in his homeward walk The Quantock Woodman hears.
I, too, have passed her on the hills Setting her little water-mills By spouts and fountains wild— Such small machinery as she turned Ere she had wept, ere she had mourned, A young and happy Child!
Farewell! and when thy days are told, Ill-fated Ruth! in hallowed mould Thy corpse shall buried be; For thee a funeral bell shall ring, And all the congregation sing A Christian psalm for thee.
* ↑ Magnolia grandiflora.
* ↑ The splendid appearance of these scarlet flowers, which are scattered with such profusion over the Hills in the Southern parts of North America, is frequently mentioned by Bartram in his Travels.
* ↑ The Tone is a River of Somersetshire at no great distance from the Quantock Hills. These Hills, which are alluded to a few Stanzas below, are extremely beautiful, and in most places richly covered with Coppice woods.