| |
| RISE! Sleep no more! ’T is a noble morn. | |
| The dews hang thick on the fringèd thorn, | |
| And the frost shrinks back like a beaten hound, | |
| Under the steaming, steaming ground. | |
| Behold, where the billowy clouds flow by, | 5 |
| And leave us alone in the clear gray sky! | |
| Our horses are ready and steady.—So, ho! | |
| I ’m gone, like a dart from the Tartar’s bow. | |
| Hark, hark!—Who calleth the maiden Morn | |
| From her sleep in the woods and the stubble corn? | 10 |
| The horn,—the horn! | |
| The merry, sweet ring of the hunter’s horn. | |
| |
| Now, through the copse where the fox is found, | |
| And over the stream at a mighty bound, | |
| And over the high lands and over the low, | 15 |
| O’er furrows, o’er meadows, the hunters go! | |
| Away!—as a hawk flies full at his prey, | |
| So flieth the hunter, away, away! | |
| From the burst at the cover till set of sun, | |
| When the red fox dies, and—the day is done. | 20 |
| Hark, hark!—What sound on the wind is borne? | |
| ’T is the conquering voice of the hunter’s horn: | |
| The horn,—the horn! | |
| The merry, bold voice of the hunter’s horn. | |
| |
| Sound! Sound the horn! To the hunter good | 25 |
| What ’s the gully deep or the roaring flood? | |
| Right over he bounds, as the wild stag bounds, | |
| At the heels of his swift, sure, silent hounds. | |
| Oh, what delight can a mortal lack, | |
| When he once is firm on his horse’s back, | 30 |
| With his stirrups short, and his snaffle strong, | |
| And the blast of the horn for his morning song? | |
| Hark, hark!—Now home! and dream till morn | |
| Of the bold, sweet sound of the hunter’s horn! | |
| The horn,—the horn! | 35 |
| Oh, the sound of all sounds is the hunter’s horn! | |
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