I have loved thee; and in my days both of happiness and sorrow I have peopled your solitudes with wild fancies of my own creation.

The woods, and lakes, and mountains which I have loved, have for me a thousand associations; and thou, oh, Sun! hast smiled upon, and borne your part in many imaginations that sprung to life in my soul alone, and which will die with me.

Your solitudes, sweet land, your trees and waters will still exist, moved by your winds, or still beneath the eye of noon, though[83] [w]hat I have felt about ye, and all my dreams which have often strangely deformed thee, will die with me.

You will exist to reflect other images in other minds, and ever will remain the same, although your reflected semblance vary in a thousand ways, changeable as the hearts of those who view thee.

One of these fragile mirrors, that ever doted on thine image, is about to be broken, crumbled to dust.