HANDOUT 5: "The Highlands" by Margaret Fuller

Highlands of the Hudson River
Thomas Chambers, 1874



THE HIGHLANDS

Margaret Fuller (1810-1850)

SAW ye first, arrayed in mist and cloud;
No cheerful lights softened your aspect bold;
A sullen gray, or green, more grave and cold,
The varied beauties of the scene enshroud.
Yet not the less, O Hudson! calm and proud,
Did I receive the impress of that hour
Which showed thee to me, emblem of that power
Of high resolve, to which even rocks have bowed;
Thou wouldst not deign thy course to turn aside,
And seek some smiling valley's welcome warm,
But through the mountain's very heart, thy pride
Has been, thy channel and thy banks to form.
Not even the "bulwarks of the world" could bar
The inland fount from joining ocean's war!

"The Highlands" is reprinted from Life without and life within; or, Reviews, narratives, essays, and poems. Margaret Fuller. New York: The Tribune association, 1869.