STEPPING WESTWARD

Alice Meynell

1910

"While my fellow-traveller and I were walking by the side of Loch

Katrine", "one fine evening after sunset", "in our road to a hut where in the course of our tour we had been hospitably entertained some weeks before", "we met", "in one of the loneliest parts of that solitary region", "two well-dressed women", "one of whom said to us", "by way of greeting", ‘"What", "you are stepping westward"?'

‘"What", "you are stepping westward"?'-‘"Yea".'

-'Twould be a wildish destiny,

If we, who thus together roam
In a strange land, and far from home,
Were in this place the guests of chance;
Yet who would stop, or fear t' advance,
Though home or shelter he had none,
With such a sky to lead him on?

The dewy ground was dark and cold;
Behind, all gloomy to behold;
And stepping westward seemed to be
A kind of heavenly destiny:
I liked the greeting; 'twas a sound
Of something without place or bound;
And seemed to give me spiritual right
To travel through that region bright.

The voice was soft, and she who spake
Was walking by her native lake;
The salutation had to me
The very sound of courtesy;
Its power was felt; and while my eye
Was fixed upon the glowing sky,
The echo of the voice enwrought
A human sweetness with the thought
Of travelling through the world that lay
Before me in my endless way.

End of title

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