III. 3.
Lord of each pang the nerves can feel,
Hence, with the rack and reeking wheel.
Faith lifts the soul above this little ball!
While gleams of glory open round,
And circling choirs of angels call,
Can’st thou, with all thy terrors crown’d,
Hope to obscure that latent spark,
Destin’d to shine when suns are dark?
Thy triumphs cease! thro’ every land,
Hark! Truth proclaims, thy triumphs cease:
Her heavenly form, with glowing hand,
Benignly points to piety and peace.
Flush’d with youth her looks impart
Each fine feeling as it flows;
Her voice the echo of her heart,
Pure as the mountain-snows:
Celestial transports round her play,
And softly, sweetly die away.
She smiles! and where is now the cloud
That blacken’d o’er thy baleful reign?
Grim darkness furls his leaden shroud,
Shrinking from her glance in vain.
Her touch unlocks the day-spring from above,
And lo! it visits man with beams of light and love.
[1] Written in the year 1784.
[2] An allusion to the sacrifice of Iphigenia.
[3] Lucretius, I. 63.
[4] When we were ready to set out, our host muttered some words in the ears of our cattle. See a Voyage to the North of Europe in 1653.
[5] The Bramins expose their bodies to the intense heat of the sun.
[6] Ridens moriar. The conclusion of an old Runic ode.
[7] In the Bedas, or sacred writings of the Hindoos, it is written: “She, who dies with her husband, shall live for ever with him in heaven.”
[8] The Fates of the Northern Mythology. See MALLET’S Antiquities.
[9] An allusion to the Second Sight.
[10] See that fine description of the sudden animation of the Palladium in the second book of the Æneid.
[11] The bull, Apis.
[12] The Crocodile.
[13] So numerous were the Deities of Egypt, that, according to an antient proverb, it was in that country less difficult to find a god than a man.
[14] The Hieroglyphics.
[15] The Catacombs, in which the bodies of the earliest generations yet remain without corruption, by virtue of the gums that embalmed them.
[16] “The Persians,” says Herodotus, “reject the use of temples, altars, and statues. The tops of the highest mountains are the places chosen for sacrifices.” I. 131. The elements, and more particularly Fire, were the objects of their religious reverence.
[17] An imitation of some wonderful lines in the sixth
Æneid.
[18] See Tacitus, 1. xiv. c. 29.
[19] This remarkable event happened at the siege and sack of
Jerusalem, in the last year of the eleventh century. Hume, I.221.
VERSES
WRITTEN TO BE SPOKEN BY
MRS. SIDDONS.[[1]]
Yes, ’tis the pulse of life! my fears were vain!
I wake, I breathe, and am myself again.
Still in this nether world; no seraph yet!
Nor walks my spirit, when the sun is set,
With troubled step to haunt the fatal board,
Where I died last—by poison or the sword;
Blanching each honest cheek with deeds of night,
Done here so oft by dim and doubtful light.
To drop all metaphor, that little bell
Call’d back reality, and broke the spell.
No heroine claims your tears with tragic tone;
A very woman—scarce restrains her own!
Can she, with fiction, charm the cheated mind,
When to be grateful is the part assign’d?
Ah, No! she scorns the trappings of her Art;
No theme but truth, no prompter but the heart!
But, Ladies, say, must I alone unmask?
Is here no other actress? let me ask.
Believe me, those, who best the heart dissect,
Know every Woman studies stage-effect.
She moulds her manners to the part she fills,
As Instinct teaches, or as Humour wills;
And, as the grave or gay her talent calls,
Acts in the drama, till the curtain falls.
First, how her little breast with triumph swells,
When the red coral rings its golden bells!
To play in pantomime is then the rage,
Along the carpet’s many-colour’d stage;
Or lisp her merry thoughts with loud endeavour,
Now here, now there—in noise and mischief ever!
A school-girl next, she curls her hair in papers,
And mimics father’s gout, and mother’s vapours;
Discards her doll, bribes Betty for romances;
Playful at church, and serious when she dances;
Tramples alike on customs and on toes,
And whispers all she hears to all she knows;
Terror of caps, and wigs, and sober notions!
A romp! that longest of perpetual motions!
—Till tam’d and tortur’d into foreign graces,
She sports her lovely face at public places;
And with blue, laughing eyes, behind her fan,
First acts her part with that great actor, MAN.
Too soon a flirt, approach her and she flies!
Frowns when pursued, and, when entreated, sighs!
Plays with unhappy men as cats with mice;
Till fading beauty hints the late advice.
Her prudence dictates what her pride disdain’d,
And now she sues to slaves herself had chain’d!
Then comes that good old character, a Wife,
With all the dear, distracting cares of life;
A thousand cards a day at doors to leave,
And, in return, a thousand cards receive;
Rouge high, play deep, to lead the ton aspire,
With nightly blaze set PORTLAND-PLACE on fire;
Snatch half a glimpse at Concert, Opera, Ball,
A Meteor, trac’d by none, tho’ seen by all;
And, when her shatter’d nerves forbid to roam,
In very spleen—rehearse the girls at home.
Last the grey Dowager, in antient flounces,
With snuff and spectacles the age denounces;
Boasts how the Sires of this degenerate Isle
Knelt for a look, and duell’d for a smile.
The scourge and ridicule of Goth and Vandal,
Her tea she sweetens, as she sips, with scandal;
With modern Belles eternal warfare wages,
Like her own birds that clamour from their cages;
And shuffles round to bear her tale to all,
Like some old Ruin, ‘nodding to its fall!’
Thus WOMAN makes her entrance and her exit;
Not least an actress, when she least suspects it.
Yet Nature oft peeps out and mars the plot,
Each lesson lost, each poor pretence forgot;
Full oft, with energy that scorns controul,
At once lights up the features of the soul;
Unlocks each thought chain’d by coward Art,
And to full day the latent passions start!
—And she, whose first, best wish is your applause,
Herself exemplifies the truth she draws.
Born on the stage—thro’ every shifting scene,
Obscure or bright, tempestuous or serene,
Still has your smile her trembling spirit fir’d!
And can she act, with thoughts like these inspir’d?
Thus from her mind all artifice she flings,
All skill, all practice, now unmeaning things!
To you, uncheck’d, each genuine feeling flows;
For all that life endears—to you she owes.
[1] After a Tragedy, performed for her benefit, at the Theatre Royal in Drury-lane, April 27, 1795.
To - - - - -
Go—you may call it madness, folly;
You shall not chase my gloom away.
There’s such a charm in melancholy,
I would not, if I could, be gay.
Oh, if you knew the pensive pleasure
That fills my bosom when I sigh,
You would not rob me of a treasure
Monarchs are too poor to buy.
THE SAILOR.
The Sailor sighs as sinks his native shore,
As all its lessening turrets bluely fade;
He climbs the mast to feast his eye once more,
And busy Fancy fondly lends her aid.
Ah! now, each dear, domestic scene he knew,
Recall’d and cherish’d in a foreign clime,
Charms with the magic of a moonlight-view;
Its colours mellow’d, not impair’d, by time,
True as the needle, homeward points his heart,
Thro’ all the horrors of the stormy main;
This, the last wish that would with life depart,
To meet the smile of her he loves again.
When Morn first faintly draws her silver line,
Or Eve’s grey cloud descends to drink the wave;
When sea and sky in midnight darkness join,
Still, still he views the parting look she gave.
Her gentle spirit, lightly hovering o’er,
Attends his little bark from pole to pole;
And, when the beating billows round him roar,
Whispers sweet hope to sooth his troubled soul.
Carv’d is her name in many a spicy grove,
In many a plaintain-forest, waving wide;
Where dusky youths in painted plumage rove,
And giant palms o’er-arch the golden tide.
But lo, at last he comes with crowded sail!
Lo, o’er the cliff what eager figures bend!
And hark, what mingled murmurs swell the gale!
In each he hears the welcome of a friend.
—’Tis she, ’tis she herself! she waves her hand!
Soon is the anchor cast, the canvass furl’d;
Soon thro’ the whitening surge he springs to land,
And clasps the maid he singled from the world.
TO AN OLD OAK.
Immota manet; multosque nepotes,
Multa virûm volvens durando sæcula, vincit.
VIRG.
Round thee, alas, no shadows move!
From thee no sacred murmurs breathe!
Yet within thee, thyself a grove,
Once did the eagle scream above,
And the wolf howl beneath.
There once the steel-clad knight reclin’d,
His sable plumage tempest-toss’d;
And, as the death-bell smote the wind,
From towers long fled by human kind,
His brow the hero cross’d!
Then Culture came, and days serene,
And village-sports, and garlands gay.
Full many a pathway cross’d the green;
And maids and shepherd-youths were seen,
To celebrate the May.
Father of many a forest deep,
(Whence many a navy thunder-fraught)
Erst in their acorn-cells asleep,
Soon destin’d o’er the world to sweep,
Opening new spheres of thought!
Wont in the night of woods to dwell,
The holy druid saw thee rise;
And, planting there the guardian-spell,
Sung forth, the dreadful pomp to swell
Of human sacrifice!
Thy singed top and branches bare
Now straggle in the evening sky;
And the wan moon wheels round to glare
On the long corse that shivers there
Of him who came to die!
FRAGMENTS FROM EURIPIDES.
Dear is that valley to the murmuring bees;
And all, who know it, come and come again.
The small birds build there; and, at summer-noon,
Oft have I heard a child, gay among flowers,
As in the shining grass she sate conceal’d,
Sing to herself.
There is a streamlet issuing from a rock.
The village-girls, singing wild madrigals,
Dip their white vestments in its waters clear,
And hang them to the sun. There first I saw her.
Her dark and eloquent eyes, mild, full of fire,
’Twas heav’n to look upon; and her sweet voice,
As tuneable as harp of many strings,
At once spoke joy and sadness to my soul!
TWO SISTERS.[[1]]
Well may you sit within, and, fond of grief,
Look in each other’s face, and melt in tears.
Well may you shun all counsel, all relief.
Oh she was great in mind, tho’ young in years!
Chang’d is that lovely countenance, which shed
Light when she spoke; and kindled sweet surprise,
As o’er her frame each warm emotion spread,
Play’d round her lips, and sparkled in her eyes.
Those lips so pure, that mov’d but to persuade,
Still to the last enliven’d and endear’d.
Those eyes at once her secret soul convey’d,
And ever beam’d delight when you appear’d.
Yet has she fled the life of bliss below,
That youthful Hope in bright perspective drew?
False were the tints! false as the feverish glow
That o’er her burning cheek Distemper threw!
And now in joy she dwells, in glory moves!
(Glory and joy reserv’d for you to share.)
Far, far more blest in blessing those she loves,
Than they, alas! unconscious of her care.
[1] On the death of a younger sister.
WRITTEN AT MIDNIGHT.
1786.
While thro’ the broken pane the tempest sighs,
And my step falters on the faithless floor,
Shades of departed joys around me rise,
With many a face that smiles on me no more;
With many a voice that thrills of transport gave,
Now silent as the grass that tufts their grave!
ON A TEAR.
Oh! that the Chemist’s magic art
Could crystallize this sacred treasure!
Long should it glitter near my heart,
A secret source of pensive pleasure.
The little brilliant, ere it fell,
Its lustre caught from CHLOE’S eye;
Then, trembling, left its coral cell—
The spring of Sensibility!
Sweet drop of pure and pearly light!
In thee the rays of Virtue shine;
More calmly clear, more mildly bright,
Than any gem that gilds the mine.
Benign restorer of the soul!
Who ever fly’st to bring relief,
When first we feel the rude controul
Of Love or Pity, Joy or Grief.
The sage’s and the poet’s theme,
In every clime, in every age;
Thou charm’st in Fancy’s idle dream,
In Reason’s philosophic page.
That very law[[1]] which moulds a tear,
And bids it trickle from its source,
That law preserves the earth a sphere,
And guides the planets in their course.
[1] The law of Gravitation.
TO A VOICE THAT HAD BEEN LOST.[[1]]
Vane, quid affectas faciem mihi ponere, pictor?
Aëris et lingua sum filia;
Et, si vis similem pingere, pinge sonum.—AUSONIUS.
Once more, Enchantress of the soul,
Once more we hail thy soft controul.
—Yet whither, whither did’st thou fly?
To what bright region of the sky?
Say, in what distant star to dwell?
(Of other worlds thou seemst to tell)
Or trembling, fluttering here below,
Resolv’d and unresolv’d to go,
In secret didst thou still impart
Thy raptures to the Pure in heart?
Perhaps to many a desert shore,
Thee, in his rage, the Tempest bore;
Thy broken murmurs swept along,
Mid Echoes yet untun’d by song;
Arrested in the realms of Frost,
Or in the wilds of Ether lost.
Far happier thou! ’twas thine to soar,
Careering on the winged wind.
Thy triumphs who shall dare explore?
Suns and their systems left behind.
No tract of space, no distant star,
No shock of elements at war,
Did thee detain. Thy wing of fire
Bore thee amidst the Cherub-choir;
And there awhile to thee ’twas giv’n
Once more that Voice[[2]] belov’d to join,
Which taught thee first a flight divine,
And nurs’d thy infant years with many a strain from Heav’n!
[1] In the winter of 1805.
[2] The late Mrs. Sheridan’s.
FROM A GREEK EPIGRAM.
While on the cliff with calm delight she kneels,
And the blue vales a thousand joys recall,
See, to the last, last verge her infant steals!
O fly—yet stir not, speak not, lest it fall.
Far better taught, she lays her bosom bare,
And the fond boy springs back to nestle there.
TO THE FRAGMENT OF A STATUE OF HERCULES,
COMMONLY CALLED
THE TORSO.
And dost thou still, thou mass of breathing stone,
(Thy giant limbs to night and chaos hurl’d)
Still sit as on the fragment of a world;
Surviving all, majestic and alone?
What tho’ the Spirits of the North, that swept
Rome from the earth, when in her pomp she slept,
Smote thee with fury, and thy headless trunk
Deep in the dust mid tower and temple sunk;
Soon to subdue mankind ’twas thine to rise.
Still, still unquell’d thy glorious energies!
Aspiring minds, with thee conversing, caught[[1]]
Bright revelations of the Good they sought;
By thee that long-lost spell[[2]] in secret given,
To draw down Gods, and lift the soul to Heav’n!
[1] In the gardens of the Vatican, where it was placed by Julius II, it was long the favourite study of those great men, to whom we owe the revival of the arts, Michael Angelo, Raphael, and the Caracci.
[2] Once in the possession of Praxiteles, if we may believe an antient epigram on the Gnidian Venus. Analecta Vet. Poetarum, III. 200.
TO ——[[1]]
Ah! little thought she, when, with wild delight,
By many a torrent’s shining track she flew,
When mountain-glens and caverns full of night
O’er her young mind divine enchantment threw,
That in her veins a secret horror slept,
That her light footsteps should be heard no more,
That she should die—nor watch’d, alas, nor wept
By thee, unconscious of the pangs she bore.
Yet round her couch indulgent Fancy drew
The kindred, forms her closing eye requir’d.
There didst thou stand—there, with the smile she knew.
She mov’d her lips to bless thee, and expir’d.
And now to thee she comes; still, still the same
As in the hours gone unregarded by!
To thee, how chang’d, comes as she ever came;
Health on her cheek, and pleasure in her eye!
Nor less, less oft, as on that day, appears,
When lingering, as prophetic of the truth,
By the way-side she shed her parting tears—
For ever lovely in the light of Youth?
[1] On the death of her sister.
WRITTEN IN A SICK CHAMBER.
There, in that bed so closely curtain’d round,
Worn to a shade, and wan with slow decay,
A father sleeps! Oh hush’d be every sound!
Soft may we breathe the midnight hours away!
He stirs—yet still he sleeps. May heavenly dreams
Long o’er his smooth and settled pillow rise;
Till thro’ the shutter’d pane the morning streams,
And on the hearth the glimmering rush-light dies.
TO A FRIEND ON HIS MARRIAGE.
On thee, blest youth, a father’s hand confers
The maid thy earliest, fondest wishes knew.
Each soft enchantment of the soul is hers;
Thine be the joys to firm attachment due.
As on she moves with hesitating grace,
She wins assurance from his soothing voice;
And, with a look the pencil could not trace,
Smiles thro’ her blushes, and confirms the choice.
Spare the fine tremors of her feeling frame!
To thee she turns—forgive a virgin’s fears!
To thee she turns with surest, tenderest claim;
Weakness that charms, reluctance that endears!
At each response the sacred rite requires,
From her full bosom bursts the unbidden sigh.
A strange mysterious awe the scene inspires;
And on her lips the trembling accents die.
O’er her fair face what wild emotions play!
What lights and shades in sweet confusion blend!
Soon shall they fly, glad harbingers of day,
And settled sunshine on her soul descend!
Ah soon, thine own confest, ecstatic thought!
That hand shall strew thy summer-path with flowers;
And those blue eyes, with mildest lustre fraught,
Gild the calm current of domestic hours!
THE ALPS AT DAY-BREAK.
The sun-beams streak the azure skies,
And line with light the mountain’s brow:
With hounds and horns the hunters rise,
And chase the roebuck thro’ the snow.
From rock to rock, with giant-bound,
High on their iron poles they pass;
Mute, lest the air, convuls’d by sound,
Rend from above a frozen mass.[[1]]
The goats wind slow their wonted way,
Up craggy steeps and ridges rude;
Mark’d by the wild wolf for his prey,
From desert cave or hanging wood.
And while the torrent thunders loud,
And as the echoing cliffs reply,
The huts peep o’er the morning-cloud,
Perch’d, like an eagle’s nest, on high.
[1] There are passes in the Alps, where the guides tell you to move on with speed, and say nothing, lest the agitation of the air should loosen the snows above. GRAY’S MEM. sect. v. lett.4.
IMITATION OF AN ITALIAN SONNET[[1]]
Love, under Friendship’s vesture white,
Laughs, his little limbs concealing;
And oft in sport, and oft in spite,
Like Pity meets the dazzled sight,
Smiles thro’ his tears revealing.
But now as Rage the God appears!
He frowns, and tempests shake his frame!—
Frowning, or smiling, or in tears,
’Tis Love; and Love is still the same.
[1] See Gray’s Mem. sect. II. lett. 30.
ON - - - - ASLEEP.
Sleep on, and dream of Heav’n awhile.
Tho’ shut so close thy laughing eyes,
Thy rosy lips still seem to smile,
And move, and breathe delicious sighs!—
Ah, now soft blushes tinge her cheeks,
And mantle o’er her neck of snow.
Ah, now she murmurs, now she speaks
What most I wish—and fear to know.
She starts, she trembles, and she weeps!
Her fair hands folded on her breast.
—And now, how like a saint she sleeps!
A seraph in the realms of rest!
Sleep on secure! Above controul,
Thy thoughts belong to Heav’n and thee!
And may the secret of thy soul
Repose within its sanctuary!
TO THE YOUNGEST DAUGHTER OF LADY **.
Ah! why with tell-tale tongue reveal
What most her blushes would conceal?[[1]]
Why lift that modest veil to trace
The seraph-sweetness of her face?
Some fairer, better sport prefer;
And feel for us, if not for her.
For this presumption, soon or late,
Know thine shall be a kindred fate.
Another shall in vengeance rise—
Sing Harriet’s cheeks, and Harriet’s eyes;
And, echoing back her wood-notes wild,
—Trace all the mother in the child!
[1] Alluding to some verses which she had written on an elder sister.
AN EPITAPH[[1]]
ON A ROBIN-REDBREAST.
Tread lightly here, for here, ’tis said,
When piping winds are hush’d around,
A small note wakes from underground,
Where now his tiny bones are laid.
No more in lone and leafless groves,
With ruffled wing and faded breast,
His friendless, homeless spirit roves;
—Gone to the world where birds are blest!
Where never cat glides o’er the green,
Or school-boy’s giant form is seen;
But Love, and Joy, and smiling Spring
Inspire their little souls to sing!
[1] Inscribed on an urn in the flower-garden at Hafod.
A WISH.
Mine be a cot beside the hill,
A bee-hive’s hum shall sooth my ear;
A willowy brook, that turns a mill,
With many a fall shall linger near.
The swallow, oft, beneath my thatch,
Shall twitter from her clay-built nest;
Oft shall the pilgrim lift the latch,
And share my meal, a welcome guest.
Around my ivy’d porch shall spring
Each fragrant flower that drinks the dew;
And Lucy, at her wheel, shall sing
In russet gown and apron blue.
The village-church, among the trees,
Where first our marriage-vows were giv’n,
With merry peals shall swell the breeze,
And point with taper spire to heav’n.
AN ITALIAN SONG.
Dear is my little native vale,
The ring-dove builds and murmurs there;
Close by my cot she tells her tale
To every passing villager.
The squirrel leaps from tree to tree,
And shells his nuts at liberty.
In orange-groves and myrtle-bowers,
That breathe a gale of fragrance round,
I charm the fairy-footed hours
With my lov’d lute’s romantic sound;
Or crowns of living laurel weave,
For those that win the race at eve.
The shepherd’s horn at break of day,
The ballet danc’d in twilight glade,
The canzonet and roundelay
Sung in the silent green-wood shade;
These simple joys, that never fail,
Shall bind me to my native vale.
TO THE GNAT.
When by the green-wood side, at summer eve,
Poetic visions charm my closing eye;
And fairy-scenes, that Fancy loves to weave,
Shift to wild notes of sweetest Minstrelsy;
’Tis thine to range in busy quest of prey,
Thy feathery antlers quivering with delight,
Brush from my lids the hues of heav’n away,
And all is Solitude, and all is Night!
—Ah now thy barbed shaft, relentless fly,
Unsheaths its terrors in the sultry air!
No guardian sylph, in golden panoply,
Lifts the broad shield, and points the glittering spear.
Now near and nearer rush thy whirring wings,
Thy dragon-scales still wet with human gore.
Hark, thy shrill horn its fearful laram flings!
—I wake in horror, and ‘dare sleep no more!’
AN INSCRIPTION.
Shepherd, or Huntsman, or worn Mariner,
Whate’er thou art, who wouldst allay thy thirst,
Drink and be glad. This cistern of white stone,
Arch’d, and o’erwrought with many a sacred verse,
This iron cup chain’d for the general use,
And these rude seats of earth within the grove,
Were giv’n by FATIMA. Borne hence a bride,
’Twas here she turn’d from her beloved sire,
To see his face no more.[[1]] Oh, if thou canst,
(’Tis not far off) visit his tomb with flowers;
And may some pious hand with water fill
The two small cells scoop’d in the marble there,
That birds may come and drink upon his grave,
Making it holy![[2]] ————
[1] See an anecdote related by Pausanias. iii. 20.
[2] A Turkish superstition. See Clarke’s Travels, I. 546.
CAPTIVITY.
Caged in old woods, whose reverend echoes wake
When the hern screams along the distant lake,
Her little heart oft flutters to be free,
Oft sighs to turn the unrelenting key.
In vain! the nurse that rusted relic wears,
Nor mov’d by gold—nor to be mov’d by tears;
And terraced walls their black reflection throw
On the green-mantled moat that sleeps below.
A CHARACTER.
As thro’ the hedge-row shade the violet steals,
And the sweet air its modest leaf reveals;
Her softer charms, but by their influence known,
Surprise all hearts, and mould them to her own.
WRITTEN IN
THE HIGHLANDS OF SCOTLAND,
SEPTEMBER 1, 1812.
Blue was the loch,[[1]] the clouds were gone,
Ben-Lomond in his glory shone,
When, Luss, I left thee; when the breeze
Bore me from thy silver sands,
Thy kirk-yard wall among the trees,
Where, grey with age, the dial stands;
That dial so well-known to me!
—Tho’ many a shadow it had shed,
Beloved Sister, since with thee
The legend on the stone was read.
The fairy-isles fled far away;
That with its woods and uplands green,
Where shepherd-huts are dimly seen,
And songs are heard at close of day;
That too, the deer’s wild covert, fled,
And that, the Asylum of the Dead:
While, as the boat went merrily,
Much of ROB ROY[[2]] the boat-man told;
His arm that fell below his knee,
His cattle-ford and mountain-hold.
Tarbat,[[3]] thy shore I climb’d at last,
And, thy shady region pass’d,
Upon another shore I stood,
And look’d upon another flood;[[4]]
Great Ocean’s self! (’Tis He, who fills
That vast and awful depth of hills;)
Where many an elf was playing round,
Who treads unshod his classic ground;
And speaks, his native rocks among,
As FINGAL spoke, and OSSIAN sung.
Night fell; and dark and darker grew
That narrow sea, that narrow sky,
As o’er the glimmering waves we flew.
The sea-bird rustling, wailing by.
And now the grampus, half descried,
Black and huge above the tide;
The cliffs and promontories there,
Front to front, and broad and bare,
Each beyond each, with giant-feet
Advancing as in haste to meet;
The shatter’d fortress, whence the Dane
Blew his shrill blast, nor rush’d in vain,
Tyrant of the drear domain;
All into midnight-shadow sweep—
When day springs upward from the deep![[5]]
Kindling the waters in its flight,
The prow wakes splendour; and the oar,
That rose and fell unseen before,
Flashes in a sea of light!
Glad sign, and sure! for now we hail
Thy flowers, Glenfinart, in the gale;
And bright indeed the path should be,
That leads to Friendship and to Thee!
Oh blest retreat, and sacred too!
Sacred as when the bell of prayer
Toll’d duly on the desert air,
And crosses deck’d thy summits blue.
Oft, like some lov’d romantic tale,
Oft shall my weary mind recall,
Amid the hum and stir of men,
Thy beechen grove and waterfall,
Thy ferry with its gliding sail,
And Her—the Lady of the Glen!
[1] Loch-Lomond.
[2] A famous out-law.
[3] Signifying in the Erse language an Isthmus.
[4] Loch-Long.
[5] A phenomenon described by many navigators.
A FAREWELL.
Once more, enchanting girl, adieu!
I must be gone while yet I may,
Oft shall I weep to think of you;
But here I will not, cannot stay.
The sweet expression of that face.
For ever changing, yet the same,
Ah no, I dare not turn to trace.
It melts my soul, it fires my frame!
Yet give me, give me, ere I go,
One little lock of those so blest,
That lend your cheek a warmer glow,
And on your white neck love to rest.
—Say, when to kindle soft delight,
That hand has chanc’d with mine to meet,
How could its thrilling touch excite
A sigh so short, and yet so sweet?
O say—but no, it must not be.
Adieu! A long, a long adieu!
—Yet still, methinks, you frown on me;
Or never could I fly from you.
TO THE BUTTERFLY.
Child of the sun! pursue thy rapturous flight,
Mingling with her thou lov’st in fields of light;
And, where the flowers of paradise unfold,
Quaff fragrant nectar from their cups of gold.
There shall thy wings, rich as an evening-sky,
Expand and shut with silent ecstasy!
—Yet wert thou once a worm, a thing that crept
On the bare earth, then wrought a tomb and slept!
And such is man; soon from his cell of clay
To burst a seraph in the blaze of day!
VERSES WRITTEN IN
WESTMINSTER ABBEY.[[1]]
Whoe’er thou art, approach, and, with a sigh,
Mark where the small remains of Greatness lie.[[2]]
There sleeps the dust of Him for ever gone;
How near the Scene where once his Glory shone!
And, tho’ no more ascends the voice of Prayer,
Tho’ the last footsteps cease to linger there,
Still, like an awful Dream that comes again,
Alas, at best, as transient and as vain,
Still do I see (while thro’ the vaults of night
The funeral-song once more proclaims the rite)
The moving Pomp along the shadowy Isle,
That, like a Darkness, fill’d the solemn Pile;
The illustrious line, that in long order led,
Of those that lov’d Him living, mourn’d Him dead;
Of those, the Few, that for their Country stood
Round Him who dar’d be singularly good;
All, of all ranks, that claim’d Him for their own;
And nothing wanting—but Himself alone![[3]]
Oh say, of Him now rests there but a name;
Wont, as He was, to breathe ethereal flame?
Friend of the Absent! Guardian of the Dead![[4]]
Who but would here their sacred sorrows shed?
(Such as He shed on NELSON’S closing grave;
How soon to claim the sympathy He gave!)
In Him, resentful of another’s wrong,
The dumb were eloquent, the feeble strong.
Truth from his lips a charm celestial drew—
Ah, who so mighty and so gentle too?
What tho’ with War the madding Nations rung,
‘Peace,’ when He spoke, dwelt ever on his tongue!
Amidst the frowns of Power, the tricks of State,
Fearless, resolv’d, and negligently great!
In vain malignant vapours gather’d round;
He walk’d, erect, on consecrated ground.
The clouds, that rise to quench the Orb of day,
Reflect its splendour, and dissolve away!
When in retreat He laid his thunder by,
For letter’d ease and calm Philosophy,
Blest were his hours within the silent grove,
Where still his god-like Spirit deigns to rove;
Blest by the orphan’s smile, the widow’s prayer,
For many a deed, long done in secret there.
There shone his lamp on Homer’s hallow’d page.
There, listening, sate the hero and the sage;
And they, by virtue and by blood allied,
Whom most He lov’d, and in whose arms He died.
Friend of all Human-kind! not here alone
(The voice, that speaks, was not to Thee unknown)
Wilt Thou be miss’d,—O’er every land and sea
Long, long shall England be rever’d in Thee!
And, when the Storm is hush’d—in distant years—
Foes on thy grave shall meet, and mingle tears!
[1] After the Funeral of the Right Hon. CHARLES JAMES FOX on Friday, October 10, 1806.
[2] Venez voir le peu qui nous reste de tant de grandeur, &c. Bossuet. Oraison funébre de Louis de Bourbon.
[3] Et rien enfin ne manque dans tons ces honneurs, que celui à qui on les rend.—Ibid.
[4] Alluding particularly to his speech on moving a new writ for the borough of Tavistock, March 16, 1802.
THE VOYAGE OF COLUMBUS.
CHI SE’ TU, CHE VIENI——?
DA ME STESSO NON VEGNO.
DANTE.
I have seen the day,
That I have worn a visor, and could tell
A tale————
SHAKSP.