I.
The sun, awakening, through the smoky air
Of the dark city casts a sullen glance,
Rousing each caitiff[323] to his task of care,
Of sinful man the sad inheritance;
Summoning revelers from the lagging dance,
Scaring the prowling robber to his den;
Gilding on battled tower the warder’s lance,
And warning student pale to leave his pen,
And yield his drowsy eyes to the kind nurse of men.
What various scenes, and, oh! what scenes of woe,
Are witness’d by that red and struggling beam!
The fever’d patient, from his pallet low,
Through crowded hospital beholds its stream;
The ruin’d maiden trembles at its gleam,
The debtor wakes to thought of gyve and jail,
The lovelorn wretch starts from tormenting dream;
The wakeful mother, by the glimmering pale,
Trims her sick infant’s couch, and soothes his feeble wail.