The marble rose the Urn above,
The World went on the same;
The Ladye smiled. Count Raimond's bride,
And flowers, like hers, that bloom'd and died,
Each May returning came.
The faded flower, the dream of love,
The poison and the dart,
The tearful trust, the smiling wrong,
The tomb,—behold, O Child of Song,
The History of thy Heart!
Narrative Lyrics.
OR,
THE PARCÆ;
IN SIX LEAVES FROM THE SIBYL'S BOOK.
The Parcæ.—Leaf the First.
NAPOLEON AT ISOLA BELLA.
In the Isola Bella, upon the Lago Maggiore, where the richest vegetation of the tropics grows in the vicinity of the Alps, there is a lofty laurel-tree (the bay), tall as the tallest oak, on which, a few days before the battle of Marengo, Napoleon carved the word "BATTAGLIA." The bark has fallen away from the inscription, most of the letters are gone, and the few left are nearly effaced.
I.
O fairy island of a fairy sea,
Wherein Calypso might have spell'd the Greek,
Or Flora piled her fragrant treasury,
Cull'd from each shore her Zephyr's wings could seek.—
From rocks, where aloes blow.