FIRST VOICE (FROM THE MOUNTAINS):
Thrice three hundred thousand years
O'er the Earthquake's couch we stood: _75
Oft, as men convulsed with fears,
We trembled in our multitude.
SECOND VOICE (FROM THE SPRINGS):
Thunderbolts had parched our water,
We had been stained with bitter blood,
And had run mute, 'mid shrieks of slaughter, _80
Thro' a city and a solitude.
THIRD VOICE (FROM THE AIR):
I had clothed, since Earth uprose,
Its wastes in colours not their own,
And oft had my serene repose
Been cloven by many a rending groan. _85
FOURTH VOICE (FROM THE WHIRLWINDS):
We had soared beneath these mountains
Unresting ages; nor had thunder,
Nor yon volcano's flaming fountains,
Nor any power above or under
Ever made us mute with wonder. _90
FIRST VOICE:
But never bowed our snowy crest
As at the voice of thine unrest.
SECOND VOICE:
Never such a sound before
To the Indian waves we bore.
A pilot asleep on the howling sea _95
Leaped up from the deck in agony,
And heard, and cried, 'Ah, woe is me!'
And died as mad as the wild waves be.
THIRD VOICE:
By such dread words from Earth to Heaven
My still realm was never riven: _100
When its wound was closed, there stood
Darkness o'er the day like blood.
FOURTH VOICE:
And we shrank back: for dreams of ruin
To frozen caves our flight pursuing
Made us keep silence—thus—and thus— _105
Though silence is a hell to us.
THE EARTH:
The tongueless caverns of the craggy hills
Cried, 'Misery!' then; the hollow Heaven replied,
'Misery!' And the Ocean's purple waves,
Climbing the land, howled to the lashing winds, _110
And the pale nations heard it, 'Misery!'
NOTE: _106 as hell 1839, B; a hell 1820.