How young Columbus seemed to rove,
Yet present in his natal grove,
Now watching high on mountain cornice,
And steering, now, from a purple cove,20
Now pacing mute by ocean's rim;
Till, in a narrow street and dim,
I stayed the wheels at Cogoletto,
And drank, and loyally drank to him.
Nor knew we well what pleased us most,25
Not the clipt palm of which they boast;
But distant colour, happy hamlet,
A mouldered citadel on the coast,
Or tower, or high hill-convent, seen
A light amid its olives green;30
Or olive-hoary cape in ocean;
Or rosy blossom in hot ravine,
Where oleanders flushed the bed
Of silent torrents, gravel-spread;
And, crossing, oft we saw the glisten35
Of ice, far up on a mountain bead.
We loved that hall, tho' white and cold,
Those nichèd shapes of noble mould,
A princely people's awful princes,
The grave, severe Genovese of old.40
At Florence too what golden hours,
In those long galleries, were ours;
What drives about the fresh Cascinè,
Or walks in Boboli's ducal bowers.
In bright vignettes, and each complete,45
Of tower or duomo, sunny-sweet,
Or palace, how the city glittered,
Thro' cypress avenues, at our feet.
But when we crost the Lombard plain
Remember what a plague of rain;50
Of rain at Reggio, rain at Parma;
At Lodi, rain, Piacenza, rain.
And stern and sad (so rare the smiles
Of sunlight) looked the Lombard piles;
Porch-pillars on the lion resting,55
And sombre, old, colonnaded aisles.