Felicia Dorothea Hemans: Verses about Silence

THERE is an hour, a pensive hour;
(And oh! how dear its soothing pow'r!)
It is, when twilight spreads her veil,
And steals along the silent dale;
'Tis when the fading blossoms close,
When all is silence and repose;
Then memory wakes, and loves to mourn,
For days—that never shall return!

There is a strain, a plaintive strain,
The source of joy and yet of pain;
It is the song, whose dying measure,
Some friend belov'd has heard with pleasure;
Some friend—who ne'er again may hear,
The melting lay, to memory dear;
Ah! then, her magic spells restore,
Visions of blissful days no more!

There is a tear of sweet relief,
A tear—of rapture and of grief;
The feeling heart alone can know
What soft emotions bid it flow!
It is when memory charms the mind,
With tender images refin'd;
'Tis when her balmy spells restore,
Departed friends, and joys no more!

WHEN twilight's grey and pensive hour
Brings the low breeze, and shuts the flower,
And bids the solitary star
Shine in pale beauty from afar;

When gathering shades the landscape veil,
And peasants seek their village-dale,
And mists from river-wave arise,
And dew in every blossom lies;

When evening's primrose opes, to shed
Soft fragrance round her grassy bed;
When glow-worms in the wood-walk light
Their lamp, to cheer the traveller's sight;

At that calm hour, so still, so pale,
Awakes the lonely Nightingale;
And from a hermitage of shade
Fills with her voice the forest-glade.

And sweeter far that melting voice,
Than all which through the day rejoice;
And still shall bard and wanderer love
The twilight music of the grove.

Father in Heaven! oh! thus when day
With all its cares hath passed away,
And silent hours waft peace on earth,
And hush the louder strains of mirth;

Thus may sweet songs of praise and prayer
To Thee my spirit's offering bear;
Yon star, my signal, set on high,
For vesper-hymns of piety.

So may thy mercy and thy power
Protect me through the midnight hour;
And balmy sleep and visions blest
Smile on thy servant's bed of rest.

From the bright stars, or from the viewless air,
Or from some world unreached by human thought,
Spirit, sweet spirit! if thy home be there,
And if thy visions with the past be fraught,
Answer me, answer me!

Have we not communed here of life and death?
Have we not said that love, such love as ours,
Was not to perish as a rose's breath,
To melt away, like song from festal bowers?
Answer me, answer me!

Thine eye's last light was mine - the soul thtat shone
Intensely, mournfully, through gathering haze -
Didst thou bear with thee to the shore unknown,
Nought of what lived in that long, earnest gaze!
Hear, hear, and answer me!

Thy voice - its low, soft, fervent, farewell tone
Thrilled through the tempest of the parting strife,
Like a faint breeze: - oh, from that music flown,
Send back
one
sound, if love's be quenchless life,
But once, oh! answer me!

In the still noontide, in the sunset's hush,
In the dead hour of night, when thought grows deep,
When the heart's phantoms from the darkness rush,
Fearfully beautiful, to strive with sleep -
Spirit! then answer me!

By the remembrance of our blended prayer;
By all our tears, whose mingling made them sweet
By our last hope, the victor o'er despair; -
Speak! if our souls in deathless yearnings meet;
Answer me, answer me!

The grave is silent: - and the far-off sky,
And the deep midnight - silent all, and lone!
Oh! if thy buried love make no reply,
What voice has earth! - Hear, pity, speak, mine own!
Answer me, answer me!

OH, queen of dreams! 'tis now the hour,
Thy fav'rite hour of silence and of sleep;
Come, bring thy wand, whose magic pow'r,
Can wake the troubled spirits of the deep!

And while around, on ev'ry eye
The 'honey-dews of slumber' lie,
Oh! guide me to the wild retreat,
Where fays in nightly revel meet;
And gaily sport in mystic ring,
By lonely glen, or haunted spring!

Now ev'ry sound has died away,
The winds and waves are lull'd to rest;
The sighing breeze forgets to play,
And moon-beams tremble o'er the ocean's breast—

Come, Fancy! come, creative pow'r!
That lov'st the tranquil reign of night:
Perhaps in such a silent hour,
Thy visions charm'd the bard of Avon's sight;
Oh, poet blest! thy guiding hand
Led him thro' scenes of fairy-land;
To him, thy favor'd child, alone,
Thy bright, Elysian worlds were shown!

Come, Fancy, come; with lov'd control,
Bewitch thy votary's pensive soul!
Come, sportive charmer! lovely maid!
In rainbow-colored vest array'd;
Invoke thy visionary train,
The subjects of thy gentle reign.

If e'er ethereal spirits meet,
On earth; to pour their dirges sweet;
Now might they hover on the moon-beam pale,
And breathe celestial music on the gale.

And hark! from yonder distant dell,
I hear angelic numbers swell!
Ah! sure some airy sylph is nigh,
To wake such heav'nly melody!
Now soft the dulcet notes decay,
Float on the breeze and melt away;
Again they fall—again they rise,
Ah! now the soft enchantment dies!
The charm is o'er—the spell is past,
The witching spell, too sweet to last!

Hail, Fancy, hail! around thy hallow'd shrine,
What sylphid bands, what radiant forms appear!
Ah! bless thy votary with thy dreams divine,
Ah! wave thy wand, and call thy visions dear!

Bear me, oh! bear me, to thy realms unknown,
Enchantress! waft me in thy car sublime!
To bend, entranc'd, before thy shadowy throne,
To view the wonders of thy fairy-clime!

HUSH! 'tis a holy hour-the quiet room
Seems like a temple, while yon soft lamp sheds
A faint and starry radiance, through the gloom
And the sweet stillness, down on fair young heads,
With all their clustering locks, untouch'd by care,
And bow'd, as flowers are bow'd with night, in prayer.

Gaze on-'tis lovely!-Childhood's lip and cheek,
Mantling beneath its earnest brow of thought-
Gaze-yet what seest thou in those fair, and meek,
And fragile things, as but for sunshine wrought?-
Thou seest what grief must nurture for the sky,
What death must fashion for eternity!

O! joyous creatures! that will sink to rest,
Lightly, when those pure orisons are done,
As birds, with slumber's honey-dew opprest,
'Midst the dim folded leaves, at set of sun-
Life up your hearts! though yet no sorrow lies
Dark in the summer-heaven of those clear eyes.

Though fresh within your breasts the untroubled springs
Of hope make melody where'er ye tread,
And o'er your sleep bright shadows, from the wings
Of spirits visiting but youth, be spread;
Yet in those flute-like voices, mingling low,
Is woman's tenderness-how soon her woe!

Her lot is on you-silent tears to weep,
And patient smiles to wear through suffering's hour,
And sumless riches, from affection's deep,
To pour on broken reeds-a wasted shower!
And to make idols, and to find them clay,
And to bewail that worship-therefore pray!

Her lot is on you-to be found untired,
Watching the stars out by the bed of pain,
With a pale cheek, and yet a brow inspired,
And a true heart of hope, though hope be vain;
Meekly to bear with wrong, to cheer decay,
And oh! to love through all things-therefore pray!

And take the thought of this calm vesper time,
With its low murmuring sounds and silvery light,
On through the dark days fading from their prime,
As a sweet dew to keep your souls from blight!
Earth will forsake-O! happy to have given
The unbroken heart's first fragrance unto Heaven.

Oh! enter not yon shadowy cave,
Seek not the bright spars there,
Though the whispering pines that o'er it wave,
With freshness fill the air:
For there the Patriot Three,
In the garb of old array'd,
By their native Forest-sea
On a rocky couch are laid.

The Patriot Three that met of yore
Beneath the midnight sky,
And leagued their hearts on the Grütli shore,
In the name of liberty!
Now silently they sleep
Amidst the hills they freed;
But their rest is only deep,
Till their country's hour of need.

They start not at the hunter's call,
Nor the Lammer-geyer's cry,
Nor the rush of a sudden torrent's fall,
Nor the Lauwine thundering by!
And the Alpine herdsman's lay,
To a Switzer's heart so dear
On the wild wind floats away,
No more for them to hear.

But when the battle-horn is blown
Till the Schreckhorn's peaks reply,
When the Jungfrau's cliffs send back the tone
Through their eagles' lonely sky;

When spear-heads light the lakes,
When trumpets loose the snows,
When the rushing war-steed shakes
The glacier's mute repose;

When Uri's beechen woods wave red
In the burning hamlet's light ;-
Then from the cavern of the dead,
Shall the sleepers wake in might!
With a leap, like Tell's proud leap,
When away the helm he flung,
And boldly up the steep
From the flashing billow sprung!

They shall wake beside their Forest-sea,
In the ancient garb they wore
When they link'd the hands that made us free,
On the Grütli's moonlight shore:
And their voices shall be heard,
And be answer'd with a shout,
Till the echoing Alps are stirr'd,
And the signal-fires blaze out.

And the land shall see such deeds again
As those of that proud day,
When Winkelried, on Sempach's plain,
Through the serried spears made way;
And when the rocks came down
On the dark Morgarten dell,
And the crowned casques* , o'erthrown,
Before our fathers fell!

For the Kühreihen's+ notes must never sound
In a land that wears the chain,
And the vines on freedom's holy ground
Untrampled must remain!
And the yellow harvests wave
For no stranger's hand to reap,
While within their silent cave
The men of Grütli sleep!

Thou giv'st me flowers, thou giv'st me songs; bring back
The love that I have lost!

WHAT wak'st thou, Spring? sweet voices in the woods,
And reed-like echoes, that have long been mute;
Thou bringest back, to fill the solitudes,
The lark's clear pipe, the cuckoo's viewless flute,
Whose tone seems breathing mournfulness or glee,
Ev'n as our hearts may be.

And the leaves greet thee, Spring! the joyous leaves,
Whose tremblings gladden many a copse and glade,
Where each young spray a rosy flush receives,
When thy south-wind hath pierced the whispery shade,
And happy murmurs, running thro' the grass,
Tell that thy footsteps pass.

And the bright waters they too hear thy call,
Spring, the awakener! thou hast burst their sleep!
Amidst the hollows of the rocks their fall
Makes melody, and in the forests deep,
Where sudden sparkles and blue gleams betray
Their windings to the day.

And flowers the fairy-peopled world of flowers!
Thou from the dust hast set that glory free,
Colouring the cowslip with the sunny hours,
And pencilling the wood-anemone;
Silent they seem yet each to thoughtful eye
Glows with mute poesy.

But what awak'st thou in the heart, O Spring!
The human heart, with all its dreams and sighs?
Thou that giv'st back so many a buried thing,
Restorer of forgotten harmonies!
Fresh songs and scents break forth where'er thou art,
What wak'st thou in the heart?

Too much, oh! there too much! we know not well
Wherefore it should be thus, yet rous'd by thee,
What fond, strange yearnings, from the soul's deep cell,
Gush for the faces we no more may see!
How are we haunted, in thy wind's low tone,
By voices that are gone!

Looks of familiar love, that never more,
Never on earth, our aching eyes shall meet,
Past words of welcome to our household door,
And vanish'd smiles, and sounds of parted feet
Spring! midst the murmurs of thy flowering trees,
Why, why reviv'st thou these?

Vain longings for the dead! why come they back
With thy young birds, and leaves, and living blooms?
Oh! is it not, that from thine earthly track
Hope to thy world may look beyond the tombs?
Yes! gentle spring; no sorrow dims thine air,
Breath'd by our lov'd ones there!

He sat in silence on the ground,
The old and haughty Czar;
Lonely, tho' princes girt him round,
And leaders of the war:
He had cast his jewell'd sabre,
That many a field had won,
To the earth beside his youthful dead,
His fair and first-born son.

With a robe of ermine for its bed,
Was laid that form of clay,
Where the light a stormy sunset shed,
Thro' the rich tent made way:
And a sad and solemn beauty
On the pallid face came down,
Which the Lord of nations mutely watch'd,
In the dust, with his renown.

Low tones at last of wo and fear
From his full bosom broke;–
A mournful thing it was to hear
How then the proud man spoke!
The voice that thro' the combat
Had shouted far and high,
Came forth in strange, dull, hollow tones,
Burden'd with agony.

'There is no crimson on thy cheek,
And on thy lip no breath,
I call thee, and thou dost not speak–
They tell me this is death!
And fearful things are whispering
That I the deed have done–
For the honour of thy father's name,
Look up, look up, my son!

'Well might I know death's hue and mien,
But on thine aspect, boy!
What, till this moment, have I seen
Save pride and tameless joy?
Swiftest thou wert to battle,
And bravest there of all–
How could I think a warrior's frame
Thus like a flower should fall?

'I will not bear that still, cold look–
Rise up, thou fierce and free!
Wake as the storm wakes! I will brook
All, save this calm, from thee!
Lift brightly up, and proudly,
Once more thy kindling eyes!
Hath my word lost its power on earth?
I say to thee, arise!

'Didst thou not know I lov'd thee well?
Thou didst not! and art gone
In bitterness of soul, to dwell
Where man must dwell alone.
Come back, young fiery spirit!
If but one hour, to learn
The secrets of the folded heart,
That seem'd to thee so stern.

'Thou wert the first, the first, fair child,
That in mine arms I press'd;
Thou wert the bright one, that hast smil'd
Like summer on my breast!
I rear'd thee as an eagle,
To the chase thy steps I led,
I bore thee on my battle-horse,
I look upon thee–dead!

'Lay down my warlike banners here,
Never again to wave,
And bury my red sword and spear,
Chiefs! in my first-born's grave!
And leave me!–I have conquer'd,
I have slain–my work is done!
Whom have I slain?–ye answer not–
Thou too art mute, my son!'

And thus his wild lament was pour'd
Thro' the dark resounding night,
And the battle knew no more his sword,
Nor the foaming steed his might.
He heard strange voices moaning
In every wind that sigh'd;
From the searching stars of heaven he shrank–
Humbly the conqueror died.

His very heart athirst
To gaze at nature in her green array,
Upon the ship's tall side he stands, possess'd
With visions prompted by intense desire;
Fair fields appear below, such as he left
Far distant, such as he would die to find:
He seeks them headlong, and is seen no more. ~ Cowper


The hollow dash of waves!–the ceaseless roar!
Silence, ye billows! vex my soul no more.

There's a spring in the woods by my sunny home,
Afar from the dark sea's tossing foam;
Oh! the fall of that fountain is sweet to hear,
As a song from the shore to the sailor's ear!

And the sparkle which up to the sun it throws,
Thro' the feathery fern and the olive boughs,
And the gleam on its path as it steals away
Into deeper shades from the sultry day,
And the large water-lilies that o'er its bed
Their pearly leaves to the soft light spread,
They haunt me! I dream of that bright spring's flow,
I thirst for its rills, like a wounded roe!

Be still, thou sea-bird, with thy clanging cry!
My spirit sickens, as thy wing sweeps by.

Know ye my home, with the lulling sound
Of leaves from the lime and the chestnut round?
Know ye it, brethren! where bower'd it lies,
Under the purple of southern skies?
With the streamy gold of the sun that shines
In thro' the cloud of its clustering vines,
And the summer-breath of the myrtle-flowers,
Borne from the mountain in dewy hours,
And the fire-fly's glance thro' the dark'ning shades,
Like shooting stars in the forest-glades,
And the scent of the citron at eve's dim fall
Speak! have ye known, have ye felt them all?

The heavy rolling surge! the rocking mast!
Hush! give my dream's deep music way, thou blast!

Oh! the glad sounds of the joyous earth!
The notes of the singing cicala's mirth,
The murmurs that live in the mountain pines,
The sighing of reeds as the day declines,
The wings flitting home thro' the crimson glow
That steeps the wood when the sun is low,
The voice of the night-bird that sends a thrill
To the heart of the leaves when the winds are still
I hear them! round me they rise, they swell,
They call back my spirit with Hope to dwell,
They come with a breath from the fresh spring-time,
And waken my youth in its hour of prime.

The white foam dashes high away, away!
Shroud my green land no more, thou blinding spray!

It is there! down the mountains I see the sweep
Of the chestnut forests, the rich and deep,
With the burden and glory of flowers that they bear,
Floating upborne on the blue summer-air,
And the light pouring thro' them in tender gleams,
And the flashing forth of a thousand streams!
Hold me not, brethren! I go, I go,
To the hills of my youth, where the myrtles blow,
To the depths of the woods, where the shadows rest,
Massy and still, on the greensward's breast,
To the rocks that resound with the water's play
I hear the sweet laugh of my fount give way!

Give way! the booming surge, the tempest's roar,
The sea-bird's wail, shall vex my soul no more.

The night-wind shook the tapestry round an ancient palace-room,
And torches, as it rose and fell, waved thro' the gorgeous gloom,
And o'er a shadowy regal couch threw fitful gleams and red,
Where a woman with long raven hair sat watching by the dead.

Pale shone the features of the dead, yet glorious still to see,
Like a hunter or a chief struck down while his heart and step were free;
No shroud he wore, no robe of death, but there majestic lay,
Proudly and sadly glittering in royalty's array.

But she that with the dark hair watch'd by the cold slumberer's side,
On her wan cheek no beauty dwelt, and in her garb no pride;
Only her full impassion'd eyes as o'er that clay she bent,
A wildness and a tenderness in strange resplendence blent.

And as the swift thoughts cross'd her soul, like shadows of a cloud,
Amidst the silent room of death, the dreamer spoke aloud;
She spoke to him who could not hear, and cried, 'Thou yet wilt wake,
And learn my watchings and my tears, belov'd one! for thy sake.

'They told me this was death, but well I knew it could not be;
Fairest and stateliest of the earth! who spoke of death for thee?
They would have wrapp'd the funeral shroud thy gallant form around,
But I forbade–and there thou art, a monarch, robed and crown'd!

'With all thy bright locks gleaming still, their coronal beneath,
And thy brow so proudly beautiful–who said that this was death?
Silence hath been upon thy lips, and stillness round thee long,
But the hopeful spirit in my breast is all undimm'd and strong.

'I know thou hast not loved me yet; I am not fair like thee,
The very glance of whose clear eye threw round a light of glee!
A frail and drooping form is mine–a cold unsmiling cheek,–
Oh! I have but a woman's heart, wherewith thy heart to seek.

'But when thou wak'st, my prince, my lord! and hear'st how I have kept
A lonely vigil by thy side, and o'er thee pray'd and wept;
How in one long, deep dream of thee my nights and days have past,
Surely that humble, patient love must win back love at last!

'And thou wilt smile–my own, my own, shall be the sunny smile,
Which brightly fell, and joyously, on all but me erewhile!
No more in vain affection's thirst my weary soul shall pine–
Oh! years of hope deferr'd were paid by one fond glance of thine!

'Thou'lt meet me with that radiant look when thou com'st from the chase,
For me, for me, in festal halls it shall kindle o'er thy face!
Thou'lt reck no more tho' beauty's gift mine aspect may not bless;
In thy kind eyes this deep, deep love, shall give me loveliness.

'But wake! my heart within me burns, yet once more to rejoice
In the sound to which it ever leap'd, the music of thy voice:
Awake! I sit in solitude, that thy first look and tone,
And the gladness of thine opening eyes, may all be mine alone.'

In the still chambers of the dust, thus pour'd forth day by day,
The passion of that loving dream from a troubled soul found way,
Until the shadows of the grave had swept o'er every grace,
Left midst the awfulness of death on the princely form and face.

And slowly broke the fearful truth upon the watcher's breast,
And they bore away the royal dead with requiems to his rest,
With banners and with knightly plumes all waving in the wind,–
But a woman's broken heart was left in its lone despair behind.

There was music on the midnight;
From a royal fane it roll'd,
And a mighty bell, each pause between,
Sternly and slowly toll'd.
Strange was their mingling in the sky,
It hush'd the listener's breath;
For the music spoke of triumph high,
The lonely bell, of death.

There was hurrying through the midnight:-
A sound of many feet;
But they fell with a muffled fearfulness,
Along the shadowy street;
And softer, fainter, grew their tread,
As it near'd the Minster-gate,
Whence broad and solemn light was shed
From a scene of royal state.

Full glow'd the strong red radiance
In the centre of the nave,
Where the folds of a purple canopy
Sweep down in many a wave;
Loading the marble pavement old
With a weight of gorgeous gloom;
For something lay 'midst their fretted gold,
Like a shadow of the tomb.

And within that rich pavilion
High on a glittering throne,
A woman's form sat silently,
Midst the glare of light alone.
Her Jewell'd robes fell strangely still-
The drapery on her breast
Seem'd with no pulse beneath to thrill,
So stone-like was its rest.

But a peal of lordly music
Shook e'en the dust below,
When the burning gold of the diadem
Was set on her pallid brow!
Then died away that haughty sound,
And from th' encircling band,
Stept Prince and Chief, 'midst the hush profound,
With homage to her hand.

Why pass'd a faint cold shuddering
Over each martial frame,
As one by one, to touch that hand,
Noble and leader came?
Was not the settled aspect fair?
Did not a queenly grace,
Under the parted ebon hair.
Sit on the pale still face?

Death, Death! canst
thou
be lovely
Unto the eye of Life?
Is not each pulse of the quick high breast
With thy cold mien at strife?
-It was a strange and fearful sight,
The crown upon that head,
The glorious robes and the blaze of light,
All gather'd round the Dead!

And beside her stood in silence
One with a brow as pale,
And white lips rigidly compress'd,
Lest the strong heart should fail;
King Pedro with a jealous eye
Watching the homage done
By the land's flower and chivalry
To her, his martyr'd one.

But on the face he look'd not
Which once his star had been:
To every form his glance was turn'd,
Save of the breathless queen;
Though something, won from the grare's embrace,
Of her beauty still was there,
Its hues were all of that shadowy place,
'Twas not for
him
to bear.

Alas! the crown, the sceptre,
The treasures of the earth,
And the priceless love that pour'd those gifts,
Alike of wasted worth!
The rites are closed-bear back the Dead
Unto the chamber deep,
Lay down again the royal head,
Dust with the dust to sleep.

There is music on the midnight-
A requiem sad and slow.
As the mourners through the sounding aisle
In dark procession go,
And the ring of state, and the starry crown,
And all the rich array,
Are borne to the house of silence down,
With her, that queen of clay.

And tearlessly and firmly,
King Pedro led the train-
But his face was wrapt in his folding robe,
When they lower'd the dust again.
-'Tis hush'd at last, the tomb above,
Hymns die, and steps depart:
Who call'd thee strong as Death, O Love?

Mightier
thou wert and art!

A sound of woe in Salem! - mournful cries
Rose from her dwellings - youthful cheeks were pale,
Tears flowing fast from dim and aged eyes,
And voices mingling in tumultuous wail;
Hands raised to heaven in agony of prayer,
And powerless wrath, and terror, and despair.

Thy daughters, Judah! weeping, laid aside
The regal splendour of their fair array,
With the rude sackcloth girt their beauty's pride,
And thronged the streets in hurrying, wild dismay;
While knelt thy priests before
His
awful shrine,
Who made, of old, renown and empire thine.

But on the spoiler moves - the temple's gate,
The bright, the beautiful, his guards unfold;
And all the scene reveals its solemn state,
Its courts and pillars, rich with sculptured gold;
And man, with eye unhallowed, views the abode,
The severed spot, the dwelling-place of God.

Where art thou, Mighty Presence! that of yore
Wert wont between the cherubim to rest,
Veiled in a cloud of glory, shadowing o'er
Thy sanctuary the chosen and the blest?
Thou! that didst make fair Sion's ark thy throne,
And call the oracle's recess thine own!

Angel of God! that through the Assyrian host,
Clothed with the darkness of the midnight hour,
To tame the proud, to hush the invader's boast,
Didst pass triumphant in avenging power,
Till burst the day-spring on the silent scene,
And death alone revealed where thou hadst been.

Wilt thou not wake, O Chastener! in thy might,
To guard thine ancient and majestic hill,
Where oft from heaven the full Shechinah's light
Hath streamed the house of holiness to fill?
Oh! yet once more defend thy loved domain,
Eternal one! Deliverer! rise again!

Fearless of thee, the plunderer, undismayed,
Hastes on, the sacred chambers to explore
Where the bright treasures of the fane are laid,
The orphan's portion, and the widow's store;
What recks
his
heart through age unsuccoured die
And want consume the cheek of infancy?

Away, intruders! - hark! a mighty sound!
Behold, a burst of light! - away, away!
A fearful glory fills the temple round,
A vision bright in terrible array!
And lo! a steed of no terrestrial frame,
His path a whirlwind, and his breath a flame!

His neck is clothed with thunder - and his mane
Seems waving fire - the kindling of his eye
Is as a meteor - ardent with disdain
His glance - his gesture, fierce in majesty!
Instinct with light he seems, and formed to bear
Some dread archangel through the fields of air.

But who is he, in panoply of gold,
Throned on that burning charger? bright his form.
Yet in its brightness awful to behold,
And girt with all the terrors of the storm!
Lightning is on his helmet's crest - and fear
Shrinks from the splendour of his brow severe.

Oh! more than kingly - godlike! - sternly grand;
Their port indignant, and each dazzling face
Beams with the beauty to immortals given,
Magnificent in all the wrath of heaven.

Then sinks each gazer's heart - each knee is bowed
In trembling awe - but, as to fields of fight,
The unearthly war-steed, rushing through the crowd
Bursts on their leader in terrific might;
And the stern angels of that dread abode
Pursue its plunderer with the scourge of God.

Darkness - thick darkness! - low on earth he lies,
Rash Heliodorus - motionless and pale -
Bloodless his cheek, and o'er his shrouded eyes
Mists, as of death, suspend their shadowy veil;
And thus the oppressor, by his fear-struck train,
Is borne from that inviolable fane.

The light returns - the warriors of the sky
Have passed, with all their dreadful pomp, away
Then wakes the timbrel, swells the song on high
Triumphant as in Judah's elder day;
Rejoice, O city of the sacred hill!
Salem, exult! thy God is with thee still.

Wildly and mournfully the Indian drum
On the deep hush of moonlight forests broke;
'Sing us a death-song, for thine hour is come,
So the red warriors to their captive spoke.
Still, and amidst those dusky forms alone,
A youth, a fair-hair'd youth of England stood,
Like a king's son; tho' from his cheek had flown
The mantling crimson of the island-blood,
And his press'd lips look'd marble. Fiercely bright,
And high around him, blaz'd the fires of night,

Rocking beneath the cedars to and fro,
As the wind pass'd, and with a fitful glow
Lighting the victim's face: But who could tell
Of what within his secret heart befel,
Known but to heaven that hour? Perchance a thought
Of his far home then so intensely wrought,
That its full image, pictur'd to his eye
On the dark ground of mortal agony,
Rose clear as day! and he might see the band,
Of his young sisters wand'ring hand in hand,
Where the laburnums droop'd; or haply binding
The jasmine, up the door's low pillars winding;
Or, as day clos'd upon their gentle mirth,
Gathering with braided hair, around the hearth
Where sat their mother; and that mother's face
Its grave sweet smile yet wearing in the place
Where so it ever smiled!Perchance the prayer
Learn'd at her knee came back on his despair;

The blessing from her voice, the very tone
Of her 'Good-night' might breathe from boyhood gone!
He started and look'd up: thick cypress boughs
Full of strange sound, wav'd o'er him, darkly red
In the broad stormy firelight; savage brows,
With tall plumes crested and wild hues o'erspread,
Girt him like feverish phantoms; and pale stars
Look'd thro' the branches as thro' dungeon bars,
Shedding no hope. He knew, he felt his doom
Oh! what a tale to shadow with its gloom
That happy hall in England! Idle fear!
Would the winds tell it? Who might dream or hear
The secret of the forests? to the stake
They bound him; and that proud young soldier strove
His father's spirit in his breast to wake,
Trusting to die in silence! He, the love
Of many hearts! the fondly rear'd, the fair,
Gladdening all eyes to see! And fetter'd there.

He stood beside his death-pyre, and the brand
Flamed up to light it, in the chieftain's hand.
He thought upon his God. Hush! hark! a cry
Breaks on the stern and dread solemnity,
A step hath pierc'd the ring! Who dares intrude
On the dark hunters in their vengeful mood?
A girl a young slight girl a fawn-like child
Of green Savannas and the leafy wild,
Springing unmark'd till then, as some lone flower,
Happy because the sunshine is its dower;
Yet one that knew how early tears are shed,
For hers had mourn'd a playmate brother dead.

She had sat gazing on the victim long,
Until the pity of her soul grew strong;
And, by its passion's deep'ning fervour sway'd,
Ev'n to the stake she rush'd, and gently laid
His bright head on her bosom, and around
His form her slender arms to shield it wound
Like close liannes; then rais'd her glittering eye
And clear-toned voice that said, 'He shall not die!'

'He shall not die!' the gloomy forest thrill'd
To that sweet sound. A sudden wonder fell
On the fierce throng; and heart and hand were still'd,
Struck down, as by the whisper of a spell.
They gaz'd their dark souls bow'd before the maid,
She of the dancing step in wood and glade!
And, as her cheek flush'd thro' its olive hue,
As her black tresses to the night-wind flew,
Something o'ermaster'd them from that young mien–
Something of heaven, in silence felt and seen;
And seeming, to their child-like faith, a token
That the Great Spirit by her voice had spoken.

They loos'd the bonds that held their captive's breath;
From his pale lips they took the cup of death;
They quench'd the brand beneath the cypress tree;
'Away,' they cried, 'young stranger, thou art free!'

A sound of music, from amidst the hills,
Came suddenly, and died; a fitful sound
Of mirth, soon lost in wail.–Again it rose,
And sank in mournfulness.–There sat a bard,
By a blue stream of Erin, where it swept
Flashing thro' rock and wood; the sunset's light
Was on his wavy, silver-gleaming hair,
And the wind's whisper in the mountain-ash,

Whose clusters droop'd above. His head was bow'd,
His hand was on his harp, yet thence its touch
Had drawn but broken strains; and many stood,
Waiting around, in silent earnestness,
Th' unchaining of his soul, the gush of song,–
Many, and graceful forms! yet one alone
Seem'd present to his dream; and she indeed,
With her pale, virgin brow, and changeful cheek,
And the clear starlight of her serious eyes,
Lovely amidst the flowing of dark locks
And pallid braiding flowers, was beautiful,
Ev'n painfully!–a creature to behold
With trembling midst our joy, lest aught unseen
Should waft the vision from us, leaving earth
Too dim without its brightness!–Did such fear
O'ershadow, in that hour, the gifted one,
By his own rushing stream?–Once more he gaz'd
Upon the radiant girl, and yet once more
From the deep chords his wandering hand brought out
A few short festive notes, an opening strain

Of bridal melody, soon dash'd with grief,
As if some wailing spirit in the strings
Met and o'ermaster'd him: but yielding then
To the strong prophet-impulse, mournfully,
Like moaning waters o'er the harp he pour'd
The trouble of his haunted soul, and sang–

Voice of the grave!
I hear thy thrilling call;
It comes in the dash of the foaming wave,
In the sear leaf's trembling fall!
In the shiver of the tree,
I hear thee, O thou voice!
And I would thy warning were but for me,
That my spirit might rejoice.

But thou art sent
For the sad earth's young and fair,
For the graceful heads that have not bent
To the wintry hand of care!

They hear the wind's low sigh,
And the river sweeping free,
And the green reeds murmuring heavily,
And the woods–but they hear not thee!

Long have I striven
With my deep foreboding soul,
But the full tide now its bounds hath riven,
And darkly on must roll.
There's a young brow smiling near,
With a bridal white-rose wreath,–
Unto me it smiles from a flowery bier,
Touch'd solemnly by death!

Fair art thou, Morna!
The sadness of thine eye
Is beautiful as silvery clouds
On the dark-blue summer sky!

And thy voice comes like the sound
Of a sweet and hidden rill,
That makes the dim woods tuneful round–
But soon it must be still!

Silence and dust
On thy sunny lips must lie,
Make not the strength of love thy trust,
A stronger yet is nigh!
No strain of festal flow
That my hand for thee hath tried,
But into dirge-notes wild and low
Its ringing tones have died.

Young art thou, Morna!
Yet on thy gentle head,
Like heavy dew on the lily's leaves,
A spirit hath been shed!

And the glance is thine which sees
Thro' nature's awful heart–
But bright things go with the summer-breeze,
And thou too, must depart!

Yet shall I weep?
I know that in thy breast
There swells a fount of song too deep,
Too powerful for thy rest!
And the bitterness I know,
And the chill of this world's breath–
Go, all undimm'd, in thy glory go!
Young and crown'd bride of death!

Take hence to heaven
Thy holy thoughts and bright,
And soaring hopes, that were not given
For the touch of mortal blight!

Might we follow in thy track,
This parting should not be!
But the spring shall give us violets back,
And every flower but thee!

There was a burst of tears around the bard:
All wept but one, and she serenely stood,
With her clear brow and dark religious eye,
Rais'd to the first faint star above the hills,
And cloudless; though it might be that her cheek
Was paler than before.–So Morna heard
The minstrel's prophecy.
And spring return'd,
Bringing the earth her lovely things again,
All, save the loveliest far! A voice, a smile,
A young sweet spirit gone.

Thou see'st her pictured with her shining hair,
(Famed were those tresses in Provencal song,)
Half braided, half o'er cheek and bosom fair
Let loose, and pouring sunny waves along
Her gorgeous vest. A child's light hand is roving
Midst the rich curls; and, oh! how meekly loving
Its earnest looks are lifted to the face,
Which bends to meet its lip in laughing grace!

Yet that bright lady's eye methinks hath less
Of deep, and still, and pensive tenderness,
Than might beseem a mother's; on her brow
Something too much there sits of native scorn,
And her smile kindles with a conscious glow,
As from the thought of sovereign beauty born.
These may be dreams but how shall woman tell
Of woman's shame, and not with tears?–She fell!
That mother left that child! went hurrying by
Its cradle haply, not without a sigh,
Haply one moment o'er its rest serene
She hung but no! it could not thus have been,
For she went on! forsook her home, her hearth,
All pure affection, all sweet household mirth,
To live a gaudy and dishonour'd thing,
Sharing in guilt the splendours of a king.

Her lord, in very weariness of life,
Girt on his sword for scenes of distant strife;
He reck'd no more of glory: grief and shame
Crush'd out his fiery nature, and his name
Died silently. A shadow o'er his halls
Crept year by year; the minstrel pass'd their walls;
The warder's horn hung mute: meantime the child
On whose first flowering thoughts no parent smiled,
A gentle girl, and yet deep-hearted, grew
Into sad youth; for well, too well, she knew
Her mother's tale! Its memory made the sky
Seem all too joyous for her shrinking eye;
Check'd on her lip the flow of song, which fain
Would there have linger'd; flush'd her cheek to pain
If met by sudden glance; and gave a tone
Of sorrow, as for something lovely gone,
Ev'n to the spring's glad voice. Her own was low
And plaintive Oh! there lie such depths of wo
In a young blighted spirit! Manhood rears
A haughty brow, and age has done with tears;
But youth bows down to misery, in amaze
At the dark cloud o'ermantling its fresh days,

And thus it was with her. A mournful sight
In one so fair for she indeed was fair
Not with her mother's dazzling eyes of light,
Hers were more shadowy, full of thought and prayer,
And with long lashes o'er a white-rose cheek,
Drooping in gloom, yet tender still and meek,
Still that fond child's–and oh! the brow above,
So pale and pure! so form'd for holy love
To gaze upon in silence! But she felt
That love was not for her, tho' hearts would melt
Where'er she mov'd, and reverence mutely given
Went with her; and low prayers, that call'd on Heaven
To bless the young Isaure.

One sunny morn
With alms before her castle gate she stood,
Midst peasant-groups; when, breathless and o'erworn,
And shrouded in long weeds of widowhood,

A stranger thro' them broke: the orphan maid
With her sweet voice, and proffer'd hand of aid,
Turn'd to give welcome; but a wild sad look
Met hers; a gaze that all her spirit shook;
And that pale woman, suddenly subdued
By some strong passion in its gushing mood,
Knelt at her feet, and bath'd them with such tears
As rain the hoarded agonies of years
From the heart's urn; and with her white lips press'd
The ground they trod; then, burying in her vest
Her brow's deep flush, sobb'd out 'Oh! undefiled!
I am thy mother spurn me not, my child!'

Isaure had pray'd for that lost mother; wept
O'er her stain'd memory, while the happy slept
In the hush'd midnight: stood with mournful gaze
Before yon picture's smile of other days,
But never breath'd in human ear the name
Which weigh'd her being to the earth with shame.

What marvel if the anguish, the surprise,
The dark remembrances, the alter'd guise,
Awhile o'erpower'd her? from the weeper's touch
She shrank 'twas but a moment yet too much
For that all humbled one; its mortal stroke
Came down like lightning, and her full heart broke
At once in silence. Heavily and prone
She sank, while o'er her castle's threshold-stone,
Those long fair tresses they still brightly wore
Their early pride, though bound with pearls no more
Bursting their fillet, in sad beauty roll'd,
And swept the dust with coils of wavy gold.

Her child bent o'er her call'd her 'twas too late
Dead lay the wanderer at her own proud gate!
The joy of courts, the star of knight and bard,
How didst thou fall, O bright-hair'd Ermengarde!

There is but one place in the world:
–Thither where he lies buried!

Anon

There, there is all that still remains of him,
That single spot is the whole earth to me.

Coleridge's Wallenstein

Alas! our young affections run to waste,
Or water but the desert.

Childe Harold

THERE went a warrior's funeral thro' the night,
A waving of tall plumes, a ruddy light
Of torches, fitfully and wildly thrown
From the high woods, along the sweeping Rhone,
Far down the waters. Heavily and dead,
Under the moaning trees, the horse-hoof's tread
In muffled sounds upon the greensward fell,
As chieftains pass'd; and solemnly the swell
Of the deep requiem, o'er the gleaming river
Borne with the gale, and with the leaves' low shiver
Floated and died. Proud mourners there, yet pale,
Wore man's mute anguish sternly;–but of one,
Oh! who shall speak? What words his brow unveil?
A father following to the grave his son!
That is no grief to picture! Sad and slow,
Thro' the wood-shadows, moved the knightly train,
With youth's fair form upon the bier laid low,
Fair even when found, amidst the bloody slain,
Stretch'd by its broken lance. They reached the lone
Baronial chapel, where the forest gloom
Fell heaviest, for the massy boughs had grown
Into thick archways, as to vault the tomb.
Stately they trod the hollow ringing aisle,
A strange deep echo shuddered thro' the pile,
Till crested heads at last, in silence bent
Round the De Coucis' antique monument,

When dust to dust was given:–and Aymer slept
Beneath the drooping banners of his line,
Whose broider'd folds the Syrian wind had swept
Proudly and oft o'er fields of Palestine:
So the sad rite was clos'd. The sculptor gave
Trophies, ere long, to deck that lordly grave,
And the pale image of a youth, arrayed
As warriors are for fight, but calmly laid
In slumber on his shield.–Then all was done,
All still around the dead.–His name was heard
Perchance when wine-cups flow'd, and hearts were stirr'd
By some old song, or tale of battle won,
Told round the hearth: but in his father's breast
Manhood's high passions woke again, and press'd
On to their mark; and in his friend's clear eye
There dwelt no shadow of a dream gone by;
And with the brethren of his fields, the feast
Was gay as when the voice whose sounds had ceas'd
Mingled with theirs.–Ev'n thus life's rushing tide
Bears back affection from the grave's dark side:
Alas! to think of this!–the heart's void place
Fill'd up so soon!–so like a summer-cloud,
All that we lov'd to pass and leave no trace!–
He lay forgotten in his early shroud.
Forgotten?–not of all!–the sunny smile
Glancing in play o'er that proud lip erewhile,
And the dark locks whose breezy waving threw
A gladness round, whene'er their shade withdrew
From the bright brow; and all the sweetness lying
Within that eagle-eye's jet radiance deep,
And all the music with that young voice dying,
Whose joyous echoes made the quick heart leap
As at a hunter's bugle:–these things lived
Still in one breast, whose silent love survived
The pomps of kindred sorrow.–Day by day,
On Aymer's tomb fresh flowers in garlands lay,
Thro' the dim fane soft summer-odours breathing,
And all the pale sepulchral trophies wreathing,

And with a flush of deeper brilliance glowing
In the rich light, like molten rubies flowing
Thro' storied windows down. The violet there
Might speak of love–a secret love and lowly,
And the rose image all things fleet and fair,
And the faint passion-flower, the sad and holy,
Tell of diviner hopes. But whose light hand,
As for an altar, wove the radiant band?
Whose gentle nurture brought, from hidden dells.
That gem-like wealth of blossoms and sweet bells,
To blush through every season?–Blight and chill
Might touch the changing woods, but duly still.
For years, those gorgeous coronals renewed,
And brightly clasping marble spear and helm,
Even thro' mid-winter, filled the solitude
With a strange smile, a glow of summer's realm.
–Surely some fond and fervent heart was pouring
Its youth's vain worship on the dust, adoring
In lone devotedness!


One spring-morn rose,
And found, within that tomb's proud shadow laid–
Oh! not as midst the vineyards, to repose
From the fierce noon–a dark-hair'd peasant maid:
Who could reveal her story?–That still face
Had once been fair; for on the clear arch'd brow,
And the curv'd lip, there lingered yet such grace
As sculpture gives its dreams; and long and low
The deep black lashes, o'er the half-shut eye–
For death was on its lids–fell mournfully.
But the cold cheek was sunk, the raven hair
Dimm'd, the slight form all wasted, as by care.
Whence came that early blight? Her kindred's place
Was not amidst the high De Couci race;
Yet there her shrine had been!–She grasp'd a wreath–
The tomb's last garland!–This was love in death.

Nor look nor tone revealeth aught
Save woman's quietness of thought;
And yet around her is a light
Of inward majesty and might.
~ M.J.J.


Wer solch ein herz an seinen Busen dr?Der kann fur herd und hof mit freuden fechten.
~ Willholm Tell


It was the time when children bound to meet
Their father's homeward step from field or hill,
And when the herd's returning bells are sweet
In the Swiss valleys, and the lakes grow still,
And the last note of that wild horn swells by,
Which haunts the exile's heart with melody.

And lovely smil'd full many an Alpine home,
Touch'd with the crimson of the dying hour,
Which lit its low roof by the torrent's foam,
And pierced its lattice thro' the vine-hung bower;
But one, the loveliest o'er the land that rose,
Then first look'd mournful in its green repose.

For Werner sat beneath the linden-tree,
That sent its lulling whispers through his door,
Ev'n as man sits, whose heart alone would be
With some deep care, and thus can find no more
Th' accustom'd joy in all which Evening brings,
Gathering a household with her quiet wings.

His wife stood hush'd before him,?sad, yet mild
In her beseeching mien;?he mark'd it not.
The silvery laughter of his bright-hair'd child
Rang from the greensward round the shelter'd spot,
But seem'd unheard; until at last the boy
Rais'd from his heap'd-up flowers a glance of joy,

And met his father's face; but then a change
Pass'd swiftly o'er the brow of infant glee,
And a quick sense of something dimly strange
Brought him from play to stand beside the knee
So often climb'd, and lift his loving eyes
That shone through clouds of sorrowful surprise.

Then the proud bosom of the strong man shook;
But tenderly his babe's fair mother laid
Her hand on his, and with a pleading look,
Thro' tears half quivering, o'er him bent, and said,
'What grief, dear friend, hath made thy heart its prey,
That thou shouldst turn thee from our love away?

'It is too sad to see thee thus, my friend!
Mark'st thou the wonder on thy boy's fair brow,
Missing the smile from thine? Oh! cheer thee! bend
To his soft arms, unseal thy thoughts e'en now!
Thou dost not kindly to withhold the share
Of tried affection in thy secret care.'

He looked up into that sweet earnest face,
But sternly, mournfully: not yet the band
Was loosen'd from his soul; its inmost place
Not yet unveil'd by love's o'ermastering hand.
'Speak low!' he cried, and pointed where on high
The white Alps glitter'd thro' the solemn sky:

'We must speak low amidst our ancient hills
And their free torrents; for the days are come
When tyranny lies couch'd by forest-rills,
And meets the shepherd in his mountain-home.
Go, pour the wine of our own grapes in fear,
Keep silence by the hearth! its foes are near.

'The envy of th' oppressor's eye hath been
Upon my heritage. I sit to-night
Under my household tree, if not serene,
Yet with the faces best-beloved in sight:
To-morrow eve may find me chain'd, and thee?
How can I bear the boy's young smiles to see?'

The bright blood left that youthful mother's cheek;
Back on the linden-stem she lean'd her form,
And her lip trembled, as it strove to speak,
Like a frail harp-string, shaken by the storm.
'Twas but a moment, and the faintness pass'd,
And the free Alpine spirit woke at last.

And she, that ever thro' her home had mov'd
With the meek thoughtfulness and quiet smile
Of woman, calmly loving and belov'd,
And timid in her happiness the while,
Stood brightly forth, and steadfastly, that hour,
Her clear glance kindling into sudden power.

Ay, pale she stood, but with an eye of light,
And took her fair child to her holy breast,
And lifted her soft voice, that gathered might
As it found language:?'Are we thus oppress'd?
Then must we rise upon our mountain-sod,
And man must arm, and woman call on God!

'I know what thou wouldst do: And be it done!
Thy soul is darken'd with its fears for me.
Trust me to Heaven, my husband!?this, thy son,
The babe whom I have born thee, must be free!
And the sweet memory of our pleasant hearth
May well give strength?if aught be strong on earth.

'Thou hast been brooding o'er the silent dread
Of my desponding tears; now, lift once more,
My hunter of the hills! thy stately head,
And let thine eagle glance my joy restore!
I can bear all, but seeing thee subdued,?
Take to thee back thine own undaunted mood.

'Go forth beside the waters, and along
The chamois paths, and thro' the forests go;
And tell, in burning words, thy tale of wrong
To the brave hearts that midst the hamlets glow.
God shall be with thee, my belov'd!?Away!
Bless but thy child, and leave me:?I can pray!'

He sprang up, like a warrior-youth awaking
To clarion-sounds upon the ringing air;
He caught her to his breast, while proud tears breaking
From his dark eyes, fell o'er her braided hair;?
And 'Worthy art thou,' was his joyous cry,
'That man for thee should gird himself to die.

'My bride, my wife, the mother of my child!
Now shall thy name be armour to my heart:
And this our land, by chains no more defiled,
Be taught of thee to choose the better part!
I go?thy spirit on my words shall dwell,
Thy gentle voice shall stir the Alps:?Farewell!'

And thus they parted, by the quiet lake,
In the clear starlight: he, the strength to rouse
Of the free hills; she, thoughtful for his sake,
To rock her child beneath the whispering boughs,
Singing its blue half-curtain'd eyes to sleep,
With a low hymn, amidst the stillness deep.

'Voice of the gifted elder time!
Voice of the charm and the Runic rhyme!
Speak! from the shades and the depths disclose,
How Sigurd may vanquish his mortal foes;
Voice of the buried past!

'Voice of the grave! 'tis the mighty hour,
When night with her stars and dreams hath power,
And my step hath been soundless on the snows,
And the spell I have sung hath laid repose
On the billow and the blast.'

Then the torrents of the North,
And the forest pines were still,
While a hollow chant came forth
From the dark sepulchral hill.

'There shines no sun 'midst the hidden dead,
But where the day looks not the brave may tread;
There is heard no song, and no mead is pour'd,
But the warrior may come to the silent board
In the shadow of the night.

'There is laid a sword in thy father's tomb,
And its edge is fraught with thy foeman's doom;
But soft be thy step through the silence deep,
And move not the urn in the house of sleep,
For the viewless have fearful might!'

Then died the solemn lay,
As a trumpet's music dies,
By the night-wind borne away
Through the wild and stormy skies.

The fir-trees rock'd to the wailing blast,
As on through the forest the warrior pass'd,-
Through the forest of Odin, the dim and old,
The dark place of visions and legends, told
By the fires of Northern pine.

The fir-trees rock'd, and the frozen ground
Gave back to his footstep a hollow sound;
And it seem'd that the depths of those awful shades,
From the dreary gloom of their long arcades,
Gave warning, with voice and sign.

But the wind strange magic knows
To call wild shape and tone
From the grey wood's tossing boughs
When night is on her throne.

The pines clos'd o'er him with deeper gloom,
As he took the path to the monarch's tomb;
The pole-star shone, and the heavens were bright
With the arrowy streams of the northern light,
But his road through dimness lay!

He pass'd, in the heart of that ancient wood,
The dark shrine stain'd with the victim's blood:
Nor paus'd, till the rock where a vaulted bed
Had been hewn of old for the kingly dead,
Arose on his midnight way.

Then first a moment's chill
Went shuddering through his breast,
And the steel-clad man stood still
Before that place of rest.

But he cross'd at length, with a deep-drawn breath,
The threshold-floor of the hall of Death,
And look'd on the pale mysterious fire
Which gleam'd from the urn of his warrior-sire,
With a strange and solemn light.

Then darkly the words of the boding strain
Like an omen rose on his soul again,
-'Soft be thy step through the silence deep,
And move not the urn in the house of sleep,
For the viewless have fearful might!'

But the gleaming sword and shield
Of many a battle-day
Hung o'er that urn, reveal'd
By the tomb-fire's waveless ray.

With a faded wreath of oak-leaves bound,
They hung o'er the dust of the far-renown'd,
Whom the bright Valkyriur's warning voice
Had call'd to the banquet where gods rejoice,
And the rich mead flows in light.

With a beating heart his son drew near,
And still rang the verse in his thrilling ear,
-'Soft be thy step through the silence deep,
And move not the urn in the house of sleep,
For the viewless have fearful might!'

And many a Saga's rhyme,
And legend of the grave,
That shadowy scene and time
Call'd back, to daunt the brave.

But he rais'd his arm-and the flame grew dim,
And the sword in its light seem'd to wave and swim,
And his faltering hand could not grasp it well-
From the pale oak-wreath, with a clash it fell
Through the chamber of the dead!

The deep tomb rang with the heavy sound,
And the urn lay shiver'd in fragments round;
And a rush, as of tempests, quench'd the fire,
And the scatter'd dust of his warlike sire
Was strewn on the Champion's head.

One moment-and all was still
In the slumberer's ancient hall,
When the rock had ceas'd to thrill
With the mighty weapon's fall.

The stars were just fading, one by one,
The clouds were just ting'd by the early sun,
When there stream'd through the cavern a torch's flame,
And the brother of Sigurd the valiant came
To seek him in the tomb.

Stretch'd on his shield, like the steel-girt slain
By moonlight seen on the battle-plain,
In a speechless trance lay the warrior there,
But he wildly woke when the torch's glare
Burst on him through the gloom.

'The morning wind blows free,
And the hour of chase is near:
Come forth, come forth, with me!
What dost thou, Sigurd, here?'

'I have put out the holy sepulchral fire,
I have scatter'd the dust of my warrior-sire!
It burns on my head, and it weighs down my heart;
But the winds shall not wander without their part
To strew o'er the restless deep!

'In the mantle of death he was here with me now,-
There was wrath in his eye, there was gloom on his brow;
And his cold still glance on my spirit fell
With an icy ray and a withering spell-
Oh! chill is the house of sleep!'

'The morning wind blows free,
And the reddening sun shines clear;
Come forth come forth, with me!
It is dark and fearful here!'

'He is there, he is there, with his shadowy frown!
But gone from his head is the kingly crown,
The crown from his head, and the spear from his hand,-
They have chas'd him far from the glorious land
Where the feast of the gods is spread!

'He must go forth alone on his phantom steed;
He must ride o'er the grave-hills with stormy speed;
His place is no longer at Odin's board,
He is driven from Valhalla without his sword!
But the slayer shall avenge the dead!'

That sword its fame had won
By the fall of many a crest,
But its fiercest work was done
In the tomb on Sigurd's breast!

Fear! I'm a Greek, and how should I fear death?
A slave, and wherefore should I dread my freedom?
I will not live degraded ~
Sardanapalus

Come from the woods with the citron-flowers,
Come with your lyres for the festal hours,
Maids of bright Scio! They came, and the breeze
Bore their sweet songs o'er the Grecian seas;?
They came, and Eudora stood rob'd and crown'd,
The bride of the morn, with her train around.

Jewels flash'd out from her braided hair,
Like starry dews midst the roses there;
Pearls on her bosom quivering shone,
Heav'd by her heart thro' its golden zone;
But a brow, as those gems of the ocean pale,
Gleam'd from beneath her transparent veil;
Changeful and faint was her fair cheek's hue,
Though clear as a flower which the light looks through;
And the glance of her dark resplendent eye,
For the aspect of woman at times too high,
Lay floating in mists, which the troubled stream
Of the soul sent up o'er its fervid beam.

She look'd on the vine at her father's door,
Like one that is leaving his native shore;
She hung o'er the myrtle once call'd her own,
As it greenly wav'd by the threshold stone;
She turn'd?and her mother's gaze brought back
Each hue of her childhood's faded track.

Oh! hush the song, and let her tears
Flow to the dream of her early years!
Holy and pure are the drops that fall
When the young bride goes from her father's hall;
She goes unto love yet untried and new,
She parts from love which hath still been true;
Mute be the song and the choral strain,
Till her heart's deep well-spring is clear again!
She wept on her mother's faithful breast,
Like a babe that sobs itself to rest;
She wept yet laid her hand awhile
In his that waited her dawning smile?
Her soul's affianced, nor cherish'd less
For the gush of nature's tenderness!
She lifted her graceful head at last?
The choking swell of her heart was past;
And her lovely thoughts from their cells found way
In the sudden flow of a plaintive lay.


The Bride's Farewell:

Why do I weep? to leave the vine
Whose clusters o'er me bend,
The myrtle yet, oh! call it mine!
The flowers I lov'd to tend.
A thousand thoughts of all things dear,
Like shadows o'er me sweep,
I leave my sunny childhood here,
Oh, therefore let me weep!

I leave thee, sister! we have play'd
Thro' many a joyous hour,
Where the silvery green of the olive shade
Hung dim o'er fount and bower.
Yes, thou and I, by stream, by shore,
In song, in prayer, in sleep,
Have been as we may be no more,
Kind sister, let me weep!

I leave thee, father! Eve's bright moon
Must now light other feet,
With the gather'd grapes, and the lyre in tune,
Thy homeward step to greet.
Thou, in whose voice, to bless thy child,
Lay tones of love so deep,
Whose eye o'er all my youth hath smiled
I leave thee! let me weep!

Mother! I leave thee! on thy breast,
Pouring out joy and wo,
I have found that holy place of rest
Still changeless yet I go!
Lips, that have lull'd me with your strain,
Eyes, that have watch'd my sleep!
Will earth give love like yours again!
Sweet mother! let me weep!

And like a slight young tree, that throws
The weight of rain from its drooping boughs,
Once more she wept. But a changeful thing
Is the human heart, as a mountain spring,
That works its way, thro' the torrent's foam,
To the bright pool near it, the lily's home!
It is well! the cloud, on her soul that lay,
Hath melted in glittering drops away.
Wake again, mingle, sweet flute and lyre!
She turns to her lover, she leaves her sire.
Mother! on earth it must still be so,
Thou rearest the lovely to see them go!

They are moving onward, the bridal throng,
Ye may track their way by the swells of song;
Ye may catch thro' the foliage their white robes' gleam,
Like a swan midst the reeds of a shadowy stream.
Their arms bear up garlands, their gliding tread
Is over the deep-vein'd violet's bed;
They have light leaves around them, blue skies above,
An arch for the triumph of youth and love!

II.
Still and sweet was the home that stood
In the flowering depths of a Grecian wood,
With the soft green light o'er its low roof spread,
As if from the glow of an emerald shed,
Pouring thro' lime-leaves that mingled on high,
Asleep in the silence of noon's clear sky.
Citrons amidst their dark foliage glow'd,
Making a gleam round the lone abode;
Laurels o'erhung it, whose faintest shiver
Scatter'd out rays like a glancing river;
Stars of the jasmine its pillars crown'd,
Vine-stalks its lattice and walls had bound,
And brightly before it a fountain's play
Flung showers thro' a thicket of glossy bay,
To a cypress which rose in that flashing rain,
Like one tall shaft of some fallen fane.

And thither Ianthis had brought his bride,
And the guests were met by that fountain-side;

They lifted the veil from Eudora's face,
It smiled out softly in pensive grace,
With lips of love, and a brow serene,
Meet for the soul of the deep wood-scene.
Bring wine, bring odours! the board is spread?
Bring roses! a chaplet for every head!
The wine-cups foam'd, and the rose was shower'd
On the young and fair from the world embower'd;
The sun looked not on them in that sweet shade,
The winds amid scented boughs were laid;
And there came by fits, thro' some wavy tree,
A sound and a gleam of the moaning sea.

Hush! be still! was that no more
Than the murmur from the shore?
Silence! did thick rain-drops beat
On the grass like trampling feet?
Fling down the goblet, and draw the sword!
The groves are fill'd with a pirate horde!
Thro' the dim olives their sabres shine;
Now must the red blood stream for wine!

The youths from the banquet to battle sprang,
The woods with the shriek of the maidens rang;
Under the golden-fruited boughs
There were flashing poniards and dark'ning brows,
Footsteps, o'er garland and lyre that fled,
And the dying soon on a greensward bed.

Eudora, Eudora! thou dost not fly!
She saw but Ianthis before her lie,
With the blood from his breast in a gushing flow,
Like a child's large tears in its hour of wo,
And a gathering film in his lifted eye,
That sought his young bride out mournfully.
She knelt down beside him, her arms she wound,
Like tendrils, his drooping neck around,
As if the passion of that fond grasp
Might chain in life with its ivy-clasp.

But they tore her thence in her wild despair,
The sea's fierce rovers they left him there;
They left to the fountain a dark-red vein,
And on the wet violets a pile of slain,
And a hush of fear thro' the summer grove,
So clos'd the triumph of youth and love!

III.
Gloomy lay the shore that night,
When the moon, with sleeping light,
Bath'd each purple Sciote hill,
Gloomy lay the shore, and still.
O'er the wave no gay guitar
Sent its floating music far;
No glad sound of dancing feet
Woke, the starry hours to greet.
But a voice of mortal wo,
In its changes wild or low,
Thro' the midnight's blue repose,
From the sea-beat rocks arose,
As Eudora's mother stood
Gazing o'er th' Egean flood,
With a fix'd and straining eye?
Oh! was the spoilers' vessel nigh?
Yes! there, becalm'd in silent sleep,
Dark and alone on a breathless deep,
On a sea of molten silver, dark,
Brooding it frown'd that evil bark!
There its broad pennon a shadow cast,
Moveless and black from the tall, still mast,
And the heavy sound of its flapping sail,
Idly and vainly wooed the gale.
Hush'd was all else: Had ocean's breast
Rock'd e'en Eudora that hour to rest?

To rest? the waves tremble! what piercing cry
Bursts from the heart of the ship on high?
What light through the heavens, in a sudden spire,
Shoots from the deck up? Fire! 'tis fire!

There are wild forms hurrying to and fro,
Seen darkly clear on that lurid glow;
There are shout, and signal-gun, and call,
And the dashing of water, but fruitless all!
Man may not fetter, nor ocean tame
The might and wrath of the rushing flame!
It hath twined the mast like a glittering snake,
That coils up a tree from a dusky brake;
It hath touch'd the sails, and their canvass rolls
Away from its breath into shrivell'd scrolls;
It hath taken the flag's high place in air,
And redden'd the stars with its wavy glare;
And sent out bright arrows, and soar'd in glee,
To a burning mount midst the moonlight sea.
The swimmers are plunging from stern and prow.
Eudora! Eudora! where, where art thou?
The slave and his master alike are gone.
Mother! who stands on the deck alone?
The child of thy bosom! and lo! a brand
Blazing up high in her lifted hand!

And her veil flung back, and her free dark hair
Sway'd by the flames as they rock and flare;
And her fragile form to its loftiest height
Dilated, as if by the spirit's might,
And her eye with an eagle-gladness fraught,
Oh! could this work be of woman wrought?
Yes! 'twas her deed! by that haughty smile
It was hers?She hath kindled her funeral pile!
Never might shame on that bright head be,
Her blood was the Greek's, and hath made her free!

Proudly she stands, like an Indian bride
On the pyre with the holy dead beside;
But a shriek from her mother hath caught her ear,
As the flames to her marriage-robe draw near,
And starting, she spreads her pale arms in vain
To the form they must never infold again.

One moment more, and her hands are clasp'd,
Fallen is the torch they had wildly grasp'd,
Her sinking knee unto Heaven is bow'd,
And her last look rais'd thro' the smoke's dim shroud,
And her lips as in prayer for her pardon move:
Now the night gathers o'er youth and love!

MARK'D ye the mingling of the city's throng,
Each mien, each glance, with expectation bright?
Prepare the pageant, and the choral song,
The pealing chimes, the blaze of festal light!
And hark! what rumour's gathering sound is nigh?
Is it the voice of joy, that murmur deep?
Away! be hush'd! ye sounds of revelry.
Back to your homes, ye multitudes, to weep!
Weep! for the storm hath o'er us darkly past,
And England's royal flower is broken by the blast!
II

Was it a dream? so sudden and so dread
That awful fiat o'er our senses came!
So loved, so blest, is that young spirit fled,
Whose early grandeur promised years of fame?
Oh! when hath life possess'd, or death destroy'd
More lovely hopes, more cloudlessly that smiled?
When hath the spoiler left so dark a void?
For all is lost-the mother and her child!
Our morning-star hath vanish'd, and the tomb
Throws its deep lengthen'd shade o'er distant years to come.
III

Angel of Death! did no presaging sign
Announce thy coming, and thy way prepare?
No warning voice, no harbinger was thine,
Danger and fear seem'd past-but thou wert there!
Prophetic sounds along the earthquake's path
Foretell the hour of nature's awful throes;
And the volcano, ere it burst in wrath,
Sends forth some herald from its dread repose:
But thou, dark Spirit! swift and unforeseen,
Cam'st like the lightning's flash, when heaven is all serene.
IV

And she is gone-the royal and the young,
In soul commanding, and in heart benign;
Who, from a race of kings and heroes sprung,
Glow'd with a spirit lofty as her line.
Now may the voice she loved on earth so well
Breathe forth her name, unheeded and in vain;
Nor can those eyes on which her own would dwell,
Wake from that breast one sympathy again:
The ardent heart, the towering mind are fled,
Yet shall undying love still linger with the dead.
V

Oh! many a bright existence we have seen
Quench'd, in the glow and fulness of its prime;
And many a cherish'd flower, ere now, hath been
Cropt, ere its leaves were breathed upon by time.
We have lost heroes in their noon of pride,
Whose fields of triumph gave them but a bier;
And we have wept when soaring genius died,
Check'd in the glory of his mid career!
But here our hopes were centred-all is o'er,
All thought in this absorb'd-she was-and is no more!
VI

We watch'd her childhood from its earliest hour,
From every word and look blest omens caught;
While that young mind developed all its power,
And rose to energies of loftiest thought.
On her was fix'd the patriot's ardent eye,
One hope still bloom'd-one vista still was fair;
And when the tempest swept the troubled sky
She was our dayspring-all was cloudless there;
And oh! how lovely broke on England's gaze,
E'en through the mist and storm, the light of distant days.
VII

Now hath one moment darken'd future years,
And changed the track of ages yet to be!-
Yet, mortal! 'midst the bitterness of tears,
Kneel, and adore the inscrutable decree!
Oh! while the clear perspective smiled in light,
Wisdom should then have temper'd hope's excess,
And, lost One! when we saw thy Iot so bright,
We might have trembled at its loveliness:
Joy is no earthly flower-nor framed to bear,
In its exotic bloom, life's cold, ungenial air.
VIII

All smiled around thee-Youth, and Love, and Praise,
Hearts all devotion and all truth were thine!
On thee was riveted a nation's gaze,
As on some radiant and unsullied shrine.
Heiress of empires! thou art passe'd away,
Like some fair vision, that arose to throw,
O'er one brief hour of life, a fleeting ray,
Then leave the rest to solitude and woe!
Oh! who shall dare to woo such dreams again!
Who hath not wept to know, that tears for thee were vain?
IX

Yet there is one who loved thee-and whose soul
With mild affections nature form'd to melt;
His mind hath bow'd beneath the stern control
Of many a grief-but this shall be unfelt!
Years have gone by-and given his honour'd head
A diadem of snow-his eye is dim-
Around him Heaven a solemn cloud hath spread,
The past, the future, are a dream to him!
Yet, in the darkness of his fate, alone
He dwells on earth, while thou, in life's full pride art gone!
X

The Chastener's hand is on us-we may weep,
But not repine-for many a storm hath past,
And, pillow'd on her own majestic deep,
Hath England slept, unshaken by the blast!
And War hath raged o'er many a distant plain
Trampling the vine and olive in his path;
While she, that regal daughter of the main,
Smiled, in serene defiance of his wrath!
As some proud summit, mingling with the sky,
Hears calmly far below the thunders roll and die.
XI

Her voice hath been the awakener-and her name
The gathering-word of nations-in her might,
And all the awful beauty of her fame,
Apart she dwelt, in solitary light.
High on her cliffs, alone and firm she stood,
Fixing the torch upon her beacon-tower;
That torch, whose flame, far streaming o'er the flood,
Hath guided Europe through her darkest hour.
Away, vain dreams of glory!-in the dust
Be humbled, ocean-queen! and own thy sentence just!
XII

Hark! 'twas the death bell's note! which, full and deep,
Unmix'd with aught of less majestic tone,
While all the murmurs of existence sleep,
Swell'd on the stillness of the air alone!
Silent the throngs that fill the darken'd street,
Silent the slumbering Thames, the lonely mart;
And all is still, where countless thousands meet,
Save the full throbbing of the awe-struck heart!
All deeply, strangely, fearfully serene,
As in each ravaged home the avenging one had been.
XIII

The sun goes down in beauty-his farewell,
Unlike the world he leaves, is calmly bright;
And his last mellowed rays around us dwell,
Lingering, as if on scenes of young delight.
They smile and fade-but, when the day is o'er.
What slow procession moves, with measured tread ?-
Lo! those who weep for her who weeps no more,
A solemn train-the mourners and the dead!
While, throned on high, the moon's untroubled ray
Looks down, as earthly hopes are passing thus away.
XIV

But other light is in that holy pile,
Where, in the house of silence, kings repose;
There, through the dim arcade, and pillar'd aisle,
The funeral torch its deep-red radiance throws.
There pall, and canopy, and sacred strain,
And all around the stamp of woe may bear;
But Grief, to whose full heart those forms are vain,
Grief unexpress'd, unsoothed by them-is there.
No darker hour hath Fate for him who mourns,
Than when the all he loved, as dust, to dust returns.
XV

We mourn-but not thy fate, departed One!
We pity-but the living, not the dead;
A cloud hangs o'er us- 'the bright day is done', {1}
And with a father's hopes, a nation's fled.
And he, the chosen of thy youthful breast, .
Whose soul with thine had mingled every thought;
He, with thine early fond affections blest,
Lord of a mind with all things lovely fraught;
What but a desert to his eye, that earth,
Which but retains of thee the memory of thy worth?
XVI

Oh! there are griefs for nature too intense,
Whose first rude shock but stupifies the soul;
Nor hath the fragile and o'erlabour'd sense
Strength e'en to feel, at once, their dread control.
But when 'tis past, that still and speechless hour,
Of the seal'd bosom, and the tearless eye,
Then the roused mind awakes, with tenfold-power
To grasp the fulness of its agony!
Its death-like torpor vanish'd-and its doom;
To cast its own dark hues o'er life and nature's bloom.
XVII

And such his lot, whom thou hast loved and left.
Spirit! thus early to thy home recall'd!
So sinks the heart, of hope and thee bereft,
A warrior's heart, which danger ne'er appall'd.
Years may pass on-and, as they roll along,
MeIlow those pangs which now his bosom rend;
And he once more, with life's unheeding throng,
May, though alone in soul, in seeming blend;
Yet still, the guardian-angel of his mind
Shall thy loved image dwell, in Memory's temple shrined.
XVIII

Yet must the days be long ere time shall steal
Aught from his grief whose spirit dwells with thee;
Once deeply bruised, the heart at length may heal,
But all it was-oh! never more shall be.
The flower, the leaf, o'erwhelm'd by winter snow,
Shall spring again, when beams and showers return;
The faded cheek again with health may glow,
And the dim eye with life's warm radiance burn;
But the pure freshness of the mind's young bloom,
Once lost, revives alone in worlds beyond the tomb
XIX

But thou-thine hour of agony is o'er,
And thy brief race in brilliance hath been run;
While Faith, that bids fond nature grieve no more,
TeIls that thy crown-though not on earth-is won.
Thou, of the world so early left, hast known
Naught but the bloom of sunshine-and for thee,
Child of propitious stars! for thee alone
The course of love ran smooth, and brightly free- {2}
Not long such bliss to mortal could be given,
It is enough for earth to catch one glimpse of heaven.
XX

What though, ere yet the noonday of thy fame
Rose in its glory on thine England's eye,
The grave's deep shadows o'er thy prospect came?
Ours is that loss-and thou wert blest to die!
Thou might'st have lived to dark and evil years,
To mourn thy people changed, thy skies o'ercast;
But thy spring morn was all undimm'd by tears,
And thou wert loved and cherish'd to the last!
And thy young name, ne'er breathed in ruder tone,
Thus dying, thou hast left to love and grief alone.
XXI

Daughter of Kings! from that high sphere look down,
Where still in hope, affection's thoughts may rise;
Where dimly shines to thee that mortal crown,
Which earth display'd to claim thee from the skies.
Look down! and if thy spirit yet retain
Memory of aught that once was fondly dear,
Soothe, though unseen, the hearts that mourn in vain,
And, in their hours of loneliness-be near!
Blest was thy lot e'en here-and one faint sigh,
Oh! tell those hearts, hath made that bliss eternity!

Du Heilige! rufe dein Kind zur?ch habe genossen das irdische Gl?ch habe gelebt und geliebet. ~
Wallenstein

The woods? oh! solemn are the boundless woods
Of the great Western World, when day declines,
And louder sounds the roll of distant floods,
More deep the rustling of the ancient pines;
When dimness gathers on the stilly air,
And mystery seems o'er every leaf to brood,
Awful it is for human heart to bear
The might and burden of the solitude!

Yet, in that hour, midst those green wastes, there sate
One young and fair,?and oh! how desolate!
But undismay'd; while sank the crimson light,
And the high cedars darken'd with the night,
Alone she sate; tho' many lay around,
They, pale and silent on the bloody ground,
Were sever'd from her need and from her wo,
Far as Death severs Life. O'er that wild spot
Combat had rag'd, and brought the valiant low,
And left them, with the history of their lot,
Unto the forest oaks. A fearful scene
For her whose home of other days had been
Midst the fair halls of England! but the love
Which fill'd her soul was strong to cast out fear,
And by its might upborne all else above,
She shrank not?mark'd not that the dead were near.
Of him alone she thought, whose languid head
Faintly upon her wedded bosom fell;
Memory of aught but him on earth was fled,
While heavily she felt his life-blood well
Fast o'er her garments forth, and vainly bound
With her torn robe and hair the streaming wound,
Yet hoped, still hoped!?Oh! from such hope how long
Affection wooes the whispers that deceive,
Ev'n when the pressure of dismay grows strong,
And we, that weep, watch, tremble, ne'er believe
The blow indeed can fall! So bow'd she there
Over the dying, while unconscious prayer
Fill'd all her soul. Now pour'd the moonlight down,
Veining the pine-stems thro' the foliage brown,
And fire-flies, kindling up the leafy place,
Cast fitful radiance o'er the warrior's face,
Whereby she caught its changes: to her eye,
The eye that faded look'd through gathering haze,
Whence love, o'ermastering mortal agony,
Lifted a long, deep, melancholy gaze,
When voice was not: that fond, sad meaning pass'd?
She knew the fulness of her wo at last!
One shriek the forests heard,?and mute she lay,
And cold; yet clasping still the precious clay
To her scarce-heaving breast. O Love and Death!
Ye have sad meetings on this changeful earth,
Many and sad! but airs of heavenly breath
Shall melt the links which bind you, for your birth
Is far apart.
Now light, of richer hue
Than the moon sheds, came flushing mist and dew;
The pines grew red with morning; fresh winds play'd,
Bright-colour'd birds with splendour cross'd the shade,
Flitting on flower-like wings; glad murmurs broke
From reed, and spray, and leaf, the living strings
Of Earth's Eolian lyre, whose music woke
Into young life and joy all happy things.
And she too woke from that long dreamless trance,
The widow'd Edith: fearfully her glance
Fell, as in doubt, on faces dark and strange,
And dusky forms. A sudden sense of change
Flash'd o'er her spirit, ev'n ere memory swept
The tide of anguish back with thoughts that slept;
Yet half instinctively she rose, and spread
Her arms, as 'twere for something lost or fled,
Then faintly sank again. The forest-bough,
With all its whispers, wav'd not o'er her now,?
Where was she? Midst the people of the wild,
By the red hunter's fire: an aged chief,
Whose home look'd sad?for therein play'd no child?
Had borne her, in the stillness of her grief,
To that lone cabin of the woods; and there,
Won by a form so desolately fair,
Or touch'd with thoughts from some past sorrow sprung,
O'er her low couch an Indian matron hung;
While in grave silence, yet with earnest eye,
The ancient warrior of the waste stood by,
Bending in watchfulness his proud grey head,
And leaning on his bow.
And life return'd,
Life, but with all its memories of the dead,
To Edith's heart; and well the sufferer learn'd
Her task of meek endurance, well she wore
The chasten'd grief that humbly can adore,
Midst blinding tears. But unto that old pair,
Ev'n as a breath of spring's awakening air,
Her presence was; or as a sweet wild tune
Bringing back tender thoughts, which all too soon
Depart with childhood. Sadly they had seen
A daughter to the land of spirits go,
And ever from that time her fading mien,
And voice, like winds of summer, soft and low,
Had haunted their dim years; but Edith's face
Now look'd in holy sweetness from her place,
And they again seem'd parents. Oh! the joy,
The rich deep blessedness?tho' earth's alloy,

Fear, that still bodes, be there?of pouring forth
The heart's whole power of love, its wealth and worth
Of strong affection, in one healthful flow,
On something all its own!?that kindly glow,
Which to shut inward is consuming pain,
Gives the glad soul its flowering time again,
When, like the sunshine, freed.?And gentle cares
Th' adopted Edith meekly gave for theirs
Who lov'd her thus: her spirit dwelt the while,
With the departed, and her patient smile
Spoke of farewells to earth;?yet still she pray'd,
Ev'n o'er her soldier's lowly grave, for aid
One purpose to fulfil, to leave one trace
Brightly recording that her dwelling-place
Had been among the wilds; for well she knew
The secret whisper of her bosom true,
Which warn'd her hence.
And now, by many a word
Link'd unto moments when the heart was stirr'd,
By the sweet mournfulness of many a hymn,
Sung when the woods at eve grew hush'd and dim,
By the persuasion of her fervent eye,
All eloquent with child-like piety,
By the still beauty of her life, she strove
To win for heaven, and heaven-born truth, the love
Pour'd out on her so freely.?Nor in vain
Was that soft-breathing influence to enchain
The soul in gentle bonds: by slow degrees
Light follow'd on, as when a summer breeze
Parts the deep masses of the forest shade
And lets the sunbeam through:?her voice was made
Ev'n such a breeze; and she, a lowly guide,
By faith and sorrow rais'd and purified,
So to the Cross her Indian fosterers led,
Until their prayers were one. When morning spread
O'er the blue lake, and when the sunset's glow
Touch'd into golden bronze the cypress-bough,
And when the quiet of the Sabbath time
Sank on her heart, tho' no melodious chime
Waken'd the wilderness, their prayers were one.
?Now might she pass in hope, her work was done!
And she was passing from the woods away;
The broken flower of England might not stay
Amidst those alien shades; her eye was bright
Ev'n yet with something of a starry light,
But her form wasted, and her fair young cheek
Wore oft and patiently a fatal streak,
A rose whose root was death. The parting sigh
Of autumn thro' the forests had gone by,
And the rich maple o'er her wanderings lone
Its crimson leaves in many a shower had strown,
Flushing the air; and winter's blast had been
Amidst the pines; and now a softer green
Fring'd their dark boughs; for spring again had come,
The sunny spring! but Edith to her home
Was journeying fast. Alas! we think it sad
To part with life, when all the earth looks glad
In her young lovely things, when voices break
Into sweet sounds, and leaves and blossoms wake:
Is it not brighter then, in that far clime
Where graves are not, nor blights of changeful time,
If here such glory dwell with passing blooms,
Such golden sunshine rest around the tombs?
So thought the dying one. 'Twas early day,
And sounds and odours with the breezes' play,
Whispering of spring-time, thro' the cabin-door,
Unto her couch life's farewell sweetness bore;
Then with a look where all her hope awoke,
'My father!'?to the grey-hair'd chief she spoke?
'Know'st thou that I depart?'?'I know, I know,'
He answer'd mournfully, 'that thou must go
To thy belov'd, my daughter!'?'Sorrow not
For me, kind mother!' with meek smiles once more
She murmur'd in low tones; 'one happy lot
Awaits us, friends! upon the better shore;
For we have pray'd together in one trust,
And lifted our frail spirits from the dust
To God, who gave them. Lay me by mine own,
Under the cedar-shade: where he is gone,
Thither I go. There will my sisters be,
And the dead parents, lisping at whose knee
My childhood's prayer was learn'd?the Saviour's prayer
Which now ye know?and I shall meet you there,
Father and gentle mother!?ye have bound
The bruised reed, and mercy shall be found
By Mercy's children.'?From the matron's eye
Dropp'd tears, her sole and passionate reply;
But Edith felt them not; for now a sleep,
Solemnly beautiful, a stillness deep,
Fell on her settled face. Then, sad and slow,
And mantling up his stately head in wo,
'Thou'rt passing hence,' he sang, that warrior old,
In sounds like those by plaintive waters roll'd.

'Thou'rt passing from the lake's green side,
And the hunter's hearth away;
For the time of flowers, for the summer's pride,
Daughter! thou canst not stay.

Thou'rt journeying to thy spirit's home,
Where the skies are ever clear!
The corn-month's golden hours will come,
But they shall not find thee here.

And we shall miss thy voice, my bird!
Under our whispering pine;
Music shall midst the leaves be heard,
But not a song like thine.

A breeze that roves o'er stream and hill,
Telling of winter gone,
Hath such sweet falls?yet caught we still
A farewell in its tone.

But thou, my bright one! thou shalt be
Where farewell sounds are o'er;
Thou, in the eyes thou lov'st, shalt see
No fear of parting more.

The mossy grave thy tears have wet,
And the wind's wild moanings by,
Thou with thy kindred shalt forget,
Midst flowers?not such as die.

The shadow from thy brow shall melt,
The sorrow from thy strain,
But where thine earthly smile hath dwelt,
Our hearts shall thirst in vain.

Dim will our cabin be, and lone,
When thou, its light, art fled;
Yet hath thy step the pathway shown
Unto the happy dead.

And we will follow thee, our guide!
And join that shining band;
Thou'rt passing from the lake's green side?
Go to the better land!'

The song had ceas'd, the listeners caught no breath,
That lovely sleep had melted into death.

'Among many nations was there no King like him.' –Nehemiah, xiii, 26.
'Know ye not that there is a prince and a great man fallen this day in Israel?' – 2 Samuel, iii, 38.

ANOTHER warning sound! the funeral bell,
Startling the cities of the isle once more
With measured tones of melanchoIy swell,
Strikes on the awakened heart from shore to shore.
He at whose coming monarchs sink to dust,
The chambers of our palaces hath trod,
And the long-suffering spirit of the just,
Pure from its ruins, hath return'd to God!
Yet may not England o'er her Father weep:
Thoughts to her bosom crowd, too many, and too deep.

Vain voice of Reason, hush!–they yet must flow,
The unrestrained, involuntary tears;
A thousand feelings sanctify the woe,
Roused by the glorious shades of vanished years.
Tell us no more 'tis not the time for grief,
Now that the exile of the soul is past,
And Death, blest messenger of Heaven's relief,
Hath borne the wanderer to his rest at last;
For him, eternity hath tenfold day,
We feel, we know, 'tis thus–yet nature will have way.

What though amidst us, like a blasted oak,
Saddening the scene where once it nobly reign'd,
A dread memorial of the lightning stroke,
Stamp'd with its fiery record, he remain'd;
Around that shatter'd tree still fondly clung
The undying tendrils of our love, which drew
Fresh nature from its deep decay, and sprung
Luxuriant thence, to Glory's ruin true;
While England hung her trophies on the stem,
That desolately stood, unconscious e'en of THEM.

Of them unconscious! Oh mysterious doom!
Who shall unfold the counsels of the skies?
His was the voice which roused, as from the tomb,
The realm's high soul to loftiest energies!
His was the spirit, o'er the isles which threw
The mantle of its fortitude; and wrought
In every bosom, powerful to renew
Each dying spark of pure and generous thought;
The star of tempests! beaming on the mast, {1}
The seaman's torch of Hope, 'midst perils deepening fast.

Then from the unslumbering influence of his worth,
Strength, as of inspiration, fill'd the land;
A young, but quenchless, flame went brightly forth,
Kindled by him–who saw it not expand!
Such was the will of heaven–the gifted seer,
Who with his God had communed, face to face
And from the house of bondage, and of fear,
In faith victorious, led the chosen race;
He through the desert and the waste their guide,
Saw dimly from afar, the promised land–and died.

O full of days and virtues! on thy head
Centred the woes of many a bitter lot;
Fathers have sorrow'd o'er their beauteous dead,
Eyes, quench'd in night, the sunbeam have forgot;
Minds have striven buoyantly with evil years,
And sunk beneath their gathering weight at length;
But Pain for thee had fill'd a cup of tears,
Where every anguish mingled all its strength;
By thy lost child we saw thee weeping stand,
And shadows deep around fell from the Eternal's hand.

Then came the noon of glory, which thy dreams
Perchance of yore had faintly prophesied;
But what to thee the splendour of its beams?
The ice-rock glows not 'midst the summer's pride!
Nations leap'd up to joy–as streams that burst,
At the warm touch of spring, their frozen chain,
And o'er the plains, whose verdure once they nursed,
Roll in exulting melody again;
And bright o'er earth the long majestic line
Of England's triumphs swept, to rouse all hearts–but thine.

Oh! what a dazzling vision, by the veil
That o'er thy spirit hung, was shut from thee,
When sceptred chieftains throng'd with palms to hail
The crowning isle, the anointed of the sea!
Within thy palaces the lords of earth
Met to rejoice–rich pageants glitter'd by,
And stately revels imaged, in their mirth,
The old magnificence of chivalry.
They reach'd not thee–amidst them, yet alone,
Stillness and gloom begirt one dim and shadowy throne.

Yet there was mercy still–if joy no more
Within that blasted circle might intrude,
Earth had no grief whose footstep might pass o'er
The silent limits of its solitude !
If all unheard the bridal song awoke
Our hearts' full echoes, as it swell'd on high;
Alike unheard the sudden dirge, that broke
On the glad strain, with dread solemnity!
If the land's rose unheeded wore its bloom,
Alike unfelt the storm that swept it to the tomb.

And she, who, tried through all the stormy past,
Severely, deeply proved, in many an hour,
Watch'd o'er thee, firm and faithful to the last,
Sustain'd inspired, by strong affection's power;
If to thy soul her voice no music bore–
If thy closed eye and wandering spirit caught
No light from looks, that fondly would explore
Thy mien, for traces of responsive thought;
Oh! thou wert spared the pang that would have thrill'd
Thine inmost heart, when death that anxious bosom still'd.

Thy loved ones fell around thee. Manhood's prime,
Youth, with its glory, in its fullness, age,
All, at the gates of their eternal clime
Lay down, and closed their mortal pilgrimage;
The land wore ashes for its perish'd flowers,
The grave's imperial harvest. Thou, meanwhile,
Didst walk unconscious through thy royal towers,
The one that wept not in the tearful isle!
As a tired warrlor, on his battle-plain,
Breathes deep in dreams amidst the mourners and the slain.

And who can tell what visions might be thine?
The stream of thought, though broken, still was pure!
Still o'er that wave the stars of heaven might shine,
Where earthly image would no more endure!
Though many a step, of once-familiar sound,
Came as a stranger's o'er thy closing ear,
And voices breathed forgotten tones around,
Which that paternal heart once thrill'd to hear;
The mind hath senses of its own, and powers
To people boundless worlds, in its most wandering hours.

Nor might the phantoms to thy spirit known
Be dark or wild, creations of remorse;
Unstain'd by thee, the blameless past had thrown
No fearful shadows o'er the future's course:
For thee no cloud, from memory's dread abyss,
Might shape such forms as haunt the tyrant's eye;
And, closing up each avenue of bliss,
Murmur their summons, to 'despair and die!'
No! e'en though joy depart, though reason cease,
Still virtue's ruin'd home is redolent of peace.

They might be with thee still–the loved, the tried,
The fair, the lost–they might be with thee still!
More softly seen, in radiance purified
From each dim vapour of terrestrial ill;
Long after earth received them, and the note
Of the last requiem o'er their dust was pour'd,
As passing sunbeams o'er thy soul might float
Those forms, from us withdrawn–to thee restored!
Spirits of holiness, in light reveal'd,
To commune with a mind whose source of tears was seal'd.

Came they with tidings from the worlds above,
Those viewless regions where the weary rest?
Sever'd from earth, estranged from mortal love,
Was thy mysterious converse with the blest?
Or shone their visionary presence bright
With human beauty?–did their smiles renew
Those days of sacred and serene delight,
When fairest beings in thy pathway grew?
Oh! Heaven hath balm for every wound it makes,
Healing the broken heart; it smites, but ne'er forsakes.

These may be fantasies–and this alone,
Of all we picture in our dreams, is sure;
That rest, made perfect, is at length thine own,
Rest, in thy God immortally secure!
Enough for tranquil faith; released from all
The woes that graved Heaven's lessons on thy brow,
No cloud to dim, no fetter to enthral,
Haply thine eye is on thy people now;
Whose love around thee still its offerings shed,
Though vainly sweet, as flowers, grief's tribute to the dead.

But if the ascending, disembodied mind,
Borne, on the wings of morning, to the skies,
May cast one glance of tenderness behind
On scenes once hallow'd by its mortal ties,
How much hast thou to gaze on! all that lay
By the dark mantle of thy soul conceal'd,
The might, the majesty, the proud array
Of England's march o'er many a noble field,
All spread beneath thee, in a blaze of light,
Shine like some glorious land, view'd from an Alpine height.

Away, presumptuous. thought!–departed saint!
To thy freed vision what can earth display
Of pomp, of royalty, that is not faint,
Seen from the birth-place of celestial day?
Oh! pale and weak the sun's reflected rays
E'en in their fervour of meridian heat,
To him, who in the sanctuary may gaze
On the bright cloud that fills the mercy-seat
And thou mayst view, from thy divine abode,
The dust of empires flit before a breath of God.

And yet we mourn thee! Yes! thy place is void
Within our hearts–there veil'd thine image dwelt,
But cherish'd still; and o'er that tie destroy'd,
Though faith rejoice, fond nature still must melt.
Beneath the long-loved sceptre of thy sway,
Thousands were born, who now in dust repose,
And many a head, with years and sorrows grey,
Wore youth's bright tresses, when thy star arose;
And many a glorious mind, since that fair dawn,
Hath fill'd our sphere with light, now to its source withdrawn.

Earthquakes have rock'd the nations:–things revered,
The ancestral fabrics of the world, went down
In ruins, from whose stones Ambition rear'd
His lonely pyramid of dread renown.
But when the fires that long had slumber'd, pent
Deep in men's bosoms, with volcanic force,
Bursting their prison-house, each bulwark rent,
And swept each holy barrier from their course,
Firm and unmoved amidst that lava-flood,
Still, by thine arm upheld, our ancient landmarks stood.

Be they eternal! –Be thy children found
Still to their country's altars true like thee!
And, while 'the name of Briton' is a sound
Of rallying music to the brave and free,
With the high feelings, at the word which swell,
To make the breast a shrine for Freedom's flame,
Be mingled thoughts of him, who loved so well,
Who left so pure, its heritage of fame!
Let earth with trophies guard the conqueror's dust,
Heaven in our souls embalms the memory of the just.

All else shall pass away–the thrones of kings,
The very traces of their tombs depart;
But number not with perishable things
The holy records Virtue leaves the heart,
Heirlooms from race to race!–and oh! in days,
When, by the yet unborn, thy deeds are blest,
When our sons learn, 'as household words', thy praise,
Still on thine offspring, may thy spirit rest!
And many a name of that imperial line,
Father and patriot! blend, in England's songs, with thine!

'Among many nations was there no King like him.' -Nehemiah, xiii, 26.
'Know ye not that there is a prince and a great man fallen this day in Israel?' - 2 Samuel, iii, 38.
ANOTHER warning sound! the funeral bell,
Startling the cities of the isle once more
With measured tones of melanchoIy swell,
Strikes on the awakened heart from shore to shore.
He at whose coming monarchs sink to dust,
The chambers of our palaces hath trod,
And the long-suffering spirit of the just,
Pure from its ruins, hath return'd to God!
Yet may not England o'er her Father weep:
Thoughts to her bosom crowd, too many, and too deep.

Vain voice of Reason, hush!-they yet must flow,
The unrestrained, involuntary tears;
A thousand feelings sanctify the woe,
Roused by the glorious shades of vanished years.
Tell us no more 'tis not the time for grief,
Now that the exile of the soul is past,
And Death, blest messenger of Heaven's relief,
Hath borne the wanderer to his rest at last;
For him, eternity hath tenfold day,
We feel, we know, 'tis thus-yet nature will have way.

What though amidst us, like a blasted oak,
Saddening the scene where once it nobly reign'd,
A dread memorial of the lightning stroke,
Stamp'd with its fiery record, he remain'd;
Around that shatter'd tree still fondly clung
The undying tendrils of our love, which drew
Fresh nature from its deep decay, and sprung
Luxuriant thence, to Glory's ruin true;
While England hung her trophies on the stem,
That desolately stood, unconscious e'en of THEM.

Of them unconscious! Oh mysterious doom!
Who shall unfold the counsels of the skies?
His was the voice which roused, as from the tomb,
The realm's high soul to loftiest energies!
His was the spirit, o'er the isles which threw
The mantle of its fortitude; and wrought
In every bosom, powerful to renew
Each dying spark of pure and generous thought;
The star of tempests! beaming on the mast, {1}
The seaman's torch of Hope, 'midst perils deepening fast.

Then from the unslumbering influence of his worth,
Strength, as of inspiration, fill'd the land;
A young, but quenchless, flame went brightly forth,
Kindled by him-who saw it not expand!
Such was the will of heaven-the gifted seer,
Who with his God had communed, face to face
And from the house of bondage, and of fear,
In faith victorious, led the chosen race;
He through the desert and the waste their guide,
Saw dimly from afar, the promised land-and died.

O full of days and virtues! on thy head
Centred the woes of many a bitter lot;
Fathers have sorrow'd o'er their beauteous dead,
Eyes, quench'd in night, the sunbeam have forgot;
Minds have striven buoyantly with evil years,
And sunk beneath their gathering weight at length;
But Pain for thee had fill'd a cup of tears,
Where every anguish mingled all its strength;
By thy lost child we saw thee weeping stand,
And shadows deep around fell from the Eternal's hand.

Then came the noon of glory, which thy dreams
Perchance of yore had faintly prophesied;
But what to thee the splendour of its beams?
The ice-rock glows not 'midst the summer's pride!
Nations leap'd up to joy-as streams that burst,
At the warm touch of spring, their frozen chain,
And o'er the plains, whose verdure once they nursed,
Roll in exulting melody again;
And bright o'er earth the long majestic line
Of England's triumphs swept, to rouse all hearts-but thine.

Oh! what a dazzling vision, by the veil
That o'er thy spirit hung, was shut from thee,
When sceptred chieftains throng'd with palms to hail
The crowning isle, the anointed of the sea!
Within thy palaces the lords of earth
Met to rejoice-rich pageants glitter'd by,
And stately revels imaged, in their mirth,
The old magnificence of chivalry.
They reach'd not thee-amidst them, yet alone,
Stillness and gloom begirt one dim and shadowy throne.

Yet there was mercy still-if joy no more
Within that blasted circle might intrude,
Earth had no grief whose footstep might pass o'er
The silent limits of its solitude !
If all unheard the bridal song awoke
Our hearts' full echoes, as it swell'd on high;
Alike unheard the sudden dirge, that broke
On the glad strain, with dread solemnity!
If the land's rose unheeded wore its bloom,
Alike unfelt the storm that swept it to the tomb.

And she, who, tried through all the stormy past,
Severely, deeply proved, in many an hour,
Watch'd o'er thee, firm and faithful to the last,
Sustain'd inspired, by strong affection's power;
If to thy soul her voice no music bore-
If thy closed eye and wandering spirit caught
No light from looks, that fondly would explore
Thy mien, for traces of responsive thought;
Oh! thou wert spared the pang that would have thrill'd
Thine inmost heart, when death that anxious bosom still'd.

Thy loved ones fell around thee. Manhood's prime,
Youth, with its glory, in its fullness, age,
All, at the gates of their eternal clime
Lay down, and closed their mortal pilgrimage;
The land wore ashes for its perish'd flowers,
The grave's imperial harvest. Thou, meanwhile,
Didst walk unconscious through thy royal towers,
The one that wept not in the tearful isle!
As a tired warrlor, on his battle-plain,
Breathes deep in dreams amidst the mourners and the slain.

And who can tell what visions might be thine?
The stream of thought, though broken, still was pure!
Still o'er that wave the stars of heaven might shine,
Where earthly image would no more endure!
Though many a step, of once-familiar sound,
Came as a stranger's o'er thy closing ear,
And voices breathed forgotten tones around,
Which that paternal heart once thrill'd to hear;
The mind hath senses of its own, and powers
To people boundless worlds, in its most wandering hours.

Nor might the phantoms to thy spirit known
Be dark or wild, creations of remorse;
Unstain'd by thee, the blameless past had thrown
No fearful shadows o'er the future's course:
For thee no cloud, from memory's dread abyss,
Might shape such forms as haunt the tyrant's eye;
And, closing up each avenue of bliss,
Murmur their summons, to 'despair and die!'
No! e'en though joy depart, though reason cease,
Still virtue's ruin'd home is redolent of peace.

They might be with thee still-the loved, the tried,
The fair, the lost-they might be with thee still!
More softly seen, in radiance purified
From each dim vapour of terrestrial ill;
Long after earth received them, and the note
Of the last requiem o'er their dust was pour'd,
As passing sunbeams o'er thy soul might float
Those forms, from us withdrawn-to thee restored!
Spirits of holiness, in light reveal'd,
To commune with a mind whose source of tears was seal'd.

Came they with tidings from the worlds above,
Those viewless regions where the weary rest?
Sever'd from earth, estranged from mortal love,
Was thy mysterious converse with the blest?
Or shone their visionary presence bright
With human beauty?-did their smiles renew
Those days of sacred and serene delight,
When fairest beings in thy pathway grew?
Oh! Heaven hath balm for every wound it makes,
Healing the broken heart; it smites, but ne'er forsakes.

These may be fantasies-and this alone,
Of all we picture in our dreams, is sure;
That rest, made perfect, is at length thine own,
Rest, in thy God immortally secure!
Enough for tranquil faith; released from all
The woes that graved Heaven's lessons on thy brow,
No cloud to dim, no fetter to enthral,
Haply thine eye is on thy people now;
Whose love around thee still its offerings shed,
Though vainly sweet, as flowers, grief's tribute to the dead.

But if the ascending, disembodied mind,
Borne, on the wings of morning, to the skies,
May cast one glance of tenderness behind
On scenes once hallow'd by its mortal ties,
How much hast thou to gaze on! all that lay
By the dark mantle of thy soul conceal'd,
The might, the majesty, the proud array
Of England's march o'er many a noble field,
All spread beneath thee, in a blaze of light,
Shine like some glorious land, view'd from an Alpine height.

Away, presumptuous. thought!-departed saint!
To thy freed vision what can earth display
Of pomp, of royalty, that is not faint,
Seen from the birth-place of celestial day?
Oh! pale and weak the sun's reflected rays
E'en in their fervour of meridian heat,
To him, who in the sanctuary may gaze
On the bright cloud that fills the mercy-seat
And thou mayst view, from thy divine abode,
The dust of empires flit before a breath of God.

And yet we mourn thee! Yes! thy place is void
Within our hearts-there veil'd thine image dwelt,
But cherish'd still; and o'er that tie destroy'd,
Though faith rejoice, fond nature still must melt.
Beneath the long-loved sceptre of thy sway,
Thousands were born, who now in dust repose,
And many a head, with years and sorrows grey,
Wore youth's bright tresses, when thy star arose;
And many a glorious mind, since that fair dawn,
Hath fill'd our sphere with light, now to its source withdrawn.

Earthquakes have rock'd the nations:-things revered,
The ancestral fabrics of the world, went down
In ruins, from whose stones Ambition rear'd
His lonely pyramid of dread renown.
But when the fires that long had slumber'd, pent
Deep in men's bosoms, with volcanic force,
Bursting their prison-house, each bulwark rent,
And swept each holy barrier from their course,
Firm and unmoved amidst that lava-flood,
Still, by thine arm upheld, our ancient landmarks stood.

Be they eternal! -Be thy children found
Still to their country's altars true like thee!
And, while 'the name of Briton' is a sound
Of rallying music to the brave and free,
With the high feelings, at the word which swell,
To make the breast a shrine for Freedom's flame,
Be mingled thoughts of him, who loved so well,
Who left so pure, its heritage of fame!
Let earth with trophies guard the conqueror's dust,
Heaven in our souls embalms the memory of the just.

All else shall pass away-the thrones of kings,
The very traces of their tombs depart;
But number not with perishable things
The holy records Virtue leaves the heart,
Heirlooms from race to race!-and oh! in days,
When, by the yet unborn, thy deeds are blest,
When our sons learn, 'as household words', thy praise,
Still on thine offspring, may thy spirit rest!
And many a name of that imperial line,
Father and patriot! blend, in England's songs, with thine!

'Midst Tivoli's luxuriant glades,
Bright-foaming falls, and olive shades,
Where dwelt, in days departed long,
The sons of battle and of song,
No tree, no shrub its foliage rears,
But o'er the wrecks of other years,
Temples and domes, which long have been
The soil of that enchanted scene.

There the wild fig-tree and the vine
O'er Hadrian's mouldering villa twine;
The cypress, in funeral grace,
Usurps the vanished column's place;
O'er fallen shrine and ruined frieze
The wall-flower rustles in the breeze;
Acanthus-leaves the marble hide
They once adorned in sculptured pride;
And nature hath resumed her throne
O'er the vast works of ages flown.

Was it for this that many a pile,
Pride of Hissus and of Nile,
To Anio's banks the image lent
Of each imperial monument?
Now Athens weeps her shattered fanes,
Thy temples, Egypt, strew thy plains;
And the proud fabrics Hadrian reared
From Tibur's vale have disappeared.
We need no prescient sibyl there
The doom of grandeur to declare;
Each stone, where weeds and ivy climb,
Reveals some oracle of Time;
Each relic utters Fate's decree,
The future as the past shall be.

Halls of the dead! in Tibur's vale,
Who now shall tell your lofty tale?
Who trace the high patrician's dome,
The bard's retreat, the hero's home?
When moss-clad wrecks alone record
There dwelt the world's departed lord,
In scenes where verdure's rich array
Still sheds young beauty o'er decay,
And sunshine on each glowing hill,
'Midst ruins finds a dwelling still.

Sunk is thy palace - but thy tomb,
Hadrian! hath shared a prouder doom,
Though vanished with the days of old
Its pillars of Corinthian mould;
And the fair forms by sculpture wrought,
Each bodying some immortal thought,
Which o'er that temple of the dead,
Serene but solemn beauty shed,
Have found, like glory's self, a grave
In Time's abyss, or Tiber's wave:
Yet dreams more lofty and more fair
Than art's bold hand hath imaged e'er,
High thoughts of many a mighty mind,
Expanding when all else declined,
In twilight years, when only they
Recalled the radiance passed away,
Have made that ancient pile their home,
Fortress of freedom and of Rome.

There he, who strove in evil days
Again to kindle glory's rays,
Whose spirit sought a path of light,
For whose dim ages far too bright,-
Crescentius long maintained the strife
Which closed but with its martyr's life,
And left the imperial tomb a name,
A heritage of holier fame.

There closed De Brescia's mission high,
From thence the patriot came to die;
And thou, whose Roman soul the last
Spoke with the voice of ages past,
Whose thoughts so long from earth had fled
To mingle with the glorious dead,
That 'midst the world's degenerate race
They vainly sought a dwelling-place.
Within that house of death didst brood
O'er visions to thy ruin wooed.
Yet, worthy of a brighter lot,
Rienzi, be thy faults forgot!
For thou, when all around thee lay
Chained in the slumbers of decay -
So sunk each heart, that mortal eye
Had scarce a
tear
for liberty -
Alone, amidst the darkness there,
Couldst gaze on Rome - yet not despair!

'Tis morn, and Nature's richest dyes
Are floating o'er Italian skies;
Tints of transparent lustre shine
Along the snow-clad Appennine;
The clouds have left Soracte's height,
And yellow Tiber winds in light,
Where tombs and fallen fanes have strewed
The wide Campagna's solitude.
'Tis sad amidst that scene to trace
Those relics of a vanished race;
Yet, o'er the ravaged path of time -
Such glory sheds that brilliant clime,
Where Nature still, though empires fall,
Holds her triumphant festival -
E'en Desolation wears a smile,
Where skies and sunbeams laugh the while;
And heaven's own light, earth's richest bloom,
Array the ruin and the tomb.

But she, who from yon convent tower
Breathes the pure freshness of the hour;
She, whose rich flow of raven hair
Streams wildly on the morning air,
Heeds not how fair the scene below,
Robed in Italia's brightest glow.
Though throned 'midst Latium's classic plains
The Eternal City's towers and fanes,
And they, the Pleiades of earth,
The seven proud hills of Empire's birth,
Lie spread beneath: not now her glance
Roves o'er that vast sublime expanse;
Inspired, and bright with hope, 'tis thrown
On Adrian's massy tomb alone:
There, from the storm, when Freedom fled,
His faithful crew Crescentius led;
While she, his anxious bride, who now
Bends o'er the scene her youthful brow,
Sought refuge in the hallowed fane,
Which then conflict shelter, not in vain.

But now the lofty strife is o'er,
And Liberty shall weep no more.
At length Imperial Otho's voice
Bids her devoted sons rejoice;
And he, who battled to restore
The glories and the rights of yore,
Whose accents, like the clarion's sound,
Could burst the dead repose around,
Again his native Rome shall see,
The sceptred city of the free!
And youth Stephania waits the hour
When leaves her lord his fortress tower,
Her ardent heart with joy elate,
That seems beyond the reach of fate;
Her mien, like creature from above,
All vivified with hope and love.

Fair is her form, and in her eye
Lives all the soul of Italy;
A meaning lofty and inspired,
As by her native day-star fired;
Such wild and high expression, fraught
With glances of impassioned thought,
As fancy sheds, in visions bright,
O'er priestess of the God of Light;
And the dark locks that lend her face
A youthful and luxuriant grace,
Wave o'er her cheek, whose kindling dyes
Seem from the fire within to rise,
But deepened by the burning heaven
To her own land of sunbeams given.
Italian art that fervid glow
Would o'er ideal beauty throw,
And with such ardent life express
Her high-wrought dreams of loveliness, -
Dreams which, surviving Empire's fall,
The shade of glory still recall.

But see! - the banner of the brave
O'er Adrian's tomb hath ceased to wave.
'Tis lowered - and now Stephania's eye
Can well the martial train descry,
Who, issuing from that ancient dome,
Pour through the crowded streets of Rome.
Now from her watch-tower on the height,
With step as fabled wood-nymph's light,
She flies - and swift her way pursues,
Through the lone convent's avenues.
Dark cypress groves, and fields o'erspread,
With records of the conquering dead,
And paths which track a glowing waste,
She traverses in breathless haste;
And by the tombs where dust is shrined,
Once tenanted by loftiest mind,
Still passing on, hath reached the gate
Of Rome, the proud, the desolate!
Thronged are the streets, and, still renewed,
Rush on the gathering multitude.

Is it their high-souled chief to greet,
That thus the Roman thousands meet?
With names that bid their thoughts ascend,
Crescentius, thine in song to blend;
And of triumphal days gone by
Recall the inspiring pageantry?
- There is an air of breathless dread,
An eager glance, a hurrying tread;
And now a fearful silence round,
And now a fitful murmuring sound,
'Midst the pale crowds, that almost seem
Phantoms of some tumultuous dream.
Quick is each step, and wild each mien,
Portentous of some awful scene.
Bride of Crescentius! as the throng
Bore thee with whelming force along,
How did thine anxious heart beat high,
Till rose suspense to agony! -
Too brief suspense, that soon shall close,
And leave thy heart to deeper woes.

Who 'midst yon guarded precinct stands,
With fearless mien, but fettered hands?
The ministers of death are nigh,
Yet a calm grandeur lights his eye;
And in his glance there lives a mind
Which was not formed for chains to bind,
But cast in such heroic mould
As theirs, the ascendant ones of old.
Crescentius! freedom's daring son,
Is this the guerdon thou hast won?
O worthy to have lived and died
In the bright days of Latium's pride!
Thus must the beam of glory close
O'er the seven hills again that rose,
When at thy voice, to burst the yoke,
The soul of Rome indignant woke?
Vain dream! the sacred shields are gone,
Sunk is the crowning city's throne:
The illusions, that around her cast
Their guardian spells, have long been past.
Thy life hath been a short-star's ray,
Shed o'er her midnight of decay;
Thy death at freedom's ruined shrine
Must rivet every chain - but thine.

Calm is his aspect, and his eye
Now fixed upon the deep-blue sky,
Now on those wrecks of ages fled,
Around in desolation spread -
Arch, temple, column, worn and grey,
Recording triumphs passed away;
Works of the mighty and the free,
Whose steps on earth no more shall be,
Though their bright course hath left a trace
Nor years nor sorrows can efface.
Why changes now the patriot's mien,
Erewhile so loftily serene?
Thus can approaching death control
The might of that commanding soul?
No! - Heard he not that thrilling cry
Which told of bitterest agony?

He
heard it, and at once, subdued,
Hath sunk the hero's fortitude.
Whence rose that voice of woe can tell;
And 'midst the gazing throngs around
One well-known form his glance hath found -
One fondly loving and beloved,
In grief, in peril, faithful proved.
Yes, in the wildness of despair,
She, his devoted bride, is there.
Pale, breathless, through the crowd she flies,
The light of frenzy in her eyes:
But ere her arms can clasp the form,
Which life ere long must cease to warm -
Ere on his agonising breast
Her heart can heave, her head can rest -
Checked in her course by ruthless hands,
Mute, motionless, at once she stands;
With bloodless cheek and vacant glance,
Frozen and fixed in horror's trance;
Spell-bound, as every sense were fled,
And thought o'erwhelmed, and feeling dead,
And the light waving of her hair,
And veil, far floating on the air,
Alone, in that dread moment, show
She is no sculptured form of woe.

The scene of grief and death is o'er,
The patriot's heart shall throb no more:
But
hers
- so vainly formed to prove
The pure devotedness of love,
And draw from fond affection's eye
All thought sublime, all feeling high;
When consciousness again shall wake,
Hath now no refuge - but to break.
The spirit long inured to pain
May smile at fate in calm disdain;
Survive its darkest hour and rise
In more majestic energies.
But in the glow of vernal pride,
If each warm hope
at once
hath died,
Then sinks the mind, a blighted flower,
Dead to the sunbeam and the shower;
A broken gem, whose inborn light
Is scattered - ne'er to reunite.

……..'This is to be a mortal,
And seek the things beyond mortality!' ~ Manfred.


Thy voice prevails - dear friend, my gentle friend!
This long-shut heart for thee shall be unsealed,
And though thy soft eye mournfully will bend
Over the troubled stream, yet once revealed
Shall its freed waters flow; then rocks must close
For evermore, above their dark repose.

Come while the gorgeous mysteries of the sky
Fused in the crimson sea of sunset lie;
Come to the woods, where all strange wandering sound
Is mingled into harmony profound;
Where the leaves thrill with spirit, while the wind
Fills with a viewless being, unconfined,
The trembling reeds and fountains - our own dwell,
With its green dimness and AEolian breath,
Shall suit the unveiling of dark records well -
Hear me in tenderness and silent faith!

Thou knewest me not in life's fresh vernal morn -
I would thou hadst! - for then my heart on thine
Had poured a worthier love; now, all o'erworn
By its deep thirst for something too divine,
It hath but fitful music to bestow,
Echoes of harp-strings broken long ago.

Yet even in youth companionless I stood,
As a lone forest-bird 'midst ocean's foam;
For me the silver cords of brotherhood
Were early loosed; the voice from my home
Passed one by one, and melody and mirth
Left me a dreamer by a silent hearth.

But, with the fulness of a heart that burned
For the deep sympathies of mind, I turned
From that unanswering spot, and fondly sought
In all wild scenes with thrilling murmurs fraught,
In every still small voice and sound of power,
And flute-note of the wind through cave and bower
A perilous delight! - for then first woke
My life's lone passion, the mysterious quest
Of secret knowledge; and each tone that broke
From the wood-arches or the fountain's breast,
Making my quick soul vibrate as a lyre,
But ministered to that strange inborn fire.

'Midst the bright silence of the mountain dells,
In noontide hours or golden summer-eves,
My thoughts have burst forth as a gale that swells
Into a rushing blast, and from the leaves
Shakes out response. O thou rich world unseen!
Thou curtained realm of spirits! - thus my cry
Hath troubled air and silence - dost thou lie
Spread all around, yet by some filmy screen
Shut from us ever? The resounding woods,
Do their depths teem with marvels? - and the floods,
And the pure fountains, leading secret veins
Of quenchless melody through rock and hill,
Have they bright dwellers? - are their lone domains
Peopled with beauty, which may never still

Our
weary thirst of soul? Cold, weak and cold,
Is earth's vain language, piercing not one fold
Of our deep being! Oh, for gifts more high!
For a seer's glance to rend mortality!
For a charmed rod, to call from each dark shrine
The oracles divine!

I woke from those high fantasies, to know
My kindred with the earth - I woke to love:
O gentle friend! to love in doubt and woe,
Shutting the heart the worshipped name above,
Is to love deeply - and
my
spirit's dower
Was a sad gift, a melancholy power
Of so adoring - with a buried care,
And with the o'erflowing of a voiceless prayer,
And with a deepening dream that day by day,
In the still shadow of the lonely sway,
Folded me closer, till the world held nought
Save the
one
being to my centred thought.
There was no music but his voice to hear;
No joy but such as with
his
step drew near:
Light was but where he looked - life where he moved:
Silently, fervently, thus, thus I loved.
Oh! but such love is fearful! - and I knew
Its gathering doom: the soul's prophetic sight
Even then unfolded in my breast, and threw
O'er all things round a full, strong, vivid light,
Too sorrowfully clear! - an under-tone
Was given to Nature's harp, for me alone
Whispering of grief. Of grief? - be strong, awake!
Hath not thy love been victory, O my soul?
Hath not its conflict won a voice to shake
Death's fastness? - a magic to control
Worlds far removed? - from o'er the grave to thee
Love hath made answer; and
thy
tale should be
Sung like a lay of triumph! Now return,
And take thy treasure from its bosomed urn,
And lift it once to light!

In fear, in pain,
I said I loved - but yet a heavenly strain
Of sweetness floated down the tearful stream,
A joy flashed through the trouble of my dream!
I knew myself beloved! - we breathed no vow,
No mingling visions might our fate allow,
As unto happy hearts; but still and deep,
Like a rich jewel gleaming in a grave,
Like golden sand in some dark river's wave,
So did my soul that costly knowledge keep
So jealousy! - a thing o'er which to shed,
When stars alone beheld the drooping head,
Lone tears! yet ofttimes burdened with the excess
Of our strange nature's quivering happiness.

But, oh! sweet friend! we dream not of love's might
Till death has robed with soft and solemn light
The image we enshrine! - Before
that
hour,
We have but glimpses of the o'ermastering power
Within us laid! -
then
doth the spirit-flame
With sword-like lightning rend its mortal frame;
The wings of that which pants to follow fast
Shake their clay-bars, as with a prisoned blast-
The sea is in our souls!

He died, -
he
died
On whom my lone devotedness was cast!
I might not keep one vigil by his side,

I
, whose wrung heart watched with him to the last!
I might not once his fainting head sustain,
Nor bathe his parched lips in the hour of pain,
Nor say to him 'Farewell!' He passed away -
Oh! had
my
love been there, its conquering sway
Had won him back from death! - but thus removed,
Borne o'er the abyss no sounding-line hath proved,
Joined with the unknown, the viewless - he became
Unto my thoughts another, yet the same -
Changed - hallowed - glorified! - and his low grave
Seemed a bright mournful altar - mine, all mine: -
Brother and friend soon left me
that
sole shrine,
The birthright of the faithful! -
their
world's wave
Soon swept them from its brink. Oh! deem thou not
That on the sad and consecrated spot
My soul grew weak! I tell thee that a power
There kindled heart and lip - a fiery shower
My words were made - a might was given to prayer,
And a strong grasp to passionate despair,
And a dread triumph! Knowest thou what I sought?
For what high boon my struggling spirit wrought?
- Communion with the dead! - I sent a cry
Through the veiled empires of eternity,
A voice to cleave them! By the mournful truth,
By the lost promise of my blighted youth,
By the strong chain a mighty love can bind
On the beloved, the spell of mind o'er mind;
By words, which in themselves are magic high,
Armed and inspired, and winged with agony;
By tears, which comfort not, but burn, and seem
To bear the heart's blood in their passion-stream;
I summoned, I adjured - with quickened sense,
With the keen vigil of a life intense,
I watched, an answer from the winds to wring,
I listened, if perchance the stream might bring
Token from worlds afar: I taught
one
sound
Unto a thousand echoes - one profound
Imploring accent to the tomb, the sky -
One prayer to-night - 'Awake, appear, reply!'
Hast thou been told that from the viewless bourne,
The dark way never hath allowed return?
That all, which tears can move, with life is fled -
That earthly love is powerless on the dead?
Believe it not! - there is a large lone star
Now burning o'er yon western hill afar,
And under its clear light there lies a spot
Which well might utter forth - Believe it not!

I sat beneath that planet - I had wept
My woe to stillness, every night-wind slept;
A hush was on the hills; the very streams
Went by like clouds, or noiseless founts in dreams
And the dark tree o'ershadowing me that hour,
Stood motionless, even as the grey church-tower
Whereon I gazed unconsciously: - there came
A low sound, like the tremor of a flame,
Or like the light quick shiver of a wing,
Flitting through twilight woods, across the air;
And I looked up! Oh! for strong words to bring
Conviction o'er thy thought! Before me there,
He, the departed, stood! Ay, face to face,
So near, and yet how far! His form his mien,
Gave to remembrance back each burning trace
Within: - Yet something awfully serene,
Pure, sculpture-like, on the pale brow, that wore
Of the once beating heart no token more;
And stillness on the lip - and o'er the hair
A gleam, that trembled through the breathless air;
And an unfathomed calm, that seemed to lie
In the gave sweetness of the illumined eye;
Told of the gulfs between our being set,
And, as that unsheathed spirit-glance I met,
Made my soul faint: - with
fear?
Oh!
not
with fear
With the sick feeling that in
his
far sphere

My
love could be as nothing! But he spoke -
How shall I tell thee of the startling thrill
In that low voice, whose breezy tones could fill
My bosom's infinite? O friend! I woke

Then
first to heavenly life! Soft, solemn, clear
Breathed the mysterious accents on mine ear,
Yet strangely seem'd as if the while they rose
From depths of distance, o'er the wide repose
Of slumbering waters wafted, or the dells
Of mountains, hollow with sweet echo-cells;
But, as they murmured on, the mortal chill
Passed from me, like a mist before the morn,
And, to that glorious intercourse upborne
By slow degrees, a calm, divinely still,
Possessed my frame: I sought that lighted eye -
From its intense and searching purity
I drank in
soul!
- I questioned of the dead -
Of the hushed, starry shores their footsteps tread,
And I was answered. If remembrance there,
With dreamy whispers fill the immortal air;
If thought, here piled from many a jewel-heap,
Be treasure in that pensive land to keep;
If love, o'ersweeping change, and blight, and blast,
Find
there
the music of his home at last;
I asked, and I was answered. Full and high
Was that communion with eternity,
Too rich for aught so fleeting! Like a knell
Swept o'er my sense its closing words, 'Farewell,
On earth we meet no more!' And all was gone -
The pale bright settled brow - the thrilling tone,
The still and shining eye! and never more
May twilight gloom or midnight hush restore
That radiant guest! One full-fraught hour of heaven
To earthly passion's wild implorings given,
Was made my own - the ethereal fire hath shivered
The fragile censer in whose mould it quivered,
Brightly, consumingly! What now is left?
A faded world, of glory's hues bereft -
A void, a chain! I dwell 'midst throngs, apart,
In the cold silence of the stranger's heart;
A fixed, immortal shadow stands between
My spirit and life's fast-receding scene;
A gift hath severed me from human ties,
A power is gone from all earth's melodies,
Which never may return: their chords are broken,
The music of another land hath spoken -
No after-sound is sweet! This weary thirst!
And I have heard celestial fountains burst! -
What
here
shall quench it?

Dost thou not rejoice,
When the spring sends forth an awakening voice
Through the young woods? Thou dost! And in that birth
Of early leaves, and flowers, and songs of mirth,
Thousands, like thee, find gladness! Couldst thou know
How every breeze then summons
me
to go!
How all the light of love and beauty shed
By those rich hours, but wooes me to the dead!
The
only
beautiful that change no more -
The only loved! - the dwellings on the shore
Of spring fulfilled! The dead! -
whom
call we so?
They that breathe purer air, that feel, that know
Things wrapt from us! Away! - within me pent,
That which is barred from its own element
Still droops or struggles! But the day
will
come -
Over the deep the free bird finds its home,
And the stream lingers 'midst the rocks, yet greets
The sea at last; and the winged flower-seed meets
A soil to rest in: shall not
I
, too, be,
My spirit-love! upborne to dwell with thee?
Yes! by the power whose conquering anguish stirred
The tomb, whose cry beyond the stars was heard,
Whose agony of triumph won thee back
Through the dim pass no mortal step may track,
Yet shall we meet! - that glimpse of joy divine
Proved thee for ever and for ever mine!

WHENCE are those tranquil joys, in mercy giv'n,
To light the wilderness with beams of Heav'n?
To sooth our cares, and thro' the cloud diffuse,
Their tempered sun-shine, and celestial hues?
Those pure delights, ordain'd on life to throw
Gleams of the bliss ethereal natures know?
Say, do they grace Ambition's regal throne,
When kneeling myriads call the world his own?
Or dwell with luxury, in th' enchanted bow'rs,
Where taste and wealth exert creative pow'rs?

Favor'd of Heav'n! O Genius! are they thine,
When round thy brow the wreaths of glory shine;
While rapture gazes on thy radiant way,
'Midst the bright realms of clear and mental day?

No! sacred joys! 'tis yours to dwell enshrin'd,
Most fondly cherish'd, in the purest mind;
To twine with flowers, those lov'd, endearing ties,
On earth so sweet,—so perfect in the skies!

Nurs'd on the lap of solitude and shade,
The violet smiles, embosom'd in the glade;
There sheds her spirit on the lonely gale,
Gem of seclusion! treasure of the vale!
Thus, far retir'd from life's tumultuous road,
Domestic bliss has fix'd her calm abode,
Where hallow'd innocence and sweet repose
May strew her shadowy path with many a rose:
As, when dread thunder shakes the troubled sky,
The cherub, infancy, can close its eye,
And sweetly smile, unconscious of a tear,
While viewless angels wave their pinions near;
Thus, while around the storms of discord roll,
Borne on resistless wing, from pole to pole;

While war's red lightnings desolate the ball,
And thrones and empires in destruction fall;
Then, calm as evening on the silvery wave,
When the wind slumbers in the ocean-cave,
She dwells, unruffled, in her bow'r of rest,
Her empire, home!—her throne, affection's breast!

For her, sweet nature wears her loveliest blooms,
And softer sun-shine ev'ry scene illumes.
When spring awakes the spirit of the breeze,
Whose light wing undulates the sleeping seas;
When summer, waving her creative wand,
Bids verdure smile, and glowing life expand;
Or autumn's pencil sheds, with magic trace,
O'er fading loveliness, a moon-light grace;
Oh! still for her, thro' Nature's boundless reign,
No charm is lost, no beauty blooms in vain;
While mental peace, o'er ev'ry prospect bright,
Throws mellowing tints, and harmonizing light!

Lo! borne on clouds, in rushing might sublime,
Stern winter, bursting from the polar clime,
Triumphant waves his signal-torch on high,
The blood-red meteor of the northern sky!
And high thro' darkness rears his giant-form,
His throne, the billow!—and his flag, the storm!

Yet then, when bloom and sun-shine are no more,
And the wild surges foam along the shore;
Domestic bliss! thy heaven is still serene,
Thy star, unclouded, and thy myrtle, green!
Thy fane of rest no raging storms invade,
Sweet peace is thine, the seraph of the shade!
Clear thro' the day, her light around thee glows,
And gilds the midnight of thy deep repose!
Hail, sacred home! where soft Affection's hand,
With flow'rs of Eden twines her magic band!
Where pure and bright, the social ardors rise,
Concentring all their holiest energies!

When wasting toil has dimm'd the vital flame,
And ev'ry power deserts the sinking frame;
Exhausted nature still from sleep implores
The charm that lulls, the manna that restores!
Thus, when oppress'd with rude tumultuous cares,
To thee, sweet home! the fainting mind repairs;
Still to thy breast, a wearied pilgrim, flies,
Her ark of refuge from uncertain skies!
Bower of repose! when torn from all we love,
Thro' toil we struggle, or thro' distance rove;
To thee we turn, still faithful, from afar,
Thee, our bright vista! thee, our magnet-star!
And from the martial field, the troubled sea,
Unfetter'd thought still roves to bliss and thee!

When ocean-sounds in awful slumber die,
No wave to murmur, and no gale to sigh;
Wide o'er the world, when peace and midnight reign,
And the moon trembles on the sleeping main;

At that still hour, the sailor wakes to keep,
'Midst the dead calm, the vigil of the deep!
No gleaming shores his dim horizon hound,
All heaven—and sea—and solitude—around!
Then, from the lonely deck, the silent helm,
From the wide grandeur of the shadowy realm;
Still homeward borne, his fancy unconfin'd,
Leaving the worlds of ocean far behind,
Wings like a meteor-flash her swift career,
To the lov'd scene, so distant, and so dear!
Lo! the rude whirlwind rushes from its cave,
And danger frowns—the monarch of the wave!
Lo! rocks and storms the striving bark repel,
And death and shipwreck ride the foaming swell!
Child of the ocean! is thy bier the surge,
Thy grave the billow, and the wind thy dirge?
Yes! thy long toils, thy weary conflicts o'er,
No storm shall wake, no perils rouse thee more!

Yet, in that solemn hour, that awful strife,
The struggling agony for death or life;
E'en then, thy mind, embitt'ring ev'ry pain,
Retrac'd the image so belov'd—in vain!
Still to sweet home, thy last regrets were true,
Life's parting sigh—the murmur of adieu!
Can war's dread scenes the hallow'd ties efface,
Each tender thought, each fond remembrance chase?
Can fields of carnage, days of toil, destroy
The lov'd impressions of domestic joy?
Ye day-light dreams! that cheer the soldier's breast,
In hostile climes, with spells benign and blest;
Sooth his brave heart, and shed your glowing ray,
O'er the long march, thro' desolation's way;
Oh! still ye bear him from th' ensanguin'd plain,
Armour's bright flash, and victory's choral strain;
To that lov'd home, where pure affection glows,
That shrine of bliss! asylum of repose!

When all is hush'd—the rage of combat past,
And no dread war-note swells the moaning blast;
When the warm throb of many a heart is o'er,
And many an eye is clos'd—to wake no more;
Lull'd by the night-wind, pillow'd on the ground,
(The dewy death-bed of his comrades round!)
While o'er the slain the tears of midnight weep,
Faint with fatigue, he sinks in slumbers deep!
E'en then, soft visions, hov'ring round, portray,
The cherish'd forms that o'er his bosom sway!
He sees fond transport light each beaming face,
Meets the warm tear-drop, and the long embrace!
While the sweet welcome vibrates thro' his heart,
'Hail, weary soldier! —never more to part!'

And, lo! at last, releas'd from ev'ry toil,
He comes! the wanderer views his native soil!
Then the bright raptures, words can never speak,
Flash in his eye, and mantle o'er his cheek!

Then love and friendship, whose unceasing pray'r,
Implor'd for him, each guardian-spirit's care;
Who, for his fate, thro' sorrow's lingering year,
Had prov'd each thrilling pulse of hope and fear;
In that blest moment, all the past forget,
Hours of suspense! and vigils of regret!

And, oh! for him, the child of rude alarms,
Rear'd by stern danger, in the school of arms;
How sweet to change the war-song's pealing note,
For woodland-sounds, in summer-air that float!
Thro' vales of peace, o'er mountain-wilds to roam,
And breathe his native gales, that whisper—'Home!'
Hail! sweet endearments of domestic ties,
Charms of existence! angel-sympathies!
Tho' pleasure smile, a soft, Circassian queen!
And guide her votaries thro' a fairy scene;
Where sylphid forms beguile their vernal hours,
With mirth and music, in Arcadian bow'rs;

Tho' gazing nations hail the fiery car,
That bears the son of conquest from afar;
While Fame's loud Pæan bids his heart rejoice,
And ev'ry life-pulse vibrates to her voice;
Yet from your source alone, in mazes bright,
Flows the full current of serene delight!
On Freedom's wing, that ev'ry wild explores,
Thro' realms of space, th' aspiring eagle soars!
Darts o'er the clouds, exulting to admire,
Meridian glory—on her throne of fire!
Bird of the sun! his keen, unwearied gaze,
Hails the full noon, and triumphs in the blaze!
But soon, descending from his height sublime,
Day's burning fount, and light's empyreal clime;
Once more he speeds to joys more calmly blest,
'Midst the dear inmates of his lonely nest!

Thus Genius, mounting on his bright career,
Thro' the wide regions of the mental sphere;

And proudly waving, in his gifted hand,
O'er Fancy's worlds, Invention's plastic wand;
Fearless and firm, with lightning-eye surveys
The clearest heav'n of intellectual rays!
Yet, on his course tho' loftiest hopes attend,
And kindling raptures aid him to ascend;
(While in his mind, with high-born grandeur fraught,
Dilate the noblest energies of thought
Still, from the bliss, ethereal and refin'd,
Which crowns the soarings of triumphant mind,
At length he flies, to that serene retreat,
Where calm and pure, the mild affections meet;
Embosom'd there, to feel and to impart,
The softer pleasures of the social heart!
Ah! weep for those, deserted and forlorn,
From ev'ry tie, by fate relentless torn!
See, on the barren coast, the lonely isle,
Mark'd with no step, uncheer'd by human smile;

Heart-sick and faint, the shipwreck'd wanderer stand,
Raise the dim eye, and lift the suppliant hand!
Explore with fruitless gaze the billowy main,
And weep—and pray—and linger!—but in vain!
Thence, roving wild thro' many a depth of shade!
Where voice ne'er echo'd, footstep never stray'd;
He fondly seeks, o'er cliffs and deserts rude,
Haunts of mankind, 'midst realms of solitude!
And pauses oft, and sadly hears alone,
The wood's deep sigh, the surge's distant moan!
All else is hush'd! so silent, so profound,
As if some viewless power, presiding round,
With mystic spell, unbroken by a breath,
Had spread for ages the repose of death!
Ah! still the wanderer, by the boundless deep,
Lives but to watch,—and watches but to weep!
He sees no sail in faint perspective rise,
His the dread loneliness of sea and skies!

Far from his cherish'd friends, his native shore,
Banish'd from being—to return no more;
There must he die!—within that circling wave,
That lonely isle—his prison and his grave!

Lo! thro' the waste, the wilderness of snows,
With fainting step, Siberia's exile goes!
Homeless and sad, o'er many a polar wild,
Where beam, or flower, or verdure, never smil'd;
Where frost and silence hold their despot-reign,
And bind existence in eternal chain!
Child of the desert! pilgrim of the gloom!
Dark is the path which leads thee to the tomb!
While on thy faded cheek, the arctic air
Congeals the bitter tear-drop of despair!
Yet not, that fate condemns thy closing day,
In that stern clime, to shed its parting ray;
Not that fair Nature's loveliness find light,
No more shall beam enchantment on thy sight;

Ah! not for this, far, far beyond relief,
Deep in thy bosom dwells the hopeless grief;
But that no friend of kindred heart is there,
Thy woes to meliorate, thy toils to share;
That no mild soother fondly shall assuage
The stormy trials of thy lingering age;
No smile of tenderness, with angel-power,
Lull the dread pangs of dissolution's hour;
For this alone, despair, a withering guest,
Sits on thy brow, and cankers in thy breast!

Yes! there, e'en there, in that tremendous clime,
Where desert-grandeur frowns, in pomp sublime;
Where winter triumphs, thro' the polar night,
In all his wild magnificence of might;
E'en there, Affection's hallow'd spell might pour,
The light of heav'n around th' inclement shore!
And, like the vales with bloom and sun-shine grac'd,
That smile, by circling Pyrennees embrac'd,

Teach the pure heart, with vital fires to glow,
E'en 'midst the world of solitude and snow!
The Halcyon's charm, thus dreaming fictions feign,
With mystic power, could tranquillize the main;
Bid the loud wind, the mountain-billow sleep,
And peace and silence brood upon the deep!
And thus, Affection, can thy voice compose
The stormy tide of passions and of woes;
Bid every throb of wild emotion cease,
And lull misfortune in the arms of peace!
Oh! mark yon drooping form, of aged mien,
Wan, yet resign'd, and hopeless, yet serene!
Long ere victorious time had sought to chase
The bloom, the smile, that once illum'd his face;
That faded eye was dimm'd with many a care,
Those waving locks were silver'd by despair!
Yet filial love can pour the sovereign balm,
Assuage his pangs, his wounded spirit calm!

He, a sad emigrant! condemn'd to roam
In life's pale autumn from his ruin'd home;
Has borne the shock of peril's darkest wave,
Where joy—and hope—and fortune—found a grave!
'Twas his, to see destruction's fiercest band,
Rush, like a TYPHON, on his native land,
And roll, triumphant, on their blasted way,
In fire and blood—the deluge of dismay!
Unequal combat rag'd on many a plain,
And patriot-valour wav'd the sword—in vain!
Ah! gallant exile! nobly, long, he bled,
Long brav'd the tempest gath'ring o'er his head!
Till all was lost! and horror's darkening eye,
Rous'd the stern spirit of despair—to die!

Ah! gallant exile! in the storm that roll'd
Far o'er his country, rushing uncontroll'd;
The flowers that grac'd his path with loveliest bloom,
Torn by the blast—were scatter'd on the tomb!

When carnage burst, exulting in the strife,
The bosom ties that bound his soul to life;
Yet one was spar'd! and she, whose filial smile,
Can sooth his wanderings, and his tears beguile,
E'en then, could temper, with divine relief,
The wild delirium of unbounded grief;
And whisp'ring peace, conceal, with duteous art,
Her own deep sorrows in her inmost heart!
And now, tho' time, subduing ev'ry trace,
Has mellow'd all, he never can erase;
Oft will the wanderer's tears in silence flow,
Still sadly faithful to remember'd woe!
Then she, who feels a father's pang alone,
(Still fondly struggling to suppress her own
With anxious tenderness is ever nigh,
To chase the image that awakes the sigh!
Her angel-voice his hinting soul can raise
To brighter visions of celestial days!
And speak of realms, where virtue's wing shall soar
On eagle-plume—to wonder and adore!

And friends, divided here, shall meet at last,
Unite their kindred souls—and smile on all the past!
Yes! we may hope, that Nature's deathless ties,
Renew'd, refin'd—shall triumph in the skies!
Heart-soothing thought! whose lov'd, consoling pow'r,
With seraph-dreams can gild reflection's hour;
Oh! still be near! and bright'ning thro' the gloom,
Beam and ascend! the day-star of the tomb!
And smile for those, in sternest ordeals prov'd,
Those lonely hearts, bereft of all they lov'd!

Lo! by the couch, where pain and chill disease,
In ev'ry vein the ebbing life-blood freeze;
Where youth is taught, by stealing, slow decay,
Life's closing lesson—in its dawning day;
Where beauty's rose is with'ring ere its prime,
Unchang'd by sorrow—and unsoil'd by time;
There, bending still, with fix'd and sleepless eye,
There, from her child, the mother learns—to die!

Explores, with fearful gaze, each mournful trace
Of ling'ring sickness in the faded face;
Thro' the sad night, when ev'ry hope is fled,
Keeps her lone vigil by the suff'rer's bed;
And starts each morn, as deeper marks declare
The spoiler's hand—the blight of death—is there!
He comes! now feebly in th' exhausted frame,
Slow, languid, quiv'ring, burns the vital flame!
From the glaz'd eye-ball sheds its parting ray,
Dim, transient spark! that flutt'ring, fades away!
Faint beats the hov'ring pulse, the trembling heart,
Yet fond existence lingers—ere she part!

'Tis past! the struggle and the pang are o'er,
And life shall throb with agony no more!
While o'er the wasted form, the features pale,
Death's awful shadows throw their silvery veil!
Departed spirit! on this earthly sphere,
Tho' poignant suff'ring mark'd thy short career;

Still could maternal love beguile thy woes,
And hush thy sighs—an angel of repose!
But who may charm her sleepless pang to rest,
Or draw the thorn that rankles in her breast?
And while she bends in silence o'er thy bier,
Assuage the grief, too heart-sick for a tear?
Visions of hope! in loveliest hues array'd,
Fair scenes of bliss! by Fancy's hand portray'd;
And were ye doom'd, with false, illusive smile,
With flatt'ring promise, to enchant awhile?
And are ye vanish'd, never to return,
Set in the darkness of the mouldering urn?
Will no bright hour departed joys restore?
Shall the sad parent meet her child no more;
Behold no more the soul-illumin'd face,
Th' expressive smile, the animated grace?
Must the fair blossom, wither'd in the tomb,
Revive no more in loveliness and bloom?—

Descend, blest Faith! dispel the hopeless care,
And chase the gathering phantoms of despair!
Tell, that the flow'r, transplanted in its morn,
Enjoys bright Eden, freed from every thorn;
Expands to milder suns, and softer dews;
The full perfection of immortal hues!
Tell, that when mounting to her native skies,
By death releas'd, the parent-spirit flies;
There shall the child, in anguish mourn'd so long,
With rapture hail her, 'midst the cherub-throng;
And guide her pinion, on exulting flight,
Thro' glory's boundless realms, and worlds of living light!

Ye gentle spirits of departed friends!
If e'er on earth your buoyant wing descends;
If, with benignant care; ye linger near,
To guard the objects in existence dear;
If hov'ring o'er, ethereal band! ye view
The tender sorrows, to your memory true;

Oh! in the musing hour, at midnight deep,
While for your loss Affection wakes to weep;
While ev'ry sound in hallow'd stillness lies,
But the low murmur of her plaintive sighs;
Oh! then, amidst that holy calm, be near!
Breathe your light whisper softly in her ear!
With secret spells, her wounded mind compose,
And chase the faithful tear—for you that flows!
Be near! when moon-light spreads the charm you lov'd,
O'er scenes where once your earthly footstep rov'd!
Then, while she wanders o'er the sparkling dew,
Thro' glens, and wood-paths, once endear'd by you;
And fondly lingers, in your fav'rite bow'rs,
And pauses oft, recalling former hours;
Then wave your pinion o'er each well-known vale,
Float in the moon-beam, sigh upon the gale!
Bid your wild symphonies remotely swell,
Borne by the summer-wind, from grot and dell;

And touch your viewless harps, and sooth her soul,
With soft enchantments and divine control!
Be near! sweet guardians! watch her sacred rest,
When slumber folds her in his magic vest!
Around her, smiling, let your forms arise
Return'd in dreams, to bless her mental eyes!
Efface the mem'ry of your last farewell,
Of glowing joys, of radiant prospects, tell!
The sweet communion of the past, renew,
Reviving former scenes, array'd in softer hue!

Be near, when death, in virtue's brightest hour,
Calls up each pang, and summons all his pow'r!
Oh! then, transcending Fancy's loveliest dream,
Then let your forms, unveil'd, around her beam!
Then waft the vision of unclouded light,
A burst of glory, on her closing sight!
Wake from the harp of heav'n th' immortal strain,
To hush the final agonies of pain!

With rapture's flame, the parting soul illume,
And smile triumphant thro' the shadowy gloom!

Oh! still be near! when, darting into day,
Th' exulting spirit leaves her bonds of clay;
Be yours to guide her flutt'ring wing on high,
O'er many a world, ascending to the sky!
There let your presence, once her earthly joy,
Tho' dimm'd with tears, and clouded with alloy;
Now form her bliss on that celestial shore,
Where death shall sever kindred hearts no more!

Yes! in the noon of that Elysian clime,
Beyond the sphere of anguish, death, or time;
Where mind's bright eye, with renovated fire,
Shall beam on glories—never to expire;
Oh! there, th' illumin'd soul may fondly trust,
More pure, more perfect, rising from the dust;
Those mild affections, whose consoling light
Sheds the soft moon-beam on terrestrial night;
Sublim'd, ennobled, shall for ever glow,
Exalting rapture—not assuaging woe!

Fair land! of chivalry the old domain,
Land of the vine and olive, lovely Spain!
Though not for thee with classic shores to vie
In charms that fix the enthusiast's pensive eye;
Yet hast thou scenes of beauty, richly fraught
With all that wakes the glow of lofty thought;
Fountains, and vales, and rocks, whose ancient name
High deeds have raised to mingle with their fame.
Those scenes are peaceful now: the citron blows,
Wild spreads the myrtle, where the brave repose.
No sound of battle swells on Douro's shore,
And banners wave on Ebro's banks no more.
But who, unmoved, unawed, shall coldly tread
Thy fields that sepulchre the mighty dead?
Blest be that soil! where England's heroes share
The grave of chiefs, for ages slumbering there;
Whose names are glorious in romantic lays,
The wild, sweet chronicles of elder days -
By goathered lone, and rude serrano sung,
Thy cypress dells, and vine-clad rocks among:
How oft those rocks have echoed to the tale
Of knights who fell in Roncesvalles' vale;
Of him, renowned in old heroic lore,
First of the brave, the gallant Campeador;
Of those, the famed in song, who proudly died
When 'Rio Verde' rolled a crimson tide;
Or that high name, by Garcilaso's might,
On the green Vega won in single fight.

Round fair Granada, deepening from afar,
O'er that green Vega rose the din of war.
At morn or eve no more the sunbeams shone
O'er a calm scene, in pastoral beauty lone;
On helm and corslet tremulous they glanced,
On shield and spear in quivering lustre danced,
Far as the sight by clear Xenil could rove,
Tents rose around, and banners glanced above.
And steeds in gorgeous trappings, armour bright
With gold, reflecting every tint of light,
And many a floating plume, and blazoned shield
Diffused romantic splendour o'er the field.

There swell those sounds that bid the life-blood start
Swift to the mantling cheek and beating heart.
The clang of echoing steel, the charger's neigh,
The measured tread of hosts in war's array;
And, oh! that music, whose exulting breath
Speaks but of glory on the road of death;
In whose wild voice there dwells inspiring power
To wake the stormy joy of danger's hour;
To nerve the arm, the spirit to sustain,
Rouse from despondence, and support in pain;
And, 'midst the deepening tumults of the strife,
Teach every pulse to thrill with more than life.

High o'er the camp, in many a broidered fold,
Floats to the wind a standard rich with gold:
There, imaged on the cross,
His
form appears
Who drank for man the bitter cup of tears -

His
form, whose word recalled the spirit fled,
Now borne by hosts to guide them o'er the dead!
O'er yon fair walls to plant the cross on high,
Spain hath sent forth her flower of chivalry.
Fired with that ardour which, in days of yore,
To Syrian plains the bold crusaders bore;
Elate with lofty hope, with martial zeal,
They come, the gallant children of Castile;
The proud, the calmly dignified: - and there
Ebro's dark sons with haughty mien repair,
And those who guide the fiery steed of war
From yon rich province of the western star.

But thou, conspicuous 'midst the glitt'ring scene,
Stern grandeur stamped upon thy princely mien;
Known by the foreign garb, the silvery vest,
The snow-white charger, and the azure crest,
Young Aben-Zurrah! 'midst that host of foes,
Why shines
thy
helm, thy Moorish lance? Disclose
Why rise the tents where dwell thy kindred train,
O son of Afric, 'midst the sons of Spain?
Hast thou with these thy nation's fall conspired,
Apostate chief! by hope of vengeance fired?
How art thou changed! Still first in every fight,
Hamet, the Moor! Castile's devoted knight!
There dwells a fiery lustre in thine eye,
But not the light that shone in days gone by
There is wild ardour in thy look and tone,
But not the soul's expression once thine own,
Nor aught like peace within. Yet who shall say
What secret thoughts thine inmost heart may sway?
No eye but Heaven's may pierce that curtained breast,
Whose joys and griefs alike are unexpressed.

There hath been combat on the tented plain;
The Vega's turf is red with many a stain;
And, rent and trampled, banner, crest, and shield,
Tell of a fierce and well-contested field:
But all is peaceful now - the west is bright
With the rich splendour of departing light;
Mulhacen's peak, half lost amidst the sky,
Glows like a purple evening-cloud on high,
And tints, that mock the pencil's art, o'erspread
The eternal snow that crowns Veleta's head;
While the warm sunset o'er the landscape throws
A solemn beauty, and a deep repose.
Closed are the toils and tumults of the day,
And Hamet wanders from the camp away,
In silent musings wrapt: - the slaughtered brave
Lie thickly strewn by Darro's rippling wave.
Soft fall the dews - but other drops have dyed
The scented shrubs that fringe the river side,
Beneath whose shade, as ebbing life retired,
The wounded sought a shelter - and expired,
Lonely, and lost in thoughts of other days,
By the bright windings of the stream he strays,
Till, more remote from battle's ravaged scene,
All is repose, and solitude serene.
There, 'neath an olive's ancient shade reclined,
Whose rustling foliage waves in evening's wind,
The harassed warrior, yielding to the power,
The mild sweet influence of the tranquil hour,
Feels, by degrees, a long-forgotten calm
Shed o'er his troubled soul unwonted balm;
His wrongs, his woes, his dark and dubious lot,
The past, the future, are awhile forgot;
And Hope, scarce owned, yet stealing o'er his breast,
Half dares to whisper, 'Thou shalt yet be blest!'

Such his vague musings - but a plaintive sound
Breaks on the deep and solemn stillness round;
A low, half-stifled moan, that seems to rise
From life and death's contending agonies.
He turns: Who shares with him that lonely shade?
- A youthful warrior on his deathbed laid.
All rent and stained his broidered Moorish vest,
The corslet shattered on his bleeding breast;
In his cold hand the broken falchion strained,
With life's last force convulsively retained;
His plumage soiled with dust, with crimson dyed,
And the red lance, in fragments, by his side;
He lies forsaken - pillowed on his shield,
His helmet raised, his lineaments revealed.
Pale is that quivering lip, and vanished now
The light once throned on that commanding brow;
And o'er that fading eye, still upward cast,
The shades of death are gathering dark and fast.
Yet, as yon rising moon her light serene
Sheds the pale olive's waving boughs between,
Too well can Hamet's conscious heart retrace,
Though changed thus fearfully, that pallid face,
Whose every feature to his soul conveys
Some bitter thought of long-departed days.

'Oh! is it thus,' he cries, 'we meet at last?
Friend of my soul in years for ever past!
Hath fate but led me hither to behold
The last dread struggle, ere that heart is cold, -
Receive thy latest agonising breath,
And, with vain pity, soothe the pangs of death?
Yet let me bear thee hence; while life remains,
E'en though thus feebly circling through thy veins,
Some healing balm thy sense may still revive,
Hope is not lost - and Osmyn yet may live!
And blest were he, whose timely care should save
A heart so noble, e'en from glory's grave.'

Roused by those accents, from his lowly bed
The dying warrior faintly lifts his head;
O'er Hamet's mien, with vague, uncertain gaze,
His doubtful glance awhile bewildered strays;
Till, by degrees, a smile of proud disdain
Lights up those features late convulsed with pain;
A quivering radiance flashes from his eye,
That seems too pure, too full of soul to die;
And the mind's grandeur, in its parting hour,
Looks from that brow with more than wonted power.

'Away!' he cries, in accents of command,
And proudly waves his cold and trembling hand.
'Apostate, hence! my soul shall soon be free,
E'en now it soars, disdaining aid from thee:
'Tis not for thee to close the fading eyes
Of him who faithful to his country dies;
Not for
thy
hand to raise the drooping head
Of him who sinks to rest on glory's bed.
Soon shall these pangs be closed, this conflict o'er,
And worlds be mine where thou canst never soar;
Be thine existence with a blighted name,
Mine the bright death which seals a warrior's fame!'

The glow hath vanished from his cheek - his eye
Hath lost that beam of parting energy;
Frozen and fixed it seems - his brow is chill;
One struggle more - that noble heart is still.
Departed warrior! were thy mortal throes,
Were thy last pangs, ere Nature found repose,
More keen, more bitter, than the envenomed dart
Thy dying words have left in Hamet's heart?

Thy
pangs were transient;
his
shall sleep no more
Till life's delirious dream itself is o'er;
But thou shalt rest in glory, and thy grave
Be the pure altar of the patriot brave.
Oh, what a change that little hour hath wrought
In the high spirit and unbending thought!
Yet, from himself each keen regret to hide,
Still Hamet struggles with indignant pride;
While his soul rises, gathering all its force,
To meet the fearful conflict with remorse.

To thee, at length, whose artless love hath been
His own, unchanged, through many a stormy scene;
Zayda! to thee his heart for refuge flies;
Yes! let the world upbraid, let foes contemn,
Thy gentle breast the tide will firmly stem;
And soon thy smile, and soft consoling voice,
Shall bid his troubled soul again rejoice.

Within Granada's walls are hearts and hands
Whose aid in secret Hamet yet commands;
Nor hard the task, at some propitious hour,
To win his silent way to Zayda's bower,
When night and peace are brooding o'er the world,
When mute the clarions, and the banners furled.
That hour is come - and, o'er the arms he bears,
A wandering fakir's garb the chieftain wears:
Disguise that ill from piercing eye could hide
The lofty port, and glance of martial pride;
But night befriends - through paths obscure he passed,
And hailed the lone and lovely scene at last;
Young Zayda's chosen haunt, the fair alcove,
The sparkling fountain, and the orange grove:
Calm in the moonlight smiles the still retreat,
As formed alone for happy hearts to meet.
For happy hearts? - not such as hers, who there
Bends o'er her lute, with dark, unbraided hair;
That maid of Zegri race, whose eye, whose mien,
Tell that despair her bosom's guest hath been.
So lost in thought she seems, the warrior's feet
Till his known accents every sense restore -
'My own loved Zayda! do we meet once more?'
She starts, she turns - the lightning of surprise,
Of sudden rapture, flashes from her eyes;
But that is fleeting - it is past - and now
Far other meaning darkens o'er her brow:
'Hence, Aben-Zurrah! death surrounds thee here!'
What mean those words, and that unwonted tone?
I will not deem thee changed - but in thy face
It is not joy, it is not love, I trace!
It was not thus in other days we met:
Hath time, hath absense, taught thee to forget?
Oh! speak once more - these rising doubts dispel;
One smile of tenderness, and all is well!'

'Not thus we met in other days! - oh, no!
Thou wert not, warrior then thy country's foe!
Those days are past - we ne'er shall meet again
With hearts all warmth, all confidence, as then.
But
thy
dark soul no gentler feelings sway,
Leader of hostile bands! away, away!
On in thy path of triumph and of power,
Nor pause to raise from earth a blighted flower.'

'And
thou
too changed! thine early vow forgot!
This, this alone was wanting to my lot!
Exiled and scorned, of every tie bereft,
Thy love, the desert's lonely fount, was left;
And thou, my soul's last hope, its lingering beam,
Thou, the good angel of each brighter dream,
Wert all the barrenness of life possest,
To wake one soft affection in my breast!
That vision ended - fate hath nought in store
Of joy or sorrow e'er to touch me more.
Go, Zegri maid! to scenes of sunshine fly,
From the stern pupil of adversity!
And now to hope, to confidence, adieu!
If thou are faithless, who shall e'er be true?'

'Hamet! oh, wrong me not! - too could speak
Of sorrows - trace them on my faded cheek,
In the sunk eye, and in the wasted form,
That tell the heart hath nursed a canker-worm!
But words were idle - read my sufferings there,
Where grief is stamped on all that once was fair.

'Oh, wert thou still what once I fondly deemed,
All that thy mien expressed, thy spirit seemed,
My love had been devotion - till in death
Thy name had trembled on my latest breath.
But not the chief who leads a lawless band,
To crush the altars of his native land;
The apostate son of heroes, whose disgrace
Hath stained the trophies of a glorious race;
Not
him
I loved - but one whose youthful name
Was pure and radiant in unsullied fame.
Hadst thou but died, ere yet dishonour's cloud
O'er that young name gathered as a shroud,
I then had mourned thee proudly, and my grief
In its own loftiness had found relief;
A noble sorrow, cherished to the last,
When every meaner woe had long been past.
Yes! let Affection weep - no common tear
She sheds, when bending o'er a hero's bier.
Let Nature mourn the dead - a grief like this,
To pangs that rend
my
bosom, had been bliss!'

'High-minded maid! the time admits not now
To plead my cause, to vindicate my vow.
That vow, too dread, too solemn to recall,
Hath urged me onward, haply to my fall.
Yet this believe - no meaner aim inspires
My soul, no dream of poor ambition fires.
No! every hope of power, of triumph, fled,
Behold me but the avenger of the dead!
One whose changed heart no tie, no kindred knows,
And in thy love alone hath sought repose.
Zayda! wilt
thou
his stern accuser be?
False to his country, he is true to thee!
Oh, hear me yet! - if Hamet e'er was dear,
By our first vows, our young affection, hear!
Soon must this fair and royal city fall,
Soon shall the cross be planted on her wall;
Then who can tell what tides of blood may flow,
While her fanes echo to the shrieks of woe?
Fly, fly with me, and let me bear thee far
From horrors thronging in the path of war:
Fly! and repose in safety - till the blast
Hath made a desert in its course - and passed!'

'Thou that wilt triumph when the hour is come,
Hastened by thee, to seal thy country's doom,
With
thee
from scenes of death shall Zayda fly
To peace and safety? - Woman, too, can die!
And die exulting, though unknown to fame,
In all the stainless beauty of her name!
Be mine, unmurmuring, undismayed, to share
The fate my kindred and my sire must bear.
When the clouds gather and the blasts assail,
Thou hast but known me ere the trying hour
Called into life my spirit's latent power;
While withering o'er my silent woes I wept;
And now, when hope and happiness are fled,
My soul is firm - for what remains to dread!
Who shall have power to suffer and to bear,
If strength and courage dwell not with Despair?

Hamet, farewell - retrace thy path again,
To join thy brethren on the tented plain.
There wave and wood, in mingling murmurs, tell
How, in far other cause, thy fathers fell!
Yes! on that soil hath Glory's footstep been,
Names unforgotten consecrate the scene!
Dwell not the souls of heroes round thee there,
Whose voices call thee in the whispering air?
Unheard, in vain, they call - their fallen son
Hath stained the name those mighty spirits won,
And to the hatred of the brave and free
Bequethed his own, through ages yet to be!

Still as she spoke, the enthusiast's kindling eye
Was lighted up with inborn majesty,
While her fair form and youthful features caught
All the proud grandeur of heroic thought,
Severely beauteous; awe-struck and amazed,
In silent trance a while the warrior gazed,
As on some lofty vision - for she seemed
One all inspired - each look with glory beamed,
While, brightly bursting through its cloud of woes,
Her soul at once in all its light arose.
Oh! ne'er had Hamet deemed there dwelt enshrined
In form so fragile that unconquered mind;
And fixed, as by some high enchantment, there
He stood - till wonder yielded to despair.

'The dream is vanished - daughter of my foes!
Reft of each hope, the lonely wanderer goes.
Thy words have pierced his soul - yet deem thou not
Thou couldst be once adored, and e'er forgot!
Oh, formed for happier love, heroic maid!
In grief sublime, in danger undismayed,
Farewell, and be thou blest! - all words were vain
From him who ne'er may view that form again;
Him, whose sole thought resembling bliss must be
He
hath
been loved, once fondly loved by, thee!',
And is the warrior gone? - doth Zayda hear
His parting footstep, and without a tear?
Thou weepest not, lofty maid! - yet who can tell
What secret pangs within thy heart may dwell?

They
feel not least, the firm, the high in soul,
Who best each feeling's agony control.
Yes, we may judge the measure of the grief
Which finds in Misery's eloquence relief;
But who shall pierce those depths of silent woe
Whence breathes no language, whence no tears may flow?
The pangs that many a noble breast hath proved,
Scorning itself that thus it
could
be moved?
He, He alone, the inmost heart who knows,
Views all its weakness, pities all its throes,
He who hath mercy when mankind contemn,
Beholding anguish - all unknown to them.

Fair city! thou that midst thy stately fanes
And gilded minarets, towering o'er the plains,
In Eastern grandeur proudly dost arise
Beneath thy canopy of deep-blue skies:
While streams that bear thee treasures in their wave,
Thy citron-groves and myrtle-gardens have:
Mourn, for thy doom is fixed - the days of fear,
Of chains, of wrath, of bitterness, are near!
Within, around thee, are the trophied graves
Of kings and chiefs - their children shall be slaves.
Fair are thy halls, thy domes majestic swell,
But there a race that reared them not shall dwell;
For midst thy councils Discord still presides,
Degenerate fear thy wavering monarch guides -
Last of a line whose regal spirit flown
Hath to their offspring but bequeathed a throne,
Without one generous thought, or feeling high,
To teach his soul how kings should live and die.

A voice resounds within Granada's wall,
The hearts of warriors echo to its call,
Whose are those tones, with power electric fraught,
To reach the source of pure exalted thought!

See, on a fortress tower, with beckoning hand,
A form, majestic as a prophet, stand!
His mien is all impassioned - and his eye
Filled with a light whose fountain is on high;
Wild on the gale his silvery tresses flow,
And inspiration beams upon his brow;
While, thronging round him, breathless thousands gaze,
As on some mighty seer of elder days.

'Saw ye the banners of Castile displayed,
The helmets glittering, and the line arrayed?
Heard ye the march of steel-clad hosts?' he cries;
'Children of conquerors! in your strength arise!
O high-born tribes! O names unstained by fear!
Azarques, Zegris, Almoradis, hear!
Be every feud forgotten, and your hands
Dyed with no blood but that of hostile bands.
Wake, princes of the land! the hour is come,
And the red sabre must decide your doom.
Where is that spirit which prevailed of yore,
When Tarik's bands o'erspread the western shore?
When the long combat raged on Xere's plain,
And Afric's tecbir swelled through yielding Spain?
Is the lance broken, is the shield decayed,
The warrior's arm unstrung, his heart dismayed?
Shall no high spirit of ascendant worth
Arise to lead the sons of Islam forth?
To guard the regions where our fathers' blood
Hath bathed each plain, and mingled with each flood;
Where long their dust hath blended with the soil
Won by their swords, made fertile by their toil!

'O ye sierras of eternal snow!
Ye streams that by the tombs of heroes flow,
Woods, fountains, rocks of Spain! ye saw their might
In many a fierce and unforgotten fight -
Shall ye behold their lost, degenerate race,
Dwell 'midst your scenes in fetters and disgrace?
With each memorial of the past around,
Each mighty monument of days renowned?
May this indignant heart ere then be cold,
This frame be gathered to its kindred mould!
And the last life-drop circling through my veins
Have tinged a soil untainted yet by chains!

'And yet one struggle ere our doom is sealed,
One mighty effort, one deciding field!
If vain each hope, we still have choice to be,
In life the fettered, or in death the free!'

Still while he speaks, each gallant heart beats high,
And ardour flashes from each kindling eye;
Youth, manhood, age, as if inspired, have caught
The glow of lofty hope and daring thought,
And all is hushed around - as every sense
Dwelt on the tones of that wild eloquence.

But when his voice hath ceased, the impetuous cry
Of eager thousands bursts at once on high;
Rampart, and rock, and fortress, ring around,
And fair Alhambra's inmost halls resound.
'Lead us, O chieftain! lead us to the strife,
To fame in death, or liberty in life!'
O zeal of noble hearts! in vain displayed!
Now, while the burning spirit of the brave
Is roused to energies that yet might save,
E'en now, enthusiasts! while ye rush to claim
Your glorious trial on the field of fame,
Your king hath yielded! Valour's dream is o'er;
Power, wealth, and freedom, are your own no more;
And for your children's portion,
but
remains
That bitter heritage - the stranger's chains.

Lonely and still are now thy marble halls,
Thou fair Alhambra! there the feast is o'er;
And with the murmur of thy fountain-falls,
Blend the wild tones of minstrelsy no more.

Hushed are the voices that in years gone by
Have mourned, exulted, menaced, through thy towers,
Within thy pillared courts the grass waves high,
And all uncultured bloom thy fairy bowers.

Unheeded there the flowering myrtle blows,
Through tall arcades unmarked the sunbeam smiles,
And many a tint of softened brilliance throws
O'er fretted walls and shining peristyles.

And well might Fancy deem thy fabrics lone,
So vast, so silent, and so wildly fair,
Some charmed abode of beings all unknown,
Powerful and viewless, children of the air.

For there no footstep treads the enchanted ground,
There not a sound the deep repose pervades,
Save winds and founts, diffusing freshness round,
Through the light domes and graceful colonnades.

For other tones have swelled those courts along,
In days romance yet fondly loves to trace;
The clash of arms, the voice of choral song,
The revels, combats, of a vanished race.

And yet awhile, at Fancy's potent call,
Shall rise that race, the chivalrous, the bold;
Peopling once more each fair, forsaken hall,
With stately forms, the knights and chiefs of old.

- The sun declines - upon Nevada's height
There dwells a mellow flush of rosy light;
Each soaring pinnacle of mountain snow
Smiles in the richness of that parting glow,
And Darro's wave reflects each passing dye
That melts and mingles in the empurpled sky.
Fragrance, exhaled from rose and citron bower,
Blends with the dewy freshness of the hour:
Hushed are the winds, and Nature seems to sleep
In light and stillness; wood, and tower, and steep,
Are dyed with tints of glory, only given
To the rich evening of a southern heaven;
Tints of the sun, whose bright farewell is fraught
With all that art hath dreamt, but never caught.
-Yes, Nature sleeps; but not with her at rest
The fiery passions of the human breast.
Hark! from the Alhambra's towers what stormy sound,
Each moment deepening, wildly swells around?
Those are no tumults of a festal throng,
Not the light zambra, nor the choral song:
The combat rages - 'tis the shout of war,
'Tis the loud clash of shield and scimitar.
Within the Hall of Lions, where the rays
Of eve, yet lingering, on the fountain blaze;
There, girt and guarded by his Zegri bands,
And stern in wrath, the Moorish monarch stands;
There the strife centres - swords around him wave;
There bleed the fallen, there contend the brave,
While echoing domes return the battle-cry,
'Revenge and freedom! let the tyrant die!'
And onward rushing, prevailing still,
Court, hall, and tower, the fierce avengers fill.

But first the bravest of that gallant train,
Where foes are mightiest, charging ne'er in vain;
In his red hand the sabre glancing bright,
His dark eye flashing with a fiercer light,
Ardent, untired, scarce conscious that he bleeds,
His Aben-Zurrahs there young Hamet leads;
While swells his voice that wild acclaim on high,
'Revenge and freedom! let the tyrant die!'

Yes! trace the footsteps of the warrior's wrath
By helm and corslet shattered in his path,
And by the thickest harvest of the slain,
And by the marble's deepest crimson stain:
Search through the serried fight, where loudest cries
From triumph, anguish, or despair, arise;
And brightest where the shivering falchions glare,
And where the ground is reddest - he is there.
Yes, that young arm, amidst the Zegri host,
Hath well avenged a sire, a brother, lost.

They perished - not as heroes should have died,
On the red field, in victory's hour of pride,
In all the glow and sunshine of their fame,
And proudly smiling as the death-pang came:
Oh! had they
thus
expired, a warrior's tear
Had flowed, almost in triumph, o'er their bier.
For thus alone the brave should weep for those
Who brightly pass in glory to repose.
- Not such their fate - a tyrant's stern command
Doomed them to fall by some ignoble hand,
As, with the flower of all their high-born race,
Summoned Abdallah's royal feast to grace,
Fearless in heart, no dream of danger nigh,
They sought the banquet's gilded hall - to die.
Betrayed, unarmed, they fell - the fountain wave
Flowed crimson with the life-blood of the brave,
Till far the fearful tidings of their fate
Through the wide city rang from gate to gate,
And of that lineage each surviving son
Rushed to the scene where vengeance might be won.

For this young Hamet mingles in the strife,
Leader of battle, prodigal of life,
Urging his followers till their foes, beset,
Stand faint and breathless, but undaunted yet.
Brave Aben-Zurrahs, on! one effort more,
Yours is the triumph, and the conflict o'er.

But lo! descending o'er the darkened hall,
The twilight shadows fast and deeply fall,
Nor yet the strife hath ceased - though scarce they know
Through that thick gloom, the brother from the foe;
Till the moon rises with her cloudless ray,
The peaceful moon, and gives them light to slay.

Where lurks Abdallah? - 'midst his yielding train,
They seek the guilty monarch, but in vain.
He lies not numbered with the valiant dead,
His champions round him have not vainly bled;
But when twilight spread her shadowy veil,
And his last warriors found each effort fail,
In wild despair he fled - a trusted few,
Kindred in crime, are still in danger true;
And o'er the scene of many a martial deed
The Vega's green expanse, his flying footsteps lead.
He passed the Alhambra's calm and lovely bowers,
Where slept the glistening leaves and folded flowers
In dew and starlight - there, from grot and cave,
Gushed, in wild music, many a sparkling wave;
There, on each breeze, the breath of fragrance rose,
And all was freshness, beauty, and repose.

But thou, dark monarch! in thy bosom reign
Storms that, once roused, shall never sleep again.
Oh! vainly bright is Nature in the course
Of him who flies from terror or remorse!
A spell is round him which obscures her bloom,
And dims her skies with shadows of the tomb;
There smiles no Paradise on earth so fair,
But guilt will raise avenging phantoms there.
Abdallah heeds not, though the light gale roves
Fraught with rich odour, stolen from orange-groves;
Hears not the sounds from wood and brook that rise,
Wild notes of Nature's vesper-melodies;
Marks not how lovely, on the mountain's head,
Moonlight and snow their mingling lustre spread
But urges onward, till his weary band,
Worn with their toil, a moment's pause demand.
He stops, and turning, on Granada's fanes
In silence gazing, fixed awhile remains
In stern, deep silence - o'er his feverish brow,
And burning cheek, pure breezes freshly blow,
But waft, in fitful murmurs, from afar,
Sounds, indistinctly fearful, - as of war.
What meteor bursts, with sudden blaze, on high,
O'er the blue clearness of the starry sky?
Awful it rises, like some Genie-form,
Seen 'midst the redness of the desert storm,
Magnificently dread - above, below,
Spreads the wild splendour of its deepening glow.
Lo! from the Alhambra's towers the vivid glare
Streams through the still transparence of the air!
Avenging crowds have lit the mighty pyre,
Which feeds that waving pyramid of fire;
And dome and minaret, river, wood, and height,
From dim perspective start to ruddy light.

Oh Heaven! the anguish of Abdallah's soul,
The rage, though fruitless, yet beyond control!
Yet must he cease to gaze, and raving fly
For life - such life as makes it bliss to die!
On yon green height, the mosque, but half revealed
Through cypress-groves, a safe retreat may yield.
Thither his steps are bent - yet oft he turns,
Watching that fearful beacon as it burns.
But paler grow the sinking flames at last,
Flickering they fade, their crimson light is past;
And spiry vapours, rising o'er the scene,
Mark where the terrors of their wrath have been.
And now his feet have reached that lonely pile,
Where grief and terror may repose awhile;
Embowered it stands, 'midst wood and cliff on high,
Through the grey rocks, a torrent sparkling nigh;
He hails the scene where every care should cease,
And all - except the heart he brings - is peace.

There is a deep stillness in those halls of state
Where the loud cries of conflict rang so late;
Stillness like that, when fierce the Ramsin's blast
Hath o'er the dwellings of the desert passed.
Fearful the calm - nor voice, nor step, nor breath,
Disturbs that scene of beauty and of death:
Those vaulted roofs re-echo not a sound,
In ceaseless melodies of plaintive tone,
Through chambers peopled by the dead alone
O'er the mosaic floors, with carnage red,
Breastplate, and shield, and cloven helm are spread
In mingled fragments - glittering to the light
Of yon still moon, whose rays, yet softly bright,
Their streaming lustre tremulously shed,
And smile, in placid beauty, o'er the dead:
O'er features where the fiery spirit's trace
E'en death itself is powerless to efface;
O'er those who, flushed with ardent youth, awoke,
When glowing morn in bloom and radiance broke,
Nor dreamt how near the dark and frozen sleep
Which hears not Glory call, nor Anguish weep;
In the low silent house, the narrow spot,
Home of forgetfulness - and soon forgot.

But slowly fade the stars - the night is o'er -
Morn beams on those who hail her light no more;
Slumberers who ne'er shall wake on earth again,
Mourners, who call the loved, the lost, in vain.
Yet smiles the day - oh! not for mortal tear
Doth nature deviate from her calm career;
Nor is the earth less laughing or less fair,
Though breaking hearts her gladness may not share.
O'er the cold urn the beam of summer glows,
O'er fields of blood the zephyr freshly blows;
Bright shines the sun, though all be dark below,
And skies are cloudless o'er a world of woe,
And flowers renewed in spring's green pathway bloom,
Alike to grace the banquet and the tomb.

Within Granada's walls the funeral-rite
Attends that day of loveliness and light;
And many a chief, with dirges and with tears,
Is gathered to the brave of other years;
And Hamet, as beneath the cypress-shade
His martyred brother and his sire are laid,
Feels every deep resolve, and burning thought
Of ampler vengeance, e'en to passion wrought;
Yet is the hour afar - and he must brood
O'er those dark dreams awhile in solitude.
Tumult and rage are hushed - another day
In still solemnity hath passed away,
In that deep slumber of exhausted wrath,
The calm that follows in the tempest's path.

And now Abdallah leaves yon peaceful fane,
His ravaged city traversing again.
No sound of gladness his approach precedes,
No splended pageant the procession leads;
Where'er he moves the silent streets along,
Broods a stern quiet o'er the sullen throng.
No voice is heard; but in each altered eye,
Once brightly beaming when his steps were nigh,
And in each look of those whose love hath fled
From all on earth to slumber with the dead,
Those by his guilt made desolate, and thrown
On the bleak wilderness of life alone -
In youth's quick glance of scarce-dissembled rage,
And the pale mien of calmly-mournful age,
May well be read a dark and fearful tale
Of thought that ill the indignant heart can veil,
And passion, like the hushed volcano's power,
That waits in stillness its appointed hour.

No more the clarion from Granada's walls,
Heard o'er the Vega, to the tourney calls;
No more her graceful daughters, throned on high,
Bend o'er the lists the darkly-radiant eye;
Silence and gloom her palaces o'erspread,
And song is hushed, and pageantry is fled.
- Weep fated city! o'er thy heroes weep -
Low in the dust the sons of glory sleep!
Furled are their banners in the lonely hall,
Their trophied shields hang mouldering on the wall,
Wildly their charges range the pastures o'er,
Their voice in battle shall be heard no more;
And they, who still thy tyrant's wrath survive,
Whom he hath wronged too deeply to forgive,
That race, of lineage high, of worth approved,
The chivalrous, the princely, the beloved -
Thine Aben-Zurrahs - they no more shall wield
In thy proud cause the conquering lance and shied;
Condemned to bid the cherished scenes farewell
Where the loved ashes of their fathers dwell,
And far o'er foreign plains, as exiles, roam,
Their land the desert, and the grave their home.
Yet there is one shall see that race depart,
In deep, though silent, agony of heart;
One whose dark fate must be to mourn alone,
Unseen her sorrows, and their cause unknown,
And veil her heart, and teach her cheek to wear
That smile, in which the spirit hath no share;
Like the bright beams that shed their fruitless glow
O'er the cold solitude of Alpine snow.

Soft, fresh, and silent, is the midnight hour,
And the young Zayda seeks her lonely bower;
That Zegri maid, within whose gentle mind
One name is deeply, secretly enshrined.
That name in vain stern Reason would efface:
Hamet! 'tis thine, thou foe to all her race!

And yet not hers in bitterness to prove
The sleepless pangs of unrequited love;
Pangs, which the rose of wasted youth consume,
And make the heart of all delight the tomb,
Check the free spirit in its eagle-flight,
And the spring-morn of early genius blight;
Nor such her grief - though now she wakes to weep,
While tearless eyes enjoy the honey-dews of sleep.

A step treads lightly through the citron shade,
Lightly, but by the rustling leaves betrayed -
Doth her young hero seek that well-known spot,
Scene of past hours that ne'er may be forgot?
'Tis he - but changed that eye, whose glance of fire
Could, like a sunbeam, hope and joy inspire,
As, luminous with youth, with ardour fraught,
It spoke of glory to the inmost thought;
Thence the bright spirit's eloquence hath fled,
And in its wild expression may be read
Stern thoughts and fierce resolves - now veiled in shade,
And now in characters of fire portrayed.
Changed e'en his voice - as thus its mournful tone
Wakes in her heart each feeling of his own.

'Zayda, my doom is fixed - another day
And the wronged exile shall be far away;
Far from the scenes where still his heart must be,
His home of youth, and more than all - from thee.
Oh! what a cloud hath gathered o'er my lot,
Since last we met on this fair tranquil spot!
Lovely as then, the soft and silent hour,
And not a rose hath faded from thy bower;
But I - my hopes the tempest hath o'erthrown,
And changed my heart, to all but thee alone.
Farewell, high thoughts! inspiring hopes of praise!
Heroic visions of my early days!
In my the glories of my race must end -
The exile hath no country to defend!
E'en in life's morn my dreams of pride are o'er
Youth's buoyant spirit wakes for me no more,
And one wild feeling in my altered breast
Broods darkly o'er the ruins of the rest.
Yet fear not thou - to thee in good or ill,
The heart, so sternly tried, if faithful still!
But when my steps are distant, and my name
Thou hearest no longer in the song of fame;
When Time steals on in silence to efface
Of early love each pure and sacred trace,
Causing our sorrows and our hopes to seem
But as the moonlight pictures of a dream, -
Still shall thy soul be with me, in the truth
And all the fervour of affection's youth?
If such thy love, one beam of heaven shall play
In lonely beauty o'er thy wanderer's way.'

'Ask not, if such my love! Oh! trust the mind
To grief so long, so silently resigned!
Let the light spirit, ne'er by sorrow taught
The pure and lofty constancy of thought,
Its fleeting trials eager to forget,
Rise with elastic power o'er each regret!
Fostered in tears,
our
young affection grew,
And I have learned to suffer and be true.
Deem not my love a frail, ephemeral flower,
Nursed by soft sunshine and the balmy shower;
No! 'tis the child of tempests, and defies,
And meets unchanged, the anger of the skies!
Too well I feel, with grief's prophetic heart,
That ne'er to meet in happier days, we part.
We part! and e'en this agonising hour,
When love first feels his own o'erwhelming power,
Shall soon to Memory's fixed and tearful eye
Seem almost happiness - for thou wert nigh!
Yes! when this heart in solitude shall bleed,
As days to days all wearily succeed,
When doomed to weep in loneliness, 'twill be
Almost like rapture to have wept with thee.

'But thou, my Hamet, thou canst yet bestow
All that of joy my blighted lot can know.
Oh! be thou still the high-souled and the brave,
To whom my first and fondest vows I gave,
In thy proud fame's untarnished beauty still
The lofty visions of my youth fulfil.
So shall it soothe me, 'midst my heart's despair,
To hold undimmed one glorious image there!'

'Zayda, my best-loved! my words too well,
Too soon, thy bright illusions must dispel;
Yet must my soul to thee unveiled be shown,
And all its dreams and all its passions known,
Thou shalt not be deceived - for pure as heaven
Is thy young love, in faith and fervour given.
I said my heart was changed - and would thy thought
Explore the ruin by thy kindred wrought,
In fancy trace the land whose towers and fanes,
Crushed by the earthquake, strew its ravaged plains;
And such that heart - where desolation's hand
Hath blighted all that once was fair or grand!
But Vengeance, fixed upon her burning throne,
Sits, 'midst the wreck, in silence and alone;
And I, in stern devotion at her shrine,
Each softer feeling, but my love, resign.
-Yes! they whose spirits all my thoughts control,
Who hold dread converse with my thrilling soul;
They, the betrayed, the sacrificed, the brave,
Who fill a blood-stained and untimely grave,
Must be avenged! and pity and remorse
In that stern cause are banished from my course.
Zayda, thou tremblest - and thy gentle breast
Shrinks from the passions that destroy my rest;
Yet shall thy form, in many a stormy hour,
Pass brightly o'er my soul with softening power,
And, oft recalled, thy voice beguile my lot,
Like some sweet lay, once heard, and ne'er forgot.

'But the night wanes - the hours too swiftly fly,
The bitter moment of farewell draws nigh;
Yet, loved one! weep not thus - in joy or pain,
Oh! trust thy Hamet, we shall meet again!
Yes, we shall meet! and haply smile at last
On all the clouds and conflicts of the past.
On that fair vision teach thy thoughts to dwell,
Nor deem these mingling tears our last farewell!'

Is the voice hushed, whose loved, expressive tone
Thrilled to her heart - and doth she weep alone?
Alone she weeps; that hour of parting o'er,
When shall the pang it leaves be felt no more?
The gale breathes light, and fans her bosom fair,
Showering the dewy rose-leaves o'er her hair;
But ne'er for her shall dwell reviving power
In balmy dew, soft breeze, or fragrant flower,
To wake once more that calm, serene delight,
The soul's young bloom, which passion's breath could blight -
The smiling stillness of life's morning hour,
Ere yet the day-star burns in all his power.
Meanwhile, through groves of deep luxurious shade,
In the rich foliage of the South arrayed,
Hamet, ere dawns the earliest blush of day,
Bends to the vale of tombs his pensive way.
Fair is that scene where palm and cypress wave
On high o'er many an Aben-Zurrah's grave.
Lonely and fair, its fresh and glittering leaves
With the young myrtle there the laurel weaves,
To canopy the dead; nor wanting there
Flowers to the turf, nor fragrance to the air,
Nor wood-bird's note, nor fall of plaintive stream -
Wild music, soothing to the mourner's dream.
There sleep the chiefs of old - their combats o'er,
The voice of glory thrills their hearts no more.
Unheard by them the awakening clarion blows;
The sons of war at length in peace repose.
No martial note is in the gale that sighs,
Where proud their trophied sepulchres arise,
'Mid founts, and shades, and flowers of brightest bloom,
As, in his native vale, some shepherd's tomb.

There, where the trees their thickest foliage spread
Dark o'er that silent valley of the dead;
Where two fair pillars rise, embowered and lone,
Not yet with ivy clad, with moss o'ergrown,
Young Hamet kneels - while thus his vows are poured
The fearful vows that consecrate his sword:
- 'Spirit of him who first within my mind
Each loftier aim, each nobler thought enshrined,
And taught my steps the line of light to trace,
Left by the glorious fathers of my race,
Hear thou my voice - for mine is with me still,
In every dream its tones my bosom thrill,
In the deep calm of midnight they are near,
'Midst busy throngs they vibrate on my ear,
Still murmuring 'vengeance!' - nor in vain the call,
Few, few shall triumph in a hero's fall!
Cold as thine own to glory and to fame,
Within my heart there lives one only aim;
There, till the oppressor for thy fate atone,
Concentring every thought, it reigns alone.
I will not weep - revenge, not grief, must be,
And blood, not tears, an offering meet for thee;
But the dark hour of stern delight will come,
And thou shall triumph, warrior! in thy tomb.

'Thou, too, my brother! thou art passed away
Without thy fame, in life's fair-dawning day.
Son of the brave! of thee no trace will shine
In the proud annals of thy lofty line;
Nor shall thy deeds be deathless in the lays
That hold communion with the after-days.
Yet, by the wreaths thou mightst have nobly won
Hadst thou but lived till rose thy noontide sun;
By glory lost, I swear! by hope betrayed,
Thy fate shall amply dearly, be repaid;
War with thy foes I deem a holy strife,
And, to avenge thy death, devote my life.
'Hear ye my vows, O spirits of the slain!
Hear, and be with me on the battle-plain!
At noon, at midnight, still around me bide,
Rise on my dreams, and tell me how ye died!'

Heroes of elder days! untaught to yield,
Who bled for Spain on many an ancient field;
Ye, that around the oaken cross of yore
Stood firm and fearless on Asturia's shore,
And with your spirit, ne'er to be subdued,
Hallowed the wild Cantabrian solitude;
Rejoice amidst your dwellings of repose,
In the last chastening of your Moslem foes!
Rejoice! - for Spain, arising in her strength,
Hath burst the remnant of their yoke at length,
And they, in turn, the cup of woe must drain,
And bathe their fetters with their tears in vain.
And thou, the warrior
born in happy hour,

Valencia's lord, whose name alone was power,
Theme of a thousand songs in days gone by,
Conqueror of kings! exult, O Cid! on high.
For still 'twas thine to guard thy country's weal,
In life, in death, the watcher for Castile!

Thou, in that hour when Mauritania's bands
Rushed from their palmy groves and burning lands,
E'en in the realm of spirits didst retain
A patriot's vigilance, remembering Spain!
Then, at deep midnight, rose the mighty sound,
By Leon heard, in shuddering awe profound,
As through her echoing streets, in dread array,
Beings, once mortal, held their viewless way:
Voices from worlds we know not - and the tread
Of marching hosts, the armies of the dead,
Thou and thy buried chieftains - from the grave
Then did thy summons rouse a king to save,
And join thy warriors with unearthly might
To aid the rescue in Tolosa's fight.
Those days are past - the crescent on thy shore,
O realm of evening! sets, to rise no more.
What banner of streams afar from Vela's tower?
The cross, bright ensign of Iberia's power!
What the glad shout of each exulting voice?
Castile and Aragon! rejoice, rejoice!
Yielding free entrance to victorious foes,
The Moorish city sees her gates unclose,
And Spain's proud host, with pennon, shield, and lance,
Through her long streets in knightly garb advance.

Oh! ne'er in lofty dreams hath Fancy's eye
Dwelt on a scene of statelier pageantry,
At joust or tourney, theme of poet's lore,
High masque, or solemn festival of yore.
The giled cupolas, that proudly rise
O'erarched by cloudless and cerulean skies;
Tall minarets, shining mosques, barbaric skies;
Fountains, and palaces, and cypress bowers:
And they, the splendid and triumphant throng,
With helmets glittering as they move along
With broidered scarf, and gem-bestudded mail,
And graceful plumage streaming on the gale;
Shields, gold-embossed, and pennons floating far,
And all the gorgeous blazonry of war,
All brightened by the rich transparent hues
That southern suns o'er heaven and earth diffuse;
Blend in one scene of glory, formed to throw
O'er memory's page a never-fading glow.
And there, too, foremost 'midst the conquering brave,
Your azure-plumes, O Aben-Zurrahs! wave.
There Hamet moves; the chief whose lofty port
Seems nor reproach to shun, nor praise to court;
Calm, stern, collected - yet within his breast
Is there no pang, no struggle, unconfessed?
If such there be, it still must dwell unseen,
Nor cloud a triumph with a sufferer's mien.

Hear'st thou the solemn yet exulting sound
Of the deep anthem floating far around?
The choral voices, to the skies that raise
The full majestic harmony of praise?
Lo! where, surrounded by their princely train,
They come, the sovereigns of rejoicing Spain,
Borne on their trophied car - lo! bursting thence
A blaze of chivalrous magnificence!

Onward their slow and stately course they bend
To where the Alhambra's ancient towers ascend,
Reared and adorned by Moorish kings of yore,
Whose lost descendants there shall dwell no more.

They reached those towers - irregularly vast
And rude they seem, in mould barbaric cast:
They enter - to their wondering sight is given
A genii palace - an Arabian heaven!
A scene by magic raised, so strange, so fair,
Its forms and colour seem alike of air.
Here, by sweet orange-bows, half shaded o'er,
The deep clear bath reveals its marble floor,
Its margin fringed with flowers, whose glowing hues
The calm transparence of its wave suffuse.
There, round the court, where Moorish arches bend,
Aerial columns, richly decked, ascend;
Unlike the models of each classic race,
Of Doric grandeur, or Corinthian grace,
But answering well each vision that portrays
Arabian splendour to the poet's gaze:
Wild, wondrous, brilliant, all - a mingling glow
Of rainbow-tints, above, around, below;
Bright streaming from the many-tinctured veins
Of precious marble, and the vivid stains
Of rich mosaics o'er the light arcade,
In gay festoons and fairy knots displayed.
On through the enchanted realm, that only seems
Meet for the radiant creatures of our dreams,
The royal conquerors pass - while still their sight
On some new wonder dwells with fresh delight.
Here the eye roves through slender colonnades,
O'er bowery terraces and myrtle shades;
Dark olive-woods beyond, and far on high
The vast sierra mingling with the sky.
There, scattering far around their diamond spray,
Clear streams from founts of alabaster play,
Through pillared halls, where exquisitely wrought,
Rich arabesques, with glittering foliage fraught,
Surmount each fretted arch, and lend the scene
A wild, romantic, Oriental mien:
While many a verse, from Eastern bards of old,
Borders the walls in characters of gold.
Here Moslem luxury, in her own domain,
Hath held for ages her voluptuous reign
'Midst gorgeous domes, where soon shall silence brood,
And all be lone - a splendid solitude.
Now wake their echoes to a thousand songs,
From mingling voices of exulting throngs;
Tambour, and flute, and atabal, are there,
And joyous clarions pealing on the air;
While every hall resounds, 'Granada won!
Granada! for Castile and Aragon!'

'Tis night - from dome and tower, in dazzling maze,
The festal lamps innumerably blaze;
Through long arcades their quivering lustre gleams
From every lattice their quivering lustre gleams
'Midst orange-gardens plays on fount and rill,
And gilds the waves of Darro and Xenil;
Red flame the torches on each minaret's height,
And shines each street an avenue of light;
And midnight feasts are held, and music's voice
Through the long night still summons to rejoice.

Yet there, while all would seem to heedless eye
One blaze of pomp, one burst of revelry,
Are hearts unsoothed by those delusive hours,
Galled by the chain, though decked awhile with flowers;
Stern passions working in the indignant breast,
Deep pangs untold, high feelings unexpressed,
Heroic spirits, unsubmitting yet -
Vengeance, and keen remorse, and vain regret.

From yon proud height, whose olive-shaded brow
Commands the wide, luxuriant plains below,
Who lingering gazes o'er the lovely scene,
Anguish and shame contending in his mien?
He, who, of heroes and of kings the son,
Hath lived to lose whate'er his fathers won;
Whose doubt and fears his people's fate have sealed,
Wavering alike in council and in field;
Weak, timid ruler of the wise and brave,
Still a fierce tyrant or a yielding slave.

Far from these vine-clad hills and azure skies,
To Afric's wilds the royal exile flies;
Yet pauses on his way, to weep in vain
O'er all he never must behold again.
Fair spreads the scene around - for him
too
fair,
Each glowing charm but deepens his despair.
The Vega's meads, the city's glittering spires,
The old majestic palace of his sires,
The gay pavillions, and retired alcoves,
Bosomed in citron and pomegranate groves;
Tower-crested rocks, and streams that wind in light,
All in one moment bursting on his sight,
Speak to his soul of glory's vanished years,
And wake the source of unavailing tears.
- Weepest thou, Abdallah? - Thou dost well to weep,
O feeble heart! o'er all thou couldst not keep!
Well do a woman's tears befit the eye
Of him who knew not, as a man, to die.

The gale sighs mournfully through Zayda's bower,
The hand is gone that nursed each infant flower.
No voice, no step, is in her father's halls,
Mute are the echoes of their marble walls;
No stranger enters at the chieftain's gate,
But all is hushed, and void, and desolate.

There, through each tower and solitary shade,
In vain doth Hamet seek the Zegri maid:
Her grove is silent, her pavilion lone,
Her lute forsaken, and her doom unknown;
And through the scene she loved, unheeded flows
The stream whose music lulled her to repose.

But oh! to him, whose self-accusing thought
Whispers, 'twas
he
that desolation wrought -
He, who his country and his faith betrayed,
And lent Castile revengeful, powerful aid -
A voice of sorrow swells in every gale,
Each wave, low rippling, tells a mournful tale;
And as the shrubs, untended, unconfined,
In wild exuberance rustle to the wind;
Each leaf hath language to his startled sense,
And seems to murmur, 'Thou hast driven her hence!'
- Where hath lost love been once recalled again?
In her pure breast, so long by anguish torn,
His name can rouse no feeling now - but scorn.
O bitter hour! when first the shuddering heart
Wakes to behold the void within - and start!
To feel its own abandonment, and brood
O'er the chill bosom's depth of solitude:
The stormy passions that in Hamet's breast
Have swayed so long, so fiercely, are at rest;
The avenger's task is closed : - he finds, too late,
It hath not changed his feelings, but his fate.
He was a lofty spirit, turned aside
From its bright path by woes, and wrongs, and pride,
And onward, in its new tumultuous course,
Borne with too rapid and intense a force
To pause one moment in the dread career,
And ask - if such could be its native sphere?
Now are those days of wild delirium o'er,
Their fears and hopes excite his soul no more;
The feverish energies of passion close,
And his heart sinks in desolate repose,
Turns sickening from the world, yet shrinks not less
From its own deep and utter loneliness.

There is a sound of voices on the air,
A flash of armour to the sunbeam's glare,
'Midst the wild Alpuxarras; - there, on high,
Where mountain-snows are mingling with the sky,
A few brave tribes, with spirit yet unbroke,
Have fled indignant from the Spaniard's yoke.

O ye dread scenes! where Nature dwells alone,
Severely glorious on her craggy throne;
Ye citadels of rock, gigantic forms,
Veiled by the mists, and girdled by the storms, -
Ravines, and glens, and deep resounding caves,
That hold communion with the torrent-waves;
And ye, the unstained and everlasting snows,
That dwell above in bright and still repose;
To you, in every clime, in every age,
Far from the tyrant's or the conqueror's rage,
Hath Freedom led her sons - untired to keep
Her fearless vigils on the barren steep.
She, like the mountain eagle, still delights
To gaze exulting from unconquered heights,
And build her eyrie in defiance proud,
To dare the wind, and mingle with the cloud.

Now her deep voice, the soul's awakener, swells,
Wild Alpuxarras, through your inmost dells.
There, the dark glens and lonely rocks among,
As at the clarion's call, her children throng.
She with enduring strength had nerved each frame,
And made each heart the temple of her flame,
Her own resisting spirit, which shall glow
Unquenchably, surviving all below.

There high-born maids, that moved upon the earth
More like bright creatures of aerial birth,
Nurslings of palaces, have fled to share
The fate of brothers and of sires; to bear,
All undismayed, privation and distress,
And smile the roses of the wilderness:
And mothers with their infants, there to dwell
In the deep forest or the cavern cell,
And rear their offspring 'midst the rock, to be,
If now no more the mighty, still the free.

And 'midst that band are veterans, o'er whose head
Sorrows and years their mingled snow have shed?
They saw thy glory, they have wept thy fall,
O royal city! and the wreck of all
They loved and hallowed most: - doth aught remain
For these to prove of happiness or pain?
Life's cup is drained - earth fades before their eye;
Their task is closing - they have but to die.
Ask ye, why fled they hither? - that their doom
Might be, to sink unfettered to the tomb.
And youth, in all its pride of strength, is there,
And buoyancy of spirit, formed to dare
And suffer all things - fallen on evil days,
Yet darting o'er the world an ardent gaze,
As on the arena where its powers may find
Full scope to strive for glory with mankind.
Such are the tenants of the mountain-hold,
The high in heart, unconquered, uncontrolled:
The day, the huntsmen of the wild - by night,
Unwearied guardians of the watch-fire's light,
They from their bleak majestic home have caught
A sterner tone of unsubmitting thought,
While all around them bids the soul arise
To blend with Nature's dread sublimities.
- But these are lofty dreams, and must not be
Were tyranny is near: - the bended knee,
The eye whose glance no inborn grandeur fires,
And the tamed heart, are tributes she requires;
Nor must the dwellers of the rock look down
On regal conquerors, and defy their frown.
What warrior-band is toiling to explore
The mountain-pass, with pine-wood shadowed o'er,
Startling with martial sounds each rude recess,
Where the deep echo slept in loneliness!
These are the sons of Spain! - Your foes are near,
O exiles of the wild sierra! hear!
Hear! wake! arise! and from your inmost caves
Pour like the torrent in its might of waves!

Who leads the invaders on? - his features bear
The deep-worn traces of a calm despair;
Yet his dark brow is haughty - and his eye
Speaks of a soul that asks not sympathy.
'Tis he! 'tis he again! the apostate chief;
He comes in all the sternness of his grief.
He comes, but changed in heart, no more to wield
Falchion for proud Castile in battle field.
Against his country's children - though he leads
Castilian bands again to hostile deeds;
His hope is but from ceaseless pangs to fly,
To rush upon the Moslem spears, and die.
So shall remorse and love the heart release,
Which dares not dream of joy, but sighs for peace.
The mountain-echoes are awake - a sound
Of strife is ringing through the rocks around.
Within the steep defile that winds between
Cliffs piled on cliffs, a dark, terrific scene,
Where Moorish exile and Castilian knight
Are wildly mingling in the serried fight.
Red flows the foaming streamlet of the glen,
Whose bright transparence ne'er was stained till then;
While swell the war-note and the clash of spears
To the bleak dwellings of the mountaineers,
Where thy sad daughters, lost Granada! wait,
In dread suspense, the tidings of their fate.
But he - whose spirit, panting for its rest,
Would fain each sword concentrate in his breast -
Who, where a spear is pointed, or a lance
Almed at another's breast, would still advance -
Courts death in vain; each weapon glances by,
As if for him 'twas bliss too great to die.
Yes, Aben-Zurrah! there are deeper woes
Reserved for thee ere Nature's last repose;
Thou knowest not yet what vengeance fate can wreak,
Nor all the heart can suffer ere it break.
Doubtful and long the strife, and bravely fell
The sons of battle in that narrow dell;
Youth in its light of beauty there hath past,
And age, the weary, found repose at last;
Till, few and faint, the Moslem tribes recoil,
Borne down by numbers, and o'erpowered by toil.
Dispersed, disheartened, through the pass they fly,
Pierce the deep wood, or mount the cliff on high;
While Hamet's band in wonder gaze, nor dare
Track o'er their dizzy path the footsteps of despair.

Yet he, to whom each danger hath become
A dark delight, and every wild a home,
Still urges onward - undismayed to tread
Where life's fond lovers would recoil with dread.
But fear is for the happy -
they
may shrink
From the steep precipice, or torrent's brink;
They to whom earth is paradise - their doom
Lends to stern courage to approach the tomb:
Not such his lot, who, schooled by fate severe,
Were but too blest if aught remained to fear.
Up the rude crags, whose giant masses throw
Eternal shadows o'er the glen below;
And by the fall, whose many-tinctured spray
Half in a mist of radiance veils its way,
He holds his venturous track: - supported now
By some o'erhanging pine or ilex bough;
Now by some jutting stone, that seems to dwell
Half in mid-air, as balanced by a spell.
Now hath his footstep gained the summit's head,
A level span, with emerald verdure spread,
A fairy circle - there the heath-flowers rise,
And the rock-rose unnoticed blooms and dies;
And brightly plays the stream, ere yet its tide
In foam and thunder cleave the mountain-side;
But all is wild beyond - and Hamet's eye
Roves o'er a world of rude sublimity.
That dell beneath, where e'en at noon of day
Earth's chartered guest, the sunbeam, scarce can stray;
Around, untrodden woods; and far above,
Where mortal footstep ne'er may hope to rove,
Bare granite cliffs, whose fixed, inherent dyes
Rival the tints that float o'er summer skies;
And the pure glittering snow-realm, yet more high,
That seems a part of Heaven's eternity.

There is no track of man where Hamet stands
Pathless the scene as Lybia's desert sands;
Yet on the calm still air a sound is heard
Of distant voices, and the gathering-word
Of Islam's tribes, now faint and fainter grown,
Now but the lingering echo of a tone.

That sound, whose cadence dies upon his ear,
He follows, reckless if his bands are near.
On by the rushing stream his way he bends,
And through the mountain's forest zone ascends;
Piercing the still and solitary shades
Of ancient pine, and dark luxuriant glades,
Eternal twilight's reign: - those mazes past,
The glowing sunbeams meet his eyes at last,
And the lone wanderer now hath reached the source
Whence the wave gushes, foaming on its course.
But there he pauses -for the lonely scene
Towers in such dread magnificence of mien,
And, mingled oft with some wild eagle's cry,
From rock-built eyrie rushing to the sky,
So deep the solemn and majestic sound
Of forests, and of waters murmuring round -
That, rapt in wondering awe, his heart forgets
Its fleeting struggles and its vain regrets.
- What earthly feeling unabashed can dwell
In Nature's mighty presence? - 'midst the swell
Of everlasting hills, the roar of floods,
And frown of rocks, and pomp of waving woods?
These their own grandeur on the soul impress,
And bid each passion feel its nothingness.

'Midst the vast marble cliffs, a lofty cave
Rears its broad arch beside the rushing wave;
Shadowed by giant oaks, and rude and lone,
It seems the temple of some power unknown,
Where earthly being may not dare intrude
To pierce the secrets of the solitude.
Yet thence at intervals a voice of wail
Is rising, wild and solemn, on the gale.
Did thy heart thrill, O Hamet! at the tone?
Came it not o'er thee as a spirit's moan?
As some loved sound, that long from earth had fled,
The unforgotten accents of the dead?
E'en thus it rose - and springing from his trance
His eager footsteps to the sound advance.
He mounts the cliffs, he gains the cavern floor;
Its dark green moss with blood is sprinkled o'er;
He rushes on - and lo! where Zayda rends
Her locks, as o'er her slaughtered sire she bends
Lost in despair; - yet, as a step draws nigh,
Disturbing sorrow's lonely sanctity,
She lifts her head, and, all-subdued by grief,
Views with a wild sad smile the once-loved chief;
While rove her thoughts, unconscious of the past,
And every woe forgetting - but the last.

'Comest thou to weep with me? - for I am left
Alone on earth, of every tie bereft.
Low lies the warrior on his blood-stained bier;
His child may call, but he no more shall hear.
He sleeps - but never shall those eyes unclose;
'Twas not my voice that lulled him to repose;
Nor can it break his slumbers. - Dost thou mourn?
And is thy heart, like mine, with anguish torn?
Weep, and my soul a joy in grief shall know,
That o'er his grave my tears with Hamet's flow!'

But scarce her voice had breathed that well-known name
When, swiftly rushing o'er her spirit, came
Each dark remembrance - by affliction's power
Awhile effaced in that o'erwhelming hour,
To wake with tenfold strength: 'twas then her eye
Resumed its light, her mien its majesty,
And o'er her wasted cheek a burning glow
Spreads, while her lips' indignant accents flow.

'Away! I dream! Oh, how hath sorrow's might
Bowed down my soul, and quenched its native light -
That I should thus forget! and bid
thy
tear
With mine be mingled o'er a father's bier!
Did he not perish, haply by thy hand,
In the last combat with thy ruthless band?
The morn beheld that conflict of despair: -
'Twas then he fell - he fell! - and thou wert there!
Thou! who thy country's children hast pursued
To their last refuge 'midst these mountains rude.
Was it for this I loved thee? - Thou hast taught
My soul all grief, all bitterness of thought!
'Twill soon be past - I bow to Heaven's decree,
Which bade each pang be ministered by thee.'

'I had not deemed that aught remained below
For me to prove of yet untasted woe;
But thus to meet thee, Zayda! can impart
One more, one keener agony of heart.
Oh, hear me yet! - I would have died to save
My foe, but still thy father, from the grave
But, in the fierce confusion of the strife,
In my own stern despair and scorn of life,
Borne wildly on, I saw not, knew not aught,
Save that to perish there in vain I sought.
And let me share thy sorrows! - hadst thou known
All I have felt in silence and alone,
E'en
thou
mightst then relent, and deem, at last,
A grief like mine might expiate all the past.

'But oh! for thee, the loved and precious flower,
So fondly reared in luxury's guarded bower,
From every danger, every storm secured,
How hast
thou
suffered! what hast thou endured!
Daughter of palaces! and can it be
That this bleak desert is a home for thee!
These rocks
thy
dwelling! thou, who shouldst have known
Of life the sunbeam and the smile alone!
Oh, yet forgive! be all my guilt forgot,
Nor bid me leave thee to so rude a lot!'

'That lot is fixed; 'twere fruitless to repine:
Still must a gulf divide my fate from thine.
I may forgive - but not at will the heart
Can bid its dark remembrances depart.
No, Hamet, no! - too deeply are these traced,
Yet the hour comes when all shall be effaced!
Not long on earth, not long, shall Zayda keep
Her lonely vigils o'er the grave to weep:
E'en now, prophetic of my early doom,
Speaks to my soul a presage of the tomb;
And ne'er in vain did hopeless mourner feel
That deep foreboding o'er the bosom steal!
Soon shall I slumber calmly by the side
Of him for whom I lived, and would have died;
Till then, one thought shall soothe my orphan lot,
In pain and peril - I forsook him not.

'And now, farewell! - behold the summer-day
Is passing like the dreams of life, away.
Soon will the tribe of him who sleeps draw nigh,
With the last rites his bier to sanctify.
Oh, yet in time, away! - 'twere not
my
prayer
This hour they come - and dost thou scorn to fly?
Save me that one last pang - to see thee die!
E'en while she speaks is heard their echoing tread,
Onward they move, the kindred of the dead.
They reach the cave - they enter - slow their pace,
And calm, deep sadness marks each mourner's face,
And all is hushed, till he who seems to wait
In silent, stern devotedness, his fate,
Hath met their glance - then grief to fury turns;
Each mien is changed, each eye indignant burns,
And voices rise, and swords have left their sheath:
Blood must atone for blood, and death for death!
They close around him; lofty still his mien,
His cheek unaltered, and his brow serene.
Unheard, or heard in vain, is Zayda's cry;
Fruitless her prayer, unmarked her agony,
But as his foremost foes their weapons bend
Against the life he seeks not to defend,
Wildly she darts between - each feeling past,
Save strong affection, which prevails at last.
Oh, not in vain its daring! - for the blow
Aimed at his heart hath bade her life-blood flow;
And she hath sunk a martyr on the breast,
Where, in that hour, her head may calmly rest,
For he is saved! Behold the Zegri band,
Pale with dismay and grief, around her stand:
While, every thought of hate and vengeance o'er,
They weep for her who soon shall weep no more.
She, she alone is calm: - a fading smile,
Like sunset, passes o'er her cheek the while;
And in her eye, ere yet it closes, dwell
Those last faint rays, the parting soul's farewell.

'Now is the conflict past, and I have proved
How well, how deeply thou hast been beloved!
Yes! in an hour like this 'twere vain to hide
The heart so long and so severely tried:
Still to thy name that heart hath fondly thrilled,
But sterner duties called - and were fulfilled:
And I am blest! - To every holier tie
My life was faithful, - and for thee I die!
Nor shall the love so purified be vain;
Severed on earth, we yet shall meet again.
Farewell! - And ye, at Zayda's dying prayer,
Spare him, my kindred tribe! forgive and spare!
Oh! be his guilt forgotten in his woes,
While I, beside my sire, in peace repose.'

Now fades her cheek, her voice hath sunk, and death:
Sits in her eye, and struggles in her breath.
One pang - 'tis past - her task on earth is done,
And the pure spirit to its rest hath flown.
But he for whom she died - Oh! who may paint
The grief, to which all other woes were faint?
There is no power in language to impart
The deeper pangs, the ordeals of the heart,
By the dread Searcher of the soul surveyed;
These have no words - nor are by words portrayed.

A dirge is rising on the mountain-air,
Whose fitful swells its plaintive murmurs bear
Far o'er the Alpuxarras; - wild its tone,
And rocks and caverns echo, 'Thou art gone!'

Daughter of heroes! thou art gone
To share his tomb who gave thee birth;
Peace to the lovely spirit flown!
It was not formed for earth.
Thou wert a sunbeam in thy race,
Which brightly passed, and left no trace.

But calmly sleep! - for thou art free,
And hands unchained thy tomb shall raise.
Sleep! they are closed at length for thee,
Life's few and evil days!
Nor shalt thou watch, with tearful eye,
The lingering death of liberty.

Flower of the desert! thou thy bloom
Didst early to the storm resign:
We bear it still - and dark
their
doom
Who cannot weep for thine!
For us, whose every hope is fled,
The time is past to mourn the dead.

The days have been when o'er thy bier
Far other strains than these had flowed;
Now, as a home from grief and fear,
We hail thy dark abode!
We, who but linger to bequeath
Our sons the choice of chains or death.

Thou art with those, the free, the brave,
The mighty of departed years;
And for the slumberers of the grave
Our fate hath left no tears.
Though loved and lost, to weep were vain
For thee, who ne'er shalt weep again.

Have we not seen, despoiled by foes,
The land our fathers won of yore?
And is there yet a pang for those
Who gaze on
this
no more?
Oh, that like them 'twere ours to rest!
Daughter of heroes! thou art blest!

A few short years, and in the lonely cave
Where sleeps the Zegri maid, is Hamet's grave.
Severed in life, united in the tomb -
Such, of the hearts that loved so well, the doom!
Their dirge, of woods and waves the eternal moan;
Their sepulchre, the pine-clad rocks alone.
And oft beside the midnight watch-fire's blaze,
Amidst those rocks, in long departed days
(When freedom fled, to hold, sequestered there,
The stern and lofty councils of despair),
Some exiled Moor, a warrior of the wild,
Who the lone hours with mournful strains beguiled,
Hath taught his mountain-home the tale of those
Who thus have suffered, and who thus repose.

Too long have Tyranny and Power combined,
To sway, with iron sceptre, o'er mankind;
Long has Oppression worn th' imperial robe,
And Rapine's sword has wasted half the globe!
O'er Europe's cultured realms, and climes afar,
Triumphant Gaul has pour'd the tide of war;
To her fair Austria veil'd the standard bright;
Ausonia's lovely plains have own'd her might;
While Prussia's eagle, never taught to yield,
Forsook her tow'ring height on Jena's field!

Oh! gallant Fred'ric! could thy parted shade,
Have seen thy country vanquish'd and betray'd;
How had thy soul indignant mourn'd her shame,
Her sullied trophies, and her tarnish'd fame!
When Valour wept lamented BRUNSWlCK's doom,
And nursed with tears, the laurels on his tomb;
When Prussia, drooping o'er her hero's grave,
Invoked his spirit to descend and save;
Then set her glories -- then expired her sun,
And fraud achieved -- e'en more than conquest won!

O'er peaceful realms, that smiled with plenty gay,
Has desolation spread her ample sway;
Thy blast, oh Ruin! on tremendous wings,
Has proudly swept o'er empires, nations, kings!
Thus the wild hurricane's impetuous force,
With dark destruction marks its whelming course;
Despoils the woodland's pomp, the blooming plain,
Death on its pinion, vengeance in its train!
-- Rise, Freedom, rise! and breaking from thy trance,
Wave the dread banner, seize the glittering lance!
With arm of might assert thy sacred cause,
And call thy champions to defend thy laws!
How long shall tyrant power her throne maintain?
How long shall despots and usurpers reign?
Is honour's lofty soul for ever fled?
Is virtue lost? is martial ardour dead?
Is there no heart where worth and valour dwell,
No patriot WALLACE, no undaunted TELL?
Yes, Freedom, yes! thy sons, a noble band,
Around thy banner, firm, exulting stand;
Once more 'tis thine, invincible, to wield
The beamy spear, and adamantine shield!
Again thy cheek with proud resentment glows,
Again thy lion-glance appals thy foes;
Thy kindling eye-beam darts unconquer'd fires,
Thy look sublime the warrior's heart inspires:
And while, to guard thy standard and thy right,
Castilians rush, intrepid, to the fight;
Lo! Britain's generous host their aid supply,
Resolved for thee to triumph or to die!
And glory smiles to see Iberia's name,
Enroll'd with Albion's in the book of fame!

Illustrious names! still, still united beam,
Be still the hero's boast, the poet's theme:
So when two radiant gems together shine,
And in one wreath their lucid light combine;
Each, as it sparkles with transcendant rays,
Adds to the lustre of its kindred blaze.

Descend, oh Genius! from thy orb descend!
Thy glowing thought, thy kindling spirit lend!
As Memnon's harp (so ancient fables say)
With sweet vibration meets the morning ray,
So let the chords thy heavenly presence own,
And swell a louder note, a nobler tone;
Call from the sun, her burning throne on high,
The seraph Ecstacy, with lightning eye;
Steal from the source of day empyreal fire,
And breathe the soul of rapture o'er the lyre!

Hail, Albion! hail, thou land of freedom's birth!
Pride of the main, and Phoenix of the earth!
Thou second Rome, where mercy, justice, dwell,
Whose sons in wisdom as in arms excel!
Thine are the dauntless bands, like Spartans brave,
Bold in the field, triumphant on the wave;
In classic elegance, and arts divine,
To rival Athens' fairest palm is thine;
For taste and fancy from Hymettus fly,
And richer bloom beneath thy varying sky,
Where Science mounts, in radiant car sublime,
To other worlds beyond the sphere of time!
Hail, Albion, hail! to thee has fate denied
Peruvian mines and rich Hindostan's pride;
The gems that Ormuz and Golconda boast,
And all the wealth of Montezuma's coast:
For thee no Parian marbles brightly shine;
No glowing suns mature the blushing vine;
No light Arabian gales their wings expand,
To waft Sabæan incense o'er the land;
No graceful cedars crown thy lofty hills,
No trickling myrrh for thee its balm distils;
Not from thy trees the lucid amber flows,
And far from thee the scented cassia blows!
Yet fearless Commerce, pillar of thy throne,
Makes all the wealth of foreign climes thy own;
From Lapland's shore to Afric's fervid reign,
She bids thy ensigns float above the main;
Unfurls her streamers to the favouring gale,
And shows to other worlds her daring sail;
Then wafts their gold, their varied stores to thee,
Queen of the trident! empress of the sea!

For this thy noble sons have spread alarms,
And bade the zones resound with Britain's arms!
Calpè's proud rock, and Syria's palmy shore,
Have heard and trembled at their battle's roar!
The sacred waves of fertilizing Nile
Have seen the triumphs of the conquering isle!
For this, for this, the Samiel-blast of war
Has roll'd o'er Vincent's cape and Trafalgar!
Victorious RODNEY spread thy thunder's sound,
And NELSON fell, with fame immortal crown'd --
Blest if their perils and their blood could gain,
To grace thy hand -- the sceptre of the main!
The milder emblems of the virtues calm, --
The poet's verdant bay, the sage's palm; --
These in thy laurel's blooming foliage twine,
And round thy brows a deathless wreath combine:
Not Mincio's banks, nor Meles' classic tide,
Are hallow'd more than Avon's haunted side;
Nor is thy Thames a less inspiring theme,
Than pure Ilissus, or than Tiber's stream.

Bright in the annals of th' impartial page,
Britannia's heroes live from age to age!
From ancient days, when dwelt her savage race,
Her painted natives, foremost in the chase,
Free from all cares for luxury or gain,
Lords of the wood, and monarchs of the plain;
To these Augustan days, when social arts,
Refine and meliorate her manly hearts;
From doubtful Arthur, hero of romance,
King of the circled board, the spear, the lance; --
To those whose recent trophies grace her shield,
The gallant victors of Vimiera's field;
Still have her warriors borne th' unfading crown,
And made the British Flag the ensign of renown.

Spirit of ALFRED! patriot soul sublime!
Thou morning-star of error's darkest time!
Prince of the lion-heart! whose arm in fight,
On Syria's plains repell'd Saladin's might!
EDWARD! for bright heroic deeds revered,
By Cressy's fame to Britain still endear'd!
Triumphant Henry! thou, whose valour proud,
The lofty plume of crested Gallia bow'd!
Look down, look down, exalted Shades! and view
Your Albion still to freedom's banner true!
Behold the land, ennobled by your fame,
Supreme in glory, and of spotless name;
And, as the pyramid indignant rears
Its awful head, and mocks the waste of years;
See her secure in pride of virtue tower,
While prostrate nations kiss the rod of power!

Lo! where her pennons waving high, aspire,
Bold victory hovers near, 'with eyes of fire!'
While Lusitania hails, with just applause,
The brave defenders of her injured cause;
Bids the full song, the note of triumph rise,
And swells th' exulting pæan to the skies!

And they, who late with anguish, hard to tell,
Breathed to their cherish'd realms a sad farewell!
Who, as the vessel bore them o'er the tide,
Still fondly linger'd on its deck, and sigh'd;
Gazed on the shore, till tears obscured their sight,
And the blue distance melted into light; --
The Royal Exiles, forced by Gallia's hate,
To fly for refuge in a foreign state; --
They, soon returning o'er the western main,
Ere long may view their clime beloved again;
And, as the blazing pillar led the host
Of faithful Israel, o'er the desert coast;
So may Britannia guide the noble band,
O'er the wild ocean, to their native land.
Oh! glorious isle! -- O sovereign of the waves!
Thine are the sons who 'never will be slaves!'
See them once more, with ardent hearts advance,
And rend the laurels of insulting France;
To brave Castile their potent aid supply,
And wave, oh Freedom! wave thy sword on high!

Is there no bard of heavenly power posses'd
To thrill, to rouse, to animate the breast?
Like Shakespeare o'er the secret mind to sway,
And call each wayward passion to obey?
Is there no bard, imbued with hallow'd fire,
To wake the chords of Ossian's magic lyre;
Whose numbers breathing all his flame divine,
The patriot's name to ages might consign?
Rise! Inspiration! rise, be this thy theme,
And mount, like Uriel, on the golden beam!

Oh, could my muse on seraph pinion spring,
And sweep with rapture's hand the trembling string!
Could she the bosom energies control,
And pour impassion'd fervour o'er the soul!
Oh! could she strike the harp to Milton given,
Brought by a cherub from th' empyrean heaven!
Ah! fruitless wish! ah! prayer preferr'd in vain,
For her! -- the humblest of the woodland train!
Yet shall her feeble voice essay to raise
The hymn of liberty, the song of praise!

IberiaN bands! whose noble ardour glows,
To pour confusion on oppressive foes;
Intrepid spirits hail! 'tis yours to feel
The hero's fire, the freeman's godlike zeal!
Not to secure dominion's boundless reign,
Ye wave the flag of conquest o'er the slain;
No cruel rapine leads you to the war,
Nor mad ambition, whirl'd in crimson car;
No, brave Castilians! yours a nobler end,
Your land, your laws, your monarch to defend!
For these, for these, your valiant legions rear
The floating standard, and the lofty spear!
The fearless lover wields the conquering sword,
Fired by the image of the maid adored!
His best-beloved, his fondest ties, to aid,
The Father's hand unsheaths the glittering blade!
For each, for all, for every sacred right,
The daring patriot mingles in the fight!
And e'en if love or friendship fail to warm,
His country's name alone can nerve his dauntless arm!

He bleeds! he falls! his death-bed is the field!
His dirge the trumpet, and his bier the shield!
His closing eyes the beam of valour speak,
The flush of ardour lingers on his cheek;
Serene he lifts to heaven those closing eyes,
Then for his country breathes a prayer -- and dies!
Oh! ever hallow'd be his verdant grave, --
There let the laurel spread, the cypress wave!
Thou, lovely Spring! bestow, to grace his tomb,
Thy sweetest fragrance, and thy earliest bloom;
There let the tears of heaven descend in balm,
There let the poet consecrate his palm!
Let honour, pity, bless the holy ground,
And shades of sainted heroes watch around!
'Twas thus, while Glory rung his thrilling knell,
Thy chief, oh Thebes! at Mantinea fell;
Smiled undismay'd within the arms of death,
While Victory, weeping nigh, received his breath!

Oh! thou, the sovereign of the noble soul!
Thou source of energies beyond control!
Queen of the lofty thought, the generous deed,
Whose sons unconquer'd fight, undaunted bleed, --
Inspiring Liberty! thy worshipp'd name
The warm enthusiast kindles to a flame;
Thy look of heaven, thy voice of harmony,
Thy charms inspire him to achievements high;
More blest, with thee to tread perennial snows,
Where ne'er a flower expands, a zephyr blows;
Where Winter, binding nature in his chain,
In frost-work palace holds perpetual reign;
Than, far from thee, with frolic step to rove,
The green savannas, and the spicy grove;
Scent the rich balm of India's perfumed gales,
In citron-woods, and aromatic vales;
For oh! fair Liberty, when thou art near,
Elysium blossoms in the desert drear!

Where'er thy smile its magic power bestows,
There arts and taste expand, there fancy glows
The sacred lyre its wild enchantment gives,
And every chord to swelling transport lives;
There ardent Genius bids the pencil trace
The soul of beauty, and the lines of grace;
With bold, Promethean hand, the canvas warms,
And calls from stone expression's breathing forms.
Thus, where the fruitful Nile o'erflows its bound,
Its genial waves diffuse abundance round,
Bid Ceres laugh o'er waste and sterile sands,
And rich profusion clothe deserted lands!

Immortal FREEDOM! daughter of the skies!
To thee shall Britain's grateful incense rise!
Ne'er, goddess! ne'er forsake thy favourite isle,
Still be thy Albion brighten'd with thy smile!
Long had thy spirit slept in dead repose,
While proudly triumph'd thine insulting foes;
Yet tho' a cloud may veil Apollo's light,
Soon, with celestial beam, he breaks to sight:
Once more we see thy kindling soul return,
Thy vestal-flame with added radiance burn;
Lo! in Iberian hearts thine ardour lives,
Lo! in Iberian hearts thy spark revives!

Proceed, proceed, ye firm undaunted band!
Still sure to conquer, if combin'd ye stand:
Though myriads flashing in the eye of day,
Stream'd o'er the smiling land in long array;
Though tyrant Asia pour'd unnumber'd foes,
Triumphant still the arm of Greece arose: --
For every state in sacred union stood,
Strong to repel invasion's whelming flood;
Each heart was glowing in the general cause,
Each hand prepared to guard their hallow'd laws;
Athenian valour join'd Laconia's might,
And but contended to be first in fight;
From rank to rank the warm contagion ran,
And Hope and Freedom led the flaming van:
Then Persia's monarch mourn'd his glories lost,
As wild confusion wing'd his flying host;
Then Attic bards the hymn of victory sung,
The Grecian harp to notes exulting rung!
Then Sculpture bade the Parian stone record,
The high achievements of the conquering sword.
Thus, brave Castilians! thus, may bright renown,
And fair success your valiant efforts crown!

Genius of chivalry! whose early days,
Tradition still recounts in artless lays;
Whose faded splendours fancy oft recalls, --
The floating banners, and the lofty halls;
The gallant feats thy festivals display'd,
The tilt, the tournament, the long crusade;
Whose ancient pride Romance delights to hail,
In fabling numbers, or heroic tale:
Those times are fled, when stern thy castles frown'd,
Their stately towers with feudal grandeur crown'd;
Those times are fled, when fair Iberia's clime,
Beheld thy Gothic reign, thy pomp sublime;
And all thy glories, all thy deeds of yore,
Live but in legends wild, and poet's lore!
Lo! where thy silent harp neglected lies,
Light o'er its chords the murmuring zephyr sighs;
Thy solemn courts, where once the minstrel sung,
The choral voice of mirth and music rung;
Now, with the ivy clad, forsaken, lone,
Hear but the breeze and echo to its moan:
Thy lonely towers deserted fall away,
Thy broken shield is mouldering in decay.
Yet though thy transient pageantries are gone,
Like fairy visions, bright, yet swiftly flown;
Genius of chivalry! thy noble train,
Thy firm, exalted virtues yet remain!
Fair truth, array'd in robes of spotless white,
Her eye a sunbeam, and her zone of light;
Warm emulation, with aspiring aim,
Still darting forward to the wreath of fame;
And purest love, that waves his torch divine,
At awful honour's consecrated shrine;
Ardour with eagle-wing, and fiery glance;
And generous courage, resting on his lance;
And loyalty, by perils unsubdued;
Untainted faith, unshaken fortitude;
And patriot energy, with heart of flame; --
These, in Iberia's sons are yet the same!
These from remotest days their souls have fired,
'Nerved every arm,' and every breast inspired!
When Moorish bands their suffering land possess'd,
And fierce oppression rear'd her giant crest;
The wealthy caliphs on Cordova's throne,
In eastern gems and purple splendour shone;
Theirs was the proud magnificence, that vied
With stately Bagdat's oriental pride;
Theirs were the courts in regal pomp array'd,
Where arts and luxury their charms display'd;
'Twas theirs to rear the Zehrar's costly towers,
Its fairy-palace and enchanted bowers;
There all Arabian fiction e'er could tell,
Of potent genii or of wizard spell; --
All that a poet's dream could picture bright,
One sweet Elysium, charm'd the wondering sight!
Too fair, too rich, for work of mortal hand,
It seem'd an Eden from Armida's wand!

Yet vain their pride, their wealth, and radiant state,
When freedom waved on high the sword of fate!
When brave Ramiro bade the despots fear,
Stern retribution frowning on his spear;
And fierce Almanzor, after many a fight,
O'erwhelm'd with shame, confess'd the Christian's might.

In later times the gallant Cid arose,
Burning with zeal against his country's foes;
His victor-arm Alphonso's throne maintain'd,
His laureate brows the wreath of conquest gain'd!
And still his deeds Castilian bards rehearse,
Inspiring theme of patriotic verse!
High in the temple of recording fame,
Iberia points to, great Gonsalvo's name;
Victorious chief! whose valour still defied
The arms of Gaul, and bow'd her crested pride;
With splendid trophies graced his sovereign's throne,
And bade Granada's realms his prowess own.
Nor were his deeds thy only boast, oh Spain!
In mighty FERDINAND's illustrious reign;
'Twas then thy glorious Pilot spread the sail,
Unfurl'd his flag before the eastern gale;
Bold, sanguine, fearless, ventured to explore
Seas unexplored, and worlds unknown before:
Fair science guided o'er the liquid realm,
Sweet hope, exulting, steer'd the daring helm;
While on the mast, with ardour-flashing eye,
Courageous enterprise still hover'd nigh:
The hoary genius of th' Atlantic main,
Saw man invade his wide majestic reign; --
His empire yet by mortal unsubdued,
The throne, the world, of awful solitude!
And e'en when shipwreck seem'd to rear his form,
And dark destruction menaced in the storm;
In every shape, when giant-peril rose,
To daunt his spirit and his course oppose;
O'er every heart when terror sway'd alone,
And hope forsook each bosom, but his own:
Moved by no dangers, by no fears repell'd,
His glorious track the gallant sailor held;
Attentive still to mark the sea-birds lave,
Or high in air their snowy pinions wave:
Thus princely Jason, launching from the steep,
With dauntless prow explored th' untravell'd deep;
Thus, at the helm, Ulysses' watchful sight,
View'd every star, and planetary light.
Sublime Columbus! when at length, descried,
The long-sought land arose above the tide;
How every heart with exultation glow'd,
How from each eye the tear of transport flow'd!
Not wilder joy the sons of Israel knew,
When Canaan's fertile plains appear'd in view;
Then rose the choral anthem on the breeze,
Then martial music floated o'er the seas;
Their waving streamers to the sun display'd,
In all the pride of warlike pomp array'd;
Advancing nearer still, the ardent band,
Hail'd the glad shore, and bless'd the stranger land;
Admired its palmy groves, and prospects fair,
With rapture breathed its pure ambrosial air;
Then crowded round its free and simple race,
Amazement pictured wild on every face:
Who deem'd that beings of celestial birth,
Sprung from the sun, descended to the earth!
Then first another world, another sky,
Beheld Iberia's banner blaze on high!

Still prouder glories beam on history's page,
Imperial CHARLES! to mark thy prosperous age:
Those golden days of arts and fancy bright,
When science pour'd her mild, refulgent light;
When Painting bade the glowing canvas breathe,
Creative Sculpture claim'd the living wreath;
When roved the Muses in Ausonian bowers,
Weaving immortal crowns of fairest flowers;
When angel-truth dispersed, with beam divine,
The clouds that veil'd religion's hallow'd shrine;
Those golden days beheld Iberia tower,
High on the pyramid of fame and power:
Vain all the efforts of her numerous foes,
Her might, superior still, triumphant rose.
Thus, on proud Lebanon's exalted brow,
The cedar, frowning o'er the plains below,
Though storms assail, its regal pomp to rend,
Majestic still aspires, disdaining e'er to bend!

When Gallia pour'd, to Pavia's trophied plain,
Her youthful knights, a bold, impetuous train;
When, after many a toil and danger past,
The fatal morn of conflict rose at last;
That morning saw her glittering host combine,
And form in close array the threat'ning line;
Fire in each eye, and force in every arm,
With hope exulting, and with ardour warm;
Saw to the gale their streaming ensigns play,
Their armour flashing to the beam of day;
Their gen'rous chargers panting, spurn the ground,
Roused by the trumpet's animating sound;
And heard in air their warlike music float,
The martial pipe, the drum's inspiring note!

Pale set the sun -- the shades of evening fell,
The mournful night-wind rung their funeral knell;
And the same day beheld their warriors dead,
Their sovereign captive, and their glories fled!
Fled, like the lightning's evanescent fire,
Bright, blazing, dreadful -- only to expire!
Then, then, while prostrate Gaul confess'd her might,
Iberia's planet shed meridian light!
Nor less, on famed St. Quintin's deathful day,
Castilian spirit bore the prize away; --
Laurels that still their verdure shall retain,
And trophies beaming high in glory's fane!
And lo! her heroes, warm with kindred flame,
Still proudly emulate their father's fame;
Still with the soul of patriot-valour glow,
Still rush impetuous to repel the foe!
Wave the bright falchion, lift the beamy spear,
And bid oppressive GALLIA learn to fear!
Be theirs, be theirs unfading honour's crown,
The living amaranths of bright renown!
Be theirs th' inspiring tribute of applause,
Due to the champions of their country's cause!
Be theirs the purest bliss that virtue loves,
The joy when conscience whispers and approves!
When every heart is fired, each pulse beats' high,
To fight, to bleed, to fall, for Liberty;
When every hand is dauntless and prepared,
The sacred charter of mankind to guard;
When Britain's valiant sons their aid unite,
Fervent and glowing still for Freedom's right,
Bid ancient enmities for ever cease,
And ancient wrongs forgotten, sleep in peace;
When firmly leagued, they join the patriot band,
Can venal slaves their conquering arms withstand?
Can fame refuse their gallant deeds to bless?
Can victory fail to crown them with success?
Look down, oh Heaven! the righteous cause maintain,
Defend the injured, and avenge the slain!
Despot of France! destroyer of mankind!
What spectre-cares must haunt thy sleepless mind!
Oh! if at midnight round thy regal bed,
When soothing visions fly thine aching head;
When sleep denies thy anxious cares to calm,
And lull thy senses in his opiate-balm;
Invoked by guilt, if airy phantoms rise,
And murder'd victims bleed before thine eyes;
Loud let them thunder in thy troubled ear,
'Tyrant! the hour, th' avenging hour is near!'
It is, it is! thy Star withdraws its ray, --
Soon will its parting lustre fade away;
Soon will Cimmerian shades obscure its light,
And veil thy splendours in eternal night!
Oh! when accusing conscience wakes thy soul,
With awful terrors, and with dread control,
Bids threat'ning forms, appalling, round thee stand,
And summons all her visionary band;
Calls up the parted shadows of the dead,
And whispers, peace and happiness are fled;
E'en at the time of silence and of rest,
Paints the dire poniard menacing thy breast;
Is then thy cheek with guilt and horror pale?
Then dost thou tremble, does thy spirit fail?
And wouldst thou yet by added crimes provoke,
The bolt of heaven to launch the fatal stroke?
Bereave a nation of its rights revered,
Of all to mortals sacred and endear'd?
And shall they tamely liberty resign,
The soul of life, the source of bliss divine?
Canst thou, supreme destroyer! hope to bind,
In chains of adamant, the noble mind?
Go, bid the rolling orbs thy mandate hear, --
Go, stay the lightning in its wing'd career!
No, Tyrant! no, thy utmost force is vain,
The patriot-arm of Freedom to restrain:
Then bid thy subject-bands in armour shine,
Then bid thy legions all their power combine!
Yet couldst thou summon myriads at command,
Did boundless realms obey thy sceptred hand,
E'en then her soul thy lawless might would spurn,
E'en then, with kindling fire, with indignation burn!

Ye Sons of Albion! first in danger's field,
The word of Britain and of truth to wield!
Still prompt the injured to defend and save,
Appal the despot, and assist the brave;
Who now intrepid lift the gen'rous blade,
The cause of JUSTICE and CASTILE to aid!
Ye Sons of Albion! by your country's name,
Her crown of glory, her unsullied fame,
Oh! by the shades of Cressy's martial dead,
By warrior-bands, at Agincourt who bled;
By honours gain'd on Blenheim's fatal plain,
By those in Victory's arms at Minden slain;
By the bright laurels WOLFE immortal won,
Undaunted spirit! valour's favourite son!
By Albion's thousand, thousand deeds sublime,
Renowned from zone to zone, from clime to clime;
Ye BRITISH heroes! may your trophies raise,
A deathless monument to future days!
Oh! may your courage still triumphant rise,
Exalt the 'lion-banner' to the skies!
Transcend the fairest names in history's page,
The brightest actions of a former age;
The reign of Freedom let your arms restore,
And bid oppression fall -- to rise no more!
Then, soon returning to your native isle,
May love and beauty hail you with their smile;
For you may conquest weave th' undying wreath,
And fame and glory's voice the song of rapture breathe!

Ah! when shall mad ambition cease to rage?
Ah! when shall war his demon-wrath assuage?
When, when, supplanting discord's iron reign,
Shall mercy wave her olive-wand again?
Not till the despot's dread career is closed,
And might restrain'd, and tyranny deposed!

Return, sweet Peace, ethereal form benign!
Fair blue-eyed seraph! balmy power divine!
Descend once more! thy hallow'd blessings bring,
Wave thy bright locks, and spread thy downy wing!
Luxuriant plenty laughing in thy train,
Shall crown with glowing stores the desert-plain;
Young smiling hope, attendant on thy way,
Shall gild thy path with mild celestial ray.
Descend once more! thou daughter of the sky!
Cheer every heart, and brighten every eye!
Justice, thy harbinger, before thee send,
Thy myrtle-sceptre o'er the globe extend:
Thy cherub-look again shall soothe mankind;
Thy cherub-hand the wounds of discord bind;

Thy smile of heaven shall every muse inspire,
To thee the bard shall strike the silver lyre.
Descend once more! to bid the world rejoice, --
Let nations hail thee with exulting voice;
Around thy shrine with purest incense throng,
Weave the fresh palm, and swell the choral song!
Then shall the shepherd's flute, the woodland reed,
The martial clarion, and the drum succeed,
Again shall bloom Arcadia's fairest flowers,
And music warble in Idalian bowers;
Where war and carnage blew the blast of death,
The gale shall whisper with Favonian breath!
And golden Ceres bless the festive swain,
Where the wild combat redden'd o'er the plain!
These are thy blessings, fair benignant maid!
Return, return, in vest of light array'd!
Let angel-forms, and floating sylphids bear,
Thy car of sapphire thro' the realms of air,
With accents milder than Eolian lays,
When o'er the harp the fanning zephyr plays;
Be thine to charm the raging world to rest,
Diffusing round the heaven -- that glows within thy breast!

Oh! thou! whose fiat lulls the storm asleep!
Thou! at whose nod subsides the rolling deep!
Whose awful word restrains the whirlwind's force,
And stays the thunder in its vengeful course;
Fountain of life! Omnipotent Supreme!
Robed in perfection! crown'd with glory's beam!
Oh! send on earth thy consecrated dove,
To bear the sacred olive from above;
Restore again the blest, the halcyon time,
The festal harmony of nature's prime!
Bid truth and justice once again appear,
And spread their sunshine o'er this mundane sphere;
Bright in their path, let wreaths unfading bloom,
Transcendant light their hallow'd fane illume;
Bid war and anarchy for ever cease,
And kindred seraphs rear the shrine of peace;
Brothers once more, let men her empire own,
And realms and monarchs bend before the throne;
While circling rays of angel-mercy shed
Eternal halos round her sainted head!

I.
Bring me the sounding of the torrent-water,
With yet a nearer swell-fresh breeze, awake!
And river, darkening ne'er with hues of slaughter
Thy wave's pure silvery green,-and shining lake,
Spread far before my cabin, with thy zone
Of ancient woods, ye chainless things and lone!
Send voices through the forest aisles, and make
Glad music round me, that my soul may dare,
Cheer'd by such tones, to look back on a dungeon's air!

II.
Oh, Indian hunter of the desert's race!
That with the spear at times, or bended bow,
Dost cross my footsteps in thy fiery chase
Of the swift elk or blue hill's flying roe;
Thou that beside the red night-fire thou heapest,
Beneath the cedars and the star-light sleepest,
Thou know'st not, wanderer-never may'st thou know!-
Of the dark holds wherewith man cumbers earth,
To shut from human eyes the dancing seasons' mirth.

III.
There, fetter'd down from day, to think the while
How bright in Heaven the festal sun is glowing,
Making earth's loneliest places, with his smile,
Flush like the rose; and how the streams are flowing
With sudden sparkles through the shadowy grass,
And water-flowers, all trembling as they pass;
And how the rich dark summer-trees are bowing
With their full foliage;-this to know, and pine
Bound unto midnight's heart, seems a stern lot-'twas mine.

IV.
Wherefore was this?-Because my soul had drawn
Light from the book whose words are grav'd in light!
There, at its well-head, had I found the dawn,
And day, and noon of freedom:-but too bright
It shines on that which man to man hath given,
And call'd the truth-the very truth, from Heaven!
And therefore seeks he, in his brother's sight,
To cast the mote; and therefore strives to bind
With his strong chains to earth, what is not earth's-the mind!

V.
It is a weary and a bitter task
Back from the lip the burning word to keep,
And to shut out Heaven's air with falsehood's mask,
And in the dark urn of the soul to heap
Indignant feelings-making even of thought
A buried treasure, which may but be sought
When shadows are abroad-and night-and sleep.
I might not brook it long-and thus was thrown
Into that grave-like cell, to wither there alone.

VI.
And I a child of danger, whose delights
Were on dark hills and many-sounding seas-
I that amidst the Cordillera heights
Had given Castilian banners to the breeze,
And the full circle of the rainbow seen
There, on the snows; and in my country been
A mountain wanderer, from the Pyrenees
To the Morena crags-how left I not
Life, or the soul's life quench'd, on that sepulchral spot?

VII.
Because Thou didst not leave me, oh, my God!
Thou wert with those that bore the truth of old
Into the deserts from the oppressor's rod,
And made the caverns of the rock their fold,
And in the hidden chambers of the dead,
Our guiding lamp with fire immortal fed,
And met when stars met, by their beams to hold
The free heart's communing with Thee,-and Thou
Wert in the midst, felt, own'd-the strengthener then as now!

VIII.
Yet once I sank. Alas! man's wavering mind!
Wherefore and whence the gusts that o'er it blow?
How they bear with them, floating uncombin'd,
The shadows of the past, that come and go,
As o'er the deep the old long-buried things,
Which a storm's working to the surface brings!
Is the reed shaken, and must we be so,
With every wind?-So, Father! must we be,
Till we can fix undimm'd our stedfast eyes on Thee.

IX.
Once my soul died within me. What had thrown
That sickness o'er it?-Even a passing thought
Of a clear spring, whose side, with flowers o'ergrown,
Fondly and oft my boyish steps had sought!
Perchance the damp roof's water-drops, that fell
Just then, low tinkling through my vaulted cell,
Intensely heard amidst the stillness, caught
Some tone from memory, of the music, welling
Ever with that fresh rill, from its deep rocky dwelling.

X.
But so my spirit's fever'd longings wrought,
Wakening, it might be, to the faint sad sound,
That from the darkness of the walls they brought
A lov'd scene round me, visibly around.
Yes! kindling, spreading, brightening, hue by hue,
Like stars from midnight, through the gloom it grew,
That haunt of youth, hope, manhood!-till the bound
Of my shut cavern seem'd dissolv'd, and I
Girt by the solemn hills and burning pomp of sky.

XI.
I look'd-and lo! the clear broad river flowing,
Past the old Moorish ruin on the steep,
The lone tower dark against a Heaven all glowing,
Like seas of glass and fire!-I saw the sweep
Of glorious woods far down the mountain side,
And their still shadows in the gleaming tide,
And the red evening on its waves asleep;
And midst the scene-oh! more than all-there smil'd
My child's fair face, and hers, the mother of my child!

XII.
With their soft eyes of love and gladness rais'd
Up to the flushing sky, as when we stood
Last by that river, and in silence gaz'd
On the rich world of sunset:-but a flood
Of sudden tenderness my soul oppress'd,
And I rush'd forward with a yearning breast,
To clasp-alas! a vision!-Wave and wood,
And gentle faces, lifted in the light
Of day's last hectic blush, all melted from my sight.

XIII.
Then darkness!-oh! th' unutterable gloom
That seem'd as narrowing round me, making less
And less my dungeon, when, with all its bloom,
That bright dream vanish'd from my loneliness!
It floated off, the beautiful!-yet left
Such deep thirst in my soul, that thus bereft,
I lay down, sick with passion's vain excess,
And pray'd to die.-How oft would sorrow weep
Her weariness to death, if he might come like sleep!

XIV.
But I was rous'd-and how?-It is no tale
Even midst thy shades, thou wilderness, to tell!
I would not have my boy's young cheek made pale,
Nor haunt his sunny rest with what befel
In that drear prison-house.-His eye must grow
More dark with thought, more earnest his fair brow,
More high his heart in youthful strength must swell;
So shall it fitly burn when all is told:-
Let childhood's radiant mist the free child yet enfold!

XV.
It is enough that through such heavy hours,
As wring us by our fellowship of clay,
I liv'd, and undegraded. We have powers
To snatch th' oppressor's bitter joy away!
Shall the wild Indian, for his savage fame,
Laugh and expire, and shall not truth's high name
Bear up her martyrs with all-conquering sway?
It is enough that Torture may be vain-
I had seen Alvar die-the strife was won from Pain.

XVI.
And faint not, heart of man! though years wane slow!
There have been those that from the deepest caves,
And cells of night, and fastnesses, below
The stormy dashing of the ocean-waves,
Down, farther down than gold lies hid, have nurs'd
A quenchless hope, and watch'd their time, and burst
On the bright day, like wakeners from the graves!
I was of such at last!-unchain'd I trod
This green earth, taking back my freedom from my God!

XVII.
That was an hour to send its fadeless trace
Down life's far sweeping tide!-A dim, wild night,
Like sorrow, hung upon the soft moon's face,
Yet how my heart leap'd in her blessed light!
The shepherd's light-the sailor's on the sea-
The hunter's homeward from the mountains free,
Where its lone smile makes tremulously bright
The thousand streams!-I could but gaze through tears-
Oh! what a sight is Heaven, thus first beheld for years!

XVIII.
The rolling clouds!-they have the whole blue space
Above to sail in-all the dome of sky!
My soul shot with them in their breezy race
O'er star and gloom!-but I had yet to fly,
As flies the hunted wolf. A secret spot,
And strange, I knew-the sunbeam knew it not;-
Wildest of all the savage glens that lie
In far sierras, hiding their deep springs,
And travers'd but by storms, or sounding eagles' wings.

XIX.
Ay, and I met the storm there!-I had gain'd
The covert's heart with swift and stealthy tread:
A moan went past me, and the dark trees rain'd
Their autumn foliage rustling on my head;
A moan-a hollow gust-and there I stood
Girt with majestic night, and ancient wood,
And foaming water.-Thither might have fled
The mountain Christian with his faith of yore,
When Afric's tambour shook the ringing western shore!

XX.
But through the black ravine the storm came swelling-
Mighty thou art amidst the hills, thou blast!
In thy lone course the kingly cedars felling,
Like plumes upon the path of battle cast!
A rent oak thunder'd down beside my cave-
Booming it rush'd, as booms a deep sea-wave;
A falcon soar'd; a startled wild-deer pass'd;
A far-off bell toll'd faintly through the roar-
How my glad spirit swept forth with the winds once more!

XXI.
And with the arrowy lightnings!-for they flash'd,
Smiting the branches in their fitful play,
And brightly shivering where the torrents dash'd
Up, even to crag and eagle's nest, their spray!
And there to stand amidst the pealing strife,
The strong pines groaning with tempestuous life,
And all the mountain-voices on their way,-
Was it not joy?-'twas joy in rushing might,
After those years that wove but one long dead of night!

XXII.
There came a softer hour, a lovelier moon,
And lit me to my home of youth again,
Through the dim chesnut shade, where oft at noon,
By the fount's flashing burst, my head had lain,
In gentle sleep: but now I pass'd as one
That may not pause where wood-streams whispering run,
Or light sprays tremble to a bird's wild strain,
Because th' avenger's voice is in the wind,
The foe's quick rustling step close on the leaves behind.

XXIII.
My home of youth!-oh! if indeed to part
With the soul's lov'd ones be a mournful thing,
When we go forth in buoyancy of heart,
And bearing all the glories of our spring
For life to breathe on,-is it less to meet,
When these are faded?-who shall call it sweet?
-Even though love's mingling tears may haply bring
Balm as they fall, too well their heavy showers
Teach us how much is lost of all that once was ours!

XXIV.
Not by the sunshine, with its golden glow,
Nor the green earth, nor yet the laughing sky,
Nor the faint flower-scents, as they come and go
In the soft air, like music wandering by;
-Oh! not by these, th' unfailing, are we taught
How time and sorrow on our frames have wrought,
But by the sadden'd eye, the darken'd brow,
Of kindred aspects, and the long dim gaze,
Which tells us we are chang'd,-how chang'd from other days!

XXV.
Before my father-in my place of birth,
I stood an alien. On the very floor
Which oft had trembled to my boyish mirth,
The love that rear'd me, knew my face no more!
There hung the antique armour, helm and crest,
Whose every stain woke childhood in my breast,
There droop'd the banner, with the marks it bore
Of Paynim spears; and I, the worn in frame
And heart, what there was I?-another and the same!

XXVI.
Then bounded in a boy, with clear dark eye-
-How should he know his father?-when we parted,
From the soft cloud which mantles infancy,
His soul, just wakening into wonder, darted
Its first looks round. Him follow'd one, the bride
Of my young days, the wife how lov'd and tried!
Her glance met mine-I could not speak-she started
With a bewilder'd gaze;-until there came
Tears to my burning eyes, and from my lips her name.

XXVII.
She knew me then!-I murmur'd 'Leonor!'
And her heart answer'd!-oh! the voice is known
First from all else, and swiftest to restore
Love's buried images with one low tone,
That strikes like lightning, when the cheek is faded,
And the brow heavily with thought o'ershaded,
And all the brightness from the aspect gone!
-Upon my breast she sunk, when doubt was fled,
Weeping as those may weep, that meet in woe and dread.

XXVIII.
For there we might not rest. Alas! to leave
Those native towers, and know that they must fall
By slow decay, and none remain to grieve
When the weeds cluster'd on the lonely wall!
We were the last-my boy and I-the last
Of a long line which brightly thence had pass'd!
My father bless'd me as I left his hall-
-With his deep tones and sweet, tho' full of years,
He bless'd me there, and bath'd my child's young head with tears.

XXIX.
I had brought sorrow on his grey hairs down,
And cast the darkness of my branded name
(For so he deem'd it) on the clear renown,
My own ancestral heritage of fame.
And yet he bless'd me!-Father! if the dust
Lie on those lips benign, my spirit's trust
Is to behold thee yet, where grief and shame
Dim the bright day no more; and thou wilt know
That not thro' guilt thy son thus bow'd thine age with woe!

XXX.
And thou, my Leonor! that unrepining,
If sad in soul, didst quit all else for me,
When stars-the stars that earliest rise-are shining,
How their soft glance unseals each thought of thee!
For on our flight they smil'd;-their dewy rays,
Thro' the last olives, lit thy tearful gaze
Back to the home we never more might see;
So pass'd we on, like earth's first exiles, turning
Fond looks where hung the sword above their Eden burning.

XXXI.
It was a woe to say-'Farewell, my Spain!
The sunny and the vintage land, farewell!'
-I could have died upon the battle plain
For thee, my country! but I might not dwell
In thy sweet vales, at peace.-The voice of song
Breathes, with the myrtle scent, thy hills along;
The citron's glow is caught from shade and dell;
But what are these?-upon thy flowery sod
I might not kneel, and pour my free thoughts out to God!

XXXII.
O'er the blue deep I fled, the chainless deep!
-Strange heart of man! that ev'n midst woe swells high,
When thro' the foam he sees his proud bark sweep,
Flinging out joyous gleams to wave and sky!
Yes! it swells high, whate'er he leaves behind;
His spirit rises with the rising wind;
For, wedded to the far futurity,
On, on, it bears him ever, and the main
Seems rushing, like his hope, some happier shore to gain.

XXXIII.
Not thus is woman. Closely her still heart
Doth twine itself with ev'n each lifeless thing,
Which, long remember'd, seem'd to bear its part
In her calm joys. For ever would she cling,
A brooding dove, to that sole spot of earth
Where she hath loved, and given her children birth,
And heard their first sweet voices. There may Spring
Array no path, renew no flower, no leaf,
But hath its breath of home, its claim to farewell grief.

XXXIV.
I look'd on Leonor, and if there seem'd
A cloud of more than pensiveness to rise,
In the faint smiles that o'er her features gleam'd,
And the soft darkness of her serious eyes,
Misty with tender gloom; I call'd it nought
But the fond exile's pang, a lingering thought
Of her own vale, with all its melodies
And living light of streams. Her soul would rest
Beneath your shades, I said, bowers of the gorgeous west!

XXXV.
Oh! could we live in visions! could we hold
Delusion faster, longer, to our breast,
When it shuts from us, with its mantle's fold,
That which we see not, and are therefore blest!
But they, our lov'd and loving, they to whom
We have spread out our souls in joy and gloom,
Their looks and accents, unto ours address'd,
Have been a language of familiar tone
Too long to breathe, at last, dark sayings and unknown.

XXXVI.
I told my heart 'twas but the exile's woe
Which press'd on that sweet bosom;-I deceiv'd
My heart but half:-a whisper faint and low,
Haunting it ever, and at times believ'd,
Spoke of some deeper cause. How oft we seem
Like those that dream, and know the while they dream,
Midst the soft falls of airy voices griev'd,
And troubled, while bright phantoms round them play,
By a dim sense that all will float and fade away!

XXXVII.
Yet, as if chasing joy, I woo'd the breeze,
To speed me onward with the wings of morn.
-Oh! far amidst the solitary seas,
Which were not made for man, what man hath borne,
Answering their moan with his!-what thou didst bear,
My lost and loveliest! while that secret care
Grew terror, and thy gentle spirit, worn
By its dull brooding weight, gave way at last,
Beholding me as one from hope for ever cast!

XXXVIII.
For unto thee, as thro' all change, reveal'd
Mine inward being lay. In other eyes
I had to bow me yet, and make a shield,
To fence my burning bosom, of disguise;
By the still hope sustain'd, ere long to win
Some sanctuary, whose green retreats within,
My thoughts unfetter'd to their source might rise,
Like songs and scents of morn.-But thou didst look
Thro' all my soul, and thine even unto fainting shook.

XXXIX.
Fall'n, fall'n, I seem'd-yet, oh! not less belov'd,
Tho' from thy love was pluck'd the early pride,
And harshly, by a gloomy faith reproved,
And sear'd with shame!-tho' each young flower had died,
There was the root,-strong, living, not the less
That all it yielded now was bitterness;
Yet still such love as quits not misery's side,
Nor drops from guilt its ivy-like embrace,
Nor turns away from death's its pale heroic face.

XL.
Yes! thou hadst follow'd me thro' fear and flight;
Thou wouldst have follow'd had my pathway led
Even to the scaffold; had the flashing light
Of the rais'd axe made strong men shrink with dread,
Thou, midst the hush of thousands, wouldst have been
With thy clasp'd hands beside me kneeling seen,
And meekly bowing to the shame thy head-
-The shame!-oh! making beautiful to view
The might of human love-fair thing! so bravely true!

XLI.
There was thine agony-to love so well
Where fear made love life's chastener.-Heretofore
Whate'er of earth's disquiet round thee fell,
Thy soul, o'erpassing its dim bounds, could soar
Away to sunshine, and thy clear eye speak
Most of the skies when grief most touch'd thy cheek.
Now, that far brightness faded! never more
Couldst thou lift heavenwards for its hope thy heart,
Since at Heaven's gate it seem'd that thou and I must part.

XLII.
Alas! and life hath moments when a glance
(If thought to sudden watchfulness be stirr'd,)
A flush-a fading of the cheek perchance.
A word-less, less-the cadence of a word,
Lets in our gaze the mind's dim veil beneath,
Thence to bring haply knowledge fraught with death!
-Even thus, what never from thy lip was heard
Broke on my soul.-I knew that in thy sight
I stood-howe'er belov'd-a recreant from the light!

XLIII.
Thy sad sweet hymn, at eve, the seas along,-
-Oh! the deep soul it breath'd!-the love, the woe,
The fervor, pour'd in that full gush of song,
As it went floating through the fiery glow
Of the rich sunset!-bringing thoughts of Spain,
With all her vesper-voices, o'er the main,
Which seem'd responsive in its murmuring flow.
-' Ave sanctissima! '-how oft that lay
Hath melted from my heart the martyr-strength away!

Ave, sanctissima!
'Tis night-fall on the sea;
Ora pro nobis!
Our souls rise to thee!

Watch us, while shadows lie
O'er the dim water spread;
Hear the heart's lonely sigh,
-Thine , too, hath bled!

Thou that hast look'd on death,
Aid us when death is near!
Whisper of Heaven to faith;
Sweet mother, hear!

Ora pro nobis!
The wave must rock our sleep,
Ora, mater, ora!
Thou star of the deep!

XLIV.
'Ora pro nobis, mater!' -What a spell
Was in those notes, with day's last glory dying
On the flush'd waters!-seem'd they not to swell
From the far dust, wherein my sires were lying
With crucifix and sword?-Oh! yet how clear
Comes their reproachful sweetness to mine ear!
'Ora!' -with all the purple waves replying,
All my youth's visions rising in the strain-
-And I had thought it much to bear the rack and chain!

XLV.
Torture!-the sorrow of affection's eye,
Fixing its meekness on the spirit's core,
Deeper, and teaching more of agony,
May pierce than many swords!-and this I bore
With a mute pang. Since I had vainly striven
From its free springs to pour the truth of Heaven
Into thy trembling soul, my Leonor!
Silence rose up where hearts no hope could share:
-Alas! for those that love, and may not blend in prayer!

XLVI.
We could not pray together midst the deep,
Which, like a floor of sapphire, round us lay,
Through days of splendour, nights too bright for sleep,
Soft, solemn, holy!-We were on our way
Unto the mighty Cordillera-land,
With men whom tales of that world's golden strand
Had lur'd to leave their vines.-Oh! who shall say
What thoughts rose in us, when the tropic sky
Touch'd all its molten seas with sunset's alchemy?

XLVII.
Thoughts no more mingled!-Then came night-th' intense
Dark blue-the burning stars!-I saw thee shine
Once more, in thy serene magnificence,
O Southern Cross! as when thy radiant sign
First drew my gaze of youth.-No, not as then;
I had been stricken by the darts of men
Since those fresh days, and now thy light divine
Look'd on mine anguish, while within me strove
The still small voice against the might of suffering love.

XLVIII.
But thou, the clear, the glorious! thou wert pouring
Brilliance and joy upon the crystal wave,
While she that met thy ray with eyes adoring,
Stood in the lengthening shadow of the grave!
-Alas! I watch'd her dark religious glance,
As it still sought thee through the Heaven's expanse,
Bright Cross!-and knew not that I watch'd what gave
But passing lustre-shrouded soon to be-
A soft light found no more-no more on earth or sea!

XLIX.
I knew not all-yet something of unrest
Sat on my heart. Wake, ocean-wind! I said;
Waft us to land, in leafy freshness drest,
Where through rich clouds of foliage o'er her head,
Sweet day may steal, and rills unseen go by,
Like singing voices, and the green earth lie
Starry with flowers, beneath her graceful tread!
-But the calm bound us midst the glassy main;
Ne'er was her step to bend earth's living flowers again.
L.
Yes! as if Heaven upon the waves were sleeping,
Vexing my soul with quiet, there they lay,
All moveless through their blue transparence keeping,
The shadows of our sails, from day to day;
While she-oh! strongest is the strong heart's woe-
And yet I live! I feel the sunshine's glow-
And I am he that look'd, and saw decay
Steal o'er the fair of earth, th' ador'd too much!
-It is a fearful thing to love what death may touch.

LI.
A fearful thing that love and death may dwell
In the same world!-She faded on-and I-
Blind to the last, there needed death to tell
My trusting soul that she could fade to die!
Yet, ere she parted, I had mark'd a change,
-But it breath'd hope-'twas beautiful, though strange:
Something of gladness in the melody
Of her low voice, and in her words a flight
Of airy thought-alas! too perilously bright!

LII.
And a clear sparkle in her glance, yet wild,
And quick, and eager, like the flashing gaze
Of some all wondering and awakening child,
That first the glories of the earth surveys.
-How could it thus deceive me?-she had worn
Around her, like the dewy mists of morn,
A pensive tenderness through happiest days,
And a soft world of dreams had seem'd to lie
Still in her dark, and deep, and spiritual eye.

LIII.
And I could hope in that strange fire!-she died,
She died, with all its lustre on her mien!
-The day was melting from the waters wide,
And through its long bright hours her thoughts had been,
It seem'd, with restless and unwonted yearning,
To Spain's blue skies and dark sierras turning
For her fond words were all of vintage-scene,
And flowering myrtle, and sweet citron's breath-
-Oh! with what vivid hues life comes back oft on death!

LIV.
And from her lips the mountain-songs of old,
In wild faint snatches, fitfully had sprung;
Songs of the orange bower, the Moorish hold,
The 'Rio verde', on her soul that hung,
And thence flow'd forth.-But now the sun was low,
And watching by my side its last red glow,
That ever stills the heart, once more she sung
Her own soft 'Ora, mater!' -and the sound
Was even like love's farewell-so mournfully profound.

LV.
The boy had dropp'd to slumber at our feet;-
-'And I have lull'd him to his smiling rest
Once more!' she said:-I rais'd him-it was sweet,
Yet sad, to see the perfect calm which bless'd
His look that hour;-for now her voice grew weak;
And on the flowery crimson of his cheek,
With her white lips a long, long kiss she press'd,
Yet light, to wake him not.-Then sank her head
Against my bursting heart.-What did I clasp?-the dead!

LVI.
I call'd-to call what answers not our cries-
By that we lov'd to stand unseen, unheard,
With the loud passion of our tears and sighs
To see but some cold glistering ringlet stirr'd,
And in the quench'd eye's fixedness to gaze,
All vainly searching for the parted rays;
This is what waits us!-Dead!-with that chill word
To link our bosom-names!-For this we pour
Our souls upon the dust-nor tremble to adore!

LVII.
But the true parting came!-I look'd my last
On the sad beauty of that slumbering face;
How could I think the lovely spirit pass'd,
Which there had left so tenderly its trace?
Yet a dim awfulness was on the brow-
No! not like sleep to look upon art Thou,
Death, death!-She lay, a thing for earth's embrace,
To cover with spring-wreaths.-For earth's?-the wave
That gives the bier no flowers-makes moan above her grave!

LVIII.
On the mid-seas a knell!-for man was there,
Anguish and love-the mourner with his dead!
A long low-rolling knell-a voice of prayer-
Dark glassy waters, like a desert spread,-
And the pale-shining Southern Cross on high,
Its faint stars fading from a solemn sky,
Where mighty clouds before the dawn grew red;-
Were these things round me?-Such o'er memory sweep
Wildly when aught brings back that burial of the deep.

LIX.
Then the broad lonely sunrise!-and the plash
Into the sounding waves!-around her head
They parted, with a glancing moment's flash,
Then shut-and all was still. And now thy bed
Is of their secrets, gentlest Leonor!
Once fairest of young brides!-and never more,
Lov'd as thou wert, may human tear be shed
Above thy rest!-No mark the proud seas keep,
To show where he that wept may pause again to weep.

LX.
So the depths took thee!-Oh! the sullen sense
Of desolation in that hour compress'd!
Dust going down, a speck, amidst th' immense
And gloomy waters, leaving on their breast
The trace a weed might leave there!-Dust!-the thing
Which to the heart was as a living spring
Of joy, with fearfulness of love possess'd,
Thus sinking!-Love, joy, fear, all crush'd to this-
And the wide Heaven so far-so fathomless th' abyss!

LXI.
Where the line sounds not, where the wrecks lie low,
What shall wake thence the dead?-Blest, blest are they
That earth to earth entrust; for they may know
And tend the dwelling whence the slumberer's clay
Shall rise at last, and bid the young flowers bloom,
That waft a breath of hope around the tomb,
And kneel upon the dewy turf to pray!
But thou, what cave hath dimly chamber'd thee?
Vain dreams!-oh! art thou not where there is no more sea?

LXII.
The wind rose free and singing:-when for ever,
O'er that sole spot of all the watery plain,
I could have bent my sight with fond endeavour
Down, where its treasure was, its glance to strain;
Then rose the reckless wind!-Before our prow
The white foam flash'd-ay, joyously-and thou
Wert left with all the solitary main
Around thee-and thy beauty in my heart,
And thy meek sorrowing love-oh! where could that depart?

LXIII.
I will not speak of woe; I may not tell-
Friend tells not such to friend-the thoughts which rent
My fainting spirit, when its wild farewell
Across the billows to thy grave was sent,
Thou, there most lonely!-He that sits above,
In his calm glory, will forgive the love
His creatures bear each other, ev'n if blent
With a vain worship; for its close is dim
Ever with grief, which leads the wrung soul back to Him!

LXIV.
And with a milder pang if now I bear
To think of thee in thy forsaken rest,
If from my heart be lifted the despair,
The sharp remorse with healing influence press'd,
If the soft eyes that visit me in sleep
Look not reproach, though still they seem to weep;
It is that He my sacrifice hath bless'd,
And fill'd my bosom, through its inmost cell,
With a deep chastening sense that all at last is well.

LXV.
Yes! thou art now-Oh! wherefore doth the thought
Of the wave dashing o'er thy long bright hair,
The sea-weed into its dark tresses wrought,
The sand thy pillow-thou that wert so fair!
Come o'er me still?-Earth, earth!-it is the hold
Earth ever keeps on that of earthy mould!
But thou art breathing now in purer air,
I well believe, and freed from all of error,
Which blighted here the root of thy sweet life with terror.

LXVI.
And if the love which here was passing light
Went with what died not-Oh! that this we knew,
But this!-that through the silence of the night,
Some voice, of all the lost ones and the true,
Would speak, and say, if in their far repose,
We are yet aught of what we were to those
We call the dead!-their passionate adieu,
Was it but breath, to perish?-Holier trust
Be mine!-thy love is there, but purified from dust!

LXVII.
A thing all heavenly!-clear'd from that which hung
As a dim cloud between us, heart and mind!
Loos'd from the fear, the grief, whose tendrils flung
A chain, so darkly with its growth entwin'd.
This is my hope!-though when the sunset fades,
When forests rock the midnight on their shades,
When tones of wail are in the rising wind,
Across my spirit some faint doubt may sigh;
For the strong hours will sway this frail mortality!

LXVIII.
We have been wanderers since those days of woe,
Thy boy and I!-As wild birds tend their young,
So have I tended him-my bounding roe!
The high Peruvian solitudes among;
And o'er the Andes-torrents borne his form,
Where our frail bridge hath quiver'd midst the storm.
-But there the war-notes of my country rung,
And, smitten deep of Heaven and man, I fled
To hide in shades unpierc'd a mark'd and weary head.

LXIX.
But he went on in gladness-that fair child!
Save when at times his bright eye seem'd to dream,
And his young lips, which then no longer smil'd,
Ask'd of his mother!-that was but a gleam
Of Memory, fleeting fast; and then his play
Through the wide Llanos cheer'd again our way,
And by the mighty Oronoco stream,
On whose lone margin we have heard at morn,
From the mysterious rocks, the sunrise-music borne.

LXX.
So like a spirit's voice! a harping tone,
Lovely, yet ominous to mortal ear,
Such as might reach us from a world unknown,
Troubling man's heart with thrills of joy and fear!
'Twas sweet!-yet those deep southern shades oppress'd
My soul with stillness, like the calms that rest
On melancholy waves: I sigh'd to hear
Once more earth's breezy sounds, her foliage fann'd,
And turn'd to seek the wilds of the red hunter's land.

LXXI.
And we have won a bower of refuge now,
In this fresh waste, the breath of whose repose
Hath cool'd, like dew, the fever of my brow,
And whose green oaks and cedars round me close,
As temple-walls and pillars, that exclude
Earth's haunted dreams from their free solitude;
All, save the image and the thought of those
Before us gone; our lov'd of early years,
Gone where affection's cup hath lost the taste of tears.

LXXII.
I see a star-eve's first-born!-in whose train
Past scenes, words, looks, come back. The arrowy spire
Of the lone cypress, as of wood-girt fane,
Rests dark and still amidst a heaven of fire;
The pine gives forth its odours, and the lake
Gleams like one ruby, and the soft winds wake,
Till every string of nature's solemn lyre
Is touch'd to answer; its most secret tone
Drawn from each tree, for each hath whispers all its own.

LXXIII.
And hark! another murmur on the air,
Not of the hidden rills, or quivering shades!
-That is the cataract's, which the breezes bear,
Filling the leafy twilight of the glades
With hollow surge-like sounds, as from the bed
Of the blue mournful seas, that keep the dead:
But they are far!-the low sun here pervades
Dim forest-arches, bathing with red gold
Their stems, till each is made a marvel to behold,

LXXIV.
Gorgeous, yet full of gloom!-In such an hour,
The vesper-melody of dying bells
Wanders through Spain, from each grey convent's tower
O'er shining rivers pour'd, and olive-dells,
By every peasant heard, and muleteer,
And hamlet, round my home:-and I am here,
Living again through all my life's farewells,
In these vast woods, where farewell ne'er was spoken,
And sole I lift to Heaven a sad heart-yet unbroken!

LXXV.
In such an hour are told the hermit's beads;
With the white sail the seaman's hymn floats by:
Peace be with all! whate'er their varying creeds,
With all that send up holy thoughts on high!
Come to me, boy!-by Guadalquivir's vines,
By every stream of Spain, as day declines,
Man's prayers are mingled in the rosy sky.
-We, too, will pray; nor yet unheard, my child!
Of Him whose voice we hear at eve amidst the wild.

LXXVI.
At eve?-oh! through all hours!-From dark dreams oft
Awakening, I look forth, and learn the might
Of solitude, while thou art breathing soft,
And low, my lov'd one! on the breast of night:
I look forth on the stars-the shadowy sleep
Of forests-and the lake, whose gloomy deep
Sends up red sparkles to the fire-flies' light.
A lonely world!-even fearful to man's thought,
But for His presence felt, whom here my soul hath sought.

I.
The voices of my home!-I hear them still!
They have been with me through the dreamy night-
The blessed household voices, wont to fill
My heart's clear depths with unalloy'd delight!
I hear them still, unchang'd:-though some from earth
Are music parted, and the tones of mirth-
Wild, silvery tones, that rang through days more bright!
Have died in others,-yet to me they come,
Singing of boyhood back-the voices of my home!

II.
They call me through this hush of woods, reposing
In the grey stillness of the summer morn,
They wander by when heavy flowers are closing,
And thoughts grow deep, and winds and stars are born;
Ev'n as a fount's remember'd gushings burst
On the parch'd traveller in his hour of thirst,
E'en thus they haunt me with sweet sounds, till worn
By quenchless longings, to my soul I say-
Oh! for the dove's swift wings, that I might flee away,

III.
And find mine ark!-yet whither?-I must bear
A yearning heart within me to the grave.
I am of those o'er whom a breath of air-
Just darkening in its course the lake's bright wave,
And sighing through the feathery canes -hath power
To call up shadows, in the silent hour,
From the dim past, as from a wizard's cave!-
So must it be!-These skies above me spread,
Are they my own soft skies?-Ye rest not here, my dead!

IV.
Ye far amidst the southern flowers lie sleeping,
Your graves all smiling in the sunshine clear,
Save one!-a blue, lone, distant main is sweeping
High o'er one gentle head-ye rest not here!-
'Tis not the olive, with a whisper swaying,
Not thy low ripplings, glassy water, playing
Through my own chesnut groves, which fill mine ear;
But the faint echoes in my breast that dwell,
And for their birth-place moan, as moans the ocean-shell.

V.
Peace!-I will dash these fond regrets to earth,
Ev'n as an eagle shakes the cumbering rain
From his strong pinion. Thou that gav'st me birth,
And lineage, and once home,-my native Spain!
My own bright land-my father's land-my child's!
What hath thy son brought from thee to the wilds?
He hath brought marks of torture and the chain,
Traces of things which pass not as a breeze,
A blighted name, dark thoughts, wrath, woe-thy gifts are these.

VI.
A blighted name-I hear the winds of morn-
Their sounds are not of this!-I hear the shiver
Of the green reeds, and all the rustlings, borne
From the high forest, when the light leaves quiver:
Their sounds are not of this!-the cedars, waving,
Lend it no tone: His wide savannahs laving,
It is not murmur'd by the joyous river!
What part hath mortal name, where God alone
Speaks to the mighty waste, and through its heart is known?

VII.
Is it not much that I may worship Him,
With nought my spirit's breathings to control,
And feel His presence in the vast, and dim,
And whispery woods, where dying thunders roll
From the far cataracts?-Shall I not rejoice
That I have learn'd at last to know His voice
From man's?-I will rejoice!-my soaring soul
Now hath redeem'd her birth-right of the day,
And won, through clouds, to Him, her own unfetter'd way!

VIII.
And thou, my boy! that silent at my knee
Dost lift to mine thy soft, dark, earnest eyes,
Fill'd with the love of childhood, which I see
Pure through its depths, a thing without disguise;
Thou that hast breath'd in slumber on my breast,
When I have check'd its throbs to give thee rest,
Mine own! whose young thoughts fresh before me rise!
Is it not much that I may guide thy prayer,
And circle thy glad soul with free and healthful air?

IX.
Why should I weep on thy bright head, my boy?
Within thy fathers' halls thou wilt not dwell,
Nor lift their banner, with a warrior's joy,
Amidst the sons of mountain chiefs, who fell
For Spain of old.-Yet what if rolling waves
Have borne us far from our ancestral graves?
Thou shalt not feel thy bursting heart rebel
As mine hath done; nor bear what I have borne,
Casting in falsehood's mould th' indignant brow of scorn.

X.
This shall not be thy lot, my blessed child!
I have not sorrow'd, struggled, liv'd in vain-
Hear me! magnificent and ancient wild;
And mighty rivers, ye that meet the main,
As deep meets deep; and forests, whose dim shade
The flood's voice, and the wind's, by swells pervade;
Hear me!-'tis well to die, and not complain,
Yet there are hours when the charg'd heart must speak,
Ev'n in the desert's ear to pour itself, or break!

XI.
I see an oak before me, it hath been
The crown'd one of the woods; and might have flung
Its hundred arms to Heaven, still freshly green,
But a wild vine around the stem hath clung,
From branch to branch close wreaths of bondage throwing,
Till the proud tree, before no tempest bowing,
Hath shrunk and died, those serpent-folds among.
Alas! alas!-what is it that I see?
An image of man's mind, land of my sires, with thee!

XII.
Yet art thou lovely!-Song is on thy hills-
Oh sweet and mournful melodies of Spain,
That lull'd my boyhood, how your memory thrills
The exile's heart with sudden-wakening pain!-
Your sounds are on the rocks-that I might hear
Once more the music of the mountaineer!-
And from the sunny vales the shepherd's strain
Floats out, and fills the solitary place
With the old tuneful names of Spain's heroic race.

XIII.
But there was silence one bright, golden day,
Through my own pine-hung mountains. Clear, yet lone
In the rich autumn light the vineyards lay,
And from the fields the peasant's voice was gone;
And the red grapes untrodden strew'd the ground,
And the free flocks untended roam'd around:
Where was the pastor?-where the pipe's wild tone?
Music and mirth were hush'd the hills among,
While to the city's gates each hamlet pour'd its throng.

XIV.
Silence upon the mountains!-But within
The city's gates a rush-a press-a swell
Of multitudes their torrent way to win;
And heavy boomings of a dull deep bell,
A dead pause following each-like that which parts
The dash of billows, holding breathless hearts
Fast in the hush of fear-knell after knell;
And sounds of thickening steps, like thunder-rain,
That plashes on the roof of some vast echoing fane!

XV.
What pageant's hour approach'd?-The sullen gate
Of a strong ancient prison-house was thrown
Back to the day. And who, in mournful state,
Came forth, led slowly o'er its threshold-stone?
They that had learn'd, in cells of secret gloom,
How sunshine is forgotten!-They, to whom
The very features of mankind were grown
Things that bewilder'd!-O'er their dazzled sight,
They lifted their wan hands, and cower'd before the light!

XVI.
To this man brings his brother!-Some were there,
Who with their desolation had entwin'd
Fierce strength, and girt the sternness of despair
Fast round their bosoms, ev'n as warriors bind
The breast-plate on for fight: but brow and cheek
Seem'd theirs a torturing panoply to speak!
And there were some, from whom the very mind
Had been wrung out: they smil'd-oh! startling smile
Whence man's high soul is fled!-where doth it sleep the while?

XVII.
But onward moved the melancholy train,
For their false creeds in fiery pangs to die.
This was the solemn sacrifice of Spain-
Heaven's offering from the land of chivalry!
Through thousands, thousands of their race they mov'd-
Oh! how unlike all others!-the belov'd,
The free, the proud, the beautiful! whose eye
Grew fix'd before them, while a people's breath
Was hush'd, and its one soul bound in the thought of death!

XVIII.
It might be that amidst the countless throng,
There swell'd some heart with Pity's weight oppress'd,
For the wide stream of human love is strong;
And woman, on whose fond and faithful breast
Childhood is rear'd, and at whose knee the sigh
Of its first prayer is breath'd, she, too, was nigh.
-But life is dear, and the free footstep bless'd,
And home a sunny place, where each may fill
Some eye with glistening smiles,-and therefore all were still-

XIX.
All still-youth, courage, strength!-a winter laid,
A chain of palsy, cast on might and mind!
Still, as at noon a southern forest's shade,
They stood, those breathless masses of mankind;
Still, as a frozen torrent!-but the wave
Soon leaps to foaming freedom-they, the brave,
Endur'd-they saw the martyr's place assign'd
In the red flames-whence is the withering spell
That numbs each human pulse?-they saw, and thought it well.

XX.
And I, too, thought it well! That very morn
From a far land I came, yet round me clung
The spirit of my own. No hand had torn
With a strong grasp away the veil which hung
Between mine eyes and truth. I gaz'd, I saw,
Dimly, as through a glass. In silent awe
I watch'd the fearful rites; and if there sprung
One rebel feeling from its deep founts up,
Shuddering, I flung it back, as guilt's own poison-cup

XXI.
But I was waken'd as the dreamers waken
Whom the shrill trumpet and the shriek of dread
Rouse up at midnight, when their walls are taken,
And they must battle till their blood is shed
On their own threshold-floor. A path for light
Through my torn breast was shatter'd by the might
Of the swift thunder-stroke-and Freedom's tread
Came in through ruins, late, yet not in vain,
Making the blighted place all green with life again.

XXII.
Still darkly, slowly, as a sullen mass
Of cloud, o'ersweeping, without wind, the sky,
Dream-like I saw the sad procession pass,
And mark'd its victims with a tearless eye.
They mov'd before me but as pictures, wrought
Each to reveal some secret of man's thought,
On the sharp edge of sad mortality,
Till in his place came one-oh! could it be?
-My friend, my heart's first friend!-and did I gaze on thee?

XXIII.
On thee! with whom in boyhood I had play'd,
At the grape-gatherings, by my native streams;
And to whose eye my youthful soul had laid
Bare, as to Heaven's, its glowing world of dreams;
And by whose side midst warriors I had stood,
And in whose helm was brought-oh! earn'd with blood
The fresh wave to my lips, when tropic beams
Smote on my fever'd brow!-Ay, years had pass'd,
Severing our paths, brave friend!-and thus we met at last!

XXIV.
I see it still-the lofty mien thou borest-
On thy pale forehead sat a sense of power!
The very look that once thou brightly worest,
Cheering me onward through a fearful hour,
When we were girt by Indian bow and spear,
Midst the white Andes-ev'n as mountain deer,
Hemm'd in our camp-but thro' the javelin shower
We rent our way, a tempest of despair!
-And thou-hadst thou but died with thy true brethren there!

XXV.
I call the fond wish back-for thou hast perish'd
More nobly far, my Alvar!-making known
The might of truth; and be thy memory cherish'd
With theirs, the thousands, that around her throne
Have pour'd their lives out smiling, in that doom
Finding a triumph, if denied a tomb!
-Ay, with their ashes hath the wind been sown,
And with the wind their spirit shall be spread,
Filling man's heart and home with records of the dead.

XXVI.
Thou Searcher of the Soul! in whose dread sight
Not the bold guilt alone, that mocks the skies,
But the scarce-own'd, unwhisper'd thought of night,
As a thing written with the sunbeam lies;
Thou know'st-whose eye through shade and depth can see.
That this man's crime was but to worship thee,
Like those that made their hearts thy sacrifice,
The call'd of yore; wont by the Saviour's side,
On the dim Olive-Mount to pray at eventide.

XXVII.
For the strong spirit will at times awake,
Piercing the mists that wrap her clay-abode;
And, born of thee, she may not always take
Earth's accents for the oracles of God;
And ev'n for this-O dust, whose mask is power!
Reed, that wouldst be a scourge thy little hour!
Spark, whereon yet the mighty hath not trod,
And therefore thou destroyest!-where were flown
Our hope, if man were left to man's decree alone?

XXVIII.
But this I felt not yet. I could but gaze
On him, my friend; while that swift moment threw
A sudden freshness back on vanish'd days,
Like water-drops on some dim picture's hue;
Calling the proud time up, when first I stood
Where banners floated, and my heart's quick blood
Sprang to a torrent as the clarion blew,
And he-his sword was like a brother's worn,
That watches through the field his mother's youngest born.

XXIX.
But a lance met me in that day's career,
Senseless I lay amidst th' o'ersweeping fight,
Wakening at last-how full, how strangely clear,
That scene on memory flash'd!-the shivery light,
Moonlight, on broken shields-the plain of slaughter,
The fountain-side-the low sweet sound of water-
And Alvar bending o'er me-from the night
Covering me with his mantle!-all the past
Flow'd back-my soul's far chords all answer'd to the blast.

XXX.
Till, in that rush of visions, I became
As one that by the bands of slumber wound,
Lies with a powerless, but all-thrilling frame,
Intense in consciousness of sight and sound,
Yet buried in a wildering dream which brings
Lov'd faces round him, girt with fearful things!
Troubled ev'n thus I stood, but chain'd and bound
On that familiar form mine eye to keep-
-Alas! I might not fall upon his neck and weep!

XXXI.
He pass'd me-and what next?-I look'd on two,
Following his footsteps to the same dread place,
For the same guilt-his sisters!-Well I knew
The beauty on those brows, though each young face
Was chang'd-so deeply chang'd!-a dungeon's air
Is hard for lov'd and lovely things to bear,
And ye, O daughters of a lofty race,
Queen-like Theresa! radiant Inez!-flowers
So cherish'd! were ye then but rear'd for those dark hours?

XXXII.
A mournful home, young sisters! had ye left,
With your lutes hanging hush'd upon the wall,
And silence round the aged man, bereft
Of each glad voice, once answering to his call.
Alas, that lonely father! doom'd to pine
For sounds departed in his life's decline,
And, midst the shadowing banners of his hall,
With his white hair to sit, and deem the name
A hundred chiefs had borne, cast down by you to shame!

XXXIII.
And woe for you, midst looks and words of love,
And gentle hearts and faces, nurs'd so long!
How had I seen you in your beauty move,
Wearing the wreath, and listening to the song!
-Yet sat, ev'n then, what seem'd the crowd to shun,
Half veil'd upon the clear pale brow of one,
And deeper thoughts than oft to youth belong,
Thoughts, such as wake to evening's whispery sway,
Within the drooping shade of her sweet eyelids lay.

XXXIV.
And if she mingled with the festive train,
It was but as some melancholy star
Beholds the dance of shepherds on the plain,
In its bright stillness present, though afar.
Yet would she smile-and that, too, hath its smile-
Circled with joy which reach'd her not the while,
And bearing a lone spirit, not at war
With earthly things, but o'er their form and hue
Shedding too clear a light, too sorrowfully true.

XXXV.
But the dark hours wring forth the hidden might
Which hath lain bedded in the silent soul,
A treasure all undreamt of;-as the night
Calls out the harmonies of streams that roll
Unheard by day. It seem'd as if her breast
Had hoarded energies, till then suppress'd
Almost with pain, and bursting from control,
And finding first that hour their pathway free:
-Could a rose brave the storm, such might her emblem be!

XXXVI.
For the soft gloom whose shadow still had hung
On her fair brow, beneath its garlands worn,
Was fled; and fire, like prophecy's had sprung
Clear to her kindled eye. It might be scorn-
Pride-sense of wrong-ay, the frail heart is bound
By these at times, ev'n as with adamant round,
Kept so from breaking!-yet not thus upborne
She mov'd, though some sustaining passion's wave
Lifted her fervent soul-a sister for the brave!

XXXVII.
And yet, alas! to see the strength which clings
Round woman in such hours!-a mournful sight,
Though lovely!-an o'erflowing of the springs,
The full springs of affection, deep as bright!
And she, because her life is ever twin'd
With other lives, and by no stormy wind
May thence be shaken, and because the light
Of tenderness is round her, and her eye
Doth weep such passionate tears-therefore she thus can die.

XXXVIII.
Therefore didst thou , through that heart-shaking scene,
As through a triumph move; and cast aside
Thine own sweet thoughtfulness for victory's mien,
O faithful sister! cheering thus the guide,
And friend, and brother of thy sainted youth,
Whose hand had led thee to the source of truth,
Where thy glad soul from earth was purified;
Nor wouldst thou, following him through all the past,
That he should see thy step grow tremulous at last.

XXXIX.
For thou hadst made no deeper love a guest
Midst thy young spirit's dreams, than that which grows
Between the nurtur'd of the same fond breast,
The shelter'd of one roof; and thus it rose
Twin'd in with life.-How is it, that the hours
Of the same sport, the gathering early flowers
Round the same tree, the sharing one repose,
And mingling one first prayer in murmurs soft,
From the heart's memory fade, in this world's breath, so oft?

XL.
But thee that breath had touch'd not; thee, nor him,
The true in all things found!-and thou wert blest
Ev'n then, that no remember'd change could dim
The perfect image of affection, press'd
Like armour to thy bosom!-thou hadst kept
Watch by that brother's couch of pain, and wept,
Thy sweet face covering with thy robe, when rest
Fled from the sufferer; thou hadst bound his faith
Unto thy soul-one light, one hope ye chose-one death.

XLI.
So didst thou pass on brightly!-but for her,
Next in that path, how may her doom be spoken!
-All-merciful! to think that such things were,
And are , and seen by men with hearts unbroken!
To think of that fair girl, whose path had been
So strew'd with rose-leaves, all one fairy scene!
And whose quick glance came ever as a token
Of hope to drooping thought, and her glad voice
As a free bird's in spring, that makes the woods rejoice!

XLII.
And she to die!-she lov'd the laughing earth
With such deep joy in its fresh leaves and flowers!
-Was not her smile even as the sudden birth
Of a young rainbow, colouring vernal showers?
Yes! but to meet her fawn-like step, to hear
The gushes of wild song, so silvery clear,
Which, oft unconsciously, in happier hours
Flow'd from her lips, was to forget the sway
Of Time and Death below,-blight, shadow, dull decay!

XLIII.
Could this change be?-the hour, the scene, where last
I saw that form, came floating o'er my mind:
-A golden vintage-eve;-the heats were pass'd,
And, in the freshness of the fanning wind,
Her father sat, where gleam'd the first faint star
Through the lime-boughs; and with her light guitar,
She, on the greensward at his feet reclin'd,
In his calm face laugh'd up; some shepherd-lay
Singing, as childhood sings on the lone hills at play.

XLIV.
And now-oh God!-the bitter fear of death,
The sore amaze, the faint o'ershadowing dread,
Had grasp'd her!-panting in her quick-drawn breath,
And in her white lips quivering;-onward led,
She look'd up with her dim bewilder'd eyes,
And there smil'd out her own soft brilliant skies,
Far in their sultry southern azure spread,
Glowing with joy, but silent!-still they smil'd,
Yet sent down no reprieve for earth's poor trembling child.

XLV.
Alas! that earth had all too strong a hold,
Too fast, sweet Inez! on thy heart, whose bloom
Was given to early love, nor knew how cold
The hours which follow. There was one, with whom,
Young as thou wert, and gentle, and untried,
Thou might'st, perchance, unshrinkingly have died;
But he was far away;-and with thy doom
Thus gathering, life grew so intensely dear,
That all thy slight frame shook with its cold mortal fear!

XLVI.
No aid!-thou too didst pass!-and all had pass'd,
The fearful-and the desperate-and the strong!
Some like the bark that rushes with the blast,
Some like the leaf swept shiveringly along,
And some as men, that have but one more field
To fight, and then may slumber on their shield,
Therefore they arm in hope. But now the throng
Roll'd on, and bore me with their living tide,
Ev'n as a bark wherein is left no power to guide.

XLVII.
Wave swept on wave. We reach'd a stately square,
Deck'd for the rites. An altar stood on high,
And gorgeous, in the midst. A place for prayer,
And praise, and offering. Could the earth supply
No fruits, no flowers for sacrifice, of all
Which on her sunny lap unheeded fall?
No fair young firstling of the flock to die,
As when before their God the Patriarchs stood?
-Look down! man brings thee, Heaven! his brother's guiltless blood!

XLVIII.
Hear its voice, hear!-a cry goes up to thee,
From the stain'd sod;-make thou thy judgment known
On him, the shedder!-let his portion be
The fear that walks at midnight-give the moan
In the wind haunting him a power to say
'Where is thy brother?'-and the stars a ray
To search and shake his spirit, when alone
With the dread splendor of their burning eyes!
-So shall earth own thy will-mercy, not sacrifice!

XLIX.
Sounds of triumphant praise!-the mass was sung-
-Voices that die not might have pour'd such strains!
Thro' Salem's towers might that proud chant have rung,
When the Most High, on Syria's palmy plains,
Had quell'd her foes!-so full it swept, a sea
Of loud waves jubilant, and rolling free!
-Oft when the wind, as thro' resounding fanes,
Hath fill'd the choral forests with its power,
Some deep tone brings me back the music of that hour.

L.
It died away;-the incense-cloud was driven
Before the breeze-the words of doom were said;
And the sun faded mournfully from Heaven,
-He faded mournfully! and dimly red,
Parting in clouds from those that look'd their last,
And sigh'd-'farewell, thou sun!'-Eve glow'd and pass'd-
Night-midnight and the moon-came forth and shed
Sleep, even as dew, on glen, wood, peopled spot-
Save one-a place of death-and there men slumber'd not.

LI.
'Twas not within the city -but in sight
Of the snow-crown'd sierras, freely sweeping,
With many an eagle's eyrie on the height,
And hunter's cabin, by the torrent peeping
Far off: and vales between, and vineyards lay,
With sound and gleam of waters on their way,
And chesnut-woods, that girt the happy sleeping,
In many a peasant-home!-the midnight sky
Brought softly that rich world round those who came to die.

LII.
The darkly-glorious midnight sky of Spain,
Burning with stars!-What had the torches' glare
To do beneath that Temple, and profane
Its holy radiance?-By their wavering flare,
I saw beside the pyres-I see thee now ,
O bright Theresa! with thy lifted brow,
And thy clasp'd hands, and dark eyes fill'd with prayer!
And thee, sad Inez! bowing thy fair head,
And mantling up thy face, all colourless with dread!

LIII.
And Alvar, Alvar!-I beheld thee too,
Pale, stedfast, kingly; till thy clear glance fell
On that young sister; then perturb'd it grew,
And all thy labouring bosom seem'd to swell
With painful tenderness. Why came I there,
That troubled image of my friend to bear,
Thence, for my after-years?-a thing to dwell
In my heart's core, and on the darkness rise,
Disquieting my dreams with its bright mournful eyes?

LIV.
Why came I? oh! the heart's deep mystery!-Why
In man's last hour doth vain affection's gaze
Fix itself down on struggling agony,
To the dimm'd eye-balls freezing, as they glaze?
It might be-yet the power to will seem'd o'er-
That my soul yearn'd to hear his voice once more!
But mine was fetter'd!-mute in strong amaze,
I watch'd his features as the night-wind blew,
And torch-light or the moon's pass'd o'er their marble hue.

LV.
The trampling of a steed!-a tall white steed,
Rending his fiery way the crowds among-
A storm's way through a forest-came at speed,
And a wild voice cried 'Inez!' Swift she flung
The mantle from her face, and gaz'd around,
With a faint shriek at that familiar sound,
And from his seat a breathless rider sprung,
And dash'd off fiercely those who came to part,
And rush'd to that pale girl, and clasp'd her to his heart.

LVI.
And for a moment all around gave way
To that full burst of passion!-on his breast,
Like a bird panting yet from fear she lay,
But blest-in misery's very lap-yet blest!-
Oh love, love, strong as death!-from such an hour
Pressing out joy by thine immortal power,
Holy and fervent love! had earth but rest
For thee and thine, this world were all too fair!
How could we thence be wean'd to die without despair?

LVII.
But she-as falls a willow from the storm,
O'er its own river streaming-thus reclin'd
On the youth's bosom hung her fragile form,
And clasping arms, so passionately twin'd
Around his neck-with such a trusting fold,
A full deep sense of safety in their hold,
As if nought earthly might th' embrace unbind!
Alas! a child's fond faith, believing still
Its mother's breast beyond the lightning's reach to kill!

LVIII.
Brief rest! upon the turning billow's height,
A strange sweet moment of some heavenly strain,
Floating between the savage gusts of night,
That sweep the seas to foam! Soon dark again
The hour-the scene-th' intensely present, rush'd
Back on her spirit, and her large tears gush'd
Like blood-drops from a victim; with swift rain
Bathing the bosom where she lean'd that hour,
As if her life would melt into th' o'erswelling shower.

LIX.
But he, whose arm sustain'd her!-oh! I knew
'Twas vain, and yet he hop'd!-he fondly strove
Back from her faith her sinking soul to woo,
As life might yet be hers!-A dream of love
Which could not look upon so fair a thing,
Remembering how like hope, like joy, like spring,
Her smile was wont to glance, her step to move,
And deem that men indeed, in very truth,
Could mean the sting of death for her soft flowering youth!

LX.
He woo'd her back to life.-'Sweet Inez, live!
My blessed Inez!-visions have beguil'd
Thy heart-abjure them!-thou wert form'd to give,
And to find, joy; and hath not sunshine smil'd
Around thee ever? Leave me not, mine own!
Or earth will grow too dark!-for thee alone,
Thee have I lov'd, thou gentlest! from a child,
And borne thine image with me o'er the sea,
Thy soft voice in my soul-speak!-Oh! yet live for me!'

LXI.
She look'd up wildly; these were anxious eyes
Waiting that look-sad eyes of troubled thought,
Alvar's-Theresa's!-Did her childhood rise,
With all its pure and home-affections fraught,
In the brief glance?-She clasp'd her hands-the strife
Of love, faith, fear, and that vain dream of life,
Within her woman's breast so deeply wrought,
It seem'd as if a reed so slight and weak
Must , in the rending storm not quiver only-break!

LXII.
And thus it was-the young cheek flush'd and faded,
As the swift blood in currents came and went,
And hues of death the marble brow o'ershaded,
And the sunk eye a watery lustre sent
Thro' its white fluttering lids. Then tremblings pass'd
O'er the frail form, that shook it, as the blast
Shakes the sere leaf, until the spirit rent
Its way to peace-the fearful way unknown-
Pale in love's arms she lay-she! -what had lov'd was gone!

LXIII.
Joy for thee, trembler!-thou redeem'd one, joy!
Young dove set free! earth, ashes, soulless clay,
Remain'd for baffled vengeance to destroy;
-Thy chain was riven!-nor hadst thou cast away
Thy hope in thy last hour!-though love was there
Striving to wring thy troubled soul from prayer,
And life seem'd robed in beautiful array,
Too fair to leave!-but this might be forgiven,
Thou wert so richly crown'd with precious gifts of Heaven!

LXIV.
But woe for him who felt the heart grow still,
Which, with its weight of agony, had lain
Breaking on his!-Scarce could the mortal chill
Of the hush'd bosom, ne'er to heave again,
And all the silence curdling round the eye,
Bring home the stern belief that she could die,
That she indeed could die!-for wild and vain
As hope might be-his soul had hoped-'twas o'er-
-Slowly his failing arms dropp'd from the form they bore.

LXV.
They forc'd him from that spot.-It might be well,
That the fierce, reckless words by anguish wrung
From his torn breast, all aimless as they fell,
Like spray-drops from the strife of torrents flung,
Were mark'd as guilt.-There are, who note these things
Against the smitten heart; its breaking strings
-On whose low thrills once gentle music hung-
With a rude hand of touch unholy trying,
And numbering then as crimes, the deep, strange tones replying.

LXVI.
But ye in solemn joy, O faithful pair!
Stood gazing on your parted sister's dust;
I saw your features by the torch's glare,
And they were brightening with a heavenward trust!
I saw the doubt, the anguish, the dismay,
Melt from my Alvar's glorious mien away,
And peace was there-the calmness of the just!
And, bending down the slumberer's brow to kiss,
'Thy rest is won,' he said :-'sweet sister! praise for this!'

LXVII.
I started as from sleep;-yes! he had spoken-
A breeze had troubled memory's hidden source!
At once the torpor of my soul was broken-
Thought, feeling, passion, woke in tenfold force.
-There are soft breathings in the southern wind,
That so your ce-chains, O ye streams! unbind,
And free the foaming swiftness of your course!
-I burst from those that held me back, and fell
Ev'n on his neck, and cried-'Friend, brother! fare thee well!'

LXVIII.
Did he not say 'Farewell?'-Alas! no breath
Came to mine ear. Hoarse murmurs from the throng
Told that the mysteries in the face of death
Had from their eager sight been veil'd too long.
And we were parted as the surge might part
Those that would die together, true of heart.
-His hour was come-but in mine anguish strong,
Like a fierce swimmer through the midnight sea,
Blindly I rush'd away from that which was to be.

LXIX.
Away-away I rush'd;-but swift and high
The arrowy pillars of the firelight grew,
Till the transparent darkness of the sky
Flush'd to a blood-red mantle in their hue;
And, phantom-like, the kindling city seem'd
To spread, float, wave, as on the wind they stream'd,
With their wild splendour chasing me!-I knew
The death-work was begun-I veil'd mine eyes,
Yet stopp'd in spell-bound fear to catch the victims' cries,

LXX.
What heard I then?-a ringing shriek of pain,
Such as for ever haunts the tortur'd ear?
-I heard a sweet and solemn-breathing strain
Piercing the flames, untremulous and clear!
-The rich, triumphal tones!-I knew them well,
As they came floating with a breezy swell!
Man's voice was there-a clarion voice to cheer
In the mid-battle-ay, to turn the flying-
Woman's-that might have sung of Heaven beside the dying!

LXXI.
It was a fearful, yet a glorious thing,
To hear that hymn of martyrdom, and know
That its glad stream of melody could spring
Up from th' unsounded gulfs of human woe!
Alvar! Theresa!-what is deep? what strong?
-God's breath within the soul!-It fill'd that song
From your victorious voices!-but the glow
On the hot air and lurid skies increas'd-
-Faint grew the sounds-more faint-I listen'd-they had ceas'd!

LXXII.
And thou indeed hadst perish'd, my soul's friend!
I might form other ties-but thou alone
Couldst with a glance the veil of dimness rend,
By other years o'er boyhood's memory thrown!
Others might aid me onward:-Thou and I
Had mingled the fresh thoughts that early die,
Once flowering-never more!-And thou wert gone!
Who could give back my youth, my spirit free,
Or be in aught again what thou hadst been to me?

LXXIII.
And yet I wept thee not, thou true and brave!
I could not weep!-there gather'd round thy name
Too deep a passion!-thou denied a grave!
Thou , with the blight flung on thy soldier's fame!
Had I not known thy heart from childhood's time?
Thy heart of hearts?-and couldst thou die for crime?
-No! had all earth decreed that death of shame,
I would have set, against all earth's decree,
Th' inalienable trust of my firm soul in thee!

LXXIV.
There are swift hours in life-strong, rushing hours,
That do the work of tempests in their might!
They shake down things that stood as rocks and towers
Unto th' undoubting mind;-they pour in light
Where it but startles-like a burst of day
For which th' uprooting of an oak makes way;-
They sweep the colouring mists from off our sight,
They touch with fire, thought's graven page, the roll
Stamp'd with past years-and lo! it shrivels as a scroll!

LXXV.
And this was of such hours!-the sudden flow
Of my soul's tide seem'd whelming me; the glare
Of the red flames, yet rocking to and fro,
Scorch'd up my heart with breathless thirst for air,
And solitude, and freedom. It had been
Well with me then, in some vast desert scene,
To pour my voice out, for the winds to bear
On with them, wildly questioning the sky,
Fiercely th' untroubled stars, of man's dim destiny.

LXXVI.
I would have call'd, adjuring the dark cloud;
To the most ancient Heavens I would have said
-'Speak to me! show me truth!'-through night aloud
I would have cried to him, the newly dead,
'Come back! and show me truth!'-My spirit seem'd
Gasping for some free burst, its darkness teem'd
With such pent storms of thought!-again I fled-
I fled, a refuge from man's face to gain,
Scarce conscious when I paus'd, entering a lonely fane.

LXXVII.
A mighty minster, dim, and proud, and vast!
Silence was round the sleepers, whom its floor
Shut in the grave; a shadow of the past,
A memory of the sainted steps that wore
Erewhile its gorgeous pavement, seem'd to brood
Like mist upon the stately solitude,
A halo of sad fame to mantle o'er
Its white sepulchral forms of mail-clad men,
And all was hush'd as night in some deep Alpine glen.

LXXVIII.
More hush'd, far more!-for there the wind sweeps by,
Or the woods tremble to the streams' loud play!
Here a strange echo made my very sigh
Seem for the place too much a sound of day!
Too much my footstep broke the moonlight, fading,
Yet arch through arch in one soft flow pervading;
And I stood still:-prayer, chant, had died away,
Yet past me floated a funereal breath
Of incense.-I stood still-as before God and death!

LXXIX.
For thick ye girt me round, ye long-departed!
Dust-imaged form-with cross, and shield, and crest;
It seem'd as if your ashes would have started,
Had a wild voice burst forth above your rest!
Yet ne'er, perchance, did worshipper of yore
Bear to your thrilling presence what I bore
Of wrath-doubt-anguish-battling in the breast!
I could have pour'd out words, on that pale air,
To make your proud tombs ring:-no, no! I could not there!

LXXX.
Not midst those aisles, through which a thousand years
Mutely as clouds and reverently had swept;
Not by those shrines, which yet the trace of tears
And kneeling votaries on their marble kept!
Ye were too mighty in your pomp of gloom
And trophied age, O temple, altar, tomb!
And you, ye dead!-for in that faith ye slept,
Whose weight had grown a mountain's on my heart,
Which could not there be loos'd.-I turn'd me to depart.

LXXXI.
I turn'd-what glimmer'd faintly on my sight,
Faintly, yet brightening, as a wreath of snow
Seen through dissolving haze?-The moon, the night,
Had waned, and dawn pour'd in;-grey, shadowy, slow,
Yet day-spring still!-a solemn hue it caught,
Piercing the storied windows, darkly fraught
With stoles and draperies of imperial glow;
And soft, and sad, that colouring gleam was thrown,
Where, pale, a pictur'd form above the altar shone.

LXXXII.
Thy form, thou Son of God!-a wrathful deep,
With foam, and cloud, and tempest, round thee spread,
And such a weight of night!-a night, when sleep
From the fierce rocking of the billows fled.
A bark show'd dim beyond thee, with its mast
Bow'd, and its rent sail shivering to the blast;
But, like a spirit in thy gliding tread,
Thou, as o'er glass, didst walk that stormy sea
Through rushing winds, which left a silent path for thee

LXXXIII.
So still thy white robes fell!-no breath of air
Within their long and slumberous folds had sway!
So still the waves of parted, shadowy hair
From thy clear brow flow'd droopingly away!
Dark were the Heavens above thee, Saviour!-dark
The gulfs, Deliverer! round the straining bark!
But thou!-o'er all thine aspect and array
Was pour'd one stream of pale, broad, silvery light-
-Thou wert the single star of that all-shrouding night!

LXXXIV.
Aid for one sinking!-Thy lone brightness gleam'd
On his wild face, just lifted o'er the wave,
With its worn, fearful; human look that seem'd
To cry through surge and blast-'I perish-save!'
Not to the winds-not vainly!-thou wert nigh,
Thy hand was stretch'd to fainting agony,
Even in the portals of th' unquiet grave!
O thou that art the life! and yet didst bear
Too much of mortal woe to turn from mortal prayer!

LXXXV.
But was it not a thing to rise on death,
With its remember'd light, that face of thine,
Redeemer! dimm'd by this world's misty breath,
Yet mournfully, mysteriously divine?
-Oh! that calm, sorrowful, prophetic eye,
With its dark depths of grief, love, majesty!
And the pale glory of the brow!-a shrine
Where Power sat veil'd, yet shedding softly round
What told that thou couldst be but for a time uncrown'd!

LXXXVI.
And more than all, the Heaven of that sad smile!
The lip of mercy, our immortal trust!
Did not that look, that very look, erewhile,
Pour its o'ershadow'd beauty on the dust?
Wert thou not such when earth's dark cloud hung o'er thee?
-Surely thou wert!-my heart grew hush'd before thee,
Sinking with all its passions, as the gust
Sank at thy voice, along its billowy way:-
-What had I there to do, but kneel, and weep, and pray?

LXXXVII.
Amidst the stillness rose my spirit's cry
Amidst the dead-'By that full cup of woe,
Press'd from the fruitage of mortality,
Saviour! for thee-give light! that I may know
If by thy will, in thine all-healing name,
Men cast down human hearts to blighting shame,
And early death-and say, if this be so,
Where then is mercy?-whither shall we flee,
So unallied to hope, save by our hold on thee?

LXXXVIII.
'But didst thou not, the deep sea brightly treading,
Lift from despair that struggler with the wave?
And wert thou not, sad tears, yet awful, shedding,
Beheld, a weeper at a mortal's grave?
And is this weight of anguish, which they bind
On life, this searing to the quick of mind,
That but to God its own free path would crave,
This crushing out of hope, and love, and youth,
Thy will indeed?-Give light! that I may know the truth!

LXXXIX.
'For my sick soul is darken'd unto death,
With shadows from the suffering it hath seen
The strong foundations of mine ancient faith
Sink from beneath me-whereon shall I lean?
-Oh! if from thy pure lips was wrung the sigh
Of the dust's anguish! if like man to die,
-And earth round him shuts heavily-hath been
Even to thee bitter, aid me!-guide me!-turn
My wild and wandering thoughts back from their starless bourne!'

XC.
And calm'd I rose:-but how the while had risen
Morn's orient sun, dissolving mist and shade!
-Could there indeed be wrong, or chain, or prison.
In the bright world such radiance might pervade?
It fill'd the fane, it mantled the pale form
Which rose before me through the pictured storm,
Even the grey tombs it kindled, and array'd
With life!-how hard to see thy race begun,
And think man wakes to grief, wakening to thee, O sun!

XCI.
I sought my home again:-and thou, my child,
There at thy play beneath yon ancient pine,
With eyes, whose lightning laughter hath beguil'd
A thousand pangs, thence flashing joy to mine;
Thou in thy mother's arms, a babe, didst meet
My coming with young smiles, which yet, though sweet,
Seem'd on my soul all mournfully to shine,
And ask a happier heritage for thee,
Than but in turn the blight of human hope to see.

XCII.
Now sport, for thou are free-the bright birds chasing,
Whose wings waft star-like gleams from tree to tree;
Or with the fawn, thy swift wood-playmate racing,
Sport on, my joyous child! for thou art free!
Yes, on that day I took thee to my heart,
And inly vow'd, for thee a better part
To choose; that so thy sunny bursts of glee
Should wake no more dim thoughts of far-seen woe,
But, gladdening fearless eyes, flow on-as now they flow.

XCIII.
Thou hast a rich world round thee:-Mighty shades
Weaving their gorgeous tracery o'er thy head,
With the light melting through their high arcades,
As through a pillar'd cloister's: but the dead
Sleep not beneath; nor doth the sunbeam pass
To marble shrines through rainbow-tinted glass;
Yet thou, by fount and forest-murmur led
To worship, thou art blest!-to thee is shown
Earth in her holy pomp, deck'd for her God alone.