Letitia Elizabeth Landon: Verses about Warning

OH lone and lovely solitude,
Washed by the sounding sea;
Nature was in a poet's mood,
When she created thee.

How pleasant in the hour of noon
To wander through the shade;
The soft and golden shade which June
Flings o'er thy inland glade:

The wild rose like a wreath above,
The ash-tree's fairy keys,
The aspen trembling, as if love
Were whispered by the breeze;

These, or the beech's darker bough,
For canopy o'er head,
While moss and fragile flowers below
An elfin pillow spread.

Here one might dream the hours away,
As if the world had not
Or grief, or care, or disarray,
To darken human lot.

Yet 'tis not here that I would dwell,
Though fair the place may be,
The summer's favourite citadel:—
A busier scene for me!

I love to see the human face
Reflect the human mind,
To watch in every crowded place
Their opposites combined.

There's more for thought in one brief hour
In yonder busy street,
Than all that ever leaf or flower
Taught in their green retreat.

Industry, intellect, and skill
Appear in all their pride,
The glorious force of human will
Triumphs on every side.

Yet touched with meekness, for on all
Is set the sign and seal
Of sorrow, suffering, and thrall,
Which none but own and feel;
The hearse that passes with its dead,
The homeless beggar's prayer,
Speak words of warning, and of dread,
To every passer there.

Aye beautiful the dreaming brought
By valleys and green fields;
But deeper feeling, higher thought,
Is what the city yields.

LIFE in its many shapes was there,
The busy and the gay;
Faces that seemed too young and fair
To ever know decay.

Wealth, with its waste, its pomp, and pride,
Led forth its glittering train;
And poverty's pale face beside
Asked aid, and asked in vain.

The shops were filled from many lands,
Toys, silks, and gems, and flowers;
The patient work of many hands,
The hope of many hours.

Yet, mid life's myriad shapes around
There was a sigh of death;
There rose a melancholy sound,
The bugle's wailing breath.

They played a mournful Scottish air,
That on its native hill
Had caught the notes the night-winds bear
From weeping leaf and rill.

'Twas strange to hear that sad wild strain
Its warning music shed,
Rising above life's busy train,
In memory of the dead.

There came a slow and silent band
In sad procession by:
Reversed the musket in each hand,
And downcast every eye.

They bore the soldier to his grave;
The sympathyzing crowd
Divided like a parted wave
By some dark vessel ploughed.

A moment, and all sounds were mute,
For awe was over all;
You heard the soldier's measured foot,
The bugle's wailing call.

The gloves were laid upon the bier,
The helmet and the sword,
The drooping war-horse followed near,
As he, too, mourned his lord.

Slowly—I followed too—they led
To where a church arose,
And flung a shadow o'er the dead,
Deep as their own repose.

Green trees were there—beneath the shade
Of one, was made a grave;
And there to his last rest was laid
The weary and the brave.

They fired a volley o'er the bed
Of an unconscious ear;
The birds sprang fluttering overhead,
Struck with a sudden fear.

All left the ground, the bugles died
Away upon the wind;
Only the tree's green branches sighed
O'er him they left behind.

Again, all filled with light and breath,
I passed the crowded street—
Oh, great extremes of life and death,
How strangely do ye meet!