William Lisle Bowles: Verses about Success

Shout! for the Lord hath triumphed gloriously!
Upon the shores of that renowned land,
Where erst His mighty arm and outstretched hand
He lifted high,
And dashed, in pieces dashed the enemy;--
Upon that ancient coast,
Where Pharaoh's chariot and his host
He cast into the deep,
Whilst o'er their silent pomp He bid the swoll'n sea sweep;
Upon that eastern shore,
That saw His awful arm revealed of yore,
Again hath He arisen, and opposed
His foes' defying vaunt: o'er them the deep hath closed!

Shades of mighty chiefs of yore,
Who triumphed on the self-same shore:
Ammon, who first o'er ocean's empire wide
Didst bid the bold bark stem the roaring tide;
Sesac, who from the East to farthest West
Didst rear thy pillars over realms subdued;
And thou, whose bones do rest
In the huge pyramid's dim solitude,
Beneath the uncouth stone,
Thy name and deeds unknown;
And Philip's glorious son,
With conquest flushed, for fields and cities won;
And thou, imperial Caesar, whose sole sway
The long-disputed world at length confessed,
When on these shores thy bleeding rival lay!
Oh, could ye, starting from your long cold rest,
Burst Death's oblivious trance,
And once again with plumed pride advance,
How would ye own your fame surpassed,
And on the sand your trophies cast,
When, the storm of conflict o'er,
And ceased the burning battle's roar,
Beneath the morning's orient light,
Ye saw, with sails all swelling white,
Britain's proud fleet, to many a joyful cry,
Ride o'er the rolling surge in awful sovereignty!

For fierce Ambition fired your mind--
Beside your glittering car,
Amid the thickest war,
Went Superstition, sorceress blind,
In dimly-figured robe, with scowling mien,
Half hid in jealous hood;
And Tyranny, beneath whose helm was seen
His eye suffused with blood;
And giant Pride,
That the great sun with haughty smile defied;
And Avarice, that grasped his guilty gold;
These, as the sorceress her loud sistrum rung,
Their dismal paean sung;
And still, far off, pale Pity hung her head,
Whilst o'er the dying and the dead
The victor's brazen wheels with gory axle rolled.
Now look on him, in holy courage bold;
The asserter of his country's cause behold!
He lifts his gaze to heaven, serenely brave,
And whilst around war's fearful banners wave,
He prays: Protect us, as our cause is just;
For in thy might alone, Judge of the world, we trust!

And they are scattered--the destroyers die!
They that usurped the bloody victor's claim,
That spoke of freedom; but, behold a cry!
They, that like a wasteful flame,
Or the huge sandy pillar, that amain
Whirls 'mid the silence of the desert plain,
Deathful in their career of terror came,
And scattered ruin as they passed!
So rush they, like the simoom's horrid blast;
They sweep, and all around is wilderness!
But from thy throne on high,
Thou, God, hast heard the cry
Of nations in distress!
Britain goes forth, beneath thy might,
To quell the proud blasphemers in the fight;
And Egypt, far along her winding main,
Echoes the shout of joy, and genuine Freedom's strain!

Now let them, who thy name, O GOD! defy,
Invoke the mighty Prophet of the East;
Or deck, as erst, the mystic feast
To Ashtaroth, queen of the starry sky!
Let them, in some cavern dark,
Seek Osiris' buried ark;
Or call on Typhon, of gigantic form,
Lifting his hundred arms, and howling 'mid the storm!
Or to that grisly king
In vain their cymbals let them ring,
To him in Tophet's vale revered
(With smoke his brazen idol smeared),
Grim Moloch, in whose fuming furnace blue
The unpitying priest the shrieking infant threw,
Whilst to shrill cries, and drums' and timbrels' sound,
The frantic and unhearing troop danced round;
To _him_ despairing let them go,
And tell their fearful tale of hideous overthrow!

Calm breathed the airs along the evening bay,
Where, all in warlike pride,
The Gallic squadron stretched its long array;
And o'er the tranquil tide
With beauteous bend the streamers waved on high
But, ah! how changed the scene ere night descends!
Hark to the shout that heaven's high concave rends!
Hark to that dying cry!
Whilst, louder yet, the cannon's roar
Resounds along the Nile's affrighted shore,
Where, from his oozy bed,
The cowering crocodile hath raised his head!
What bursting flame
Lightens the long track of the gleamy brine!
From yon proud ship it came,
That towered the leader of the hostile line!
Now loud explosion rends the midnight air!
Heard ye the last deep groaning of despair?
Heaven's fiery cope unwonted thunders fill,
Then, with one dreadful pause, earth, air, and seas are still!

But now the mingled fight
Begins its awful strife again!
Through the dun shades of night
Along the darkly-heaving main
Is seen the frequent flash;
And many a towering mast with dreadful crash
Rings falling. Is the scene of slaughter o'er?
Is the death-cry heard no more?
Lo! where the East a glimmering freckle streaks,
Slow o'er the shadowy wave the gray dawn breaks.
Behold, O Sun, the flood
Strewed with the dead, and dark with blood!
Behold, all scattered on the rocking tide,
The wrecks of haughty Gallia's pride!
But Britain's floating bulwarks, with serene
And silent pomp, amid the deathful scene
Move glorious, and more beautiful display
Their ensigns streaming to thy orient ray.

Awful Genius of the land!
Who (thy reign of glory closed)
By marble wrecks, half-hid in sand,
Hast mournfully reposed;
Who long, amid the wasteful desert wide,
Hast loved with death-like stillness to abide;
Or wrapped in tenfold gloom,
From noise of human things for ages hid,
Hast sat upon the shapeless tomb
In the forlorn and dripping pyramid;
Awake! Arise!
Though thou behold the day no more
That saw thy pride and pomp of yore;
Though, like the sounds that in the morning ray
Trembled and died away
From Memnon's statue; though, like these, the voice
That bade thy vernal plains rejoice,
The voice of Science, is no longer heard;
And all thy gorgeous state hath disappeared:
Yet hear, with triumph, and with hope again,
The shouts of joy that swell from thy forsaken main!

And, oh! might He, at whose command
Deep darkness shades a mourning land;
At whose command, bursting from night,
And flaming with redoubled light,
The Sun of Science mounts again,
And re-illumes the wide-extended plain!
Might He, from this eventful day,
Illustrious Egypt, to thy shore
Science, Freedom, Peace restore,
And bid thy crowded ports their ancient pomp display!
No more should Superstition mark,
In characters uncouth and dark,
Her dreary, monumental shrine!
No more should meek-eyed Piety
Outcast, insulted lie
Beneath the mosque, whose golden crescents shine,
But starting from her trance,
O'er Nubia's sands advance
Beyond the farthest fountains of the Nile!
The dismal Gallas should behold her smile,
And Abyssinia's inmost rocks rejoice
To hear her awful lore, yet soft consoling voice!

Hasten, O GOD! the time, when never more
Pale Pity, from her moonlight seat shall hear,
And dropping at the sound a fruitless tear,
The far-off battle's melancholy roar;
When never more Horror's portentous cry
Shall sound amid the troubled sky;
Or dark Destruction's grimly-smiling mien,
Through the red flashes of the fight be seen!
Father in heaven! our ardent hopes fulfil;
Thou speakest 'Peace,' and the vexed world is still!
Yet should Oppression huge arise,
And with bloody banners spread,
Upon the gasping nations tread,
Whilst he thy name defies,
Trusting in Thee alone, we hope to quell
His furious might, his purpose fell;
And as the ensigns of his baffled pride
O'er the seas are scattered wide,
We will take up a joyous strain and cry--
Shout! for the Lord hath triumphed gloriously!

Stern Father of the storm! who dost abide
Amid the solitude of the vast deep,
For ever listening to the sullen tide,
And whirlwinds that the billowy desert sweep!
Thou at the distant death-shriek dost rejoice;
The rule of the tempestuous main is thine,
Outstretched and lone; thou utterest thy voice,
Like solemn thunders: These wild waves are mine;
Mine their dread empire; nor shall man profane
The eternal secrets of my ancient reign.

The voice is vain: secure, and as in scorn,
The gallant vessel scuds before the wind;
Her parting sails swell stately to the morn;
She leaves the green earth and its hills behind;
Gallant before the wind she goes, her prow
High bearing, and disparting the blue tide
That foams and flashes in its rage below;
Meantime the helmsman feels a conscious pride,
And while far onward the long billows swell,
Looks to the lessening land, that seems to say, Farewell!

Father of storms! then let thy whirlwinds roar
O'er seas of solitary amplitude;
Man, the poor tenant of thy rocky shore,
Man, thy terrific empire hath subdued;
And though thy waves toss his high-foundered bark
Where no dim watch-light gleams, still he defies
Thy utmost rage, and in his buoyant ark
Speeds on, regardless of the darkening skies;
And o'er the mountain-surges, as they roll,
Subdues his destined way, and speeds from pole to pole.

Behold him now, far from his native plain,
Where high woods shade some wild Hesperian bay,
Or green isles glitter in the southern main,
His streaming ensign to the morn display!
Behold him, where the North's pale meteors dance,
And icy rocks roll glimmering from afar,
Fearless through night and solitude advance!
Or where the pining sons of Andamar,
When dark eclipse has wrapt the labouring moon,
Howl to the demon of the dread monsoon!

Time was, like them, poor Nature's shivering child,
Pacing the beach, and by the salt spray beat,
He watched the melancholy surge, or smiled
To see it burn and bicker at his feet;
In some rude shaggy spot, by fortune placed,
He dreamed not of strange lands, and empires spread,
Beyond the rolling of the watery waste;
He saw the sun shine on the mountain's head,
But knew not, whilst he hailed the orient light,
What myriads blessed his beam, or sickened at the sight.

From some dark promontory, that o'erbent
The flashing waves, he heard their ceaseless roar;
Or carolled in his light canoe content,
As, bound from creek to creek, it grazed the shore;
Gods of the storm the dreary space might sweep,
And shapes of death, and gliding spectres gaunt,
Might flit, he thought, o'er the remoter deep;
And whilst strange voices cried, Avaunt, avaunt!
Uncertain lights, seen through the midnight gloom,
Might lure him sadly on to his cold watery tomb.

No city, then, amid the calm clear day,
O'er the blue waters' undulating line,
With battlements, and fans that glittered gay,
And piers, and thronging masts, was seen to shine.
No cheerful sounds were wafted on the gale,
Nor hummed the shores with early industry;
But mournful birds in hollow cliffs did wail,
And there all day the cormorant did cry,
While with sunk eye, and matted, dripping locks,
The houseless savage slept beneath the foam-beat rocks.

Thus slumbering long upon the dreamy verge
Of instinct, see, he rouses from his trance!
Faint, and as glimmering yet, the Arts emerge,
One after one, from darkness, and advance,
Beauteous, as o'er the heavens the stars' still way.
Now see the track of his dominion wide,
Fair smiling as the dayspring; cities gay
Lift their proud heads, and o'er the yellow tide,
Whilst sounds of fervent industry arise,
A thousand pennants float bright streaming in the skies!

Genius of injured Asia! once sublime
And glorious, now dim seen amid the storm,
And melancholy clouds of sweeping time,
Who yet dost half reveal thine awful form,
Pointing, with saddened aspect and slow hand,
To vast emporiums, desolate and waste;
To wrecks of unknown cities, sunk in sand!
'Twas at thy voice, Arts, Order, Science, Taste.
Upsprung, the East adorning, like the smile
Of Spring upon the banks of thy own swelling Nile.

'Twas at thy voice huge Enterprise awoke,
That, long on rocky Aradus reclined,
Slumbered to the hoarse surge that round her broke,
And hollow pipings of the idle wind;
She heard thy voice, upon the rock she stood
Gigantic, the rude scene she marked--she cried,
Let there be intercourse, and the great flood
Waft the rich plenty to these shores denied!
And soon thine eye delighted saw aspire,
Crowning the midland main, thy own Imperial Tyre.

Queen of the waters! who didst ope the gate
Of Commerce, and display in lands unknown
Thy venturous sail, ev'n now in ancient state
Methinks I see thee on thy rocky throne;
I see their massy piles thy cothons rear,
And on the deep a solemn shadow cast;
I traverse thy once echoing shores, and hear
The sound of mighty generations past:
I see thy kingly merchants' thronged resort,
And gold and purple gleam o'er all thy spacious port.

I mark thy glittering galleys sweep along--
The steady rowers to the strokes incline,
And chaunt in unison their choral song;
White through their oars the ivory benches shine;
The fine-wrought sails, which looms of Egypt wove,
Swell beautiful beneath the bending mast;
Hewn from proud Lebanon's immortal grove,
The oaks of Bashan brave the roaring blast!
So o'er the western wave thy vessels float,
For verdant Egypt bound, or Calpe's cliffs remote.

Queen of the waters! throned upon thy seat
Amid the sea, thy beauty and thy fame
The deep, that rolls low-murmuring at thy feet,
And all the multitude of isles, proclaim!
For thee Damascus piles her woolly store;
To thee their flocks Arabia's princes bring;
And Sheba heaps her spice and glittering ore;
The ships of Tarshish of thy glory sing:
Queen of the waters! who is like to thee,
Replenished in thy might, and throned on the sea!

The purple streamers fly, the trumpets sound,
The adventurous bark glides on in tranquil state;
The voyagers, with leafy garlands crowned,
Draw back their arms together, and elate
Sweep o'er the surge; the spray far scattered flies
Beneath the stroke of their unwearied oars;
To their loud shouts the circling coast replies;
And now, o'er the deep ocean, where it roars
They fly; till slowly lessening from the shore,
Beneath the haze they sink--sink, and are seen no more.

When Night descends, and with her silver bow
The Queen of Heaven comes forth in radiance bright,
Surveying the dim earth and seas below;
Why from afar resounds the mystic rite
Hymned round her uncouth altar? Virgins there
(Amid the brazen cymbal's hollow ring)
And aged priests the solemn feast prepare;
To her their nightly orisons they sing;
That she may look from her high throne, and guide
The wandering bark secure along the trackless tide.

Her on his nightly watch the pilot views
Careful, and by her soft and tranquil light,
Along the uncertain coast his track pursues;
And now he sees great Carmel's woody height,
Where nightly fires to grisly Baal burn;
Round the rough cape he winds; meantime far on
Thick eddying scuds the hollow surf upturn;
He thinks of the sweet light of summer gone!
He thinks, perhaps, dashed on the rugged shore,
He never shall behold his babes' loved mother more!

Slow comes the morn; but ah! what demon form,
While pealing thunder the high concave rends,
Rises more vast amid the rushing storm!
With dreadful shade his horrid bulk ascends
Dark to the driving clouds; beneath him roars
The deep; his troubled brow is wrapped in gloom;
See, it moves onwards; now more huge it soars!
Who shall avert the poor seafarer's doom!
Who now shall save him from the spectre's might
That treads the rocking waves in thunder and in night!

Dread phantom! art thou he whose fearful sway,
As Egypt's hoary chronicles have told,
The clouds, the whirlwinds, and the seas obey,
Typhon, of aspect hideous to behold!
Oh, spare the wretched wanderers, who, led
By flattering hopes, have left the peaceful shore!
Behold, they shrink, they bend with speechless dread;
From their faint grasp drops the unheeded oar!
It answers not, but mingling seas and sky,
In clouds, and wind, and thunder, rushes by.

Hail to thy light, lord of the golden day,
That, bursting through the sable clouds again,
Dost cheer the seaman's solitary way,
And with new splendour deck the lucid main!
And lo! the voyage past, where many a palm,
Its green top only seen, the prospect bounds,
Fringing the sunny sea-line, clear and calm;
Now hark the slowly-swelling human sounds!
Meantime the bark along the placid bay
Of Tamiatis keeps her easy-winding way.

Here rest we safe from scenes of peril past,
No danger lurks in this serene retreat;
No more is heard the roaring of the blast,
But pastoral sounds of scattered flocks that bleat,
Or evening herds that o'er the champaign low;
Here citrons tall and purple dates around
Delicious fragrance and cool shade bestow;
The shores with murmuring industry resound;
While through the vernal pastures where he strays,
The Nile, as with delight, his mazy course delays.

My heart has sighed in secret, when I thought
That the dark tide of time might one day close,
England, o'er thee, as long since it has closed
On Egypt and on Tyre: that ages hence,
From the Pacific's billowy loneliness,
Whose tract thy daring search revealed, some isle
Might rise in green-haired beauty eminent,
And like a goddess, glittering from the deep,
Hereafter sway the sceptre of domain
From pole to pole; and such as now thou art,
Perhaps NEW-HOLLAND be. For who shall say
What the OMNIPOTENT ETERNAL ONE,
That made the world, hath purposed! Thoughts like these,
Though visionary, rise; and sometimes move
A moment's sadness, when I think of thee,
My country, of thy greatness, and thy name,
Among the nations; and thy character,--
Though some few spots be on thy flowing robe,--
Of loveliest beauty: I have never passed
Through thy green hamlets on a summer's morn,
Nor heard thy sweet bells ring, nor seen the youths
And smiling maidens of thy villages,
Gay in their Sunday tire, but I have said,
With passing tenderness--Live, happy land,
Where the poor peasant feels his shed, though small,
An independence and a pride, that fill
His honest heart with joy--joy such as they
Who crowd the mart of men may never feel!
Such, England, is thy boast. When I have heard
The roar of ocean bursting 'round thy rocks,
Or seen a thousand thronging masts aspire,
Far as the eye could reach, from every port
Of every nation, streaming with their flags
O'er the still mirror of the conscious Thames,--
Yes, I have felt a proud emotion swell
That I was British-born; that I had lived
A witness of thy glory, my most loved
And honoured country; and a silent prayer
Would rise to Heaven, that Fame and Peace, and Love
And Liberty, might walk thy vales, and sing
Their holy hymns, while thy brave arm repelled
Hostility, even as thy guardian cliffs
Repel the dash of that dread element
Which calls me, lingering on the banks of Thames,
On to my destined voyage, by the shores
Of Asia, and the wreck of cities old,
Ere yet we burst into the wilder deep
With Gama; or the huge Atlantic waste
With bold Columbus stem; or view the bounds
Of field-ice, stretching to the southern pole,
With thee, benevolent, lamented Cook!
Tyre be no more! said the ALMIGHTY voice:
But thou too, Monarch of the world, whose arm
Rent the proud bulwarks of the golden queen
Of cities, throned upon her subject seas,
ART THOU TOO FALL'N?
The whole earth is at rest:
'They break forth into singing:' Lebanon
Waves all his hoary pines, and seems to say,
No feller now comes here; HELL from beneath
Is moved to meet thy coming; it stirs up
The DEAD for thee; the CHIEF ONES of the earth,
Tyre and the nations, they all speak and say--
Art thou become like us! Thy pomp brought down
E'en to the dust! The noise of viols ceased,
The worm spread under thee, the crawling worm
To cover thee! How art thou fall'n from heaven,
Son of the morning! In thy heart thou saidst,
I will ascend to Heaven; I will exalt
My throne above the stars of God! Die--die,
Blasphemer! As a carcase under foot,
Defiled and trodden, so be thou cast out!
And SHE, the great, the guilty Babel--SHE
Who smote the wasted cities, and the world
Made as a wilderness--SHE, in her turn,
Sinks to the gulf oblivious at the voice
Of HIM who sits in judgment on her crimes!
Who, o'er her palaces and buried towers,
Shall bid the owl hoot, and the bittern scream;
And on her pensile groves and pleasant shades
Pour the deep waters of forgetfulness.
On that same night, when with a cry she fell,
(Like her own mighty idol dashed to earth,)
There was a strange eclipse, and long laments
Were heard, and muttering thunders o'er the towers
Of the high palace where his wassail loud
Belshazzar kept, mocking the GOD OF HEAVEN,
And flushed with impious mirth; for BEL had left
With sullen shriek his golden shrine, and sat,
With many a gloomy apparition girt,
NISROCH and NEBO chief, in the dim sphere
Of mooned ASTORETH, whose orb now rolled
In darkness:--They their earthly empire mourned;
Meantime the host of Cyrus through the night
Silent advanced more nigh; and at that hour,
In the torch-blazing hall of revelry,
The fingers of a shadowy hand distinct
Came forth, and unknown figures marked the wall,
Searing the eye-balls of the starting king:
Tyre is avenged; Babel is fall'n, is fall'n!
Bel and her gods are shattered!
PRINCE, to thee
Called by the voice of God to execute
His will on earth, and raised to Persia's throne,
CYRUS, all hearts pay homage. Touched with tints
Most clear by the historian's magic art,
Thy features wear a gentleness and grace
Unlike the stern cold aspect and the frown
Of the dark chiefs of yore, the gloomy clan
Of heroes, from humanity and love
Removed: To thee a brighter character
Belongs--high dignity, unbending truth--
Yet Nature; not that lordly apathy
Which confidence and human sympathy
Represses, but a soul that bids all hearts
Smiling approach. We almost burn in thought
To kiss the hand that loosed Panthea's chains,
And bless him with a parent's, husband's tear,
Who stood a guardian angel in distress
To the unfriended, and the beautiful,
Consigned a helpless slave. Thy portrait, touched
With tints of softest light, thus wins all hearts
To love thee; but severer policy,
Cyrus, pronounces otherwise: she hears
No stir of commerce on the sullen marge
Of waters that along thy empire's verge
Beat cheerless; no proud moles arise; no ships,
Freighted with Indian wealth, glide o'er the main
From cape to cape. But on the desert sands
Hurtles thy numerous host, seizing, in thought
Rapacious, the rich fields of Hindostan,
As the poor savage fells the blooming tree
To gain its tempting fruit; but woe the while!
For in the wilderness the noise is lost
Of all thy archers;--they have ceased;--the wind
Blows o'er them, and the voice of judgment cries:
So perish they who grasp with avarice
Another's blessed portion, and disdain
That interchange of mutual good, that crowns
The slow, sure toil of commerce.
It was thine,
Immortal son of Macedon! to hang
In the high fane of maritime renown
The fairest trophies of thy fame, and shine,
THEN only like a god, when thy great mind
Swayed in its master council the deep tide
Of things, predestining th' eventful roll
Of commerce, and uniting either world,
Europe and Asia, in thy vast design.
Twas when the victor, in his proud career,
O'er ravaged Hindostan, had now advanced
Beyond Hydaspes; on the flowery banks
Of Hyphasis, with banners thronged, his camp
Was spread. On high he bade the altars rise,
The awful records to succeeding years
Of his long march of glory, and to point
The spot where, like the thunder rolled away,
His army paused. Now shady eve came down;
The trumpet sounded to the setting sun,
That looked from his illumed pavilion, calm
Upon the scene of arms, as if, all still,
And lovely as his parting light, the world
Beneath him spread; nor clangours, nor deep groans,
Were heard, nor victory's shouts, nor sighs, nor shrieks,
Were ever wafted from a bleeding land,
After the havoc of a conqueror's sword.
So calm the sun declined; when from the woods,
That shone to his last beam, a Brahmin old
Came forth. His streaming beard shone in the ray,
That slanted o'er his feeble frame; his front
Was furrowed. To the sun's last light he cast
A look of sorrow, then in silence bowed
Before the conqueror of the world. At once
All, as in death, was still. The victor chief
Trembled, he knew not why; the trumpet ceased
Its clangor, and the crimson streamer waved
No more in folds insulting to the Lord
Of the reposing world. The pallid front
Of the meek man seemed for a moment calm,
Yet dark and thronging thoughts appeared to swell
His beating heart. He paused--and then abrupt:
Victor, avaunt! he cried,
Hence! and the banners of thy pride
Bear to the deep! Behold on high
Yon range of mountains mingled with the sky!
It is the place
Where the great Father of the human race
Rested, when all the world and all its sounds
Ceased; and the ocean that surrounds
The earth, leaped from its dark abode
Beneath the mountains, and enormous flowed,
The green earth deluging! List, soldier, list!
And dread His might no mortal may resist.
Great Bramah rested, hushed in sleep,
When Hayagraiva came,
With mooned horns and eyes of flame,
And bore the holy Vedas to the deep.
Far from the sun's rejoicing ray,
Beneath the huge abyss, the buried treasures lay.
Then foamed the billowy desert wide,
And all that breathed--they died,
Sunk in the rolling waters: such the crime
And violence of earth. But he above,
Great Vishnu, moved with pitying love,
Preserved the pious king, whose ark sublime
Floated, in safety borne:
For his stupendous horn,
Blazing like gold, and many a rood
Extended o'er the dismal flood,
The precious freight sustained, till on the crest
Of Himakeel, yon mountain high,
That darkly mingles with the sky,
Where many a griffin roams, the hallowed ark found rest.
And Heaven decrees that here
Shall cease thy slaughtering spear:
Enough we bleed, enough we weep,
Hence, victor, to the deep!
Ev'n now along the tide
I see thy ships triumphant ride:
I see the world of trade emerge
From ocean's solitude! What fury fires
My breast! The flood, the flood retires,
And owns its future sovereign! Urge
Thy destined way; what countless pennants stream!
(Or is it but the shadow of a dream?)
Ev'n now old Indus hails
Thy daring prows in long array,
That o'er the lone seas gliding,
Around the sea-gods riding,
Speed to Euphrates' shores their destined way.
Fill high the bowl of mirth!
From west to east the earth
Proclaims thee Lord; shall the blue main
Confine thy reign?
But tremble, tyrant; hark in many a ring,
With language dread
Above thy head,
The dark Assoors thy death-song sing.
What mortal blow
Hath laid the king of nations low?
No hand: his own despair.--
But shout, for the canvas shall swell to the air,
Thy ships explore
Unknown Persia's winding shore,
While the great dragon rolls his arms in vain.
And see, uprising from the level main,
A new and glorious city springs;--
Hither speed thy woven wings,
That glance along the azure tide;
Asia and Europe own thy might;--
The willing seas of either world unite:
Thy name shall consecrate the sands,
And glittering to the sky the mart of nations stands.
He spoke, and rushed into the thickest wood.
With flashing eyes the impatient monarch cried--
Yes, by the Lybian Ammon and the gods
Of Greece, thou bid'st me on, the self-same track
My spirit pointed; and, let death betide,
My name shall live in glory!
At his word
The pines descend; the thronging masts aspire;
The novel sails swell beauteous o'er the curves
Of INDUS; to the Moderators' song
The oars keep time, while bold Nearchus guides
Aloft the gallies. On the foremost prow
The monarch from his golden goblet pours
A full libation to the gods, and calls
By name the mighty rivers, through whose course
He seeks the sea. To Lybian Ammon loud
The songs ascend; the trumpets bray; aloft
The streamers fly, whilst on the evening wave
Majestic to the main the fleet descends.

Such are thy views, DISCOVERY! The great world
Rolls to thine eye revealed; to thee the Deep
Submits its awful empire; Industry
Awakes, and Commerce to the echoing marts
From east to west unwearied pours her wealth.
Man walks sublimer; and Humanity,
Matured by social intercourse, more high,
More animated, lifts her sovereign mien,
And waves her golden sceptre. Yet the heart
Asks trembling, is no evil found! Oh, turn,
Meek Charity, and drop a human tear
For the sad fate of Afric's injured sons,
And hide, for ever hide, the sight of chains,
Anguish, and bondage! Yes, the heart of man
Is sick, and Charity turns pale, to think
How soon, for pure religion's holy beam,
Dark crimes, that sullied the sweet day, pursued,
Like vultures, the Discoverer's ocean tract,
Screaming for blood, to fields of rich Peru,
Or ravaged Mexico, while Gold more Gold!
The caverned mountains echoed, Gold more Gold!
Then see the fell-eyed, prowling buccaneer,
Grim as a libbard! He his jealous look
Turns to the dagger at his belt, his hand
By instinct grasps a bloody scymitar,
And ghastly is his smile, as o'er the woods
He sees the smoke of burning villages
Ascend, and thinks ev'n now he counts his spoil.
See thousands destined to the lurid mine,
Never to see the sun again; all names
Of husband, sire, all tender charities
Of love, deep buried with them in that grave,
Where life is as a thing long passed; and hope
No more its sickly ray, to cheer the gloom,
Extends.
Thou, too, dread Ocean, toss thine arms,
Exulting, for the treasures and the gems
That thy dark oozy realm emblaze; and call
The pale procession of the dead, from caves
Where late their bodies weltered, to attend
Thy kingly sceptre, and proclaim thy might!
Lord of the Hurricane! bid all thy winds
Swell, and destruction ride upon the surge,
Where, after the red lightning flash that shows
The labouring ship, all is at once deep night
And long suspense, till the slow dawn of day
Gleams on the scattered corses of the dead,
That strew the sounding shore!
Then think of him,
Ye who rejoice with those you love, at eve,
When winds of winter shake the window-frame,
And more endear your fire, oh, think of him,
Who, saved alone from the destroying storm,
Is cast on some deserted rock; who sees
Sun after sun descend, and hopeless hears;
At morn the long surge of the troubled main,
That beats without his wretched cave; meantime
He fears to wake the echoes with his voice,
So dread the solitude!
Let Greenland's snows
Then shine, and mark the melancholy train
There left to perish, whilst the cold pale day
Declines along the further ice, that binds
The ship, and leaves in night the sinking scene.
Sad winter closes on the deep; the smoke
Of frost, that late amusive to the eye
Rose o'er the coast, is passed, and all is now
One torpid blank; the freezing particles
Blown blistering, and the white bear seeks her cave.
Ill-fated outcasts, when the morn again
Shall streak with feeble beam the frozen waste,
Your air-bleached and unburied carcases
Shall press the ground, and, as the stars fade off,
Your stony eyes glare 'mid the desert snows!
These triumphs boast, fell Demon of the Deep!
Though never more the universal shriek
Of all that perish thou shalt hear, as when
The deep foundations of the guilty earth
Were shaken at the voice of God, and man
Ceased in his habitations; yet the sea
Thy might tempestuous still, and joyless rule,
Confesses. Ah! what bloodless shadows throng
Ev'n now, slow rising from their oozy beds,
From Mete, and those gates of burial
That guard the Erythraean; from the vast
Unfathomed caverns of the Western main
Or stormy Orcades; whilst the sad shell
Of poor Arion, to the hollow blast
Slow seems to pour its melancholy tones,
And faintly vibrate, as the dead pass by.
I see the chiefs, who fell in distant lands,
The prey of murderous savages, when yells,
And shouts, and conch, resounded through the woods.
Magellan and De Solis seem to lead
The mournful train. Shade of Perouse! oh, say
Where, in the tract of unknown seas, thy bones
Th' insulting surge has swept?
But who is he,
Whose look, though pale and bloody, wears the trace
Of pure philanthropy? The pitying sigh
Forbid not; he was dear to Britons, dear
To every beating heart, far as the world
Extends; and my faint faltering touch ev'n now
Dies on the strings, when I pronounce thy name,
Oh, lost, lamented, generous, hapless Cook!
But cease the vain complaint; turn from the shores,
Wet with his blood, Remembrance: cast thine eyes
Upon the long seas, and the wider world,
Displayed from his research. Smile, glowing Health!
For now no more the wasted seaman sinks,
With haggard eye and feeble frame diseased;
No more with tortured longings for the sight
Of fields and hillocks green, madly he calls
On Nature, when before his swimming eye
The liquid long expanse of cheerless seas
Seems all one flowery plain. Then frantic dreams
Arise; his eye's distemper'd flash is seen
From the sunk socket, as a demon there
Sat mocking, till he plunges in the flood,
And the dark wave goes o'er him.
Nor wilt thou,
O Science! fail to deck the cold morai
Of him who wider o'er earth's hemisphere
Thy views extended. On, from deep to deep,
Thou shalt retrace the windings of his track;
From the high North to where the field-ice binds
The still Antarctic. Thence, from isle to isle,
Thou shalt pursue his progress; and explore
New-Holland's eastern shores, where now the sons
Of distant Britain, from her lap cast out,
Water the ground with tears of penitence,
Perhaps, hereafter, in their destined time,
Themselves to rise pre-eminent. Now speed,
By Asia's eastern bounds, still to the North,
Where the vast continents of either world
Approach: Beyond, 'tis silent boundless ice,
Impenetrable barrier, where all thought
Is lost; where never yet the eagle flew,
Nor roamed so far the white bear through the waste.
But thou, dread POWER! whose voice from chaos called
The earth, who bad'st the Lord of light go forth,
Ev'n as a giant, and the sounding seas
Roll at thy fiat: may the dark deep clouds,
That thy pavilion shroud from mortal sight,
So pass away, as now the mystery,
Obscure through rolling ages, is disclosed;
How man, from one great Father sprung, his race
Spread to that severed continent! Ev'n so,
FATHER, in thy good time, shall all things stand
Revealed to knowledge.
As the mind revolves
The change of mighty empires, and the fate
Of HIM whom Thou hast made, back through the dusk
Of ages Contemplation turns her view:
We mark, as from its infancy, the world
Peopled again, from that mysterious shrine
That rested on the top of Ararat,
Highest of Asian mountains; spreading on,
The Cushites from their mountain caves descend;
Then before GOD the sons of Ammon stood
In their gigantic might, and first the seas
Vanquished: But still from clime to clime the groan
Of sacrifice, and Superstition's cry,
Was heard; but when the Dayspring rose of heaven,
Greece's hoar forests echoed, The great Pan
Is dead! From Egypt, and the rugged shores
Of Syrian Tyre, the gods of darkness fly;
Bel is cast down, and Nebo, horrid king,
Bows in imperial Babylon: But, ah!
Too soon, the Star of Bethlehem, whose ray
The host of heaven hailed jubilant, and sang,
Glory to God on high, and on earth peace,
With long eclipse is veiled.
Red Papacy
Usurped the meek dominion of the Lord
Of love and charity: vast as a fiend
She rose, Heaven's light was darkened with her frown,
And the earth murmured back her hymns of blood,
As the meek martyr at the burning stake
Stood, his last look uplifted to his GOD!
But she is now cast down, her empire reft.
They who in darkness walked, and in the shade
Of death, have seen a new and holy light,
As in th' umbrageous forest, through whose boughs,
Mossy and damp, for many a league, the morn
With languid beam scarce pierces, here and there
Touching some solitary trunk, the rest
Dark waving in the noxious atmosphere:
Through the thick-matted leaves the serpent winds
His way, to find a spot of casual sun;
The gaunt hyaena through the thicket glides
At eve: then, too, the couched tiger's eye
Flames in the dusk, and oft the gnashing jaws
Of the fell crocodile are heard. At length,
By man's superior energy and toil,
The sunless brakes are cleared; the joyous morn
Shines through the opening leaves; rich culture smiles
Around; and howling to their distant wilds
The savage inmates of the wood retire.
Such is the scene of human life, till want
Bids man his strength put forth; then slowly spreads
The cultured stream of mild humanity,
And gentler virtues, and more noble aims
Employ the active mind, till beauty beams
Around, and Nature wears her richest robe,
Adorned with lovelier graces. Then the charms
Of woman, fairest of the works of Heaven,
Whom the cold savage, in his sullen pride,
Scorned as unworthy of his equal love,
With more attractive influence wins the heart
Of her protector. Then the names of sire,
Of home, of brother, and of children, grow
More sacred, more endearing; whilst the eye,
Lifted beyond this earthly scene, beholds
A Father who looks down from heaven on all!
O Britain, my loved country! dost thou rise
Most high among the nations! Do thy fleets
Ride o'er the surge of ocean, that subdued
Rolls in long sweep beneath them! Dost thou wear
Thy garb of gentler morals gracefully!
Is widest science thine, and the fair train
Of lovelier arts! While commerce throngs thy ports
With her ten thousand streamers, is the tract
Of the undeviating ploughshare white
That rips the reeking furrow, followed soon
By plenty, bidding all the scene rejoice,
Even like a cultured garden! Do the streams
That steal along thy peaceful vales, reflect
Temples, and Attic domes, and village towers!
Is beauty thine, fairest of earthly things,
Woman; and doth she gain that liberal love
And homage, which the meekness of her voice,
The rapture of her smile, commanding most
When she seems weakest, must demand from him,
Her master; whose stern strength at once submits
In manly, but endearing, confidence,
Unlike his selfish tyranny who sits
The sultan of his harem!
Oh, then, think
How great the blessing, and how high thy rank
Amid the civilised and social world!
But hast thou no deep failings, that may turn
Thy thoughts within thyself! Ask, for the sun
That shines in heaven hath seen it, hath thy power
Ne'er scattered sorrow over distant lands!
Ask of the East, have never thy proud sails
Borne plunder from dismembered provinces,
Leaving the groans of miserable men
Behind! And free thyself, and lifting high
The charter of thy freedom, bought with blood,
Hast thou not stood, in patient apathy,
A witness of the tortures and the chains
That Afric's injured sons have known! Stand up;
Yes, thou hast visited the caves, and cheered
The gloomy haunts of sorrow; thou hast shed
A beam of comfort and of righteousness
On isles remote; hast bid the bread-fruit shade
Th' Hesperian regions, and has softened much
With bland amelioration, and with charms
Of social sweetness, the hard lot of man.
But weighed in truth's firm balance, ask, if all
Be even. Do not crimes of ranker growth
Batten amid thy cities, whose loud din,
From flashing and contending cars, ascends,
Till morn! Enchanting, as if aught so sweet
Ne'er faded, do thy daughters wear the weeds
Of calm domestic peace and wedded love;
Or turn, with beautiful disdain, to dash
Gay pleasure's poisoned chalice from their lips
Untasted! Hath not sullen atheism,
Weaving gay flowers of poesy, so sought
To hide the darkness of his withered brow
With faded and fantastic gallantry
Of roses, thus to win the thoughtless smile
Of youthful ignorance! Hast thou with awe
Looked up to Him whose power is in the clouds,
Who bids the storm rush, and it sweeps to earth
The nations that offend, and they are gone,
Like Tyre and Babylon! Well weigh thyself:
Then shalt thou rise undaunted in the might
Of thy Protector, and the gathered hate
Of hostile bands shall be but as the sand
Blown on the everlasting pyramid.
Hasten, O Love and Charity! your work,
Ev'n now whilst it is day; far as the world
Extends may your divinest influence
Be felt, and more than felt, to teach mankind
They all are brothers, and to drown the cries
Of superstition, anarchy, or blood!
Not yet the hour is come: on Ganges' banks
Still superstition hails the flame of death,
Behold, gay dressed, as in her bridal tire,
The self-devoted beauteous victim slow
Ascend the pile where her dead husband lies:
She kisses his cold cheeks, inclines her breast
On his, and lights herself the fatal pile
That shall consume them both!
On Egypt's shore,
Where Science rose, now Sloth and Ignorance
Sleep like the huge Behemoth in the sun!
The turbaned Moor still stains with strangers' blood
The inmost sands of Afric. But all these
The light shall visit, and that vaster tract
From Fuego to the furthest Labrador,
Where roam the outcast Esquimaux, shall hear
The voice of social fellowship; the chief
Whose hatchet flashed amid the forest gloom,
Who to his infants bore the bleeding scalp
Of his fall'n foe, shall weep unwonted tears!
Come, Faith; come, Hope; come, meek-eyed Charity!
Complete the lovely prospect: every land
Shall lift up one hosannah; every tongue
Proclaim thee FATHER, INFINITE, and WISE,
And GOOD. The shores of palmy Senegal
(Sad Afric's injured sons no more enslaved)
Shall answer HALLELUJAH, for the LORD
Of truth and mercy reigns;--reigns KING OF KINGS;--
HOSANNAH--KING OF KINGS--and LORD OF LORDS!
So may His kingdom come, when all the earth,
Uniting thus as in one hymn of praise,
Shall wait the end of all things. This great globe,
His awful plan accomplished, then shall sink
In flames, whilst through the clouds, that wrap the place
Where it had rolled, and the sun shone, the voice
Of the ARCHANGEL, and the TRUMP OF GOD,
Amid heaven's darkness rolling fast away,
Shall sound!
Then shall the sea give up its dead;--
But man's immortal mind, all trials past
That shook his feverish frame, amidst the scenes
Of peril and distemper, shall ascend
Exulting to its destined seat of rest,
And 'justify His ways' from whom it sprung.

The morn returns, and, reddening, seems to shed
One ray of glory on the patriot-dead.
Round the dark stone, the victor-chiefs behold!
Still on their locks the gouts of gore hang cold!
There stands the brave Caupolican, the pride
Of Chili, young Lautaro, by his side!
Near the grim circle, pendent from the wood,
Twelve hundred Spanish heads are dripping blood.
Shrill sound the notes of death: in festive dance,
The Indian maids with myrtle boughs advance;
The tinkling sea-shells on their ancles ring,
As, hailing thus the victor-youth, they sing:--

SONG OF INDIAN MAIDS.

Oh, shout for Lautaro, the young and the brave!
The arm of whose strength was uplifted to save,
When the steeds of the strangers came rushing amain,
And the ghosts of our fathers looked down on the slain!

'Twas eve, and the noise of the battle was o'er,
Five thousand brave warriors were cold in their gore;
When, in front, young Lautaro invincible stood,
And the horses and iron-men rolled in their blood!

As the snows of the mountain are swept by the blast,
The earthquake of death o'er the white men has passed;
Shout, Chili, in triumph! the battle is won,
And we dance round the heads that are black in the sun!

Lautaro, as if wrapt in thought profound,
Oft turned an anxious look inquiring round.
He is not here!--Say, does my father live?
Ere eager voices could an answer give,
With faltering footsteps and declining head,
And slowly by an aged Indian led,
Wounded and weak the mountain chief appears:
Live, live! Lautaro cried, with bursting tears,
And fell upon his neck, and, kissing, pressed,
With folding arms, his gray hairs to his breast.
Oh, live! I am thy son--thy long-lost child!
The warrior raised his look, and faintly smiled;
Chili, my country, is avenged! he cried:
My son!--then sunk upon a shield--and died.
Lautaro knelt beside him, as he bowed,
And kissed his bleeding breast, and wept aloud.
The sounds of sadness through the circle ran,
When thus, with lifted axe, Caupolican:
What, for our fathers, brothers, children, slain,
Canst thou repay, ruthless, inhuman Spain?
Here, on the scene with recent slaughter red,
To sooth the spirits of the brave who bled,
Raise we, to-day, the war-feast of the dead.
Bring forth the chief in bonds! Fathers, to-day
Devote we to our gods the noblest prey!
Lautaro turned his eyes, and, gazing round,
Beheld Valdivia and Anselmo bound!
One stood in arms, as with a stern despair,
His helmet cleft in twain, his temples bare,
Where streaks of blood that dropped upon his mail,
Served but to show his face more deadly pale:
His eyebrows, dark and resolute, he bent,
And stood, composed, to wait the dire event.
Still on the cross his looks Anselmo cast,
As if all thought of this vain world was passed,
And in a world of light, without a shade,
Ev'n now his meek and guileless spirit strayed.
Where stood the Spanish chief, a muttering sound
Rose, and each club was lifted from the ground;
When, starting from his father's corse, his sword
Waving before his once-triumphant lord,
Lautaro cried, My breast shall meet the blow:
But save--save him, to whom my life I owe!
Valdivia marked him with unmoving eye,
Then looked upon his bonds, nor deigned reply;
When Harratomac, stealing with slow pace,
And lifting high his iron-jagged mace,
Smote him to earth; a thousand voices rose,
Mingled with shouts and yells, So fall our foes!
Lautaro gave to tears a moment's space,
As black in death he marked Valdivia's face,
Then cried--Chiefs, friends, and thou, Caupolican,
Oh, spare this innocent and holy man!
He never sailed, rapacious, o'er the deep,
The gold of blood-polluted lands to heap;
He never gave the armed hosts his aid,
But meekly to the Mighty Spirit prayed,
That in all lands the sounds of woe might cease,
And brothers of the wide world dwell in peace!
The victor-youth saw generous sympathy
Already steal to every warrior's eye;
Then thus again: Oh, if this filial tear
Bear witness my own father was most dear;
If this uplifted arm, this bleeding steel
Speak for my country what I felt and feel;
If, at this hour, I meet her high applause,
While my heart beats still ardent in her cause;--
Hear, and forgive these tears that grateful flow,
Oh! hear, how much to this poor man I owe!
I was a child--when to my sire's abode,
In Chillan's vale, the armed horsemen rode:
Me, whilst my father cold and breathless lay,
Far off the crested soldiers bore away,
And for a captive sold. No friend was near,
To mark a young and orphan stranger's tear!
This humble man, with kind parental care,
Snatched me from slavery--saved from dark despair;
And as my years increased, protected, fed,
And breathed a father's blessings on my head.
A Spanish maid was with him: need I speak?
Behold, affection's tear still wets my cheek!
Years, as they passed, matured in ripening grace
Her form unfolding, and her beauteous face:
She heard my orphan tale; she loved to hear,
And sometimes for my fortunes dropped a tear.
I could have bowed to direst ills resigned,
But wept at looks so sweet, at words so kind.
Valdivia saw me, now in blooming age,
And claimed me from the father as his page;
The chief too cherished me, yea, saved my life,
When in Peru arose the civil strife.
Yet still remembering her I loved so well,
Oft I returned to the gray father's cell:
His voice instructed me; recalled my youth
From rude idolatry to heavenly truth:
Of this hereafter; he my darkling mind
Cleared, and from low and sensual thoughts refined.
Then first, with feelings new impressed, I strove
To hide the tear of tenderness and love:
Amid the fairest maidens of Peru,
My eyes, my heart, one only object knew:
I lived that object's love and faith to share;
He saw, and blessed us with a father's prayer.
Here, at Valdivia's last and stern command,
I came, a stranger in my native land!
Anselmo (so him call--now most in need--
And standing here in bonds, for whom I plead)
Came, by our chief so summoned, and for aid
To the Great Spirit of the Christians prayed:
Here as a son I loved him, but I left
A wife, a child, of my fond cares bereft,
Never to see again; for death awaits
My entrance now in Lima's jealous gates.
Caupolican, didst thou thy father love?
Did his last dying look affection move?
Pity this aged man; unbend thy brow:
He was my father--is my father, now!
Consenting mercy marks each warrior's mien.
But who is this, what pallid form is seen,
As crushed already by the fatal blow,
Bound, and with looks white as a wreath of snow,
Her hands upon her breast, scarce drawn her breath,
A Spanish woman knelt, expecting death,
Whilst, borne by a dark warrior at her side,
An infant shrunk from the red plumes, and cried!
Lautaro started:
Injured maid of Spain!
Me!--me! oh, take me to thine arms again!
She heard his voice, and, by the scene oppressed,
With one faint sigh fell senseless on his breast.
Caupolican, with warm emotion, cried,
Live, live! Lautaro and his beauteous bride!
Live, aged father!--and forthwith commands
A warrior to unbind Anselmo's hands.
She raised her head: his eyes first met her view,
As round Lautaro's neck her arms she threw,
Ah, no! she feebly spoke; it is not true!
It is some form of the distempered brain!
Then hid her face upon his breast again.
Dark flashing eyes, terrific, glared around:
Here, his brains scattered by the deadly wound,
The Spanish chief lay on the gory ground.
With lowering brows, and mace yet drooping blood,
And clotted hair, there Mariantu stood.
Anselmo here, sad, yet in sorrow mild,
Appeared: she cried, A blessing on your child,
And knelt, as slow revived her waking sense,
And then, with looks aghast, Oh bear us hence!
Now all the assembled chiefs, assenting, cried,
Live, live! Lautaro and his beauteous bride!
With eager arms Lautaro snatched his boy,
And kissed him in an agony of joy;
Then to Anselmo gave, who strove to speak,
And felt the tear first burning on his cheek:
The infant held his neck with strict embrace,
And kissed his pale emaciated face.
From the dread scene, wet with Valdivia's gore,
His wan and trembling charge Lautaro bore.
There was a bank, where slept the summer-light,
A small stream whispering went in mazes bright,
And stealing from the sea, the western wind
Waved the magnolias on the slope inclined:
The woodpecker, in glittering plumage green,
And echoing bill, beneath the boughs was seen;
And, arched with gay and pendent flowers above,
The floripondio its rich trellis wove.
Lautaro bent, with looks of love and joy,
O'er his yet trembling wife and beauteous boy:
Oh, by what miracle, beloved! say,
Hast thou escaped the perils of the way
From Lima, where our humble dwelling stood,
To these tumultuous scenes, this vale of blood?
Roused by his voice, as from the sleep of death,
Faint she replied, with slow-recovering breath,
Who shall express, when thou, best friend! wert gone,
How sunk my heart!--deserted and alone!
Would I were with thee! oft I sat and sighed,
When the pale moon shone on the silent tide--
At length resolved, I sought thee o'er the seas:
The brave bark cheer'ly went before the breeze,
That arms and soldiers to Valdivia bore,
From Lima bound to Chili's southern shore:
I seized the fair occasion--ocean smiled,
As to the sire I bore his lisping child.
The storm arose: with loud and sudden shock
The vessel sunk, disparting on a rock.
Some mariners, amidst the billows wild,
Scarce saved, in one small boat, me and my child.
What I have borne, a captive since that day--
Forgive these tears--I scarce have heart to say!
None pitied, save one gentle Indian maid--
A wild maid--of her looks I was afraid;
Her long black hair upon her shoulders fell,
And in her hand she bore a wreathed shell.
Lautaro for a moment turned aside,
And, Oh, my sister! with faint voice he cried.
Already free from sorrow and alarms,
I clasped in thought a husband in my arms,
When a dark warrior, stationed on the height,
Who held his solitary watch by night,
Before me stood, and lifting high his lance,
Exclaimed: No further, on thy life, advance!
Faint, wearied, sinking to the earth with dread,
Back to the dismal cave my steps he led.
Only at eve, within the craggy cleft,
Some water, and a cake of maize, were left.
The thirteenth sun unseen went down the sky;
When morning came, they brought me forth to die;
But hushed be every sigh, each boding fear,
Since all I sought on earth, and all I love, is here!
Her infant raised his hands, with glistening eye,
To reach a large and radiant butterfly,
That fluttered near his face; with looks of love,
And truth and tenderness, Lautaro strove
To calm her wounded heart; the holy sire,
His eyes faint-lighted with a transient fire,
Hung o'er them, and to Heaven his prayer addressed,
While, with uplifted hands, he wept and blest.
An aged Indian came, with feathers crowned,
And knelt before Lautaro on the ground.
What tidings, Indian?

INDIAN.

When I led thy sire,
Whom late thou saw'st upon his shield expire,
Son of our Ulmen, didst thou mark no trace,
In these sad looks, of a remembered face?
Dost thou remember Izdabel? Look here!
It is thy father's hatchet and his spear.
Friend of my infant days, how I rejoice,
Lautaro cried, once more to hear that voice!
Life like a dream, since last we met, has fled--
Oh, my beloved sister, thou art dead!

INDIAN.

I come to guide thee through untrodden ways,
To the lone valley, where thy father's days
Were passed; where every cave and every tree,
From morn to morn, reminded him of thee!
Lautaro cried: Here, faithful Indian, stay;
I have a last sad duty yet to pay.
A little while we part:--thou here remain.
He spake, and passed like lightning o'er the plain.
Ah, cease, Castilian maid, thy vain alarms!
See where he comes--his father in his arms!
Now lead, he cried. The Indian, sad and still,
Paced on from wood to vale, from vale to hill;
Her infant tired, and hushed a while to rest,
Smiled, in a dream, upon its mother's breast;
The pensive mother gray Anselmo led;
Behind, Lautaro bore his father dead.
Beneath the branching palms they slept at night;
The small birds waked them ere the morning light.
Before their path, in distant view, appeared
The mountain-smoke, that its dark column reared
O'er Andes' summits, in the pale blue sky,
Lifting their icy pinnacles so high.
Four days they onward held their eastern way;
On the fifth rising morn, before them lay
Chillan's lone glen, amid whose windings green,
The Warrior's loved and last abode was seen.
No smoke went up, a stillness reigned around,
Save where the waters fell with soothing sound,
Save where the Thenca sang so loud and clear,
And the bright humming-bird was spinning near.
Yet here all human tumults seemed to cease,
And sunshine rested on the spot of peace;
The myrtles bloomed as fragrant and as green
As if Lautaro scarce had left the scene;
And in his ear the falling waters' spray
Seemed swelling with the sounds of yesterday.
Where yonder rock the aged cedars shade,
There shall my father's bones in peace be laid.
Beneath the cedar's shade they dug the ground;
The small and sad communion gathered round.
Beside the grave stood aged Izdabel,
And broke the spear, and cried: Farewell, farewell!
Lautaro hid his face, and sighed Adieu!
As the stone hatchet in the grave he threw.
The little child that to its mother clung,
Stretched out its arm, then on her garment hung,
With sidelong looks, half-shrinking, half-amazed,
And dropped its flowers, unconscious, as it gazed.
And now Anselmo, his pale brow inclined,
The honoured relics, dust to dust, consigned
With Christian rites, and sung, on bending knee,
'Eternam pacem dona, Domine.'
Then rising up he closed the holy book;
And lifting in the beam his lighted look,
(The cross, with meekness, folded on his breast),
Here, too, he cried, my bones in peace shall rest!
Few years remain to me, and never more
Shall I behold, O Spain! thy distant shore!
Here lay my bones, that the same tree may wave
O'er the poor Christian's and the Indian's grave.
Oh, may it (when the sons of future days
Shall hear our tale and on the hillock gaze),
Oh, may it teach, that charity should bind,
Where'er they roam, the brothers of mankind!
The time shall come, when wildest tribes shall hear
Thy voice, O Christ! and drop the slaughtering spear.
Yet we condemn not him who bravely stood,
To seal his country's freedom with his blood;
And if, in after-times, a ruthless band
Of fell invaders sweep my native land,
May she, by Chili's stern example led,
Hurl back his thunder on the assailant's head;
Sustained by Freedom, strike the avenging blow,
And learn one virtue from her ancient foe!

Oh for a view, as from that cloudless height
Where the great Patriarch gazed upon the world,
His offspring's future seat, back on the vale
Of years departed! We might then behold
Thebes, from her sleep of ages, awful rise,
Like an imperial shadow, from the Nile,
To airy harpings; and with lifted torch
Scatter the darkness through the labyrinths
Of death, where rest her kings, without a name,
And light the winding caves and pyramids
In the long night of years! We might behold
Edom, in towery strength, majestic rise,
And awe the Erithraean, to the plains
Where Migdol frowned, and Baal-zephon stood,
Before whose naval shrine the Memphian host
And Pharaoh's pomp were shattered! As her fleets
From Ezion went seaward, to the sound
Of shouts and brazen trumpets, we might say,
How glorious, Edom, in thy ships art thou,
And mighty as the rushing winds!
But night
Is on the mournful scene: a voice is heard,
As of the dead, from hollow sepulchres,
And echoing caverns of the Nile--So pass
The shades of mortal glory! One pure ray
From Sinai bursts (where God of old revealed
His glory, through the darkness terrible
That sat on the dread Mount), and we descry
Thy sons, O Noah! peopling wide the scene,
From Shinar's plain to Egypt.
Let the song
Reveal, who first 'went down to the great sea
In ships,' and braved the stormy element.
THE SONS OF CUSH. Still fearful of the FLOOD,
They on the marble range and cloudy heights
Of that vast mountain barrier,--which uprises
High o'er the Red Sea coast, and stretches on
With the sea-line of Afric's southern bounds
To Sofala,--delved in the granite mass
Their dark abode, spreading from rock to rock
Their subterranean cities, whilst they heard,
Secure, the rains of vexed Orion rush.
Emboldened they descend, and now their fanes
On Egypt's champaign darken, whilst the noise
Of caravans is heard, and pyramids
In the pale distance gleam. Imperial THEBES
Starts, like a giant, from the dust; as when
Some dread enchanter waves his wand, and towers
And palaces far in the sandy wilds
Spring up: and still, her sphinxes, huge and high,
Her marble wrecks colossal, seem to speak
The work of some great arm invisible,
Surpassing human strength; while toiling Time,
That sways his desolating scythe so vast,
And weary havoc murmuring at his side,
Smite them in vain. Heard ye the mystic song
Resounding from her caverns as of yore?
Sing to Osiris, for his ark
No more in night profound
Of ocean, fathomless and dark,
Typhon has sunk! Aloud the sistrums ring--
Osiris!--to our god Osiris sing!--
And let the midnight shore to rites of joy resound!
Thee, great restorer of the world, the song
Darkly described, and that mysterious shrine
That bore thee o'er the desolate abyss,
When the earth sank with all its noise!
So taught,
The borderers of the Erithraean launch'd
Their barks, and to the shores of Araby
First their brief voyage stretched, and thence returned
With aromatic gums, or spicy wealth
Of India. Prouder triumphs yet await,
For lo! where Ophir's gold unburied shines
New to the sun; but perilous the way,
O'er Ariana's spectred wilderness,
Where ev'n the patient camel scarce endures
The long, long solitude of rocks and sands,
Parched, faint, and sinking, in his mid-day course.
But see! upon the shore great Ammon stands--
Be the deep opened! At his voice the deep
Is opened; and the shading ships that ride
With statelier masts and ampler hulls the seas,
Have passed the Straits, and left the rocks and GATES
OF DEATH. Where Asia's cape the autumnal surge
Throws blackening back, beneath a hollow cove,
Awhile the mariners their fearful course
Ponder, ere yet they tempt the further deep;
Then plunged into the sullen main, they cast
The youthful victim, to the dismal gods
Devoted, whilst the smoke of sacrifice
Slowly ascends:
Hear, King of Ocean! hear,
Dark phantom! whether in thy secret cave
Thou sittest, where the deeps are fathomless,
Nor hear'st the waters hum, though all above
Is uproar loud; or on the widest waste,
Far from all land, mov'st in the noontide sun,
With dread and lonely shadow; or on high
Dost ride upon the whirling spires, and fume
Of that enormous volume, that ascends
Black to the skies, and with the thunder's roar
Bursts, while the waves far on are still: Oh, hear,
Dread power, and save! lest hidden eddies whirl
The helpless vessels down,--down to the deeps
Of night, where thou, O Father of the Storm,
Dost sleep; or thy vast stature might appear
High o'er the flashing waves, and (as thy beard
Streamed to the cloudy winds) pass o'er their track,
And they are seen no more; or monster-birds
Darkening, with pennons lank, the morn, might bear
The victims to some desert rock, and leave
Their scattered bones to whiten in the winds!
The Ocean-gods, with sacrifice appeased,
Propitious smile; the thunder's roar has ceased,
Smooth and in silence o'er the azure realm
The tall ships glide along; for the South-West
Cheerly and steady blows, and the blue seas
Beneath the shadow sparkle; on they speed,
The long coast varies as they pass from cove
To sheltering cove, the long coast winds away;
Till now emboldened by the unvarying gale,
Still urging to the East, the sailors deem
Some god inviting swells their willing sails,
Or Destiny's fleet dragons through the surge
Cut their mid-way, yoked to the beaked prows
Unseen!
Night after night the heavens' still cope,
That glows with stars, they watch, till morning bears
Airs of sweet fragrance o'er the yellow tide:
Then Malabar her green declivities
Hangs beauteous, beaming to the eye afar
Like scenes of pictured bliss, the shadowy land
Of soft enchantment. Now Salmala's peak
Shines high in air, and Ceylon's dark green woods
Beneath are spread; while, as the strangers wind
Along the curving shores, sounds of delight
Are heard; and birds of richest plumage, red
And yellow, glance along the shades; or fly
With morning twitter, circling o'er the mast,
As singing welcome to the weary crew.
Here rest, till westering gales again invite.
Then o'er the line of level seas glide on,
As the green deities of ocean guide,
Till Ophir's distant hills spring from the main,
And their long labours cease.

Hence Asia slow
Her length unwinds; and Siam and Ceylon
Through wider channels pour their gems and gold
To swell the pomp of Egypt's kings, or deck
With new magnificence the rising dome
Of Palestine's imperial lord.
His wants
To satisfy; 'with comelier draperies'
To clothe his shivering form; to bid his arm
Burst, like the Patagonian's, the vain cords
That bound his untried strength; to nurse the flame
Of wider heart-ennobling sympathies;--
For this young Commerce roused the energies
Of man; else rolling back, stagnant and foul,
Like the GREAT ELEMENT on which his ships
Go forth, without the currents, winds, and tides
That swell it, as with awful life, and keep
From rank putrescence the long-moving mass:
And He, the sovereign Maker of the world,
So to excite man's high activities,
Bad various climes their various produce pour.
On Asia's plain mark where the cotton-tree
Hangs elegant its golden gems; the date
Sits purpling the soft lucid haze, that lights
The still, pale, sultry landscape; breathing sweet
Along old Ocean's billowy marge, the eve
Bears spicy fragrance far; the bread-fruit shades
The southern isles; and gems, and richest ore,
Lurk in the caverned mountains of the west.
With ampler shade the northern oak uplifts
His strength, itself a forest, and descends
Proud to the world of waves, to bear afar
The wealth collected, on the swelling tides,
To every land:--Where nature seems to mourn
Her rugged outcast rocks, there Enterprise
Leaps up; he gazes, like a god, around;
He sees on other plains rich harvests wave;
He marks far off the diamond blaze; he burns
To reach the glittering prize; he looks; he speaks;
The pines of Lebanon fall at his voice;
He rears the towering mast: o'er the long main
He wanders, and becomes, himself though poor,
The sovereign of the globe!
So Sidon rose;
And Tyre, yet prouder o'er the subject waves,--
When in his manlier might the Ammonian spread
Beyond Philistia to the Syrian sands,--
Crowned on her rocky citadel, beheld
The treasures of all lands poured at her feet.
Her daring prows the inland main disclosed;
Freedom and Glory, Eloquence, and Arts,
Follow their track, upspringing where they passed;
Till, lo! another Thebes, an ATHENS springs,
From the AEgean shores, and airs are heard,
As of no mortal melody, from isles
That strew the deep around! On to the STRAITS
Where tower the brazen pillars to the clouds,
Her vessels ride. But what a shivering dread
Quelled their bold hopes, when on their watch by night
The mariners first saw the distant flames
Of AEtna, and its red portentous glare
Streaking the midnight waste! 'Tis not thy lamp,
Astarte, hung in the dun vault of night,
To guide the wanderers of the main! Aghast
They eye the fiery cope, and wait the dawn.
Huge pitchy clouds upshoot, and bursting fires
Flash through the horrid volume as it mounts;
Voices are heard, and thunders muttering deep.
Haste, snatch the oars, fly o'er the glimmering surge--
Fly far--already louder thunders roll,
And more terrific flames arise! Oh, spare,
Dread Power! for sure some deity abides
Deep in the central earth, amidst the reek
Of sacrifice and blue sulphureous fume
Involved. Perhaps the living Moloch there
Rules in his horrid empire, amid flames,
Thunders, and blackening volumes, that ascend
And wrap his burning throne!
So was their path,
To those who first the cheerless ocean roamed,
Darkened with dread and peril. Scylla here,
And fell Charybdis, on their whirling gulph
Sit, like the sisters of Despair, and howl,
As the devoted ship, dashed on the crags,
Goes down: and oft the neighbour shores are strewn
With bones of strangers sacrificed, whose bark
Has foundered nigh, where the red watch-tower glares
Through darkness. Hence mysterious dread, and tales
Of Polyphemus and his monstrous rout;
And warbling syrens on the fatal shores
Of soft Parthenope. Yet oft the sound
Of sea-conch through the night from some rude rock
Is heard, to warn the wandering passenger
Of fiends that lurk for blood!
These dangers past,
The sea puts on new beauties: Italy,
Beneath the blue soft sky beaming afar,
Opens her azure bays; Liguria's gulph
Is past; the Baetic rocks, and ramparts high,
That CLOSE THE WORLD, appear. The dashing bark
Bursts through the fearful frith: Ah! all is now
One boundless billowy waste; the huge-heaved wave
Beneath the keel turns more intensely blue;
And vaster rolls the surge, that sweeps the shores
Of Cerne, and the green Hesperides,
And long-renowned Atlantis, whether sunk
Now to the bottom of the 'monstrous world;'
Or was it but a shadow of the mind,
Vapoury and baseless, like the distant clouds
That seem the promise of an unknown land
To the pale-eyed and wasted mariner,
Cold on the rocking mast. The pilot plies,
Now tossed upon Bayonna's mountain-surge,
High to the north his way; when, lo! the cliffs
Of Albion, o'er the sea-line rising calm
And white, and Marazion's woody mount
Lifting its dark romantic point between.
So did thy ships to Earth's wide bounds proceed,
O Tyre! and thou wert rich and beautiful
In that thy day of glory. Carthage rose,
Thy daughter, and the rival of thy fame,
Upon the sands of Lybia; princes were
Thy merchants; on thy golden throne thy state
Shone, like the orient sun. Dark Lebanon
Waved all his pines for thee; for thee the oaks
Of Bashan towered in strength: thy galleys cut,
Glittering, the sunny surge; thy mariners,
On ivory benches, furled th' embroidered sails,
That looms of Egypt wove, or to the oars,
That measuring dipped, their choral sea-songs sung;
The multitude of isles did shout for thee,
And cast their emeralds at thy feet, and said--
Queen of the Waters, who is like to thee!
So wert thou glorious on the seas, and said'st,
_I am a God_, and there is none like me.
But the dread voice prophetic is gone forth:--
Howl, for the whirlwind of the desert comes!
Howl ye again, for Tyre, her multitude
Of sins and dark abominations cry
Against her, saith the LORD; in the mid seas
Her beauty shall be broken; I will bring
Her pride to ashes; she shall be no more,
The distant isles shall tremble at the sound
When thou dost fall; the princes of the sea
Shall from their thrones come down, and cast away
Their gorgeous robes; for thee they shall take up
A bitter lamentation, and shall say--
How art thou fallen, renowned city! THOU,
Who wert enthroned glorious on the seas,
To rise no more!
So visible, O GOD,
Is thy dread hand in all the earth! Where Tyre
In gold and purple glittered o'er the scene,
Now the poor fisher dries his net, nor thinks
How great, how rich, how glorious, once she rose!
Meantime the furthest isle, cold and obscure,
Whose painted natives roamed their woody wilds,
From all the world cut off, that wondering marked
Her stately sails approach, now in her turn
Rises a star of glory in the West--
Albion, the wonder of the illumined world!
See there a Newton wing the highest heavens;
See there a Herschell's daring hand withdraw
The luminous pavilion, and the throne
Of the bright SUN reveal; there hear the voice
Of holy truth amid her cloistered fane,
As the clear anthem swells; see Taste adorn
Her palaces; and Painting's fervid touch,
That bids the canvas breathe; hear angel-strains,
When Handel, or melodious Purcell, pours
His sweetest harmonies; see Poesy
Open her vales romantic, and the scenes
Where Fancy, an enraptured votary, roves
At eve; and hark! 'twas Shakspeare's voice! he sits
Upon a high and charmed rock alone,
And, like the genius of the mountain, gives
The rapt song to the winds; whilst Pity weeps,
Or Terror shudders at the changeful tones,
As when his Ariel soothes the storm! Then pause,
For the wild billows answer--Lycidas
Is dead, young Lycidas, dead ere his prime,
Whelmed in the deep, beyond the Orcades,
Or where the 'vision of the guarded Mount,
BELERUS holds.'
Nor skies, nor earth, confine
The march of England's glory; on she speeds--
The unknown barriers of the utmost deep
Her prow has burst, where the dread genius slept
For ages undisturbed, save when he walked
Amid the darkness of the storm! Her fleet
Even now along the East rides terrible,
Where early-rising commerce cheered the scene!
Heard ye the thunders of her vengeance roll,
As Nelson, through the battle's dark-red haze
Aloft upon the burning prow directs,
Where the dread hurricane, with sulphureous flash,
Shall burst unquenchable, while from the grave
Osiris ampler seems to rise? Where thou,
O Tyre! didst awe the subject seas of yore,
Acre even now, and ancient Carmel, hears
The cry of conquest. 'Mid the fire and smoke
Of the war-shaken citadel, with eye
Of temper'd flame, yet resolute command,
His brave sword beaming, and his cheering voice
Heard 'mid the onset's cries, his dark-brown hair
Spread on his fearless forehead, and his hand
Pointing to Gallia's baffled chief, behold
The British Hero stand! Why beats my heart
With kindred animation? The warm tear
Of patriot triumph fills mine eye. I strike
A louder strain unconscious, while the harp
Swells to the bold involuntary song.

I.

Fly, SON OF TERROR, fly!
Back o'er the burning desert he is fled!
In heaps the gory dead
And livid in the trenches lie!
His dazzling files no more
Flash on the Syrian sands,
As when from Egypt's ravaged shore,
Aloft their gleamy falchions swinging,
Aloud their victor paeans singing,
Their onward way the Gallic legions took.
Despair, dismay, are on his altered look,
Yet hate indignant lowers;
Whilst high on Acre's granite towers
The shade of English Richard seems to stand;
And frowning far, in dusky rows,
A thousand archers draw their bows!
They join the triumph of the British band,
And the rent watch-tower echoes to the cry,
Heard o'er the rolling surge--They fly, they fly!

II.

Now the hostile fires decline,
Now through the smoke's deep volumes shine;
Now above the bastions gray
The clouds of battle roll away;
Where, with calm, yet glowing mien,
Britain's victorious youth is seen!
He lifts his eye,
His country's ensigns wave through smoke on high,
Whilst the long-mingled shout is heard--They fly, they fly!

III.

Hoary CARMEL, witness thou,
And lift in conscious pride thy brow;
As when upon thy cloudy plain
BAAL'S PROPHETS cried in vain!
They gashed their flesh, and leaped, and cried,
From morn till lingering even-tide.
Then stern ELIJAH on his foes
Strong in the might of Heaven arose!--
On CARMEL'S top he stood,
And while the blackening clouds and rain
Came sounding from the Western main,
Raised his right hand that dropped with impious blood.
ANCIENT KISHON prouder swell,
On whose banks they bowed, they fell,
The mighty ones of yore, when, pale with dread,
Inglorious SISERA fled!
So let them perish, Holy LORD,
Who for OPPRESSION lift the sword;
But let all those who, armed for freedom, fight,
'Be as the sun who goes forth in his might.'

Come,--for the sun yet hangs above the bay,--
And whilst our time may brook a brief delay
With other thoughts, and, haply with a tear,
An old man's tale of sorrow thou shalt hear.
I wished not to reveal it;--thoughts that dwell
Deep in the lonely bosom's inmost cell
Unnoticed, and unknown, too painful wake,
And, like a tempest, the dark spirit shake,
When, starting from our slumberous apathy,
We gaze upon the scenes of days gone by.
Yet, if a moment's irritating flush,
Darkens thy cheek, as thoughts conflicting rush,
When I disclose my hidden griefs, the tale
May more than wisdom or reproof prevail.
Oh, may it teach thee, till all trials cease,
To hold thy course, though sorrowing, yet in peace;
Still looking up to Him, the soul's best stay,
Who Faith and Hope shall crown, when worlds are swept away!
Where fair Seville's Morisco turrets gleam
On Guadilquiver's gently-stealing stream;
Whose silent waters, seaward as they glide,
Reflect the wild-rose thickets on its side,
My youth was passed. Oh, days for ever gone!
How touched with Heaven's own light your mornings shone
Even now, when lonely and forlorn I bend,
My weary journey hastening to its end,
A drooping exile on a distant shore,
I mourn the hours of youth that are no more.
The tender thought amid my prayers has part,
And steals, at times, from Heaven my aged heart.
Forgive the cause, O God!--forgive the tear,
That flows, even now, o'er Leonora's bier;
For, 'midst the innocent and lovely, none
More beautiful than Leonora shone.
As by her widowed mother's side she knelt,
A sad and sacred sympathy I felt.
At Easter-tide, when the high mass was sung,
And, fuming high, the silver censer swung;
When rich-hued windows, from the arches' height,
Poured o'er the shrines a soft and yellow light;
From aisle to aisle, amid the service clear,
When 'Adoremus' swelled upon the ear.
(Such as to Heaven thy rapt attention drew
First in the Christian churches of Peru),
She seemed, methought, some spirit of the sky,
Descending to that holy harmony.
But wherefore tell, when life and hope were new,
How by degrees the soul's first passion grew!
I loved her, and I won her virgin heart;
But fortune whispered, we a while must part.
The minster tolled the middle hour of night,
When, waked to agony and wild affright,
I heard those words, words of appalling dread--
'The Holy Inquisition!'--from the bed
I started; snatched my dagger, and my cloak--
Who dare accuse me!--none, in answer, spoke.
The demons seized, in silence, on their prey,
And tore me from my dreams of bliss away.
How frightful was their silence, and their shade,
In torch-light, as their victim they conveyed,
By dark-inscribed, and massy-windowed walls,
Through the dim twilight of terrific halls;
(For thou hast heard me speak of that foul stain
Of pure religion, and the rights of Spain
Whilst the high windows shook to night's cold blast,
And echoed to the foot-fall as we passed!
They left me, faint and breathless with affright,
In a cold cell, to solitude and night;
Oh! think, what horror through the heart must thrill
When the last bolt was barred, and all at once was still!
Nor day nor night was here, but a deep gloom,
Sadder than darkness, wrapped the living tomb.
Some bread and water, nature to sustain,
Duly was brought when eve returned again;
And thus I knew, hoping it were the last,
Another day of lingering life was passed.
Five years immured in that deep den of night,
I never saw the sweet sun's blessed light.
Once as the grate, with sullen sound, was barred,
And to the bolts the inmost cavern jarred,
Methought I heard, as clanged the iron door,
A dull and hollow echo from the floor;
I stamped; the vault, and winding caves around,
Returned a long and melancholy sound.
With patient toil I raised a massy stone,
And looked into a depth of shade unknown;
The murky twilight of the lurid place
Helped me, at length, a secret way to trace:
I entered; step by step explored the road,
In darkness, from my desolate abode;
Till, winding through long passages of night,
I saw, at distance, a dim streak of light:--
It was the sun--the bright, the blessed beam
Of day! I knelt--I wept;--the glittering stream
Rolled on beneath me, as I left the cave,
Concealed in woods above the winding wave.
I rested on a verdant bank a while,
I saw around the summer landscape smile;
I gained a peasant's hut; nor dared to leave,
Till, with slow step, advanced the glimmering eve.
Remembering still affection's fondest hours,
I turned my footsteps to the city towers;
In pilgrim's dress, I traced the streets unknown:
No light in Leonora's lattice shone.
The morning came; the busy tumult swells;
Knolling to church, I heard the minster bells;
Involuntary to that scene I strayed,
Disguised, where first I saw my faithful maid.
I saw her, pallid, at the altar stand,
And yield, half-shrinking, her reluctant hand;
She turned her head; she saw my hollow eyes,
And knew me, wasted, wan, in my disguise;
She shrieked, and fell;--breathless, I left the fane
In agony--nor saw her form again;
And from that day her voice, her look were given,
Her name, her memory, to the winds of heaven.
Far off I bent my melancholy way,
Heart-sick and faint, and, in this gown of gray,
From every human eye my sorrows hid,
Unknown, amidst the tumult of Madrid.
Grief in my heart, despair upon my look,
With no companion save my beads and book,
My morsel with Affliction's sons to share,
To tend the sick and poor, my only care,
Forgotten, thus I lived; till day by day
Had worn nigh thirteen years of grief away.
One winter's night, when I had closed my cell,
And bid the labours of the day farewell,
An aged crone approached, with panting breath,
And bade me hasten to the house of death.
I came. With moving lips intent to pray,
A dying woman on a pallet lay;
Her lifted hands were wasted to the bone,
And ghastly on her look the lamp-light shone;
Beside the bed a pious daughter stands
Silent, and, weeping, kisses her pale hands.
Feebly she spoke, and raised her languid head,
Forgive, forgive!--they told me he was dead!--
But in the sunshine of that dreadful day,
That gave me to another's arms away,
I saw him, like a ghost, with deadly stare;
I saw his wasted eye-balls' ghastly glare;
I saw his lips (oh, hide them, God of love!)
I saw his livid lips, half-muttering, move,
To curse the maid--forgetful of her vow:--
Perhaps he lives to curse--to curse me now!
He lives to bless! I cried; and, drawing nigh,
Held up the crucifix; her heavy eye
She raised, and scarce pronounced--Does he yet live?
Can he his lost, his dying child forgive?
Will God forgive--the Lord who bled--will He?--
Ah, no, there is no mercy left for me!
Words were but vain, and colours all too faint,
That awful moment of despair to paint.
She knew me; her exhausted breath, with pain,
Drawing, she pressed my hand, and spoke again:
By a false guardian's cruel wiles deceived,
The tale of fraudful falsehood I believed,
And thought thee dead; he gave the stern command,
And bade me take the rich Antonio's hand.
I knelt, implored, embraced my guardian's knees;
Ruthless inquisitor, he held the keys
Of the dark torture-house. Trembling for life,
Yes, I became a sad, heart-broken wife!
Yet curse me not; of every human care
Already my full heart has had its share:
Abandoned, left in youth to want and woe,
Oh! let these tears, that agonising flow,
Witness how deep ev'n now my heart is rent!
Yet one is lovely--one is innocent!
Protect, protect, (and faint in death she smiled)
When I am dead, protect my orphan child!
The dreadful prison, that so long detained
My wasting life, her dying words explained.
The wretched priest, who wounded me by stealth,
Bartered her love, her innocence for wealth!
I laid her bones in earth; the chanted hymn
Echoed along the hollow cloister dim;
I heard, far off, the bell funereal toll,
And sorrowing said: Now peace be with her soul!
Far o'er the Western Ocean I conveyed,
And Indiana called the orphan maid;
Beneath my eye she grew, and, day by day,
Seemed, grateful, every kindness to repay.
Renouncing Spain, her cruelties and crimes,
Amid untutored tribes, in distant climes,
'Twas mine to spread the light of truth, or save
From stripes and torture the poor Indian slave.
I saw thee, young and innocent, alone,
Cast on the mercies of a race unknown;
I saw, in dark adversity's cold hour,
Thy virtues blooming, like a winter's flower;
From chains and slavery I redeemed thy youth,
Poured on thy mental sight the beams of truth;
By thy warm heart and mild demeanour won,
Called thee my other child--my age's son.
I need not tell the sequel;--not unmoved
Poor Indiana heard thy tale, and loved;
Some sympathy a kindred fate might claim;
Your years, your fortunes, and your friend the same;
Both early of a parent's care bereft,
Both strangers in a world of sadness left;
I marked each slowly-struggling thought; I shed
A tear of love paternal on each head;
And, while I saw her timid eyes incline,
Blessed the affection that had made her thine!
Here let the murmurs of despondence cease:
There is a God--believe--and part in peace!
Rich hues illumed the track of dying day
As the great sun sank in the western bay,
And only its last light yet lingering shone,
Upon the highest palm-tree's feathery cone;
When at a distance on the dewy plain,
In mingled group appeared an Indian train;
Men, women, children, round Anselmo press,
Farewell! they cried. He raised his hand to bless,
And said: My children, may the God above
Still lead you in the paths of peace and love;
To-morrow, we must part;--when I am gone,
Raise on this spot a cross, and place a stone,
That tribes unborn may some memorial have,
When I far off am mouldering in the grave,
Of that poor messenger, who tidings bore
Of Gospel-mercy to your distant shore.
The crowd retired; along the twilight gray,
The condor kept its solitary way,
The fire-flies shone, when to the hermit's cell
Who hastens but the minstrel Zarinel!
In foreign lands, far from his native home,
'Twas his, a gay, romantic youth, to roam,
With a light cittern o'er his shoulders slung,
Where'er he passed he played, and loved, and sung;
And thus accomplished, late had joined the train
Of gallant soldiers on the southern plain.
Father, he cried, uncertain of the fate
That may to-morrow's toilsome march await,
For long will be the road, I would confess
Some secret thoughts that on my bosom press.
They are of one I left, an Indian maid,
Whose trusting love my careless heart betrayed.
Say, may I speak?
Say on, the father cried,
Nor be to penitence all hope denied.
Then hear, Anselmo! From a very child
I loved all fancies marvellous and wild;
I turned from truth, to listen to the lore
Of many an old and fabling troubadour.
Thus, with impassioned heart, and wayward mind,
To dreams and shapes of shadowy things resigned,
I left my native vales and village home,
Wide o'er the world a minstrel boy to roam.
I never shall forget the day, the hour,
When, all my soul resigned to Fancy's power,
First, from the snowy Pyrenees, I cast
My labouring vision o'er the landscape vast,
And saw beneath my feet long vapours float,
Streams, mountains, woods, and ocean's mist remote.
There once I met a soldier, poor and old,
Who tales of Cortes and Bilboa told,
And this new world; he spoke of Indian maids,
Rivers like seas, and forests whose deep shades
Had never yet been pierced by morning ray,
And how the green bird mocked, and talked all day.
Imagination thus, in colours new,
This distant world presented to my view;
Young, and enchanted with the fancied scene,
I crossed the toiling seas that roared between,
And with ideal images impressed,
Stood on these unknown shores a wondering guest.
Still to romantic phantasies resigned,
I left Callao's crowded port behind,
And climbed the mountains which their shadow threw
Upon the lessening summits of Peru.
Some sheep the armed peasants drove before,
That all our food through the wild passes bore,
Had wandered in the frost-smoke of the morn,
Far from the track; I blew the signal horn--
But echo only answered: 'mid the snows,
Wildered and lost, I saw the evening close.
The sun was setting in the crimson west;
In all the earth I had no home of rest;
The last sad light upon the ice-hills shone;
I seemed forsaken in a world unknown;
How did my cold and sinking heart rejoice,
When, hark! methought I heard a human voice!
It might be some wild Indian's roving troop,
Or the dread echo of their distant whoop;
Still it was human, and I seemed to find
Again some commerce with remote mankind.
The voice comes nearer, rising through the shade--
Is it the song of some rude mountain-maid?
And now I heard the tread of hastening feet,
And, in the western glen, a Llama bleat.
I listened--all is still; but hark! again
Near and more near is heard the welcome strain;
It is a wild maid's carolling, who seeks
Her wandering Llama 'midst the snowy peaks:
Truant, she cried, thy lurking place is found!
With languid touch I waked the cittern's sound,
And soon a maid, by the pale light, I saw
Gaze breathless with astonishment and awe:
What instant terrors to her fancy rose,
Ha! is it not the Spirit of the snows!
But when she saw me, weary, cold, and weak,
Stretch forth my hand (for now I could not speak),
She pitied, raised me from the snows, and led
My faltering footsteps to her father's shed;
The Llama followed with her tinkling bell;
The dwelling rose within a craggy dell,
O'erhung with icy summits. To be brief,
She was the daughter of an aged chief;
He, by her gentle voice to pity won,
Showed mercy, for himself had lost a son.
The father spoke not; by the pine-wood blaze,
The daughter stood, and turned a cake of maize;
And then, as sudden shone the light, I saw
Such features as no artist hand might draw.
Her form, her face, her symmetry, her air,
Father! thy age must such recital spare:--
She saved my life; and kindness, if not love,
Might sure in time the coldest bosom move!
Mine was not cold; she loved to hear me sing,
And sometimes touched with playful hand the string;
And when I waked some melancholy strain,
She wept, and smiled, and bade me sing again.
So many a happy day, in this deep glen,
Far from the noise of life, and sounds of men,
Was passed! Nay, father, the sad sequel hear:
'Twas now the leafy spring-time of the year--
Ambition called me: true, I knew to part
Would break her generous, warm, and trusting heart;
True, I had vowed, but now estranged and cold,
She saw my look, and shuddered to behold:--
She would go with me, leave the lonely glade
Where she grew up, but my stern voice forbade;
She hid her face and wept: Go then away,
(Father, methinks, ev'n now, I hear her say)
Go to thy distant land, forget this tear,
Forget these rocks, forget I once was dear;
Fly to the world, o'er the wide ocean fly,
And leave me unremembered here to die!
Yet to my father should I all relate,
Death, instant death, would be a traitor's fate!
Nor fear, nor pity moved my stubborn mind,
I left her sorrows and the scene behind;
I sought Valdivia on the southern plain,
And joined the careless military train;
Oh! ere I sleep, thus, lowly on my knee,
Father, I absolution crave from thee!
Anselmo spoke, with look and voice severe:
Yes, thoughtless youth, my absolution hear.
First, by deep penitence the wrong atone,
Then absolution ask from God alone!
Yet stay, and to my warning voice attend,
And hear me as a father, and a friend.
Let Truth severe be wayward Fancy's guide,
Let stern-eyed Conscience o'er each thought preside;
The passions, that on noblest natures prey,
Oh! cast them, like corroding bonds, away!
Disdain to act mean falsehood's coward part,
And let religion dignify thine art.
If, by thy bed, thou seest at midnight stand
Pale Conscience, pointing, with terrific hand,
To deeds of darkness done, whilst, like a corse,
To shake thy soul, uprises dire Remorse;
Fly to God's mercy, fly, ere yet too late--
Perhaps one hour marks thy eternal fate;
Let the warm tear of deep contrition flow,
The heart obdurate melt, like softening snow,
The last vain follies of thy youth deplore,
Then go, in secret weep, and sin no more!
The stars innumerous in their watches shone--
Anselmo knelt before the cross alone.
Ten thousand glowing orbs their pomp displayed,
Whilst, looking up, thus silently he prayed:--
Oh! how oppressive to the aching sense,
How fearful were this vast magnificence,
This prodigality of glory, spread
Above a poor and dying emmet's head,
That toiled his transient hour upon the shore
Of mortal life, and then was seen no more;
If man beheld, on his terrific throne,
A dark, cold, distant Deity, alone!
Felt no relating, no endearing tie,
That Hope might upwards raise her glistening eye,
And think, with deep unutterable bliss,
In yonder radiant realm my kingdom is!
More glorious than those orbs that silent roll,
Shines Heaven's redeeming mercy on the soul--
Oh, pure effulgence of unbounded love!
In Thee, I think--I feel--I live--I move;
Yet when, O Thou, whose name is Love and Light,
When will thy Dayspring on these realms of night
Arise! Oh! when shall severed nations raise
One hallelujah of triumphant praise,
Tibet on Fars, Andes on Atlas call,
And 'roll the loud hosannah' round the ball!
Soon may Thy kingdom come, that love, and peace,
And charity, may bid earth's chidings cease!
Meantime, in life or death, through good or ill,
Thy poor and feeble servant, I fulfil,
As best I may, Thy high and holy will,
Till, weary, on the world my eyelids close,
And I enjoy my long and last repose!

God said, Let there be light, and there was light!
At once the glorious sun, at his command,
From space illimitable, void and dark,
Sprang jubilant, and angel hierarchies,
Whose long hosannahs pealed from orb to orb,
Sang, Glory be to Thee, God of all worlds!
Then beautiful the ball of this terrene
Rolled in the beam of first-created day,
And all its elements obeyed the voice
Of Him, the great Creator; Air, and Fire,
And Earth, and Water, each its ministry
Performed, whilst Chaos from his ebon throne
Leaped up; and so magnificent, and decked,
And mantled in its ambient atmosphere,
The living world began its state!
To thee,
Spirit of Air, I lift the venturous song,
Whose viewless presence fills the living scene,
Whose element ten thousand thousand wings
Fan joyous; o'er whose fields the morning clouds
Ride high; whose rule the lightning-shafts obey,
And the deep thunder's long-careering march!
The Winds too are thy subjects; from the breeze,
That, like a child upon a holiday,
On the high mountain's van pursues the down
Of the gray thistle, ere the autumnal shower
Steals soft, and mars his pastime; to the King
Of Hurricanes, that sounds his mighty shell,
And bids Tornado sweep the Western world.
Sylph of the Summer Gale, on thee I call!
Oh, come, when now gay June is in her car,
Wafting the breath of roses as she moves;
Come to this garden bower, which I have hung
With tendrils, and the fragrant eglantine,
And mandrake, rich with many mantling stars!
'Tis pleasant, when thy breath is on the leaves
Without, to rest in this embowering shade,
And mark the green fly, circling to and fro,
O'er the still water, with his dragon wings,
Shooting from bank to bank, now in quick turns,
Then swift athwart, as is the gazer's glance,
Pursuing still his mate; they, with delight,
As if they moved in morris, to the sound
Harmonious of this ever-dripping rill,
Now in advance, now in retreat, now round,
Dart through their mazy rings, and seem to say:
The Summer and the Sun are ours!
But thou,
Sylph of the Summer Gale, delay a while
Thy airy flight, whilst here Francesca leans,
And, charmed by Ossian's harp, seems in the breeze
To hear Malvina's plaint; thou to her ear
Come unperceived, like music of the song
From Cona's vale of streams; _then_ with the bee,
That sounds his horn, busied from flower to flower,
Speed o'er the yellow meadows, breathing ripe
Their summer incense; or amid the furze,
That paints with bloom intense the upland crofts,
With momentary essence tinge thy wings;
Or in the grassy lanes, one after one,
Lift light the nodding foxglove's purple bell.
Thence, to the distant sea, and where the flag
Hangs idly down, without a wavy curl,
Thou hoverest o'er the topmast, or dost raise
The full and flowing mainsail: Steadily,
The helmsman cries, as now thy breath is heard
Among the stirring cordage o'er his head;
So, steadily, he cries, as right he steers,
Speeds our proud ship along the world of waves.
Sylph, may thy favouring breath more gently blow,
More gently round the temples and the cheek
Of him, who, leaving home and friends behind,
In silence musing o'er the ocean leans,
And watches every passing shade that marks
The southern Channel's fast-retiring line;
Then, as the ship rolls on, keeps a long look
Fixed on the lessening Lizard, the last point
Of that delightful country, where he left
All his fond hopes behind: it lessens still;
Still, still it lessens, and now disappears!
He turns, and only sees the waves that rock
Boundless. How many anxious morns shall rise,
How many moons shall light the farthest seas,
O'er what new scenes and regions shall he stray,
A weary man, still thinking of his home,
Ere he again that shore shall view, and greet
With blissful thronging hopes and starting tears,
Of heartfelt welcome, and of warmest love!
Perhaps, ah! never! So didst thou go forth,
My poor lost brother!
The airs of morning as enticing played,
And gently, round thee, and their whisperings
Might sooth (if aught could sooth) a boding heart;
For thou wert bound to visit scenes of death,
Where the sick gale (alas! unlike the breeze
That bore the gently-swelling sail along)
Was tainted with the breath of pestilence,
That smote the silent camp, and night and day
Sat mocking on the putrid carcases.
Thou too didst perish! As the south-west blows,
Thy bones, perhaps, now whiten on the coast
Of old Algarva. I, meantime, these shades
Of village solitude, hoping erewhile
To welcome thee from many a toil restored,
Still deck, and now thy empty urn alone
I meet, where, swaying in the summer gale,
The willow whispers in my evening walk.
Sylph, in thy airy robe, I see thee float,
A rainbow o'er thy head, and in thy hand
The magic instrument, that, as thy wing,
Lucid, and painted like the butterfly's,
Waves to and from, most musically rings;
Sometimes in joyance, as the flaunting leaf
Of the white poplar, sometimes sad and slow,
As bearing pensive airs from Pity's grave.
Soft child of air, thou tendest on his sway,
As gentle Ariel at the bidding hies
Of mighty Prospero; yet other winds
Throng to his wizard 'hest, inspiring some,
Some melancholy, and yet soothing much
The drooping wanderer in the fading copse;
Some terrible, with solitude and death
Attendant on their march:--the wild Simoom,
Riding on whirling spires of burning sand,
That move along the Nubian wilderness,
And bury deep the silent caravan;--
Monsoon, up-starting from his half-year sleep,
Upon the vernal shores of Hindostan,
And tempesting with sounds of torrent rain,
And hail, the darkening main;--and red Sameel,
Blasting and withering, like a rivelled leaf,
The pilgrim as he roams;--Sirocco sad,
That pants, all summer, on the cloudless shores
Of faint Parthenope;--deep in the mine
Oft lurks the lurid messenger of death,
The ghastly fiend that blows, when the pale light
Quivers, and leaves the gasping wretch to die;--
The imp, that when the hollow curfew knolls,
Wanders the misty marish, lighting it
At night with errant and fantastic flame.
Spirit of air, these are thy ministers,
That wait thy will; but thou art all in all,
And dead without thee were the flower, the leaf,
The waving forest rivelled, the great sea
Still, the lithe birds of heaven extinct, and ceased
The soul of melting music.
This fair scene
Lives in thy tender touch, for so it seems;
Whilst universal nature owns thy sway;
From the mute insect on the summer pool,
That with long cobweb legs, firm as on earth
The ostrich skims, flits idly to and fro,
Making no dimple on the watery mass;
To the huge grampus, spouting, as he rolls,
A cataract, amid the cold clear sky,
And furrowing far and wide the northern deep.
Thy presence permeates and fills the whole!
As the poor butterfly, that, painted gay,
With mealy wings, red, amber, white, or dropped
With golden stains, floats o'er the yellow corn,
Idly, as bent on pastime, while the morn
Smiles on his devious voyage; if inclosed
In the exhausted prison, whence thy breath
With suction slow is drawn, he feels the change
How dire! in palsied inanition drops!
Weak flags his weary wing, and weaker yet;
His frame with tremulous convulsion moves
A moment, and the next is still in death.
So were the great and glorious world itself;
The tenants of its continents, all ceased!
A wide, a motionless, a putrid waste,
Its seas! How droops the languid mariner,
When not a breath, along the sluggish main,
Strays on the sultry surface as it sleeps;
When far away the winds are flown, to dash
The congregated ocean on the Cape
Of Southern Africa, leaving the while
The flood's vast surface noiseless, waveless, white,
Beneath Mozambique's long-reflected woods,
A gleaming mirror, spread from east to west,
Where the still ship, as on a bed of glass,
Sits motionless. Awake, ye hurricanes!
Ye winds that harrow up the wintry waste,
Awake! for Thunder in his sounding car,
Flashing thick lightning from the rolling wheels,
And the red volley, charged with instant death,
Were music to this lingering, sickening calm,
The same eternal sunshine; still, all still,
Without a vapour, or a sound.
If thus,
Beneath the burning, breathless atmosphere,
Faint Nature sickening droop; who shall ascend
The height, where Silence, since the world began,
Has sat on Cimborazzo's highest peak,
A thousand toises o'er the cloud's career,
Soaring in finest ether? Far below,
He sees the mountains burning at his feet,
Whose smoke ne'er reached his forehead; never there,
Though the black whirlwind shake the distant shores,
The passing gale has murmured; never there
The eagle's cry has echoed; never there
The solitary condor's weary wing
Hath yet ascended!
Let the rising thought
Beyond the confines of this vapoury vault
Be lifted, to the boundless void of space,
How dread, how infinite! where other worlds,
Ten million and ten million leagues aloft,
In other precincts with their shadows roll.
There roams the sole erratic comet, borne
With lightning speed, yet twice three hundred years
Its destined course accomplishing.
Then whirled,
Far from the attractive orb of central fire,
Back through the dim and infinite abyss,
Dread flaming visitant, ere thou return'st,
Empires may rise and fail; the palaces,
That shone on earth, may vanish like the dews
Of morning, scarce illumined ere they fly.
Dread flaming visitant, who that pursues
Thy long and lonely voyage, ev'n in thought,
(Till thought itself seem in the effort lost,)
But tremblingly exclaims, There is a God:
There is a God who lights ten thousand suns,
Round which revolve worlds wheeling amid worlds.
He launched thy voyage through the vast abyss,
He hears his universe, through all its orbs,
As with one voice, proclaim,
There is a God!
Lifted above this dim diurnal sphere,
So fancy, rising with her theme, ascends,
And voyaging the illimitable void,
Where comets flame, sees other worlds and suns
Emerge, and on this earth, like a dim speck,
Looks down: nor in the wonderful and vast
Of the dread scene magnificent, she views
Alone the Almighty Ruler, but the web
That shines in summer time, and only seen
In the slant sunbeam, wakes a moral thought.
In autumn, when the thin long spider gains
The leafy bush's top, he from his seat
Shoots the soft filament, like threads of air,
Scarce seen, into the sky; and thus sustained,
Boldly ascends into the breezy void,
Dependent on the trembling line he wove,
Insidious, and intent on scenes of spoil
And death:--So mounts Ambition, and aloft
On his proud summit meditates new scenes
Of plunder and dominion, till the breeze
Of fortune change, that blows to empty air
His feeble, frail support, and once again
Leaves him a reptile, struggling in the dust!
But what the world itself, what in His view
Whose dread Omnipotence is over all!
A twinkling air-thread in the vast of space.
And what the works of that proud insect, Man!
His mausoleums, fanes, and pyramids,
Frown in the dusk of long-revolving years,
While generations, as they rise and drop,
Each following each to silence and to dust,
Point as they pass, and say, It was a God
That made them: but nor date, nor name
Oblivion shows; cloud only, rolling on,
And wrapping darker as it rolls, the works
Of man!
Now raised on Contemplation's wing,
The blue vault, fervent with unnumbered stars,
He ranges: speeds, as with an angel's flight,
From orb to orb; sees distant suns illume
The boundless space, then bends his head to earth,
So poor is all he knows!
O'er sanguine fields
Now rides he, armed and crested like the god
Of fabled battles; where he points, pale Death
Strides over weltering carcases; nor leaves,--
But still a horrid shadow, step by step,
Stalks mocking after him, till now the noise
Of rolling acclamation, and the shout
Of multitude on multitude, is past:
The scene of all his triumphs, wormy earth,
Closes upon his perishable pride;
For 'dust he is, and shall to dust return'!
But Conscience, a small voice from heaven replies,
Conscience shall meet him in another world.
Let man, then, walk meek, humble, pure, and just;
Though meek, yet dignified; though humble, raised,
The heir of life and immortality;
Conscious that in this awful world he stands,
He only of all living things, ordained
To think, and know, and feel, there is a God!
Child of the air, though most I love to hear
Thy gentle summons whisper, when the Spring,
At the first carol of the village lark,
Looks out and smiles, or June is in her car;
Not undelightful is the purer air
In winter, when the keen north-east is high,
When frost fantastic his cold garland weaves
Of brittle flowers, or soft-succeeding snows
Gather without apace, and heavy load
The berried sweetbrier, clinging to my pane.
The blackbird, then, that marks the ruddy pods
Peep through the snow, though silent is his song,
Yet, pressed by cold and hunger, ventures near.
The robin group, familiar, muster round
The garden-shed, where, at his dinner set,
The laboured hind strews here and there a crumb
From his brown bread; then heedless of the winds
That blow without, and sweep the shivered snow,
Sees from his broken tube the smoke ascend
On an inverted barrow, as in state
He sits, though poor, the monarch of the scene,
As pondering deep the garden's future state,
His kingdom; the rude instruments of death
Lie at his feet, fashioned with simple skill,
With which he hopes to snare the prowling race,
The mice, rapacious of his vernal hopes.
So seated, on the spring he ruminates,
And solemn as a sophi, moves nor hand,
Nor eye, till haply some more venturous bird,
(The crumbs exhausted that he lately strewed
Upon the groundsill,) with often dipping beak,
And sidelong look, as asking larger dole,
Comes hopping to his feet: and say, ye great,
Ye mighty monarchs of this earthly scene,
What nobler views can elevate the heart
Of a proud patriot king, than thus to chase
The bold rapacious spoilers from the field,
And with an eye of merciful regard
To look on humble worth, wet from the storm,
And chilled by indigence!
But thoughts like these
Ill suit the radiant summer's rosy prime,
And the still temper of the calm blue sky.
The sunny shower is past; at intervals
The silent glittering drops descend; and mark,
Upon the blue bank of yon western cloud,
That looms direct against the emerging orb,
How bright, how beautiful the rainbow's hues
Steal out, how stately bends the graceful arch
Above the hills, and tinging at his foot
The mead and trees! Fancy might think young Hope
Pants for the vision, and with ardent eye
Pursues the unreal shade, and spreads her hands,
Weeping to see it fade, as all her dreams
Have faded.
These, O Air! are but the toys,
That sometimes deck thy fairy element;
So oft the eye observant loves to trace
The colours, and the shadows, and the forms,
That wander o'er the veering atmosphere.
See, in the east, the rare parhelia shine
In mimic glory, and so seem to mock
(Fixed parallel to the ascending or
The majesty, the splendour, and the shape,
Of the sole luminary that informs
The world with light and heat! The halo-ring
Bends over all!
With desultory shafts,
And long and arrowy glance, the night-lights shoot
Pale coruscations o'er the northern sky;
Now lancing to the cope, in sheets of flame,
Now wavering wild, as the reflected wave,
On the arched roof of the umbrageous grot.
Hence Superstition dreams of armaments,
Of fiery conflicts, and of bleeding fields
Of slaughter; so on great Jerusalem,
Ere yet she fell, the flaming meteor glared;
A waving sword ensanguined seemed to point
To the devoted city, and a voice
Was heard, Depart, depart!
The atmosphere,
That with the ceaseless hurry of its clouds,
Encircles the round globe, resembles oft
The passing sunshine, or the glooms that stray
O'er every human spirit.
Thin light streaks
Of thought pass vapoury o'er the vacant mind,
And fade to nothing. Now fantastic gleams
Play, flashing or expiring, of gay hope,
Or deep despair; then clouds of sadness close
In one dark settled gloom, and all the man
Droops, in despondence lost.
Aerial tints
Please most the pensive poet: and the views
He forms, though evanescent, and as vain
As the air's mockery, seem to his eye
Ev'n as substantial images, and shapes,
Till in a hurrying rack they all dissolve.
So in the cloudless sky, amusive shines
The soft and mimic scenery; distant hills
That, in refracted light, hang beautiful
Beneath the golden car of eve, ere yet
The daylight lingering fades.
Hence, on the heights
Of Apennine, far stretching to the south,
The goat-herd, while the westering sun, far off,
Hangs o'er the hazy ocean's brim, beholds
In the horizon's faintly-glowing verge
A landscape, like the rainbow, rise, with rocks
That softened shine, and shores that trend away,
Beneath the winding woods of Sicily,
And Etna, smouldering in the still pale sky;
And dim Messina, with her spires, and bays
That wind among the mountains, and the tower
Of Faro, gleaming on the tranquil straits;
Unreal all, yet on the air impressed,
From light's refracted ray, the shadow seems
The certain scene: the hind astonished views,
Yet most delighted, till at once the light
Changes, and all has vanished!
But to him,
How different in still air the unreal view,
Who wanders in Arabian solitudes,
When, faint with thirst, he sees illusive streams
Shine in the arid desert!
All around,
A silent waste of dark gray sand is spread,
Like ashes; not a speck in heaven appears,
But the red sun, high in his burning noon,
Shoots down intolerable fire: no sound
Of beast, or blast, or moving insect, stirs
The horrid stillness. Oh! what hand will guide
The pilgrim, panting in the trackless dust,
To where the pure and sparkling fountain cheers
The green oasis. See, as now his lip
Hangs parched and quivering, see before him spread
The long and level lake!
He gazes; still
He gazes, till he drops upon the sands,
And to the vision stretches, as he faints,
His feeble hand.
Come, Sylph of Summer, come!
Return to these green pastures, that, remote
From fiery blasts, or deadly blistering frosts,
Beneath the temperate atmosphere rejoice!
A crown of flame, a javelin in his hand,
Like the red arrow that the lightning shoots
Through night, impetuous steeds, and burning wheels,
That, as they whirl, flash to the cope of heaven,
Proclaim the angel of the world of fire!
The ocean-king, lord of the waters, rides
High on his hissing car, whose concave skirrs
The azure deep beneath him, flashing wide,
As to the sun the dark-green wave upturns,
And foaming far behind: sea-horses breast
The bickering surge, with nostrils sounding far,
And eyes that flash above the wave, and necks,
Whose mane, like breakers whitening in the wind,
Toss through the broken foam: he kingly bears
His trident sceptre high; around him play
Nereids, and sea-maids, singing as he rides
Their choral song: huge Triton, weltering on,
With scaly train, at times his wreathed shell
Sounds, that the caverns of old ocean shake!
But milder thou, soft daughter of the air,
Sylph of the Summer, come! the silent shower
Is past, and 'mid the dripping fern, the wren
Peeps, till the sun looks through the clouds again.
Oh, come, and breathe thy gentler influence,
And send a home-felt quiet to my heart,
Soothed as I hear, by fits, thy whisper run,
Stirring the tall acacia's pendent leaves,
And through yon hazel alley rustling soft
Upon the vacant ear!
Yon eastern downs,
That weather-fence the blossoms of the vale,
Where winds from hill to hill the mighty Dike,
Of Woden named, with many an antique mound,
The warrior's grave, bids exercise awake,
And health, the breeze of morning to inhale:
Meantime, remote from storms, the myrtle blooms
Beneath my southern sash.
The hurricane
May rend the pines of snowy Labrador,
The blasting whirlwinds of the desert sweep
The Nubian wilderness--we fear them not;
Nor yet, my country, do thy breezes bear,
From citrons, or the blooming orange-grove,
As in Rousillon's jasmine-bordered vales,
Incense at eve.
But temperate airs are thine,
England; and as thy climate, so thy sons
Partake the temper of thine isle; not rude,
Nor soft, voluptuous, nor effeminate;
Sincere, indeed, and hardy, as becomes
Those who can lift their look elate, and say,
We strike for injured freedom; and yet mild,
And gentle, when the voice of charity
Pleads like a voice from heaven: and, thanks to GOD,
The chain that fettered Afric's groaning race,
The murderous chain, that, link by link, dropped blood,
Is severed; we have lost that foul reproach
To all our virtuous boast!
Humanity,
England, is thine! not _that_ false substitute,
That meretricious sadness, which, all sighs
For lark or lambkin, yet can hear unmoved
The bloodiest orgies of blood-boltered France;
Thine is consistent, manly, rational,
Nor needing the false glow of sentiment
To melt it into sympathy, but mild,
And looking with a gentle eye on all;
Thy manners open, social, yet refined,
Are tempered with reflection; gaiety,
In her long-lighted halls, may lead the dance,
Or wake the sprightly chord; yet nature, truth,
Still warm the ingenuous heart: there is a blush
With those most gay, and lovely; and a tear
With those most manly!
Temperate Liberty
Hath yet the fairest altar on thy shores;
Such, and so warm with patriot energy,
As raised its arm when a false Stuart fled;
Yet mingled with deep wisdom's cautious lore,
That when it bade a Papal tyrant pause
And tremble, held the undeviating reins
On the fierce neck of headlong Anarchy.
Thy Church, (nor here let zealot bigotry,
Vaunting, condemn all altars but its own),
Thy Church, majestic, but not sumptuous,
Sober, but not austere, with lenity
Tempering her fair pre-eminence, sustains
Her liberal charities, yet decent state.
The tempest is abroad; the fearful sounds
Of armament, and gathering tumult, fill
The ear of anxious Europe. If, O GOD!
It is thy will, that in the storm of death,
When we have lifted the brave sword in vain,
We too should sink, sustain us in that hour!
Meantime be mine, in cheerful privacy,
To wait Thy will, not sanguine, nor depressed;
In even course, nor splendid, nor obscure,
To steal through life among my villagers!
The hum of the discordant crowd, the buzz
Of faction, the poor fly that threads the air
Self-pleased, the wasp that points its tiny sting
Unfelt, pass by me like the idle wind
That I regard not; while the Summer Sylph,
That whispers through the laurels, wakes the thought
Of quietude, and home-felt happiness,
And independence, in a land I love!