University of Virginia Library

How beautiful art thou!
Thou, that arisest like a dream
From the blue mirror of thy liquid plain,
And lift'st aloft the radiance of thy brow
O'er Adria's azure main!
Ne'er yet by moonlight gleam,
When the lone bard delights his lay to weave,
Might lovelier vision float at summer eve:
Ne'er yet the tale of Araby,
That charms the caravan from nightly slumbers,
Feign'd at the melody of magic numbers,
A fairer city rising suddenly,
Than thine, which, slowly rear'd by human hand,
Saw in th' unstable wave its firm foundation stand.

A golden light along the Lido plays.
I see thy brilliant isles, each radiant gem
That sparkles on thy liquid diadem:
The ocean at their base his strength allays,
And not a billow breaks upon thy shore,
Nor swells upon thy breeze the Deep's tempestuous roar.

Ere yet I stole upon thy silent sea,
And saw the bold Rialto proudly throw
His arch athwart thy water heaving slow,
So vividly the painter's magic pow'r
Thy image had pourtray'd,
I knew each fane palladian, gothic tow'r,
All that St. Mark display'd,
Dome, palace, cupolas, each bold arcade:
And sable gondolas, that to and fro,
Like shadows, come and go.
I knew that bridge of sighs; that ducal roof,
Where the Doge wove the viewless woof
That o'er the brow of Pleasure clos'd,
Nor day, nor night repos'd.
All, all th' enchantment of thy scenery
At once familiar seem'd, and charm'd my sight,
Like a remember'd dream, re-picturing past delight.

Ah! Venice! ere a distant age,
That magic picture shall alone retain
The goddess sprung from Adria's main.
There, faithful to thy storied page,
When thou, and all thy race are past,
The trophies of thy pow'r shall last.
There shall the brazen coursers stand,
Yet breathing of Lysippus' hand.
There shall the triple pillars soar,
Each that a kingdom's standard bore,
When Cyprus, Negropont, and Crete,
Kiss'd the merchant-monarch's feet:
And there the column tow'r apart,
That, scornful of the merchant's mart,
With the wing'd lion crowns its brow,
Stern-gazing on the sea below:
And there the Bucentaur unfold
His banners o'er a flood of gold,
And Fancy's myriad shapes recall
The gay Venetian carnival.

What art thou, but a picture of the past,
Thy day of glory o'er,
A picture, half-evanish'd, fading fast?
Yet, would I fain, ere thou art seen no more,
Once, once again upon thy marble strand,
Recall, 'mid trophies of the years of yore,
The wonders of thy trident-scepter'd hand:
Or in delightful dream of idleness,
When Eve, slow-stealing out in mantle grey,
On her pale forehead binds one beauteous star,
Disparting Night and Day,
Float on the level of thy sea of glass:
While scarce a ripple from th' inaudible oar
Shivers the mirror as the shadows pass,
And nought is heard save gondolas soft-gliding,
And on that silent sea the vesper chimes subsiding.

Mute now the voice
That, when the fisher dragg'd his net along,
Lighten'd his labour with familiar song.
The lute forgets its fingering:—none rejoice:
No answering gondolier at close of day
Takes up Medoro's tale, or sweet Erminia's lay.

But could Medoro's lay, or that soft breeze,
Which, waking when the sun deserts the sky,
Ripples the dead lagunes, that round thee lie,
Fanning them into freshness; say, could these
Silence thy deep lament?—Why gaze around,
Ceaselessly weeping on thy shipless sea?
Thy worshippers, thy lovers, who, ere-while,
Braided thy brow with gems—none, none are found:
None from the deep beholding thy bright isle
Raise the glad shout to Venice.—Woe to thee,
The tread of whose lone foot sounds heavily,
Where erst St. Mark, as on earth's central place,
Gather'd the human race,
Making all nations one, and the wide main
The highway of the world.—Where now the throng,
The princely traffickers that round thee press'd,
Nor let thy echoes rest?
The many-languag'd, where? the Babel sound
Of barter, whose discordant voices gave
A tongue to every wave?

Where now the monarch-merchant, war his trade,
Who, 'mid his carracks, and his argosies,
Sent fleets, that, charg'd with victory, swept the seas,
And dashing from their prow the billowy storm,
And Death's opposing form,
'Mid battle-trophies to thy shouting shore
The Athenean lion bore.

Thy wise men—the Elect—the Senate—where?
Where he, their chief, the watcher, and the watch'd,
The ruler, and the rul'd, whose silver hair,
Silver'd by time and toils of state, bow'd down
Beneath the ducal crown!
Yet—not the less, kings, and their councils, sate,
Waiting his word of fate,
While his eye mark'd the turning of the beam,
Where balanc'd nations trembled in the scale.
Where—these?—All—all alike an idle tale:
All, all, a tale that's told—the vision of a dream.

Thou, never more, at rest from glorious war,
Beneath whose standard, streaming on the gale,
The Turkish Moon turn'd pale,
Yearly in triumph on the Bucentaur
Shall cast thy ring in the betrothed sea,
And wed, and dow'r thy Bride with sov'reignty.
They, never more, thy sons, the brave, the free,
Shall company the Bridegroom on his way,
Where the consenting Deep kept holiday,
And all the isles, one floating pageantry,
Their banner'd pomp and blazonry display'd,
And Ocean seem'd on fire beneath the crimson shade.

Nay—mock me not with gorgeous palaces:
Vaunt not to me thy Titian's living light:
Far other scenes must fix a Briton's sight.
Show me the hand that rais'd thee from the seas,
Link'd isle to isle, and driving back the tide,
Strengthen'd the ocean's bed to bear thy pride.
Pour on my ear the voice that proudly said,
“Thou, Deep! here roll thy wave! be here thy billows stay'd!”

The annals of thy glorious years unfold:
Show me how Freedom walk'd with thee of old
Upon the mountain billows; how her pow'r
Gave to thy sword its edge, thy helm its course,
Thy soul its boundless force,
Till all the world of waters was thine own:
And thou, like her of Tyre, on whose peel'd head
Their nets the fishers spread,
Spak'st unto Ocean from thy island throne,
“I reign—and none beside—I am—and I alone!”

But, when thy day was one continuous dream,
And all thy night a masque—a festival—
A moonlight music, and a midnight ball;
Then Luxury round thee clasp'd Armida's zone,
And wreath'd thy temples with a flowery braid,
Where venemous serpents play'd,
And mingled charms in thy Circean bowl,
That turn'd the man to brute, and steep'd in sloth the soul.

Thus wert thou found, when in the evil hour
A giant helmeted in war-array,
Pluck'd from the Syren's brow the mask away.
Venice! the sword that flam'd on Stamboul's tow'r,
Venice! the shield that with its single pow'r
Had stay'd the world in arms, were cast aside.
Thou call'dst thy sons—in vain—
None from a thousand islands, none replied:
None on another—on himself—relied:
No drop that swelled thy veins ere fell on Adria's main.

Ere yet for ever silenc'd, Venice! raise,
To Albion raise thy voice!
Ask her—whose native, erst, when wintry blasts
Rav'd o'er the void of ocean, dark and deep,
Like a lone eagle on the rocky steep,
That from his spread of wing the snow-storm casts,
Stood on the cliff, and, shivering from his lair,
The winged sea-foam shook from his dishevell'd hair:
Ask her—whose savage wander'd forth to prowl
For food, or sprang from ambush in his cave,
'Mid sea-herds, gamboling on the summer wave:
Or when the bleak moon heard the she-wolf howl,
From the deserted den bore off her brood,
And gorg'd the quivering flesh, and quaff'd the living blood:—
Ask her, whence rose her pow'r,
Her grandeur, her dominion, her renown,
The might and exaltation of her crown,
Fleets, whose rich freights her princely merchant's dow'r,
And war-charg'd navies, that from sea to sea
Spread out her empire?—Freedom gave her force
To cope with harsh necessity, and brave
The monsters of the wild, the wood, the wave:
Freedom: whose youthful hardihood, nor Dane,
Nor Saxon, nor mail'd Norman in his pride
Could captive hold:—Freedom, who cast aside
Their bonds, and taught the monarch how to reign:
Then stood between the nation and the throne,
The arch of empire struck, and pois'd its central stone.
Her glory, hence, has spread from land to land,
And o'er the Deep, her native element,
Mail'd harbinger, before her Terror went;
And Commerce and twin Conquest, hand in hand,
Where'er a billow roll'd, her flag unfurl'd,
And pil'd on her bleak rocks the tribute of the world.

Briton! are these thy birth-right?—Thine that word?—
False as the wave, and fickle as the blast,
Commerce from shore to shore has veer'd—has past:
The sword of conquest has betray'd its lord.
Alone, on Virtue's adamantine base,
Shall Freedom's column stand—stand on its resting place.

Seek we a Tyre, or Venice to presage
The irreversible fate?
Ask we a prophet to unclose the gate
Of dark futurity?—The doom's foreshown:
The history by Time's iron pen engrav'd
On Truth's eternal page.
Britain! peruse that record—'tis thine own.
There view thy lion-progeny enslav'd,
And the bold realm that earth's leagu'd banners brav'd,
On Freedom's wreck o'erthrown,
If Luxury round thee clasp Armida's serpent zone.

Honour'd art thou, my country!—fear'd art thou—
Envy'd of nations!—Thine the sword and shield
That rescu'd earth.—This struck the Titan low:
That spread its ægis o'er the rally'd field,
When far and wide the shatter'd empires reel'd,
And sank beneath the blow—
Gaul, and the blood-stain'd harvest of her sword,
Lay at thy foot—thou wouldst not touch the spoil:
And when thy pow'r had peace to earth restor'd,
Thou view'dst thy son, returning to his rest,
Bring back in triumph to his native soil
Nought—save the laurel that repaid his toil,
The scar—that grac'd his breast.

Glory and greatness be upon thy brow!
Britain! at rest from victory, consummate
In peace thy great career!—Convoke again
The Senate, where presiding Justice sate,
And Mercy, as she pleaded, heard the chain
From Afric fall—thy word the fetter broke:
Crush its last link—Lo! Avarice yet upholds,
Holds in defiance up the murderous yoke:
The lingering nations yet the curse retain:
Go in thy strength, and free from earth the stain
Of brother's blood.—Loose Erin's galling band,
The fetter on the soul—
Her blessing and her curse are in thy hand:
Leave the free spirit free, and faith to God's control.

The Thames the tribute of thy wealth demands.
Rolls that fam'd flood indignant on his way,
To mingle with the ocean's yellow sands,
Unhonour'd of the merchant-kings?—Extend
On granite arches, rang'd in proud array,
Where domes and terrac'd palaces ascend,
'Mid triumph arcs his marble-paved quay:
There, moor thy navies, fraught with either Ind:
There, free as air, fling wide thy golden gate
Of commerce to mankind:
There launch thy fleets; and weary every gale,
To wing from clime to clime thy welcome sail,
Wafting to each the gifts of all—so bind
The world in love.—The western realms await
Thy coming; to their rising strength impart
Stability of freedom—largely shed
O'er desarts from the world divided far,
Where the poor savage, struggling into life,
With Nature, and her elements, at war
Wages unequal strife,
The seeds of knowledge, and implanted art:
And o'er the isles in darkness, spread the light,
The day-spring of salvation.—Thus, tow'r up,
Tow'r, 'stablish'd in thy might:
And while thy cliffs ascend, and billows flow,
Glory shall hail thy name, and Greatness gird thy brow.

And art thou, Venice! but a warning sound?
Degenerate! on whose brow a father's fame
Deepens the brand of shame—
Ere dark oblivion o'er thee spread her pall,
Call from his long repose—on thy first Founder call!—

Ask, why his foot forsook yon flow'ry strand,
Abandoning the fruitful heritage
Where his forefathers pass'd in peace their age.
His foot disdain'd to rest
On earth no longer blest,
When the invader held aloft the chain
That fell upon the land:
While Freedom, pointing to th' unfetter'd main,
'Mid the dank marish, on the rushy bed
Where scream'd the bittern, and the serpent bred,
His banner on th' unpeopled isle display'd,
And bad a Venice rise beneath its guardian shade.

Go in his glorious poverty again:
Quit the gold palace, and the marble dome,
The temple, and the sanctuary, and the shrine:
Forsake thy father's home,
The hearth no longer thine.
And, if a wreck remain
Of the proud Bucentaur that 'spous'd the Deep,
With hallowing reverence its last relic keep,
And, under guard of its palladium, go
Where'er the free waves flow,
And traversing the illimitable sea,
Wreathe with its floating weed the brow of Liberty!—

Better to fall in arms beneath the foe,
Than witness, day by day,
Thy palaces abandon'd by their lords,
And marble domes decay:
And, mouldering into dust in silent halls,
Where spiders web the walls,
The banners of their glory fade away.

Better to fall in arms beneath the foe,
And leave a lasting name,
Than, reckless of the heritage of fame,
Sink lowly down in bitterness of shame,
And waste without a blow.—

Thus wert thou seen—where'er I gaz'd around,
Groan'd servitude, corruption, and decay:
Thy temples totter'd on their piles unsound,
And not an arm was stretch'd the plague to stay,
When from the liquid grave around thee spread,
The tainted mist steam'd up—the breathing of the dead.

Ere long, th' enchanting vision, that arose
Like a fair dream, shall, like a dream, depart,—
Tow'r, temple, palace, domes of eastern art,
Beneath the flood, repose.
There, shall the sea-mew, and hoarse birds that make
The deep their haunt, shriek where thy revels rung;
There round the pillar, where thy love-lyre hung,
Coil the huge volumes of the ocean-snake:
And while, beneath, thick swarms the slimy brood,
Above, a stagnant sea shall spread its solitude.