Poems :: :: University of Virginia Library

When the Leader of Israel,
From Pisgah's lone height,
Turned his far-seeing glance
On the land of delight,
Where the palm-trees stand stately
In Jericho's vale,
The vineyards are fadeless,
The flocks never fail;

Where the corn-fields are reeling
With ungathered grain,
From the gnarled oak the honey
Drops down to the plain,
Where Jordan cleaves swiftly
His rock-cradled bed,
Round whose green marge the toil
Of the heathen is spread;—

A moment he gazed
And sank down on the sod,
But his ecstatic spirit
Passed upwards to God.
For him the archangel
Dread sepulture made,
Nor Prophet nor Priest
Knew where Moses was laid.

A portent more wondrous
The Church may record
When Catharine fell pierced
By the tyrant's sharp sword;—
'Twas mid-day—the sunlight
Looked down on the Nile,
Alexandria's city
Was glad in its smile.

The lordly usurper
Was feasting in pride,
His hands with the life-blood
Of martyrs were dyed,

Of the tender and young,—
Persecution's stern blast
Swept o'er them unshaken,
The fiercest and last.

At noonday the sun
From the blue heaven looked down,
The murmur of myriads
Uprose from the town.
Lo! the sunlight at mid-day
Hath paled in the sky;
Lo! a sound hath out-murmured
The multitude's cry.

O'er their rapt gaze a splendour
Unearthly was flung,
A chant through the air,
As of angel-harps, rung;
On the wings of the breezes
Those missioners sped,
Till the glory-cloud rested
Where Catharine lay dead.

The viewless procession
In triumph passed by,
The track of its glory
Grew faint in the sky.

There is rage and unrest
In the City's broad square,
But the body of Catharine
No longer is there.

PART II.

On the mist-shrouded summit
The daylight was dim,
Where the monks of Mount Sinai
Were chanting their hymn;—
Through the chapel a radiance
Shot sudden and clear,
And their vespers were hushed
As the angels grew near.

The Eternal of old
Spake from Sinai's hoar brow—
What strange visitation
Re-hallows it now?
There the archangel's trumpet
Waxed shrilly and loud,
And the Voice of the Father
Pierced through the dark cloud.

There the thunder-clap pealed
And the forked lightning shone,
The arrow-winged message
Sent forth from the throne
The stern pre-announcement
Of duty to man,
Ere grace had completed
What justice began.

God's angels are wending
To Sinai once more,
But other in semblance
They come than of yore;
Not shrouded in darkness
And dreadful in state,
The trumpet their herald,
The tablets their freight;

Not bearing to sinners
The sentence of wrath,
But to Him who redeemed them
The fruits of His death;
Their hands have uplifted
A virginal form,
In whose pale cheeks the life-blood
No longer is warm.

Encinctured with glory
Her lily-white brow,
Her raiment of triumph
Is purer than snow,
Her smile is unclouded,
The palm-branch alone
Tells the death-strife accomplished,
The victory won.

Where the mountain rears highest
Its stone-sprinkled sward
The angels have left her
To wait for her Lord;
From the Church's loud anthems
Her name shall ne'er cease,
Her body on Sinai
Is buried in peace.

The Emperor Maximin.