University of Virginia Library

The Hebrews, then abroad, with wonder looked
On field, tree, hill, fast blackening,—as if Night
Had turned again, to strangle the young Day:
And, marvelling while they gazed—suspecting each
His own sight failing,—lc! upon the ear,
Came also wonder strange! A sound it was,—
Or as the feeble twilight of a sound,—
Real, and somewhere; but, in sky, on earth,
At right, or left, behind them, or before,
Still doubtful was; for everywhere it seemed;
As if all air were quickening into life,
And feebly moaning thus. But more and more
It swelled, and deepened: darker, and more dark,
Gathered the veil o'er heaven: and, all around,
Thicker and thicker grew the atmosphere.
Colors the brightest, to an inky hue
Quickly 'gan turn: things distant, were shut out;
Things nigh, appeared as shadows. Louder yet
Became the great, deep, universal hum,
Making air quiver: for the black fog, now,
A cloud of life became; a cloud, from earth
Upreaching into heaven,—from East to West,
From South to North, o'ershadowing all the land!
Silent they stood, astonished, motionless,
Gazing, and listening: and, when toward the ground
At length they looked,—behold, no ground they saw;
But a black sheet of life, o'erspreading all,—
Flies of strange fashion; such as eye of man
Never till then had known,—large-headed, lean,
Bodied like scorpions,—their dark wings outstretched,
And quivering as the horizontal air
Of tropical noon. And lo! even while they looked,
The black wings to the hue of dull red fire
Changed rapidly, till like to flame they grew;
And on their broad fronts, eyes, like diamond specks
In sunshine, 'gan to flicker. More and more,
The murmur swelled, and deepened: and above,
And all around them, when the Hebrews gazed,—
Poised in the air, a mighty sea of life,
Filling all space, they saw,—a fire-like life,
From wings flame-hued; and numberless as sands
On broadest ocean-shore. Anon, behold!
As when, from slumber of long centuries,
In his deep bed the giant Etna wakes,
And stirs the abysmal fires,—cloud heaped on cloud,
From the vast crater, rolls upon the air,
Hill and plain hiding, and the firmament,—
Even so, as by command, rolled on at once,
Cloud upon cloud, that infinite of new life;
Mounting, and sinking; surging to and fro;
Like smoke before a tempest driving on;
And carrying noise as of a mighty wind
Amid the forest, when great trees bow down,
Moaning in thunder.

All astonished stood
The Israelites, that living hurricane
Hearing, and seeing: but, erelong, arose,
Though faintly in the distance, other sounds;
Mad bellowing of beasts, and howl of dogs;
Strange shrieks from horses, and wild cries of men,
Women and children,—for the Plague was now
Fiercely at work; nor living thing could 'scape!
Up from their slumber, throughout all the land,
As if fire-scorched, the millions started,—wild,
Screaming with terror and pain: for, wheresoe'er
Was opening left,—in hovel of the poor,
In palace, house, or temple,—therein shot
The living tempest: on the faces poured,
And hands of heavy sleepers; and their stings
Struck deep: nay, through light drapery of the bed,
Pierced to the body; that as one great scald
From head to foot, the torture might have seemed,—
But that the eye, in one brief glance—the ear,
Dinned by the fierce hum,—as from hornet's nest,
Suddenly stirred,—the terrible Plague spake out.