The Legend of Genevieve :: :: University of Virginia Library

Far in the bosom of the night
The Ochills' dusky summits rise,
Their outlines starting, darkly bright,
In the clear mirror of the skies;
The northern skies, through which the Sun
The circuit of his path explores,
Imparting glory, never done,
And life to other shores.

And Silence reigns upon the sea,
While hosts of stars are on their march,
To stud the lucid canopy,
That mantles the nocturnal arch.
The beacon-light on yonder isle,
Revolving, wanes, or waxes clear;
And sheds a mild, but mournful smile,
Like Hope beguiling Fear.

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How bright it burns!—of threatening wreck
To warn the wareless mariner;
He hails it from the midnight deck,
And feels as if a friend were near:
Thus, as the navigator spied
The berries on the ocean foam,
That gladly omen'd land beside,
This ushers him to home.

Yet rocks bestrew Life's stormy sea,
And dangerous quicksands there abound;
We never pause, nor turn to flee,
Till Hope is past, and wreck around.
No eye can pierce the shades of Fate,
Nor Wisdom point to Sorrow's goal;
What heavenly light shall dissipate
The darkness of the soul?

And many a heart hath leapt to hail
That sparkling beacon of the deep;
And eyes been bright, with joyful tale,
That left it long ago to weep;

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The memory of departed days
Will rush upon the pilgrim's mind,
More warm and hallow'd thoughts to raise
Of those he left behind.

Say, where shall Anguish rest her head,
When Sorrow's shadows lower around!
Youth's fascinating dreams are fled,
Its friends are now no longer found;
The kindness that upheld our hearts
Hath fled, as flashes light away,
And Memory only now imparts
Her retrospective day.

How often o'er this breezy walk,
At eve, with Friendship stray'd have I,
Pursuing themes of varied talk;
What time within the southern sky,
As day-light's western flood was stemm'd,
The orb of Venus glitter'd bright,
The foremost of the train, that gemm'd
The diadem of Night.

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While flowers and grass were sprinkled o'er
With diamonds of the sparkling dew;
And, homeward veering from the shore,
The congregated ravens flew;
And while the white-wing'd sea-gull rose,
To hold its solitary way
To where the cliffs of Bass oppose
Tamtallan's quiet bay.

While, then, it burn'd, as now it burns,
On lovely nights, to Memory dear;
And then it turn'd, as now it turns,
Dim—distant—fairer—brighter—clear.
The earth, since then, has lost a hue;
The sky a tint—the heart a string;—
Ah! never more shall Time renew
The glories of our Spring!

The Summer of the soul is past;
The Sun-shine of existence fled;
Its flowers have bent in Sorrow's blast,
Or only blossom o'er the dead.

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The bounding pulse, the glowing heart,
Affection's warmth, and Pity's tear,
Yea, all ennobling thoughts depart,
To leave us wretched here.

The world allures—the world betrays—
The world corrupts the purest mind;
The gem that glitters, by its blaze
Too often strikes the gazer blind.
The glorious dreams that Hope could weave
All that, in youth, we could adore;
Have vanish'd from the view—to leave
Nothing worth living for!

Who are the mighty of our race?—
Behold, they perish'd in their prime!
Age never drew a wrinkling trace
O'er them—they never stoop'd to Time.
Soon did the flower of Cressy fall—
Wolfe—Crichton—Hampden, bold for Truth;

“Were we superstitious,” says a celebrated critic, “we should be inclined to think that it was the fate of a certain gracefulness of character, personal and intellectual, to meet with an early death; as if Providence would keep its image with us always young—

—‘lovely to the last;
Extinguished, not decayed.’

Surrey, we see, died at thirty-one; Raphael died at thirty-seven; and Sir Philip Sidney at thirty-two. Yet Ariosto reached a good age; and Alfred lived long enough to surmount our idea of him, as the accomplished young soldier and musician; and holds his place in our memories as a bearded sage.”

To these illustrious men, and early martyrs to death, I have added other seven in my text; in all of whom this gracefulness of person and splendour of intellect were equally remarkable; and whom the world had only time to see—and admire—and lose. We have now to add the dead, but deathless Byron, at thirty-seven! And why should we omit Burns?

Moore—Horner—Gordon—glorious all!
Extinguish'd in their youth!—

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And yet a thousand souls live on,—
Dark, worthless, abject, and debased,
From out whose bosoms, cold as stone,
All generous feelings are erased.
These are the low—the lost of mind—
The sons of Fashion—Folly—Mirth—
The host—the herd of human kind—
The governors of earth.

Cease doubt to rack—cease fear to gloom;
As is the ocean by that light,
The hidden mysteries of our doom
Shall stand unveil'd—reveal'd to sight.
When Time no more shall mar or make,
And all this shadowy dream be o'er;
The beacon stars of Heaven awake,
To shine for evermore!

Columbus.