University of Virginia Library

previous section Memorials of a residence on the continent
next section
1

MEMORIALS OF A RESIDENCE ON THE CONTINENT.

THE DEATH OF DAY.

WRITTEN ON THE RHINE.

Full of hours, the Day is falling
Where its brethren lie,—
A stern and royal voice is calling
The beautiful to die.
The banners of the west
A splendid breadth unfold,—
Their glory be unblest!
There is blood upon the gold.
2

Great Time, how canst thou slay,
With such a fune'ral state,
The gay and gentle Day,
Whom none could fear or hate?
Oh! mark him on his bed,
How flusht his quiet cheek,
How lowly droops his head,
And eyes that more than speak.
Let not the giddy breeze
Make sport of his last moans;
Weave them, ye aged trees,
Into Æolian tones.
The hills, in clear outline,
Against the blanching sky,
Stand forth, nor seem to pine
For' the joy that' is passing by
But solemnly and boldly
They bid a sad farewell,
Nor feel the pain more coldly
They are too proud to tell.
3

All leaves and blossoms pray
One deep and constant prayer:
“Take him not all away,
That made us seem so fair;
“Say not, that, in its turn,
'Tis pleasant to behold
The lamp of darkness burn
Light-amber or red-gold;
“Praise not the coming night,
Its damp and sallow ray,
We would not call it bright,
Tho' it came not after Day.
“We' have wept when Day was sighing,—
His gloom has made us mourn,—
And now our love is dying,
What care we for the born?”
4

ON A RUINED CASTLE, NEAR THE RHINE.

This was a fortress, firm and stout,
When there was battling round about,—
It has been deckt in gala-plight,
In days of ladie-love and knight,—
It' has known carouse and Provençal song,
And the dance right featly tript along,
While' the red yuhl-log and wassail bowl
Cheered the pilgrim's thirsty soul.
The swoop of Time has been to it
A bounty and a benefit,—
It has gained glory from those wings,
Which have annihilated Kings;
And now it stands in its massiveness,
Wi' the scars of many an age,
Like a lore-encumbered prophetess,
Who' has worn away her youthfulness,
In studies deep and sage.
5

[I love the Forest;—I could dwell among]

I love the Forest;—I could dwell among
That silent people, till my thoughts up-grew
In nobly-ordered form, as to my view
Rose the succession of that lofty throng:—
The mellow footstep on a ground of leaves
Formed by the slow decay of nume'rous years,—
The couch of moss, whose growth alone appears,
Beneath the fir's inhospitable eaves,—
The chirp and flutter of some single bird,—
The rustle in the brake,—what precious store
Of joys have these on Poets' hearts conferred?
And then at times to send one's own voice out,
In the full frolic of one startling shout,
Only to feel the after-stillness more!
6

THE BOY ROBERT.

FROM THE GERMAN OF ARNDT.

The stripling Robert, good and brave,
Holds in his hand a bare-drawn glaive,
And on the altar of the Lord,
He lays it with this earnest word:
“I swear to thee, O fatherland!
With naked sword in clenchèd hand,
On this thy consecrated shrine,
Still to the death to be sincerely thine.
“I swear with heart and mind to be
Thy honest servant, Liberty!
Body and soul, through all life's span,
For thou art the sublimest good of Man.
7

“I swear a bloody, burning, hate,
And scorn, whose depth can ne'er abate,
To Gallic guile and Gallic band,
That they may never shame our German land.
“And Thou, whose high coercing sway
Heaven's Suns and earthly hearts obey,
Thou mighty God! stand by my oath,
Be thou the guardian of my faithful troth.
“That I, from lie and treache'ry pure,
May be thy Lieger true and sure,—
And that this brand may never pause
In the high duty of a righteous cause.
“And if against my fatherland
And God I draw it, then this hand
Be dust, this arm be withered cold,
And be this hilt a hundred-weight to hold!”
Oh! no, oh! no, for ever no!
No caitiff thought will Robert know,—
To God the Lord this oath is given,
Honour and Virtue lighten him to heaven.
8

ON THE JUNGFRAU, BY MOONLIGHT.

The maiden moon is resting
The maiden mount above,
They gaze upon each other,
With cold majestic love.
So I and Thou, sweet sister,
Upon each other gaze,
Our love was warm, but sorrow
Has shorn it of its rays.
As in the hazy heav'n
That gentle Orb appears,
Thou lookest in my face,
Tearful,—not shedding tears.
9

Like thine, her face is pale,
But from within a light,
Mild-gleaming as thy spirit,
Comes out upon the night,
And casts a tender sheen
On that pale hill beneath,
Pale! as my heart, which wears
The dull-white hue of Death.
10

MONT BLANC.

Mount! I have watcht thee, at the fall of dew,
Array thee in thy panoply of gold,—
And then cast over it thy rosy vest,—
And last that awful robe that looks so cold,
Thy ghastly spectre-dress of nameless hue:
Then thou art least of earth, and then I love thee best.
11

WRITTEN IN THE MOUNTAINS OF THE TYROL.

A Heart the world of men had bound and sealed
With shameful stamp and miserable chain,
Here, mother Nature, is to Thee revealed,
Open to Thee; oh! be it not in vain.
Flow over it, ye Torrents,—though I fear,
That be your course as fierce as e'er it may,
The sorrow-stains engrained there many a year
Your force can never, never, wash away:
Then come, ye Mountains, ye half-heavenly Forms,
Based in deep lakes and woods, and crowned with storms,
Close on it,—cover,—seal it up again,
But with the signet of your own pure power,
So that unbroken, till the' all-searching hour
Of Death, that impress may on it remain.
12

[This dainty instrument, this table-toy]

[_]

In the treasury of the Benedictine Monastery of St. Peter at Salzburg, I was shown a gold and jewel-studded pen with which every brother, on his entrance into the order, signed his name. This had been the custom for many centuries. MS. Journal.

This dainty instrument, this table-toy,
Might seem best fitted for the use and joy
Of some high Ladie in old gallant times,
Or gay-learned weaver of Provencal rhymes:
With such a pen did sweet Francesca trace
Some hurried lines beneath her blushing face,
And hid them in her lover's doublet-sleeve,
To let him know, that, ere to-morrow eve,
They would enjoy the luscious summer-weather,
And read their favo'rite Launcelot together;
With such a pen did tremu'lous Mary write
To bid good Chat'elet come and play to-night;
And so we might go on for hours, and fold
Our colo'ring fancies round this antient gold;
13

But here one stern Reality appears,
And leaves no place for other dreams or tears,—
The simple record, that, with this one pen,
Have hundreds of our brothers, fellow-men,
Signed by their names the awfullest decree
That between them and all the world could be;
Those few small letters, when thus written, said—
“The writer, though he live, is living dead;
“The world of man, of beauty, and of bloom,
“This visi'ble earth, but serves him for a tomb,—
“He feels no more its glories or its gains,
“His soul can only know its purging pains,—
“Here from the trails of sin however sure,
“He needs that suffe'ring to be perfect-pure.”
Think of the fingers that have dared to hold
This fateful relic! Some with grasp so bold,
You would believe that nothing but the pride
Of glory won, ambition satisfied,
Or joy of meed long-toiled for, could command
Such full composure in an aged hand:
And yet the most of those, who hither brought
Their Being's sacrifice were men well taught
In the world's wisdom, men who had lived through
All that life gives to suffer and to do;
14

Who had grown old in wars of spi'rit and arm,
But found in Victo'ry no victorious charm
Against the clouding armament of Ill,
Licenst on earth by God's unsounded will.
Some might be young,—by strange heart-prescience led
To know that Life is but a sick-man's bed,
On which, with aching head and limbs, we lie
Through the hot Night of our humanity,
Waiting for Death, our Lucifer,—so blest
Is he, through whose deep-drugged and senseless rest
No Dreams can pierce,—and thus they did but crave
To seek this stupor in the cloiste'ral grave;
These held the Pen, as valor holds a sword
Against the foe that doubted of its word;
Yet others still might be,—young too and fair,
Strong too, but only strengthened by Despair,
Who,—when that closing moment came at last,
That one thin line, which lay between the past
And the unknown bleak Future,—that deep trench,
Which now leapt over, by a fearful wrench
Of all most natu'ral instincts, held the soul,
Once the world's freeman, once without controul
Working and wande'ring, bound to a new law,
Captive in Faith and prisoner in Awe,—
15

Caught up this Pen, and quiveringly traced
The names, that thence could never be effaced,
With moveless eyes and pale-blue lips convulst,
As if the salient blood were all repulst
To its free source,—as if within their clutch
They had a poisoned dagger, and its touch
Was on their living flesh;—yet they, even they,
Found in these precincts Joy, we will not say,
But, what is better, Peace;—they askt no more;
Happy the wave that breaks upon the shore!
74

TO GIOVANNI BELLINI.

SUGGESTED BY THE FACT OF THAT PAINTER'S HAVING HAD IN HIS ROOM A GRECIAN STATUE OF VENUS AS A STUDY.

Thou didst not slight with vain and partial scorn
The inspirations of our nature's youth,
Knowing that Beauty, wheresoe'er 'tis born,
Must ever be the foster-child of Truth.
Nor didst thou lower the Mother of the Lord
To the mere Goddess of a Pagan bower,
But with such grace as Christians have adored
Those sense-delighting charms thou didst empower;
And would that they who followed thee, and gave
To famous Venice yet another fame,
To be the Painter's home, had done the same,
Nor made their Art the imitative slave
Of those dead forms, as if the Christian span
Embraced no living Poetry for man.
 

The decline of pure religious feeling in Art in Venice may be, perhaps, most accurately dated from the influence of Aretino over Titian; up to that time he had hardly ever painted a profane subject, and no other artist ever seems to have thought of it. Afterwards such exceptions as Bonifacio and the piety of the people prevented so sudden a degradation as took place in the Roman school from Raffael to Giulio Romano, and in the Bolognese from Francia to Guido; but too soon came the younger Palma and his followers, the Caracci of the Venetians.

75

TO RAFFAEL.

Raffael, alas! was the only person who conceived the project of recovering the remains of ancient Rome from its rubbish by means of methodical excavations, and this led to no result whatever.

Niebuhr.

Thine was the scheme, and worthy to be thine,
O Painter-Poet! with care and regu'lar toil,
To raise those marvels from the' entombing soil
With which Greek Art made Rome a place divine.
Though Gothic rage with Christian zeal combine,
Earthquake with flood,—the desolating coil
Of plague two centuries old with Guiscard's spoil,—
Brancaleone's fierccly-sage design,
With other shocks,—of Pagan Rome to make
A mere blank memo'ry,—thou hadst bade awake
Rare shapes from their deep beds, had Sympathy
Lent thee good aid ... Still I could wish for thee
That thou had'st never yearned for them,—elate
To be in Christian Art so great among the Great.
76

THE IMMORTALITY OF ROME.

“Urbi et Orbi ,”—mystic euphony,
What depth of Christian meaning lies in Thee!
How, from this world apart, this world above,
Selected by a special will of Love,
In its own spi'ritual atmosphere sublime,
Rome lives, a thought, without the reign of Time.
Thus, at the gates of great Eternity,
Nature, the constant he'rald of God, I see,
And ever onward reads she this decree:—
“Let nations have their cycles,—let their course
Still run unchanged, whate'er their inner force;
Let each, whate'er its fabric, firm or frail,
Give its one chapter to the' historic tale,
77

In silence and in shadow then to lie,
And, but in Memo'ry's echo-life, to die;—
There is an end for all that is begun,
For the Sun's self, and all beneath the Sun.”
Who dare deny this record?—Rome alone;
Rome has no histo'ry she can call her own;—
The histo'ry of the Western World is hers,
Writ out in all its mazy characters:
What know we of it, till that name began,
Whose light still hovers o'er the Vatican?
Where is the fount of all its myriad rills,
But springing 'mid the seven low Latian hills?
There, thoughtless organs of divine intent,
Some scanty tribes in rudest union blent
Defensive force and martial will combined,
Till lust of conquest filled them, like a mind;
Then fast the mustard-tree of power up-grew,
Fed into strength by Fortune's choicest dew,
Gathered the winds within its ample room,
And gave the swaying boughs a voice of doom,
For ever striving, as none else had striven,
Earth for its root, and for its branches Heaven.
78

And when the flush of life was past,—when came
Age's dry heart and Winter's naked shame,—
The conscious giant trembled at the spell,
Bowed his high head in agony, and fell.
That ruin is before us,—and we all
Have felt the shock of that tremendous fall
Within our quive'ring hearts; we all have seen
Those temples altarless, and streets grass-green,
And columns standing lone, and basements bare,
And fragments crumbling in the new-found air;
And, if at last our thought found utte'rance, said,
“Surely this is the City of the Dead!”
I stood one night,—one rich Italian night,
When the Moon's lamp was prodigal of light,—
Within that Circus, whose enormous range,
Tho' rent and shattered by a life of change,
Still stretches forth its undiminisht span,
Telling the weakness and the strength of Man.
In that vague hour which magnifies the great,
When Desolation seems most desolate,
I thought not of the rushing crouds of yore,
Who filled with din the vasty corridor;
Those hunters of fierce pleasure are swept by,
And host on host has trampled where they lie.
79

But where is He, that stood so strong and bold,
In his thick armour of enduring gold,
Whose massive form irradi'ant as the sun,
Baptized the work his glory beamed upon
With his own name, Colossal?—From the day
Has that sublime illusion shrunk away,
Leaving a blank weed-matted Pedestal
Of his high place the sole memorial?—
And is this mira'cle of imperial power,
The chosen of his tute'lage, hour by hour,
Following his doom, and Rome, alive,—awake?
Weak mother! orphaned as thou art, to take
From Fate this sordid boon of lengthened life,
Of most unnatu'ral life, which is not life,
As thou wert used to live; oh! rather stand
In thy green waste, as on the palm-fleckt sand,
Old Tadmor , hiding not its death;—a tomb,
Haunted by sounds of life, is none the less a tomb.—
Then from that picture of the wreck-strewn ground,
Which the arch held in frame-work, slowly round
I turned my eyes and fixt them, where was seen
80

A long spare shadow stretcht across the green,
The shadow of the Crucifix,—that stood,
A simple shape of rude uncarven wood,
Raising, erect and firm, its lowly head
Amid that pomp of ruin,—amid the dead,
A sign of salient life;—the Mystery
Of Rome's immortal being was then made clear to me.
 

The form of the Papal Benediction.

You cannot plant an Oak in a flower-pot;—she must have Earth for her root, and Heaven for her branches.

Harrington—Oceana.

Tadmor signifies the “City of the Palm-grove,”—hence the Roman appellation.

81

THE PAPAL BENEDICTION,

FROM ST. PETER'S.

Higher than ever lifted into space,
Rises the sove'ran dome,—
Into the Colonnade's immense embrace
Flows all the life of Rome;
The' assembled peasants of a hundred mountains,
Beneath the Sun's clear disk,
Behold that peerless Whole of radiant Fountains,—
Exorcised Obelisk,—
And massive Front, from whose high ridge outslanted,
A spacious awning fell;—
The swaying breadth each gazer's breast enchanted
To follow its slow swell.
82

Why are they met in their collective might,
That earnest multitude?
Is it to vindicate some injured right,
By threat and clamor rude?
To watch with tip-toe foot and eager eye
Some mere device of Pride,
Meaningless pomp of regal vanity
The void of Truth to hide?
To feed some popu'lar lust which cautious power
Would, for wise ends, restrain,
Not barte'ring to the passion of an hour
What ages toiled to gain?
Thanks, thanks to Heaven, that in these evil days,
Days of hard hearts and cold,
Days where no love is found in all our ways,
When Man is overbold,
And loathes all tender mutual offices,
And nothing old reveres,
Unwilling to be seen upon his knees,
Ashamed of his own tears,—
83

My soul the gracious privi'lege of this sight,
This priceless sight, has won,
A people of too simple faith to slight
A Father's benison;—
Not in low flatte'ry, not in selfish dread,
Before one meek old man,
A people, a whole people, prostrated,
Infant and veteran.
By that High-Priest in prelude of deep prayer
Implored and sanctified,
The benediction of paternal care
Can never be denied.
Most surely from that narrow gallery,
The oriflamme unfurled,
Shelters within its grand benignity
Rome and the orbèd world.
The faintest wretch may catch the dew that falls
From those anointed lips,
And take away a wealth that never palls,
A joy without eclipse.
84

Old pines, that darkly skirt the circling hills,
Bend down in grateful awe,—
Infuse the earth's dry heart, prolific rills,
With Love's unbroken law!
Bear the glad tidings to your sister seas,
Mediterranean waves!
Let eve'ry mutte'ring storm be husht in peace,
Silent the thunde'rous caves!
And would my spi'rit from Earth's embasing rule
Were in this moment riven!
That I might pass through such fit vestibule
Up to the face of Heaven.
107

IMPRESSION, ON RETURNING TO ENGLAND.

In just accordance with attentive sight,
Through airy space and round our planet ball,
The inorganic world is voiced with Light,
And Colors are the words it speaks withal.
Thus has my eye had glad experience
Of that most perfect utte'rance and clear tone,
With which all visi'ble things address the sense,
In lands retiring from the northern zone.
But, oh! in what poor language, faintly caught,
Do the old features of my England greet
Her stranger-son! how powerless,—how unmeet
For the free vision Italy had taught
What to expect from Nature; I must scan
Her face, I fear, no more, and look alone to Man.
previous section Memorials of a residence on the continent
next section