University of Virginia Library

This is the land of song:—the very mountains
Are vocal with invisible minstrelsy;
The valleys are the haunt of unseen choirs;
The fountains utter music, and the hills
Are full of pleasant sounds. Before me stands
The temple of the Muses, Helicon,
The seat of their divinity, when Greece
Stood fair and glorious. It is beautiful,
But lonely. Where are now the hallowed shrines,
The pillared porches, and the sun-gilt domes,
Where ancient Genius offered up his prayers,
And kindled, on the altar of his God,
A sacrifice, whose odor was divine,
And breathed of inspiration?—Fallen, broken,
And overgrown with natural wildness, like
The intellect that wanders round these ruins,
With all its brightness veiled.
Now, I have come
On a fond poet's pilgrimage; my foot,
Wearied, yet eager still, shall find its way
Upward to yonder pinnacle of rock,
The mountain's sacred summit, by the side
Of clear Termessus, where it throws itself,
From leap to leap, over the polished stones,
And with a sportive wildness hurries on
To this secluded nook of bays and roses,
This quiet shelter, where the dove of peace
Nestles securely, while the distant roar
Of violence comes from the open plains,
Echoed, but faintly.
Pleasant stream, that erst
Gave water to the shepherd in old times,
When from their cloudy dwelling they descended,
Memory's bright daughters, in the silent night,
Breathing sweet voices, through the slumbering air,
Into his dreaming ear, and told to him
Mysteries, which he revealed in harmonies
Of measured sounds, high oracles that made
The crowd his worshippers, and drew around
The woodmen from their caves, to learn of him
Kindness and love,—clear rolling stream, whose wave
Shines in this gladdening sun like flowing gold
Poured from a fretted urn, so smooth the rocks
That border thee, and so fantastical
Their time-worn hollows,—how it gushes out
From some obscure recess, where it lay hidden
In clustered vines and feathery foliage, wet
With ever-falling dews! and how it bulges
In silvery brightness o'er the polished boss
Of marble, veined like pictures from the hand
Of tasteful art, and yet the very sport
Of frolic nature! what a busy din
Of tinkling waterfalls! and how it blends
With the low murmur of the shaken leaves,
And the still hum of bees! These many sounds,
These murmuring melodies of many voices,
They lap me in oblivion, and I seem
Living in dreams. I wonder not the bards
Who gathered here in worship, and were filled
With the dim feeling of religious awe,—
That they imagined, on the shores of Lethe,
Such murmurs from the beds of amaranth-flowers,
When they went nodding to the odorous winds,
That stole from laurel groves and myrtle shades,
And crisped the waters as they glided on
Over their sands of gold. Such happiness
As now I feel in listening to thy music,
And gazing on thy sparkling waterfalls,
Thy bubbling wells, thy mossy-cinctured lakes,
And rose-crowned islands, where the bird and bee
Nestle and find their home,—such happiness
Elysium well might envy. But I pause,
Even on the threshold, when the far ascent
Calls me to regions where a loftier power
Dwelt on his airy throne.
Then be my guide,
Wandering Termessus, upward through thy vale,
And let me find, beneath the twisted boughs
Of these old evergreens, coolness and shade,
To make my toil the easier. Darkly rolls
Thy current under them, and hollower sounds
Thy hidden roar. I just can catch a glimpse
Of yon deep pool, dark and mysterious,
Sunk in its well of rock; and now from out
A tuft of seeded fern I see thee plunge,
Tinted with golden green, for there a sunbeam
Strays through thy arch of shade. Still as I climb
Thy voice goes with me, like the laborer's song,
To cheer me; and anon I see thee flashing
Through the laburnum thickets, rivalling
Their golden flowers; and then thou rushest by
Crested with foam, the whiter for the darkness
That covers thee; and then I pause and hang
Over a broad, smooth mirror, where the sky
Looks in, and sees itself, as purely blue,
As vast and round, and all its cloudy folds;
Their snowy bosses and their iris fringes
Are there, and all the circling rocks repeat
Their lights and shadows in that vacancy,
So clear, it seems but air. Thou rollest on
Thus brightly, and for ages thou hast kept
This ever-varying, yet eternal way;
And like the voice of a divinity
Thou pourest thy endless song. But now the rocks
That hemmed thee in recede, and, round and fair,
The open vale of Aganippe smiles
To greet me, as a fond and gentle mistress
Welcomes her weary lover, when he comes
At evening to her bower.
Enchanted vale!
Well did the early worshippers of song
Choose thee to be their place of pilgrimage,
That in thy quiet groves and still recesses
They might invoke, with due solemnity,
The boon-inspiring power. Here they would come,
From the blue islands, and the olive-groves
Of Thebes and Athens, and thy laurel-crowned
And golden banks, Alpheus, and the shores
Of far Ionia, where the wooing air
Pants with a softer breath through myrtle groves,
And thee, thou emerald gem, amid the foam
Of ocean, whence thy guardian goddess rose,
To be the world's delight. From every land
That heard the echo of those flowing sounds,
That dropping honey, which, from eloquent lips,
Distilled persuasion, reverently they came,
Clad in white robes, and crowned with wreaths of bay,
And bearing golden harps and ivory citterns,
And round the marble temple, and the fountain
Of soft and gentle harmony, uplifted
The joyous pæan, through the bright-eyed day
Singing, till sunset threw its yellow veil
Round thy blue summit, Helicon, and Night
Sat on her purple cloud, and dipped her bough
Of cypress in Nepenthe, and then waved,
Over their leafy beds, oblivion
And holy dreams;—and when their God arose,
And shook his yellow locks in the blue air,
And dropped his shining dews, then they began
Anew their solemn chant, and up the heights
They moved in measured march, bearing their hymns
To Hippocrene and the crowning rocks,
Whence they beheld Parnassus, white and bare,
Glittering among the clouds, a golden throne
Rich with a waste of gems; and, as it rose,
Touched with the sun's first blaze, its forked peak
Seemed like twin spires of flame, curling and trembling
From earth to heaven. They saw,—and then they bowed,
And worshipped in their hearts,—their voices paused,
Their harps were mute, and fearful silence told,
More eloquent than words, their love and awe.

'T was thus of old: now all is desolate,
But fair and lovely. 'T is a wilderness
Of bush and flower, and over it are hung
A few old knotted oaks and untrimmed bays,
That, in their careless dress, are like the hearts
Of this rude land,—beautiful thoughts run wild,—
Courage and tenderness concealed beneath
Ungovernable rage and stern revenge.

Here is a ruin,—once a temple, now
Fallen, shapeless, and o'ergrown,—a mingled pile
Of blocks and broken pillars, fretted ceilings
And sculptured friezes, moulded cornices,
And wreaths and garlands, heaped confusedly,
And veiled with clematis and ivy, where,
Under their verdurous tufts, the lizard lurks,
And serpents cast their coats, or in the sun
Lie basking in their burnished mail, and roll
Their fascinating eyes. There is a hum
Of settling bees, and the quick swallow darts
Between two columns, sole amid the wreck
Unbroken, with their brief entablature
Telling in scattered characters, half worn
And eaten out by time, here was the temple
Of Pæan and the Muses. But the fountain,
Where wells it? It has gathered in a marsh,
O'ergrown with rustling reeds and water-lilies,
And bordered round with tamarisks and osiers,
The favorite haunt of painted flies and reptiles
That love the midday sun; and here I trace it,
Oozing through tall rank grass and irises
From underneath a falling arch. Here flowed
The gentle fountain,—here they built a shrine
To its peculiar Naiad, where it threw
Its bubbling waters from the opening rocks,
In shade and coolness. Still it gushes over
Through tangled leaves, and still it gives a murmur,
That soothes and yet inspires. Methinks I see,
Peeping from bosky dells, the nymphs who loved
This sylvan hollow. Grecian girls are they,
With braided locks twined gracefully around
Their ivory foreheads, and their arching brows
Pencilled above such eyes, gems, living gems,
Dark as deep night, and wild, yet winning quick
And darting like a flame; and now and then,
Less timidly, they lean from their retreats;
And then such lips, cheeks, dimples, necks like swans,
And polished arms, colors so bright and clear,
Still dripping from their fountains, glancing still
With water-drops,—they seem to beckon me,
Only to smile and vanish. Happy days,
When ye were seen as real, worshipped too
With dance and song,—worshipped by youths and maidens
Only less bright and fair than deities,
Full of high health and buoyant happiness,
Creatures of poetry and love. Ye ages!
Why have ye borne us downward, till the blood
Flows stagnant, like this fountain from its well,
'Mid weeds and thorns? Or has it ever been
Thus with the dreamer, Man,—ever in love
With an imagined joy?
But what is here,
Perched on the hill-side? Here a chapel stands,
Built of the fragments of the Muses' shrine,
And with its humble cross and rude stone altar
Telling of other faith and lowlier worship
Than that of old. Here are no genial banquets,
No songs nor dances. Here the lonely hermit
Utters his feeble orisons, and chants
His one unvaried hymn. A shadowy elm
O'erhangs his cell; and here, upon the turf,
Half slumbering, half awake, I muse away
The hours of noon. The mountain tops around
Sparkle and glow,—a quivering vapor floats
Above them, and with strange, mysterious power
Lifts them to loftier regions, where they hang
Like hot and fiery clouds. How still the air!
How motionless the leaves! The only sound
Is the perpetual hum of water-flies
Above the reedy pool. My brain feels dim,
And slumber steals apace, and silently
I sink in deep oblivion. Still my fancy
Plays with the shapes before my half-shut eyes,
And tunes the falling murmur in my ears
To music. So I pass away in dreams
The sultry hours; and now, the sun descending
Behind the loftier summits, I awake,
And feel the breezy coolness steal around me,
And give me life and joy. I turn myself
To the fresh evening air, and let it dry
My feverish brow and dripping locks, and twine them
In artless curls,—then to my pleasant task,
And onward to the summit.
Now my way
Is by a gentler stream, that tinkles down
Over the smooth-worn marbles, hollowed out
In semblances of urns, and bowls, and lavers;
And then in open pipes lapsing away,
Clear as a gush of flowing pearls, and tinged
With shifting colors, as it catches hues
From the stained rock it kisses, purple, green,
And golden,—hues that emulate the dove's
Or trembling opal's,—soft and velvet hues
Due to the water mosses, silent growth
Of centuries, o'er which the hurrying wave
Slides with a stiller murmur. Now the mountain,
Lifted above the forest region, glows
With flowering shrubs, that scatter odorous airs,
Sweet as from Eden,—purple heath and balm,
And lurking beds of thyme, and bright laburnum,
And arbute hung with snowy flowers and fruits
Red as a flammant's wing, and spiry grass,
Breathing of early May, and calling up
Memories of pastoral days, of shepherds lulled
By whispering elms, and nymphs with flowing hair,
Tressing it in the fountains, bleating flocks
Calling their truant lambs, and browsing goats
Pendant from bushy rocks, and harmonies
Of pipes and flutes and voices, warbling out
Unstudied songs, and with alternate verse
Singing the sun to setting, while cool airs
Came from the west, as if Favonius loved
Their minstrelsy, and with the tuneful leaves
Went dallying, and woke the slumbering pool
To music faint but sweet. Such thoughts are wakened
By the low whispering of the evening wind,
Through tufts of flowering grass and withered halm,
The golden harvest of an earlier year,
Still in this happy climate undecayed,
Still nodding with its ears. And as I move
Thoughtfully on, how populous these flowers
With honey-bees! how still their humming sounds
O'er all the voiceless mountain, while they gather
Nectar from golden cups, and urns of pearl,
And homelier vases hidden in their beds
Of heath and thyme, vases that breathe perfume,
And lurking yet reveal their hiding-place,
As if by clouds of incense. There they dart
From bloom to bloom, and till the lengthening shadows
Fall from the mountain peaks, and stretch away
O'er vale and plain, and distant cottages
Tell of their evening fires, they ply their task,
And then go murmuring to their sheltered hives
In cave, or hollow trunk, or straw-roofed shed.
O'er which the ivy climbs. Thus whiled away,
Time flies apace, till suddenly I pause,
And greet the higher fountain, whence uprose
The flying steed, that bore to loftier heights
The young, aspiring soul. It gushes forth,
Sparkling and bright and clear, from out the clefts
Of living rocks, and throws at once a stream
Full and o'erflowing. How the setting light
Tinges it with its hues,—rich, golden hues,
As if the God of Song still loved the spring,
And smiled as he withdrew! No broken arch
Chokes up its way, but from its natural caves
At once it bursts to light, and hurrying takes
Its journey to the plain. Here all is left
Simple and void of art, but where the rock
Is graved with moss-grown characters, that tell
Of earlier pilgrims, when they came and paid
Vows from the heart. Above me swells a throne
Of broad, bare rock, and there Apollo sat,
With all his train of Muses, and indulged
The charm of thought. Here many a poet dreamed,
When night was full of stars, that heavenly voices
Came from that shadowy summit, and they told
The bliss of song. They kindly led him on,
Spite of a scornful world, and filled his heart
With self-approving joy. Now, as the sun
Bends to his ocean couch, and well has neared
The far blue mountains, round his holiest shrine
In Delphi, upward to that pinnacle
My foot must hasten. Let no wandering look
Turn from the one bright goal. Even as the pilgrim
Goes with his eye fixed on his prophet's tomb,
Or where his god is laid, so let me on,
Bent to that summit, where retiring day
Kindles its latest fires.
I now have conquered,
And heaven is all above me. Earth below
Spreads infinite, and rolls its mountain waves
Tumultuously around me. Breathless awe
Broods o'er my spirit, and I stand awhile
Rapt and absorbed. The magic vision floats
Dimly before me, and uncertain lights
Flash on my troubled eye, and then a calm,
High and uplifted, like the peace of heaven,
Steals on my heart, and instantly my thoughts
Are fixed and daring. 'T is the land of song,—
The home of heroes. O, ye boundless plains,
Ye snowy peaks, ye dusky mountains, heaped
Like ocean billows, far retiring vales,
Blue seas, and gleaming bays, and islands set
Like gems in gold! to you I kneel with awe
Deep and unfeigned. If I have ever felt
The stirring energies of warlike virtue,
The sternness of unbending right, the bliss
Of high and holy dreams, the charm of beauty,
The power of verse and song, only to you
Be all the praise. And now ye are before me,
Rich with the tints of evening. What an arch
Of golden light swells, from the point of setting,
Over the Delphian hills! and how it rolls,
In dazzling waves, round all the mingled heights
That rise between! Yonder my eye can catch
Glimpses from out the far Achaian gulf,
Waving with flame, and seeming through the depths,
That dimly open to them, fiery portals
To brighter worlds. But now to calmer scenes,
And shadier skies. I trace the silver stream
Threading its way, now hidden, now revealed,
To the round vale, half up the mountain-side,
Then lost in woods, and then in distant windings
Stealing along the plain. Yon lower ridge
Lies dark in shade; and hidden half in trees,
The whitewashed convent, with its gilded cross
And humble tower, sends upward through the hushed
And vacant air its vesper knoll, by distance
Mellowed to music. This is all the sound
That tells of life. Down through a gloomy gorge,
Walled in by rifted rocks, the vale of Ascra
Lies, like a nook withdrawn beyond the reach
Of violence; and yet the crescent crowns
A minaret, and tells a startling tale
Of woe and fear. Beyond, the Theban plain
Stretches to airy distance, till it seems
Lifted in air,—green corn-fields, olive groves
Blue as their heaven, and lakes, and winding rivers,
And towns whose white walls catch the amber light,
That burns, then dies away, and leaves them pale
And glimmering, while a floating vapor spreads
From marsh and stream, till all is like a sea,
Rolling to Œta, and the Eubœan chain,
Stretching, in purple dimness, on the verge
Of this unclouded heaven. Far in the east
The Ægean twinkles, and its thousand isles
Hover in mist, and round the dun horizon
Are many floating visions, clouds, or peaks,
Tinted with rose. Before me lies a land
Hallowed with a peculiar sanctity,
The eye of Greece,—a wild of rocks and hills,
Lifted in shadowy cones, and deep between
Mysterious hollows, once the proud abodes
Of Genius and of Power. Now twilight throws
Around her softest veil, a purple haze
Investing all at hand, and farther on
Skyey and faint and dim. Methinks I catch,
Through the far opening heights, the Parthenon,
And all its circling glories. Salamis
Lies on its dusky wave; and farther out
Islands and capes, and many a flitting sail
White as a sea-bird's wing. The stars are out,
And all beneath is dark. The lower hills
Float in obscurity, and plain and sea
Are blended in one haze. Cyllene still
Bears on her snowy crown the rosy blush
Of twilight; and thy loftier head, Parnassus,
Has not yet lost the glory and the blaze
That suit the heaven of song. There let me pause;
There fix my latest look. How beautiful,
Sublimely beautiful, thou hoverest
High in the vacant air! Thou seemest uplifted
From all of earth, and like an island floating
Away in heaven. How pure the eternal snows
That crown thee! yet how rich the golden blaze
That flashes from thy peak! how like the rose,
The virgin rose, the tints that fade below,
Till all is sweetly pale! Are there not harps
Warbling above thee? voices, too, attuned
To an unearthly song? Methinks I hear them
Breathing around me, with a charm and spell,
That melt my heart to weeping. It is sad,
That song of heaven,—the funeral symphony
Of ancient worthies, for the murdered peace
And glory of their land. They greet the heroes,
Who rise to meet them in these iron times,
And hail them as their sons; and yet they weep
Their unavailing toil. Is there no hand
To grasp the avenging sword, and tear the knife
From the assassin? Must these generous hearts
Pour out their blood like water, till the flood
Of rage and power has swept them from the earth,
And buried all their bright and hallowed land
In death and darkness? O, forbid it, nations
Who bear the name of Christian, and are proud
Of light and truth and mercy. Arm ye; take
The cross and sword; move to the war of death
Stern and devoted; pause not, till the Turk
Has lost the power to harm; then give to Greece
Her ancient liberty, and ye shall live
Immortal, in your fame.