University of Virginia Library

A festal Morn! The sunshine-heavens burn bright
And fair, as though there could be no more night!
Thousands of thousands, throngs on throngs await,
Breathless with eagerness, with hope elate—
With throbbing hearts, and keenly-straining ear—
Trusting to catch the tale of rapturous cheer,
The tidings of their prayers fulfilled to hear!—
As, when some Prophetess arose, to unfold
A nation's destinies,—men stood, of old,
Hushing their very breath—their pulses' play
Checking—to greet those sounds of silvery sway,
Fraught or with Exultation or Dismay,
So stand those thick-wedged Thousands; so they wait—
As 't were to learn their future, and their fate:
A weight of such stern stillness seems to brood
O'er all that mixed and mingling multitude!
A passionate, voiceless rapture of suspense
Controls them with a burning might intense.
(While one strong feeling, deepening as it ran,
Made all that vasty concourse as one Man!)
A tension of most anxious vigilance
Binds each existence in a feverish trance.
A passion of Expectancy chains down
All those quick human hearts; and, heavily thrown
Around the multitude, a mantle deep
Of Silence clings—like that of Death or Sleep.
With adamantine strain, and leaden stress—
Too deep the Emotion is, for words to express.
Thickens the crowd; they speed, they throng, they press;
And still that silence spreads!—throughout that Host
No breath, no pulse, no movement might be lost.
All thoughts, all energies should seem constrained
To one keen vigil; or forborne—refrained.
All hopes, all interests merged in one desire;
Taught to one mark, and for one meed to aspire.
All Powers, all Passions gathered to one hush
Of mighty Feeling; which, ere long, shall rush
In one astounding burst—one cataract gush—
One all o'er-sweeping, hurrying, mastering tide
Of joy and confidence, and zeal and pride;
Seeking, as for relief, their force to shew,
Till foiled expression can no farther go,
And haply, Silence—peaceful and profound—
Once more prevails; once more succeeds to Sound.
Hark! hark! the peal—the rolling, throbbing gun!
It bursts upon that silence, as the Sun
Bursts from the eclipse of hurricanes, i' the hour
Of its resumption and retort of power!
Peal after peal, in quick succession pours,
As wave on wave crowd thick on Ocean's shores.
One more —and France is ecstasy! it comes,
It thunders o'er her capital's fair domes—
'Tis echoed by a tempest-shout! a sound
That makes a billowy surge of the air around,
Rocking the haughty sunshine on its swell,
Till on the sense it seems to grow and dwell.
Hark — hark — that shout! that startling, staggering shout,
Bringing ten thousand, thousand echoes out!
A nation's soul is on that whirlwind-cry;
A nation's zeal, a nation's ecstasy.
Well may it shake and pierce the astonished sky—
And plough the Element, and wildly spread
Unto the horizon's ends—full, deep, and dread!
Surely 't were almost strong to awake, to arouse,
The very Dead from their sepulchral house;
To make those reliques breathe, those embers burn—
And start and tremble in their funeral urn;
And with its clamorous stun, its deafening roar,
To pierce their deafness—bid their trance give o'er!
'T was one grand Unison; as though the whole
Of that dense multitude—one Voice, one Soul,
One Hope, one Doom, and one Emotion shared;
Nor masked their feelings, nor the Expression spared;
But glorying, wreaked their turbulent joy's excess—
Their full, intoxicating happiness,
On passionate Demonstration! Far and near,
Peals that wild sound of mad and maddening cheer—
That Pæan-shout!—it strikes with haughty aim
The Firmaments, which fulmine back the Acclaim!
What were the clarion's blasts, the cannon's roar,
To that deep Voice! more startling—glorious more—
Far more imposing, lofty, and sublime,
Than music's crash, or proud Cathedral-chime!
To welcome thee, beloved and blessed Boy,
An Empire rises in majestic joy!
A festal morn! a jubilee of earth—
To hail the eventful, the auspicious birth;
A festal morn! all sights and sounds conspire
To raise the popular joy yet high and higher,—
Stately Processions pass in long array,
With torch and taper glimmering faint by day;
And lifted cross, and solemn-breathing strain,
Pouring thanksgivings, many a pompous Train!
Full many a royal blazon flouts the wind,
With broidered tapestries every street is lined—
Flowers o'er the pavements strewn, a vernal glow
Shed round them, and the very face of Woe
Cheerily now a look of gladness wears—
Where but too lately trespassed blistering tears;
Pain starts up from its fevered couch, and owns
A joy that bids it change its hollow groans,
For cries and shouts of cheer; now for awhile
Its pallid countenance assumes the smile—
Its tortured frame, the weariness, the fret,
The writhings, and the tossings, doth forget;
Age, hurrying to the festive scene apace,
Smoothes down the tell-tale furrows from its face—
No more the misty film its lit eye dims,
No more it drags a weight of nerveless limbs;
But braced and buoyed with vigorous airs of hope,
Joins the unmarshalled multitudinous Troop—
And in the last days of its scant grey hair,
Exults and triumphs with the youngest there!
And Childhood, gladsome Childhood mad with glee,
Bright as a foam-wreath on the tossing sea;
Takes part in all the uproarious revelry,
(While haply, for the cause it little cares,
Of that loud joy it so intensely shares).
Mothers, upon this proud, propitious morn,
Turn from their own dear babes, their own first-born,
And clasp their hands and breathe their heart-felt prayer
For him—the Hope, the Promise, and the Heir!
Then to their arms, those treasures newly given,
Snatch with redoubled joy, redoubled trust in heaven.

A festal morn! a holiday to all!
A boundless, universal Carnival!
From lowliest hearth, to loftiest, lordliest hall,
From end to end of the triumphant land,
Her sons now form one close, fraternal band;
One mighty sympathy at once prevades
Her palaced cities and her cottaged glades;
One gracious unity of Feeling binds
All ranks and orders, as all hearts and minds—
Such sacred fellowship, such concord pure,
Why may it not unchangeably endure,
So rendering human happiness secure?
Hark—hark!—that loud, and lond, and wild acclaim,
Which heaves ten thousand bosoms and the same!
Oh, how the Imperial and Maternal heart
Must in that scene have borne transcendant part!
And yet not so! the stormy triumph there,
Wrapped in a heavenly calm it might not share,
What were those haughty revelries and wild
To her,—who hails and clasps her first-born child?
An Empire's joy is nothing unto hers,
Whose inmost soul the speechless prayer prefers;
Whose heart with every loftiest feeling stirs,
(In the white hour of this auspicious date,
When fortune smiles, and smiles consenting fate.)
Loftiest and loveliest too, but silent all,
Words may not bind such feelings in their thrall—
Language hath ne'er their precious worth confessed,
'Tis in the bosom's depths they lie compressed,—
'Tis in the silence of adoring tears,
Surely she lays aside the burthening fears
That late o'ercame her; and the mother's heart
In that proud scene—takes but the Mother's part!
She nothing hears of that rejoicing din,
Her world of feeling now lies all within—
She nothing recks of that Triumphal show;
One object only, wins her gaze below
With magnet-like attraction that enchains
Her every thought, while throbbing through her veins,
Solemn, yet sweet emotions, kindling pass
Like chequering lights and shades o'er some smooth glass—
She starts not at the thunderous-volumed stun
Of loud artillery—not the signal gun
Can rouse her from her high and hallowed trance,
Nor shake her glad dream's calm predominance;
Nor break those threads of musings, pure and fine,
Which in Imagination's web entwine
Their aëry gossamery—No!—she lies bound
In spells that yield not to that haughty sound;
No, no;—her tender infant's feeble wail
Alone can her maternal ear assail—
Alone o'er her maternal sense prevail!
That Infant, dearer to her soul and sight,
Than all Earth's pomps—pure Fountain of Delight!
Which shall not poisoned be, nor poured to waste;
Nor, when the thirsting lip would bend to taste—
Shivered to foam, nor shrunk, nor chilled, nor dimmed;
But more and more with blessedness be brimmed!
Pure Fountain! whence no brackish spray-drops cast,
Shall taint the present, nor make dark the past—
Whose only bitter draught shall be the last,
(That draught of bitterness which she shall drain,
Ev'n to its dregs, of anguish and of pain!)
Oh, Rainbow! fairest Rainbow! where combined
Past, Present, Future seem, in bright tints joined;
Blest Rainbow! whose most soft and eloquent dyes
Calmly illustrate all the gladdened skies—
Dear harbinger of deep and halcyon peace,
At whose approach all storms and tempests cease;
Bright morning star of Hope! (Hope, whose sweet ray
Each cloud disparts, each dull mist warms away—
And through each sunbeam doth fresh light infuse,
Lending to day more clear, more vivid hues;
That Ray, which round, above, beyond us, glows—
Till Earth and Air, and Skies and Stars compose
—By no dissevering bars asunder riven,—
One universal Sun! one boundless Heaven!)
Anchor,—on which her very heart may lean,
With all its freight of deep affections keen;
Nor fear 't will fail it, in the hour of need
Frail as a splintered staff, a broken reed;
Scion of Promise—freshly planted here,
Who—who shall say if not from some far sphere,
Gently transplanted by the Omnific hand—
Who—who shall say, for who can understand?
Oh, perfect flower! the very Flower of Flowers,
Just budded, and to bloom through boundless hours,
Through everlasting seasons, 'midst the bowers,
The amaranth bowers of Eden—as fond hope
Fain, fain would dream, where fair things do not droop;
Where blossoms are not shed, nor smooth leaves strown;
Nor buds are cankered; haply ere they're blown!—
Where never bleak Frost chains, nor Tempest smites;
Nor Death's black wind, comes down with all its blights.
Sweet Flower of Flowers! is not thy native clime
Beyond Earth's chills, above the clouds of Time?
Mother and Child! whose union close and true,
No after-times of change shall all undo;
How exquisite an influence o'er the heart,
In such an hour ye conqueringly assert!
The Parent and the Infant both exert
Such gentle influence, and deep interest claim,
While every lip for them doth fond prayers frame!
His ancestorial heritage of pride—
And thine, sweet Mother! now seems laid aside,
Forgotten, in the intense, religious joy
Which brightly doth these blessed hours employ;
And dost thou one awakening feeling own
That is not ruled by sacred Love alone?
No peasant-mother in an Alpine home,
Could with more breathless watchfulness become
The guardian angel of her Child, than thou,
With empire's wreaths, ablaze along thy brow,
Its jewelled purple round thy fair form thrown,
And all its glories o'er thy path-way strown!
Yea, thine is Empire. Thou! thou art nature's own;—
No peasant-mother could more meekly raise
The deep thanksgivings, and glad prayers of praise;
Nor with more fond and true emotions glow—
The holiest, best emotions felt below;—
No peasant-mother with more gentle joy,
Bend o'er the first bright slumber of her boy,
Than thou in thy young lofty motherhood,
Imperial being of Imperial blood!
Thou whom high Duty with an Angel's voice,
Calls to fulfil her dictates and rejoice;
Thou whom Affection's fine and fervent power
O'ershadows in this deep, this full-blown hour!
While love, meek love, its hallowing mantle flings
O'er thee, the Daughter of an hundred Kings!
Is this a dream? a fiction?—let them tell
Who ever bowed to the enchanting spell
Of such an hour—yea, let them speak and say
Who ever yielded to its rapturous sway.
Is it a Fable? Is't a Fiction? No!
Truth, Nature, make reply, and say, “it is not so!”
Since those mysterious, mighty days of yore—
When the great mother of Mankind first bore
A living infant,—ever o'er and o'er
This beautiful History hath enacted been,
The loveliest spectacle of Life's wide scene!
And thou, thrice welcomed, worshipped, treasured Child!
How proud a star above thy birth hath smiled!
A wreath—a galaxy of stars! ne'er yet
Above one head such clustering glories met;
Such pomp of earthly grandours surely ne'er
Before was meted to one mortal's share.
Lo! on that childish Front the Regal band,
The Imperial fasces in that infant hand;
The sovran Purple swathed round that slight frame—
And oh! the mighty magic of thy name,
Focus to every ray of glory or of fame!
How is thy cradle by wild shouts assailed;
Thou welcomed, worshipped One; the invoked, the hailed—
And hailed thou art, by myriads and by One,
That chief of Monarchs, on his throne-piled Throne;
He who with voice subdued, now calls thee Son!
He of an hundred Battles, bends above
His slumbering Babe, and softens into love:
He of an hundred Victories, vanquished now—
Seals with a father's kiss, the cherub brow
Of his young cradled Son, and fondly stoops
O'er the sweet star of all his dearest hopes.
The ambitions chief—the autocratic lord—
He who cut through with his resistless sword,
Earth's Gordian knot of Powers established; mild—
He yields deep Nature's homage to his Child!
Gazes upon the meekness of its face,
And folds his Infant in a Sire's embrace.

A festal Eve!—the illuminated Spires
And Domes, seem bursting with a thousand fires.
Night comes! and comes but to be chased away
By that wild glare, that ev'n might challenge Day,
Turning the midnight-Heavens to burning gold;
Like some proud Regal Banner wide-unrolled,
With stars encrusted thick on every fold.
A festal Eve!—where'er the eye can turn,
A myriad lights with boundless lustre burn:
Streets, Temples, Theatres, Columns, Bridges, Towers,
Minsters, and Palaces and Palace-Bowers,
Commingle in the illuminated blaze;
And nought of gloom relieves the aching gaze!
A Magical Volcano, wide it spreads;
And, 'stead of Ruin, festal radiance sheds!
The Royal City doth indeed rejoice,
Her joy hath found a symbol and a voice.
The Mistress of the Nations, she appears,
While high her bannered, turreted head she rears!
And thou 'rt the awakener of these transports, Child;
Thou gentle, lowly thing, and undefiled!
The Astyanax of this proud Ilium—thou,
That cradled in unconscious rest liest now;
The living, bright Palladium of the land,
That trebly armed the Foeman to withstand—
Should now Exultant and inspired arise!
With that sweet rainbow smiling in her Skies—
That Dove of Peace, to hallow her proud ark—
That youthful Cæsar's fortunes in her bark!
A very Talisman of strength and power
Thou 'lt surely prove—Star of this Star-bright hour!

The City shines, arrayed in dazzling pomp;
The Air is ringing with the piercing tromp.
The heavy beat of Drums rolls loud and long,
Mixed with the echoes of the chorussed Song.
The Banquet is prepared—the feast is spread;
Odours are scattered, and fresh wreaths are shed.
And Syren voices warble Pæan-lays
Of Loyal joy, of triumph, and of praise.
The Dancers' steps bound through the arched saloon,
Where lamp, and harp, and beaker, and festoon
Make glad the hours. And hark! where, bursting high,
The crackling Fireworks leap along the sky.
The Seine rolls down, a wave of golden flame;
A sheet of bickering splendours spreads its stream!
While on its sparkling and effulgent breast
The Stars no longer shine in placid rest—
Lost in that lustrous glow!—the Seine doth bear
Th' imaged illuminations on its fair
And lovely surface—ruddily doth it glare.
And where the night-breeze on the stream grows strong,
In billowy lightnings seems to flash along;
The waters are a conflagration! wide,
Fire's broad reflection spreads on every side.
Hush! hark! what sounds are borne upon the Night—
The deep, resounding Night! Shouts of delight
And stormy triumph; for they hail thy Son—
Oh, thou Armi-potent Napoleon!
The birth of thy first-born—the auspicious birth—
They hail with the uproar of that glorying mirth:
And still their Io-cry is thy proud Name!
And say—shall he, whose birth they thus proclaim,
Be heir to all thy fortunes, and thy fame?

A quiet Morn!—a morn of Summer too;
And blue the fair sky is—serenely blue.
Yet, 'midst this bright and tender quietude,
A mystic sadness dimly seems to brood.
And round a Palace-dwelling, high and proud,
A gloom seems clinging, like a mantling cloud.
Oh, what a deeply different scene is this!
Here are no signs of triumph, nor of bliss.
No festal sounds, no festal sights are here;
But all is still; and, in that stillness drear,
No thronging myriads, trembling with suspense,
Wait round in speechless watchfulness intense:
No loud artillery's long-resounding roll,
Startles and stuns the senses and the soul:
No broidered tapestries, hung from house to house,
Spread their rich breadths; nor shouts the echoes rouse;
Nor clarion blast swells gloryingly along
The answering air—clear, jubilant, and strong!
No stormy drums disturb that mournful air;
No blazoned banners, wildly fluttering there,
Deepen the sunshine to a ruddy glare.
No flowery wreaths lie scattered o'er the ground,
Shedding a glow of Midsummer around:
No incense-clouds float up, whose fragrant steam
Makes every breeze with odorous treasures teem:
No laurelled arches raise their fronts of pride,
No stately trophies gleam on every side;
Nor high processions pass, with chanted hymn,
With lifted cross, and torches wavering dim—
In the clear daylight—borne by white-rob'd Priest:
All sounds, all sights of joy are gone—have ceased;
There is no Pomp, no Revelry, no Feast!
All, all is changed—a fearful, startling change;
Dull, heavy, melancholy, sadly strange.
The Imperial and Maternal heart must feel
The pang, that words were formed not to reveal.
The Imperial and Maternal heart must bear
The last, worst anguish few but faintly share;—
The impending, imminent death-stroke of despair!
That wounded heart must struggle to endure
The immedicable ill that loathes a cure;
The uttermost, innermost distress and grief,
That shrinks from solace, and that shuns relief.
Yea! such must be its portion; haply, yet
Heroic lessons doth it not forget.
Haply, a holy valour nerves and fires—
And brightly aids—religiously inspires.

Alas! where stretched in help lessness and pain,
The Royal Sufferer doth unsoothed remain.
Unsoothed—though Love, unwearied Love keeps watch,
His faintest accent—lightest breath to catch.
That deepest, truest Love—first, fondest, best;
The Love that glows in the Maternal breast.
Alas! where stretched in helplessness and pain,
On the sad couch he ne'er shall quit again,
The heir, the hope, the Star of promise lies,
With life's last rays receding from his eyes—
And misty dreams the pitying fates dispense,
To o'ercloud the aching avenues of sense
Veiling his soul, with shadows dim and drear,
And mystic sounds no ear but his can hear—
Bringing strange messages of hope and fear.
Are there indeed so few to watch, to wait
At this dark hour of dire and mournful date,
So few to shew compassion or regret—
When that fair sun is hastening on to set;
So few to feel or feign congenial woes,
With her who, wrung and tortured, from repose
Awaits till every hope at length shall close.
Are there indeed so few? yet who can tell
What myriads, countless though invisible—
May around Innocency's death-bed wait,
To soothe or watch the fiat of its fate—
Who, who can tell what missioned hosts attend,
When a so blameless life draws near its end?
What angel guests may still and silent stand
Around, a ministrant and guardian band;
And as the spirit sinks and ebbs away,
Yield it a bright support, a heavenly stay,
While slow and faint the numbered pulses play—
And if Life's parting-brightness yet enchains
That lingering spirit, breathe consoling strains;
And pour sweet balms o'er every wound, and shed
Slumber's own twilight-languors round the head
That long hath ached upon a sleepless bed?
Oh! little now could man's vain help avail—
In this stern hour, when even the strongest fail,
The proudest tremble, and the bravest shrink,
The firmest totter on the dizzying brink;
(The dizzying brink of that dread precipice,
Which mortal traveller shall ne'er tread twice;
Which darkness clasps around, above, beneath,
The blackness of thy darkness, fearful Death!)
And what could man do for thee now, thou pale,
Thou gentle sufferer—reed on fate's strong gale!
Man's agency and aid were mockery all,
When the pale angel's still small voice doth call—
Then what could thronging crowds do for thee now,
While his damp dews are gathering to thy brow?
And thou, poor Mother! could the assembled world
Ward off the stroke which at thy heart is hurled?
That young majestic flower thou'dst reared and blessed,
(The loveliest gift of heaven—the dearest, best;)
And in those widowed arms ecstatic pressed—
Bowed, ruined, broken, smitten in thy sight,
By the unpitying blast, the unsparing blight;
Oh, what a dreadful blow! Grief hast thou known,
And many a loss; but what were throne and crown,
The Pomp, the Pride, the Triumph, and the Sway—
The Honours, and the Advantage, reft away;
Oh! what were they,—what any loss to this?
In this fair casket—all thy hopes of bliss
Lay hoarded; in this fragile tenement,
Thy heart-dear treasures were close locked and pent!

And now how fast his sinking strength declines—
How faint the lamp of life, low-flickering shines,—
Now, now, outbursts a spring of staunchless tears,
That must o'erflow a waste of desolate years;
Now, now, a heavy darkness doth descend
O'er present, future, past—and seems to blend
In one inextricable gloom the whole,
At least unto that bowed and stricken soul,—
Unsolaced Mourner! thou indeed hast known
Calamity, that ev'n a heart of stone
Might bruise, might melt,—so fraught hath it been still
With harrowing eircumstance of deadliest ill;
Now shalt thou back to thy sad home return,
Clasping in thought the shadowy funeral urn
To thy lorn heart—nor shall the fervid skies
Of Italy, be lovely in thine eyes;
Nor all the glories of that purple land,
Where warbling streams—by scented breezes fanned,
And myrtle-bowers and orange thickets shine—
And Ruin's self appears a thing divine,
Win thee from one sad vision—one dark dream,
Nor gild thy path with even Delusion's gleam;
While still one voice shall whisper in thine ear,
Midst all the melodies serene and clear,
That wander through that blue transparent air,
Low cadences of sorrow—and shall bear
Far through thy bosom's depths a quivering thrill,
A restless tremor: so the song-birds' trill,
The fountain's fall, the scented breeze's tone,
Shall gain a thoughtful sadness not their own;
And every close of every melody
Shall be, or seem to be, a lingering sigh.
A mournful Eve! the sultry time is still—
Or almost so, by wood and plain and hill;
And low faint sounds, as of some hidden rill,
Or moaning breeze—or stir of living things,
Winnowing the air with their soft sheeny wings—
Seeking the tranquil refuge of their nest,
And panting for the honey-dews of rest,
Come fitfully along the listening ear;
Those sweet faint sounds now distant float—now near,
By fancy magnified, and wrought by fear—
A dim and dreamy fear, to something strange,
And vague and dubious, till in ceaseless change
They wander by, and hardly they retain
A likeness of themselves, while the under-strain
Imagination breathes, doth more and more
Confuse them and distort—perplexing sore;
Now they might seem like some unearthly wail,
Vexing the air and loading the faint gale—
Poured by the viewless Spirits of the spot,
As if they sorrowed o'er a hopeless lot,—
And now they shift to dull and hollow sounds,
Like low groans on deserted battle-grounds—
(When come the high stars forth, with their pure light
So calmly, beatifically bright,
So exquisitely, spiritually clear—
A separate Heaven, might seem each separate sphere!
And ill, but ill, their solemn smiles accord
With the fierce crimson ruin of the sword);
And now like dreamy cadences that dwell
'Midst the wreathed windings of the ocean-shell,
They linger on the enchained, and watchful sense,
And tristful feelings to the soul dispense;
A whisper of dark omens,—dark and deep,
Seems faintly on the conscious air to creep;—
A broken murmur,—a most plaintive tone,
So mournful, that 't is Melancholy's own,
Assails the ear on this sweet pensive eve,
When nature seems with wild caprice to grieve;
But is it Nature's voice, that voice of woe?
Doth it from her eternal bosom flow?
No! 't is the heart's prophetic Lyre-strings soft,
That now those sorrowing modulations waft.
A sad, sweet Eve!—the sultry time is still,
(Save where those gentle whispers float and thrill,)
And the pure dews all tremulously spill
Their priceless treasures 'midst the quivering leaves;
Till every vein new freshness so receives—
And softly, slowly sink their silvery showers
On the overblown and dimmed dejected flowers,—
Which the impetuous glance of haughty noon
Had scorched in their mid-beauty, many a tune
Of homeward-wheeling birds, and laden bees,
(Soft as the murmurs of the gentle breeze,)
Is heard beneath the massy, clustering trees—
Now while the encroaching darkness steals along,
And shadows spread the leafy haunts among,
Silence contending seems, with fairy sound,
And tender gloom, with faint light—whilst around,
A deep mysterious presence seems to dwell,
Mighty the soul's vain earthward dreams to quell;
The twilight dimness thickly gathering grows,
Yet something there disturbs the calm repose—
And while those shadow-breadths stretch fast and far,
Still something seems the tranquil seene to mar—
Now deep and deeper grows the thrilling hush,
Pale Fancy's phantoms from the stillness rush;
Till sinks that weight of stillness on the soul,
And even Fancy owns its stern control!
And Night and Silence solemnly conspire,
While Summer's midnight-heavens lie bathed in fire.

And now again 'tis morn—the last his eyes
Who on the bed of mortal suffering lies,
Shall ever see outburst from yon fair skies.
A glorious Morn!—a morn of Summer, rife
Of beauty, hope, enjoyment, freshness, life.
The Stars have faded, melted out of sight;
Splendour in Splendour merged, Light lost in Light!
Of them remains not now the slightest trace;
But boundless glory springs up in their place.
And lo! 't is daybreak on the awakening world;
The many-coloured mists have shrunk and curled.
Now from the heights, by viewless hand withdrawn,
(Raised curtains for thy victor-march—Proud Dawn!)
And vanished from the brows of grove-clad hills,
And woods, plains, valleys, flowered knolls, and blue rills,
The Horizon far, the scene of beauty near—
City and hamlet-fold, outshining clear
The Morning and the morning's beauty, wear
Even as a Royal raiment—glorious more
Than ever yet monarchic shoulders bore;
Wrought, jewelled, burnished each transparent fold,
It spreads and shines in sheets of wavy gold,
From earth's green depths, to heaven's refulgent roof,
Framed in the same pure everlasting woof—
And thus apparelled, all things lovelier look,
As each some separate charm from morning took;
Morning! most conquering, most transcendant time,
Be blessings on thy hours of lustrous prime—
To meet thy breath, thy smile, thy blushful glow,
Is almost to forget all ills below.
Nature and thee, like fond twin sisters greet,
And rush into embraces long and sweet—
At such an hour—Care, anxious care doth seem
A dull mistake, and even stern Death a dream;
Pain half a cheat, and Sorrow half a crime—
And all but Joy, a treason to the time!
And wheresoe'er we wander or delay,
Something of lovely soothes, or cheers our way—
Birds spread their various plumage in the ray
Of sunshine, borrowing thence (but lending too),
Warm radiance—many a swiftly-glancing hue.
The Rose in purple Royalty shines bright,
And round her sheds a dreamy flush of light,
And a most fragrant, rapturous atmosphere—
The Rose shines forth, and shines without a peer;
Save 't is the stainless Lily at her side,
That looks a vestal, or a white-robed bride—
A thousand, thousand fair things, seem new-born
To greet and grace bright Midsummer and Morn!
A glorious glowing Morn it is in truth—
All redolent of Delight, and Hope, and Youth;
But 't is the night of Death to him! The last
Dread act of Life's perplexing drama's past—
And 't is the night of Death to him—the Young,
The Proud, the Beautiful!—a veil is flung,
A deep dense veil—his darkened sight between,
And all the glory of Earth's varied scene—
And even from thought's impassioned reach, removed
Is he, the watched, the treasured, and the loved!—
Pale is that once fair form—pale, rigid, chill,
The latest gasp is hushed, and all is still—
Life's quivering chords, at last have ceased to thrill!
And 't is the night of Death, deep Death to thee,
In the prostration of thine agony,
(The night of deadliest Death it is, must be)
Throneless and childless queen and mother.—Thou,
From whose augustly sad and mournful brow
So many of Earth's rich, richest garlands proud
Have fallen and faded, as cloud after cloud
Broke o'er thy Regal head, while far and wide
Stern Ruin followed, till on every side
Black Desolation frowned, o'erwhelming all
With leaden crush and adamantine thrall.
Hark! hush! what muffled sounds, dull, ominous, low,
Invade the ear? dire sounds of deepest woe,
Which the thrilled sense can recognize too well—
The alarum of despair, the funeral-knell!
Oh sad, sad morn—a heavy morn indeed,
That sees youth die, and Love's true bosom bleed;
The Imperial hearths look desolate! the walls
Of Schoenbrunn, and its arched and 'scutcheoned halls
Wear a dimmed aspeet, and a mournful air;
And it may well be so, for Death is there.
He whose strong hand in one short moment tears
Up by the roots, the cherished Hope of years,—
He whose stern presence clouds the loveliest bowers,
The Peasants' homesteads, and the Kaiser's towers;
He, through the arched halls and sculptured galleries strode,
A Chief midst Chiefs, to fix his proud abode,
While that fair morning lit the festive skies,
To gladden all but filmed and dying eyes!
The palace chambers have an altered look,
'T was not long since an arrowy lightning stroke
Shattered a sculptured eagle, that adorned
That Royal Dwelling—ah, it dimly warned,
It darkly prophesied,—too soon behold
Empire's bright Sunbird of Imperial mould,
Sunk in its springtime—stricken to the heart
By Death's black lightnings and envenomed dart;
Leaving the purple realms of joyous day,
For those of darkness, silence, and decay;
Yet, did not the olden superstition tell,
That where Heaven's lightnings, scorching, scathing fell,
They sanctified? oh! let us dream so now—
And while we see thee, to the fiat bow—
Thus in the glory of thy blooming years,
Still woo that thought to while away our fears,
To check, to charm, or consecrate our tears;
And surely hallowed thou dost seem, and blest,
In that most sweet serenity of rest—
And freed from every earthly taint and stain,
Heaven's, Heaven's, and thy Creator's all again!

Place ye round that bright brow no Regal band,
It needs it not to impress and to command;
Though by the frost-like crush of Death weighed down,
That pure bright brow is in itself a crown!
And be no costly mantle vainly thrown
About those youthful limbs—whose sculptured grace,
Not Death itself hath wholly power to efface!
The whitest, the most soft, and simple shroud
Should round them hang, like twilight's pearly cloud,
And nought of pomp, and nought of funeral gloom,
Remind us there, or of the Throne or Tomb!
Gently hath Death dealt on that lovely form;
No stately Lily by a summer storm
O'erborne, e'er lovelier in its ruin lay,
Than that fair fragile fabric of bright clay.

He lived, and he was loved! he smiled, and died!
And there—all the Earth's vain grandeurs laid aside,
And there—lies he, once a proud Nation's pride!
The Kingly, though the Unkinged, whose infant brow
Was cinctured by the crown—reft from it now,
And o'er whose cradle played supremely bright
Hope's glowing sunbursts of Etherial light.
Ah! those wild glories that illumed thy dawn,
Perchance, in Love and Mercy were with-drawn.
Thee never harassed public cares; nor worse,
The Ingratitude, that like a withering curse
Too oft awaits Earth's Rulers, thou wert spared,
Those treacherous Counsels, that have oft ensnared
The Great; the contumely, the bitter wrong,
That oft abase the high, and crush the strong:
The assaults of Faction, with its ambushed sting—
That Hydra-headed and mysterious thing;
And all the dire Variety of Ills,
Which still the Historic page with darkness fills!
These thou wert spared! who once 't was hoped should be
The Founder of a Mighty Dynasty!
The Heir of Victory's vast Inheritance;
The Sovereign of the unconquerable France;
The Guardian of her honour and her laws;
The unmoved, devoted Champion of her Cause;
The Leader of her Legioned Hosts; the Lord
Of her thronged Millions, all!—the obeyed, the adored!
(Poor young probationer of a various lot—
What matters now, if cherished or forgot!
But if remembered, let for bearance veil
Thy natural, human faults,—since all are frail.
A little Charity, to embalm thy name,
Is all thou need'st of Flattery, or of Fame.)
Six feet of earth can circumscribe the scope
Of all that proud and most Majestic Hope!
Scion of Cæsars! sleep—sleep well, and long!
Thee never more shall fickle Fortune wrong.
The veil of Purity, the robe of Peace
Wrapt round thee,—thou art gone, where conflicts cease;
Where griefs, and pains, and trials are no more;
Even to yon starry-paven, pensive shore!
Scion of Cæsars—sleep! thine early tomb
Shall prove a happier, a more hallowed doom
Than thy dread Sire's! who deeply, sternly drew
His dark delights from Tumult, and ne'er knew
The Enchantments of Repose; who proudly wreathed
His brows with dazzling Terrors; and but breathed
War's Hurricane-breath of fierce Convulsion: so,
His life was Agitation's prey below;
Who thundering drove his adamantine car—
The throned and sceptred Jaggernaut of War!
Who wreaked his wild and turbulent soul of Fire
On steep adventure, difficult and dire;
On perilous enterprise, and Titan aim:
He who achieved a more than mortal Name;
And tired the unequal feet of panting Fame:
He, of the Nations and their Lords, the Lord,
Whose haughty purpose lightened from his sword!
Who, an incarnate Whirlwind, stirred to strife
All the energies and impulses of Life:
Whose name was an Eclipse! whose earthquake-word
A Fiat and a Fate to whoso heard!
Yea! he who soared to a meridian height,
But to emit chill rays of blackest night;
To cloak the reeking and defeatured globe
With an ensanguined and funereal robe:
He whose avatar was all Ruin! yet,
Whose iron laughter mocked the suns that set,
Quenched in that ruin,—scorning to regret!
And with Success for his proud handmaid, moved
As one commissioned, hurtless, unreproved,
Along his fearful course the wide and wild!—
He who sprang forth, mailed, girt, and armed; the Child
Of a tumultuous and chaotic time—
A fatal season of triumphant crime!
Discord's Apostle—wide he preached, and well,
Her heinous precepts; sounding the echoing knell
Of golden Peace, that, drowned in tears and gore,
Trembled, and shuddering sank, and was no more!
While heavenly Concord and sweet Mercy spread
Their angel-plumes, and from the pale Earth fled!

The Tyrant's Tyrant, he!—the Monarch's scourge!
How could those hands victorious, deign to forge
Chains for the free—fresh yokes for the oppressed—
Till Earth hugged Slavery to her bleeding breast;
And Liberty—wronged Liberty became
The echo of the whisper of a Name!
And yet he laboured out—that Man of Blood—
The ends of Mercy, and the intents of Good:
And that apparently erratic course
Was planned by Wisdom, and constrained by Force—
By Force Almighty—viewlessly constrained—
And in dread yoke and strong, was he enchained!
And every step of that mysterious way,
Bared to the Eye of Heaven, from the commencement lay!
While still he left in his terrific path
An awful Anarchy of gloom and wrath!
(Red Battle knew his mighty Master well—
Ev'n as a steed his rider! Fierce and fell
He grew in that great presence: yet, that burst—
That storm of fury, at its wildest, worst—
That shadowing gloom, that made the Sun grow dim;
That fierceness, still proved fealty to him.
The ruthless Giant ramped, and tossed, and roared—
'T was still Submission's homage to his Lord—
While in his savage deadliness of mirth,
“Aha!” he cried, and smote the shuddering Earth!
“Aha!” he cried; and from her cloudy seat
Annihilation came, and crouched her at his feet!
And yet he proved a traitor foul, at last,
And all forswore the allegiance of the past—
When the still Mightier Master came, and saw,
And conquered—him he served as if in awe;
The Mightier Master—Lord of starr'd Renown,
Who hung his laurel-wreathed triumphal crown
High on that pyramid of Empires, proud,
Beneath the weight of which the World seemed bowed;—
Whose crown of Victory o'er it blazed in light,
Nor with it, sank into the gulphs of night,
But beams for ever from its solar height!)
Lo! from France' blood-red banners, wide unfurled,
Plague, Strife, Oppression, Horror, Death, he hurled—
Defacing Heaven's high image from the world,
In slaughtered millions, to the dust consigned.
A terror to the Universal Mind;
An awful Arbiter of general Doom;
A Presence dread—a most tremendous Gloom,
He moved along; and nothing might suffice—
Not homage, praise, submission, sacrifice—
To melt that heart of Iron and of Ice.
For such it was, when dark Ambition wrought
Within the vast sphere of his towering thought.
On, on he moved,—in terrible might arrayed,
O'ermantling Earth as with his Shadow's shade!
As though the sweeping scythe he wrenched from Time—
And played, terrifically played the Mime,
Girt with his fearful attributes—with all
His savage prowess fired, until his thrall—
His rule, was almost as supremely vast,
And Change came o'er Creation where he past!
As though the horrent ensign of command,
The giant-sceptre, from the clay-cold hand
Of Death he seized, and with o'ersweeping might
Usurped his shadowy Empire of the Night;
And too unconquerably strong went forth,
From earth to raze the loveliness and worth,
The glory, and the splendour, and the pride;
With Strife his playmate—Danger for his bride,
And Massacre still rampant at his side.
Yea! Death, Time's Phantom-comrade, Death, seemed still
To obey his dictates and to work his will;
To take stern hints from him, whose lordly voice
So oft had bade him feast him and rejoice—
Who many a banquet had before him spread,
When rash resisting foes bowed, sunk, and bled!
—As though ev'n at the Fates themselves he mocked,
And at their cloud-capped gates triumphant knocked,
And bade them mark his fiat and behest,
And homage do to their victorious guest—
And on their awful necks, would have them take
His yoke, and meekly follow in his wake,
And shield, and raise, and spare, or crush and smite,
Ev'n as he listed—as in proud despite
Of Circumstance, Expedience, or of Right—
A shadowing doubt his dread achievements cast
O'er the Heroic and Chivalrous Past!
And many a blazing deed of glorious war
Grows pale before his sun-surpassing star;
Hath not his name, his high and haughty name,
Made the unborn Future's sealed and shrouded Fame,
All—all but hopeless? since what acts shall bear
With his astounding triumphs to compare?—
All, all but hopeless, a precipitous aim,
An almost desperate quest and rash presumptuous claim?
His mighty influence still unchecked, extends
O'er the aroused Earth, even to its farthest ends.
Hath not his dust cried “havoc,” from its cell?
His memory proved a dire and fearful spell?
His name, alas! a factious watchword been,
To pave once more with wrecks, earth's darkened scene?
But should this be? no! let his memory float,
Ev'n as a flag of truce,—and as a note
Proclaiming peace, let that wild name become;
And Concord, heavenly Concord from his tomb,
Spring like the rainbow from the storm's black gloom,
And so let the' Earth, the wronged unhappy Earth,
Be through his death consoled for his dark birth.

Droop lower still, ye mournful-drooping willows,
That crest Helena's hollow-sounding billows;
Droop lower still, above that awful dust,
Consigned to ye in melancholy trust,
Ye pensive sentinels! ye guardians meek!
That shade that burial-isle, the wild and bleak—
Whose cold, unsympathizing comrades are,
The Winds, the Rock, the Billow, and the Star;
Sweet willows! lone's that dread tomb by the deep,
Your long, caressing, weeping boughs o'ersweep;
Sweet willows! far more fittingly above
The Son's calm grave, surely ye'd lean in love
And drooping lowliness, and fragile grace,
Surely that tomb were more congenial place
For such meek mourners, than that last abode,
Of him, who the Earth in wrath and mystery trod—
Like the dread shadow of an angry God!

Droop lower still! o'er those proud embers, now
Weep sadder dews from every weeping bough,
For him the hope, the blessing, and the boast—
The Phœnix of proud Promise, fallen and lost;
Oh ever-weeping willows! though afar
He rest—inhumed beneath a distant star!
But thou shalt sleep while age succeeds to age,
And time 'gainst Earth his long-drawn war shall wage;
But thou shalt sleep a long and tranquil sleep,
Young princely Reichstadt! though no mourners keep
Perpetual vigil o'er thy place of rest,
Nor Art's, nor Nature's—these divinely drest
In leafy honours, and soft vernal hues,
Kissed by Heaven's winds and hallowed by Heaven's dews,
And those in marble lineaments composed,
Cold as the forms, the rigid forms enclosed
In the proud pompous sepulchre, beside
Where by like breathless watchers they abide;
Adversity thou 'st known, but even her yoke
Fell lightly on thy shoulders, as the stroke
Of Death the Conqueror hath descended now
To chill thy heart, and pale thy princely brow.
Thou'rt fallen,—yet no! not fallen, but thou 'rt flown,
Thy guiltless soul doth Earth's dull thrall disown,
And other realms than hers, are all thine own!
Thou'st left behind, like suns that smile and set,
A twilight-tenderness of soft regret;
Thou'st melted off, like music's loveliest breath,—
Peace to thy gentle Soul, even Peace in Death!