University of Virginia Library

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v

TO THE VISCOUNTESS GALWAY.
xii

Though blank the range of place and fact
To hearts that only rise and fall,
God and the Poet can extract
Beauty and Truth from each and all.
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.
111

WRITTEN IN IRELAND.

CLIFDEN, IN CUNNEMARA.

Here the vast daughters of the eastward tide,
Heaved from the bosoms of the' Atlantic deep,
Lay down the burthen of their mighty forms,
Like some diviner natures of our kind,
Weary with gathered power, and sure to find
Only at once destruction and repose.
Yet no aerial cliff with harsh repulse
Confronts the roving buttresses of sea;
But on the gentle slant of yielding shores
The wande'rers of a world, intent on rest,
Impress their massive substances, break down
The' uneven slope by measureless degrees,
Wear out the line in thousand rugged shapes,
112

Detacht, dissolving, and peninsular,
Now closed within broad circle, like a lake,
Now narrow as a river far inland:
Thence rose the name whose very utterance
Is as an echo of the distant main,
The name of Cunnemara,—land of bays.
I stood among those waters and low hills,
Within the circuit of a goodly town,
Furnisht with mart and port and church and school,
Meet for the duteous work of social man
And all the uses of commodious life:
While round me circulated, free and wide,
A shifting crowd of almost giant shapes,
Creatures of busy blood and glorious eyes
Andalusìan, (as beseems the race),
Moulds of magnificent humanity.
Then was I told that twenty years before,
Or less, this spot, thus gay and populous,
Was one unmitigated solitude,
And all this outer wonder brought about
By the mere act of one industrious man!
Thus rolls amain the large material world,
Impelled and energised by human will.
113

Accord not him alone the Hero's name,
Who weaves the complicate historic woof,
Out of the rough disorder of mankind,
Fashioning nations to his own proud law:
Nor him alone the Poet's, who creates,
In his own chamber and exclusive spirit,
A universe of beauty, undisturbed
But by serene and sister sympathies.
For He who in one unremitting chain
Of solemn purpose solders link to link
Of active day and meditative night,
And with unquive'ring heart and hand can meet
Ever distress, ever impediment,
And wring from out a world of checks and flaws
Some palpable and most perspicuous whole
Of realised design and change imprest,
Shall be enrolled among heroic souls,
Though small the scope and slow the growth of deed.
He too, whose care has made some arid soil
Alive with waters of humane delight,
That shall in merry channels gambol on,
Or rest in depths of happy consciousness,—
114

Has planted and defended in the wild
Some garden of affection, a safe place
For daily love to grow in, and when ripe
To shed sweet seeds, that in their turn will feed
The winds of life with odours, shall be writ
Poet,—Creator, in that book of worth,
Which Nature treasures for the eye of Heaven.
115

THE SUBTERRANEAN RIVER, AT CONG.

A pleasant mean of joy and wonder fills
The trave'ller's mind, beside this secret stream,
That flows from lake to lake beneath the hills,
And penetrates their slumber like a dream.
Untrackt by sound or sight it wends its way,
Save where this well-like cave descending far,
Through ivy curtains, lets the' uncertain day
Fall on the current and its couch of spar.
A slippe'ry stair will lead you to the brink,
There cast your torch athwart the gleaming tide,
And while you watch the motions of the link
That marries the great waters on each side,—
116

Think of our common life that glides a span
In partial light dark birth and death between,—
Think of the treasures of the heart of man
That once float by us and are no more seen.
Or, for more cheerful mood, let local fame
Recount, how in old time, the faery sprite,
Finvara, or some such melodious name,
Fashioned this channel for her own delight;
And here, distrest at these unloyal days,
Maskt in a milk-white fish, still sports along,
And altogether leaves the moonlight rays
For the cool shadow of her Caves of Cong.
117

[One moment more before that fatal leap!]

We arrived at the Coleraine Salmon Leap on the 12th of August, just in time to see the last salmon caught,—the fishery there ending that day.

MSS. Journal

One moment more before that fatal leap!
One moment more! and now thou hadst been free
To wanton in the autumn sun or sleep
In the warmed crystal of thy little sea.
I saw thee pant,—I saw the flicke'ring shades
Wander beneath thy silver, loth to die,—
And still their glazèd brilliancy upbraids
The heavens that they permit man's perfidy.
But is it not a weak nor sinless thought,
Since Nature's law thus undisturbed has run,
Heedless of all the same hard fate has wrought,
To pass the myriad and deplore the one?
No, no,—our heart has but a narrow span,
Let it hold all the sympathy it can.
118

VALENTIA.

A FRAGMENT.

Where Europe's varied shore is bent
Out to the utmost Occident,
There rose of old from sea to air,
An island wonderful and fair!
Not that on his way to cheer
Our stranger-sister hemisphere,
Here the Sun is pleased to cast
Liefest smiles, as more his last,
Kinder than he gives to us—
Parting love-looks rubious:
Not that here the wind may fling
Odours from his faithless wing,
119

Scented breath of heaths and bowers,—
Keepsakes from confiding flowers,—
That the rover may be light
For his long Atlantic flight:—
Not that here the haughty land,
Spurning an assistant hand,
Makes a gracious rivalry
With its fere the hoary sea,
Offe'ring up to regal man
All the loyal gifts it can,
Such is not the rarity
O' the Island of the Western Sea.
The name is of a richer tone
Than our baptismal forms may own,—
A Spanish name, I little doubt,
Yet stands no Spanish lady out
When myriad star-rays mingle o'er
Her rose-emblazoned mirador,
Following with a flattered ear
A voice that follows a guitar,
Too mild and mellowed to be near,
But every precious word so clear,
It cannot come from very far.
120

No relick of gone days is here,
No antient-minded cavalier,
Who takes his grandson on his knee
And half in play, half earnestly,
Watches the darling's tender hand
Labour to clasp a well-used brand,
Which sleeps in quiet rust at last,—
And tells him of the echoing past,
What time the gallant Moorish race
Made Christian Spain their dwelling-place,
But Spain could never be the slave
Of stranger hosts, however brave,
And how this steel had helped to free
Her soil from turbaned Paynimrie.
The world has had its childly days,
Passion-bred hopes and earnest plays,—
The world has had its manhood fraught
With power and war and holy thought,—
The world is now grown vain and old,
Her head and heart are palsy cold,—
Light was called to meet her prime,
Thunder waits on her eve-time,
With a light that is not light,
But a death-glare ghastly bright.
121

And a voice is every where
Louder than thousand trumpets' blare,
“Hear it, ye mortals, every one,
The life from out your world is gone.”
So murmurs many' a soul sublime,
Engaoled in this unhealthy time,
Whose embryo-thoughts and half-desires
Feed not his heart's sky-seeking fires;
Who scales all highths, and with sharp ken
Observes the policies of men,
Their aims and objects, and can see,
However wide the' horizon be,
No onward-leading knightly road,
Such as his antient heroes trode,—
No one secure and honest way
Where he can travel night and day,—
But every moment full of fear,
Of Truth forgot and Error near:
He dare not mingle in that maze,
He dare not front the doubtful haze,—
He dare not,—as he would keep whole
His virgin rectitude of soul,
As he holds dear his life to be
His claim to blest Eternity!
122

And thus, with all his loving mind,
He stands at bay against his kind,
Half sad to see amidst the blind.
Is there no refuge but the tomb
For all this timeless spirit-bloom?
Does earth no other prospect yield
But one broad barren battle-field?
Or if there be some cradling spot
Where such grown evil enters not,
Lies it in countries far away
From where he first drank in the day?
Where, if despairing he be driven,
He must renounce his native heaven,
No more by olden ties be bound,
Take other dress, and let the sound
Of native and of neighbour speech
No more his aliened senses reach!
Be it not so! for thou art here,
O Island beautifully drear!
For thou, encounte'ring such a guest,
Wilt claspt him to thy hardy breast,
And bid him dwell at peace with thee
In thy uncitied modesty;
123

Let him his spirit slake and steep
In thy immense Atlantic deep,—
Let him from thy rude nature gain
Some sturdy posture to sustain
The burthen of ideal care
To which the Poet's soul is heir.
124

HISTORICAL POEMS.

SAUL AND DAVID.

And it came to pass, when the spirit from God was upon Saul, that David took an harp, and played with his hand: so Saul was refresht, and was well, and the evil spirit departed from him.

1 Sam. xvi. 23.

“An evil spirit lieth on our King!”
So went the wailful tale up Israel,
From Gilgal unto Gibeah; town and camp
Caught the sad fame that spread like pestilence,
In the low whispers of pale maiden lips,
And tones, half-stifled by religious awe,
Outbreathed from hearts that else had known no fear.
There stood a Boy beside the glooming King,
Whose serfish garb was strangely dissonant
125

To the high bearing and most gentle air
That waited on his beauty; health and joy,
Tho' tempered now by sorrowing reverence,
Lay on his rose-red cheek; transcendent love
Rounded his brow; and when the deli'cate hand
Swept o'er the chords of that sweet instrument,
With which it long had been his use to fill
The lonely measure of his pasto'ral hours,—
It would have been no weak idolatry
To shroud your eyes and feel your heart beat strong,
As in the presence of one fresh from heaven,
Come down to save that doomed and deso'late man.
A strain of war,—a deep and nervous strain
Of full and solemn notes, whose long-drawn swell
Dies on the silence, slow and terrible,
Making the blood of him who listens to it
To follow the great measure; every tone
Clear in its utterance, and eloquent
Above all words: there was the settled tramp
Of warriors faithful to ancestral swords;
There was the prayer that was not all a prayer,
But rising in a suppliant murmuring
Grows to a war-cry,—“Victory, oh God!
For Israel's God and Israel, victory!”
126

Then came the onset,—chord fast following chord,
In passio'nate clang, as if the conscious harp
Were prodigal of all its life of sound,
To give that awful feint reality.
From off the couch, at one enormous leap,
To where his helmet and long-shadowing spear
And brazen target hung beside the wall,
Bounded the King, and graspt the quive'ring arms.
He raised his hand, and, as to gathe'ring hosts,
Shouted, “Where's Jonathan?—he is not here;
Watchman, look out! I cannot find my son;
Here is the Ark,—there is the Philistine,—
There too is Jonathan! On, Israel,—on!
Alloo! Alloo !” He ceast; and while the short
Heroic blaze flared and died out, he cried,
In a most faint and miserable voice,
“He is not there,—the foe!—he is within!”
And fell upon his face, even as before.
The harper paused; and when a struggling tear
Dropt on the string from his uplifted eye,
The spirit of the strain was changed;—awhile
127

An under-current of discordant tones
Went trickling on, beneath the random fingers,—
Till, from a labyrinth of tangled notes
Came up with placid step a shape of sound
Distinct and fine-proportioned, redolent
Of love,—a fair old Hebrew melody,
Most plaintive numbers, born of that pure time,—
That golden-shaded, half-revealèd time,
When Israel's patriarchs fed their wealth of herds
About the myrrhine shades of Araby,
And eve'ry passion out of their chaste hearts
Gusht freely forth, and wove a sepa'rate song.
But, more than all, to the tormented King
That rythm was full of memo'ries;—fold by fold
The grey loose veil of long-forgotten Time
Shrunk back before the mystic minstrelsy;
He was once more the simple Benjamite,
The gallant Boy, the innocent, the brave,
The choicest and the goodliest of his peers ;
He was once more the owner of a life
Whose moments were all feathered, and kept cool
From scorching passion by continuous airs
Of gaysome hope and self-contenting joy.
128

Awful command and peri'lous empery
The diffi'cult mean of power,—the hard, hard, task
To be at once a lord and servitor,
To rule allotted kingdoms and obey,
The caster of the lot, the King of Kings,
Had set no snaring choice before him, then.
How often in the vain and weary guest
When he pursued his father's wande'ring droves
All down the slopes of pleasant Ephraim
Thro' Shalisha and Shalim, had his ear
Drunk in the burthen of that antique tune
Giving him brotherhood with stranger-lands:
Oft too the maid, whose image ever lived
Within his breast, stronger than all real things,
Returning homeward when the' expiring Sun
Mingled its life-blood with the waning light,
Had clothed her long farewell in that rich form,
While he, expecting on some distant height
His starlit watch, sent back such loud response
As made a chorus of the echoing hills.
As when the surges of the midland sea,
Break on the carious, citron-fruited, shore
Of Western Italy in morn's grey prime,
Slowly above the coasting Apennine,
129

The sun appearing meets the wallowing foam
And pierces it with light, till eve'ry wave
Loses its frowning aspect and now sports
About the myrtles, showe'ring precious gifts,
Rare diamond globes and flecks of liquid gold:
So to the fury of the darkened Spirit
The sunrise of that harmony unveiled
Its beauty, making beautiful, so fell,
Transformed from out its former terri'ble shape,
The passion into tender sympathy.
Tears, blessed tears, in full profusion burst
From the dry sockets, breaking up the dams
And foul embankments, arts of ill had raised
Against all holy natu'ral impulses.
From the prostration of his body' and soul
Saul rose, but as a man who long had lain
Wasted by dire disease,—pale, sorrowful,
Yet calm and almost smiling in his woe.
And did He not rejoice, that marve'llous youth,
To see his pious mediating work
Consummated? Glowed not his downy cheek
With a serene delight, while fade away
The notes in linge'ring trills and solemn sighs?
But is his countenance of other hue
130

When Saul, in gene'rous gratefulness profuse,
Proffers him jewels, wealth, and titled name,
Or other gift, whate'er his soul might crave.
A pallid tremor swept across his face,
As with a suppliant but determi'nate mien
He speaks, “Oh! deem not, deem not, gracious Lord!
That I, of mean estate, dare scorn the boon
Thy sove'ran bounty would pour forth on me,
But yet no gems, no gold, no praise for me!
Glory and praise and honor be to Him,
In the great circle of whose single will
I and my harp are most poor instruments,
His mightiness and goodness to proclaim.
Go forth into the clear and open air,
Look at all common things, and thou wilt find
The form of all this outward Universe
Is as the Body of the Living God:
And eve'ry movement, odour, shade, and hue
Is animate with music as divine
As lute, or harp, or dulcimer: to thee,
The' anthemnal voice of aged cataracts,
The jovial murmurings of summer brooks,
The carol that emblazoned flowers send up
From the cold earth in spring-time, the wild hymn
Of winter blasts sitting among the pines,
131

And the articu'late pulse of that large heart
Which beats beneath the Ocean, will be parts
Of the eternal symphony sublime,
In which the Maker of all worlds reveals
The spirit-depths of his untiring Love;
If then all Nature, rightly askt, can do
What I have done, how dare I claim reward?”
In sooth it was a wondrous sight to see
How far above the proud and vaunted king,
In all the moral majesty of being,
That moment stood the God-selected child.
Thrice through the chamber with irreso'lute step
Saul paced, and prest his hand upon his temples,
As if to hide the passing cloud of shame,
Then answe'ring not a word, and motioning
That David should retire, in thoughtfulness
Or prayer, he past into the outer hall.
 

1 Sam. xiv. 17 to 20.

1 Sam. ix. 2.

132

DECIUS BRUTUS, ON THE COAST OF PORTUGAL.

Having traverst the whole of the country to the very coast, the conqueror at last turned his standards, but not until, with a certain dread of sacrilege and conscious horror, he had discovered the Sun sinking into the ocean, and its fire overwhelmed by the waters.

Florus.

Never did Day, her heat and trouble o'er,
Proclaim herself more blest,
Than when, beside that Lusitanian shore,
She wooed herself to rest:
And, freed from all that cumbrous-gilded dress
That pleased the lusty noon,
Lay down in her thin-shaded loveliness,
Cool as the coming moon.
133

There stood the gentlest and the wildest growth
Together in the calm,
The nightingale's long song was over both,
A dream of bliss and balm.
Pale-amber fruit among the cloiste'ring leaves
Hung redolent and large,
Strong-spikèd aloes topt the broad rock-eaves
Above that fair sea-marge.
When through a thunder-cleft, now summer-dry,
A loosely-straggling band,
Plated in war's offensive blazonry,
Descended on the strand.
Men of flint brows, hard hands and hearts, were they,
Hunters of weaker men,
Shedders of blood for pleasure and for prey,
Wolves of the Roman den.
From their great home they had come out so far,
Nor ever loss or shame
Had lowered their fierce pride, they likened war
To pestilence or flame.
134

Frighting the tongueless caves with untuned cries,
They leapt from stone to stone;
But last, and linge'ring, with unheedy eyes,
The leader came alone.
And suddenly upon the clear-edged orb,
Fast-verging to the sea,
He gazed, like one whom music doth absorb
In mournful reverie.
His burly limbs were frosted with strange cold,
His blood grew half-asleep,
Beholding the huge corpse of ruddy gold
Let down into the deep.
At last to that wild crew he called aloud,
“O soldiers! we have been
Too daring-hardy,—we have been too proud,—
Too much have done and seen.
“It is a ventu'rous and unholy thing
To try the utmost bound
Of possibility,—our froward wing
Has reacht forbidden ground.
135

“We stand upon the earth's extremest edge,
Beside the sacred bed
Of the Sun-god,—it is a privilege
Too lofty not to dread.”—
But they were drunk with glory as with wine,
They heard him not that day;
That coast to them was nothing but a sign
Of Rome's earth-circling sway;
Till when, like dancers by amazing thunder
Stunned in their mad career,
Their bold mid-revel ceased for very wonder,
Their insolence for fear.
For they had caught a sound, first quive'ring low,
Then wide'ning o'er the brine,
As of a river slowly poured into
A red-hot iron mine.
136

And with confede'rate looks and held-in breath,
They watcht the molten round
Loosing its form, the swelte'ring ooze beneath,
To that terrific sound.
The hissing storm toward the darke'ning land
A heated west-wind bore;
They closed their ears, they croucht upon the sand,
But heard it more and more.
They saw the whole full Ocean boil and swell,
Receiving such a guest
As elemental Light inscrutable,
Within its patient breast.
At last into the void of dreary space
The tumult seemed to roll,
And left no other noise on Nature's face
Than the waves' muffled toll.
But to their first mistempered haughtiness
Those hearts returned no more,—
They were encumbered with a sore distress,
Crusht to the very core.
137

The Chief this while had stood apart, and bowed
In penitential pain
His staunch war-soul, till that now-supple croud
His voice thus reacht again:—
“Oh what a sanctu'ary have we profaned
In this unblest emprize!
Oh that a jealous wrath may be restrained
By timely sacrifice!
“On these crag-altars let our choicest spoil
Be laid with humblest prayer;
For what avails our valor or our toil,
If angered Gods be there?
“As ye hold dear the memory of Rome,
Implore the Lords of Heaven,
That we once more may bear our victo'ries home,
This sacrilege forgiven!”
So was it done:—columns of vapo'rous grey
Rose from that lone sea-glen,—
And Brutus and his followers turned away
Wiser and gentler men.
138

Thus, in the time when Fancy was the nurse
Of our young human heart,
The Power whose voice is in the universe,
And through each inmost part
Vibrates, and in one total melody
Man and Creation blends,
Workt out by marvel and by prodigy
Its high religious ends.
Knowledge to us another scene displays,
We fear nor sight nor sound;
Nature has bared her bosom, and we gaze
Into the vast profound.
A myriad of her subtlest harmonies
Our learnèd ears can tell;
We dare those simple liste'ners to despise,
But do we feel as well?
 

For the notion of the fearful noise which accompanied the fall and quenching of the sun in the great Western Ocean, consult Strabo, lib. iii.; Juvenal, xiv. 279; Ausonius, epist. xviii. The wide credit which this local tradition obtained may be inferred from the serious refutation of the physical fact in the second Book of the Cyclic Theory of Cleomedes.

139

THE DEATH OF ALMANZOR.

[_]

Almanzor was the Campeador of the Moors in Spain, the guardian of the fainéant King Hixem;—it is thought he aspired to the crown.

Two and fifty times Almanzor had the Christian host o'erthrown;
Still again the Christians gatherèd, by despair the stronger grown.
Cityless and mountain-refuged they approacht the Douro's shores,
Falling, as a storm in summer, on the unsuspecting Moors.
Valiantly the Moslem rallied, all unordered as they stood,
Till the Evening, in her shadow, bore them safe across the flood.
140

Then they cried, “The stream's between us; now can we their schemes defy;”—
But the great Almanzor spoke,—“I have retreated, and I die.”
“Allah, keep us from such evil!” prayed the faithful, crouding round,
While the wise Arabian leech his wounds examined, stauncht, and bound.
“Lightly has the Christian toucht thee,—much for thee is yet in store;
Many are thy years, but Allah gives his conque'rors many more.
“Do not the huge bells, that summoned pilgrims to Iago's shrine,
Hang within our prophet's temple, and confess thy work divine?
“What is it that one small moment thou and thine did seem to yield,
Wielders of Mohammed's sword, and guarded by Mohammed's shield?
141

“Few shall be their boastful hours,—thou in wrath wilt rise again;
Thou shalt cleanse the mountains of them, like the cities and the plain.”
So consoled the duteous servant, but he could not still the cry
Bursting from Almanzor's lips,—“I have retreated, and I die.”
Once he rose and feebly spoke,—“My friends, I perish of self-scorn;
Shame is come on my white hairs,”—and thus he died the morrow-morn.
Fiercest hands in sorrow trembled, as they deeply dug the grave,
On the spot where Azrael's lance had struck the captain of the brave.
There his spirit's dearest brethren, closest comrades of his glory,
Laid him as a Moslem-martyr, in his garments torn and gory.
142

There too, from his side unsevered, lay his old familiar brand,
Never to be toucht and tarnisht by a less victorious hand.
From a chest that in his marches ever had been borne before him,
Holy dust from two and fifty battle-fields was sprinkled o'er him;
While arose the imprecation, “Utter Death to Christian Spain!”
Praise to Jesus and his mother, that the vow was vowed in vain!
143

THE DEPARTURE OF ST. PATRICK FROM SCOTLAND.

FROM HIS OWN “CONFESSIONS.”

Twice to your son already has the hand of God been shewn,
Restoring him from alien bonds to be once more your own,
And now it is the self-same hand, dear kinsmen, that to-day
Shall take me for the third time from all I love away.
While I look into your eyes, while I hold your hands in mine,
What force could tear me from you, if it were not all divine?
Has my love ever faltered? Have I ever doubted yours?
And think you I could yield me now to any earthly lures?
144

I go not to some balmier land in pleasant ease to rest,—
I go not to content the pride that swells a mortal breast,—
I go about a work my God has chosen me to do;
Surely the soul which is his child must be his servant too.
I seek not the great city where our sacred father dwells,—
I seek not the blest eremites within their sandy cells,—
I seek not our Redeemer's grave in distant Palestine,—
Another, shorter pilgrimage, a lonelier path is mine.
When sunset clears and opens out the breadth of western sky,
To those who in yon mountain isles protect their flocks on high
Loom the dark outlines of a land, whose nature and whose name
Some have by harsh experience learnt, and all by evil fame.
145

Oh, they are wild and wanton men, such as the best will be,
Who know no other gifts of God but to be bold and free,
Who never saw how states are bound in golden bonds of law,
Who never knew how strongest hearts are bent by holy awe.
When first into their pirate hands I fell, a very boy,
Skirting the shore from rock to rock in unsuspecting joy,
I had been taught to pray, and thus those slavish days were few,
A wondrous hazard brought me back to liberty and you.
But when again they met me on the open ocean field,
And might of numbers prest me round and forced my arm to yield,
I had become a man like them, a selfish man of pride,
I could have curst the will of God for shame I had not died.
146

And still this torment haunted me three weary years, until
That summer night,—among the sheep,—upon the seaward hill,
When God of his miracu'lous grace, of his own saving thought,
Came down upon my lonely heart and rested unbesought!
That night of light! I cared not that the day-star glimmered soon,
For in my new-begotten soul it was already noon;
I knew before what Christ had done, but never felt till then
A shadow of the love for him that he had felt for men!
Strong faith was in me,—on the shore there lay a stranded boat,
I hasted down, I thrust it out, I felt it rock afloat;
With nervous arm and sturdy oar I sped my wate'ry way,
The wind and tide were trusty guides,—one God had I and they.
147

As one from out the dead I stood among you free and whole,
My body Christ could well redeem, when he had saved my soul;
And perfect peace embraced the life that had been only pain,
For Love was shed upon my head from every thing, like rain.
Then on so sweetly flowed the time, I almost thought to sail
Eve'n to the shores of Paradise in that unwave'ring gale,
When something rose and nightly stood between me and my rest,
Most like some one, beside myself, reflecting in my breast.
I cannot put it into words, I only know it came,
A sense of self-abasing weight, intolerable shame,
“That I should be so vile that not one tittle could be paid
Of that enormous debt which Christ upon my soul had laid!”
148

This yielded to another mood, strange objects gathered near,
Phantoms that entered not by eye, and voices not by ear,
The land of my injurious thrall a gracious aspect wore,
I yearned the most toward the forms I hated most before.
I seemed again upon that hill, as on that blissful night,
Encompast with celestial air and deep retiring light,
But sight and thought were fettered down, where glimme'ring lay below
A plain of gasping, struggling, men in every shape of woe.
Faint solemn whispers gathered round, “Christ suffered to redeem,
Not you alone, but such as these, from this their savage dream,—
Lo, here are souls enough for you to bring to him, and say,
These are the earnest of the debt I am too poor to pay.”
149

A cloud of children freshly born, innumerable bands,
Past by me with imploring eyes and little lifted hands,
And all the Nature, I believed so blank and waste and dumb,
Became instinct with life and love, and echoed clearly “Come!”
“Amen!” said I; with eager steps a rude descent I tried,
And all the glory followed me like an on-coming tide,
With trails of light about my feet I crost the darkling wild,
And, as I toucht each suffe'rer's hand, he rose and gently smiled.
Thus night on night the vision came, and left me not alone,
Until I swore that in that land should Christ be preacht and known,
And then at once strange coolness past on my long fevered brow,
As from the flutter of light wings: I feel, I feel it now!
150

And from that moment unto this, this last and proving one,
I have been calm and light at heart as if the deed were done;
I never thought how hard it was our earthly loves to lay
Upon the altar of the Lord, and watch them melt away!
Speak, friends! speak what you will,—but change those asking looks forlorn,
—Sustain me with reproachful words,—uphold me with your scorn:
—I know God's heart is in me, but my human bosom fears
Those drops that pierce it as they fall, those full and silent tears.
These comrades of my earliest youth have pledged their pious care
To bear me to the fronting coast, and gently leave me there:
It may be I shall fall at once, with little toil or need,—
Heaven often takes the simple will for the most perfect deed:
151

Or, it may be that from that hour beneath my hand may spring
A line of glories unachieved by hero, sage, or king,—
That Christ may glorify himself in this ignoble name,
And shadow forth my endless life in my enduring fame.
—All as He wills! Now bless me, mother,—your cheek is almost dry:—
Farewell, kind brothers!—only pray ye may be blest as I;
Smile on me, sisters,—when death comes near each of you, still smile,
And we shall meet again somewhere, within a little while!
152

THE BEGGAR'S CASTLE.

A STORY OF THE SOUTH OF FRANCE.

Those ruins took my thoughts away
To a far eastern land;
Like camels, in a herd they lay
Upon the dull red sand;
I know not that I ever sate
Within a place so desolate.
Unlike the relics that convert
Our hearts with antient Time,
All moss-besprent and ivy-deckt,
Gracing a lenient clime,
Here all was death and nothing born,—
No life but the unfriendly thorn.
161

“My little guide, whose sunny eyes
And darkly-lucid skin,
Witness, in spite of shrouded skies,
Where southern realms begin;
Come, tell me all you've heard and know
About these mighty things laid low.”
The Beggar's Castle, wayward name,
Was all these fragments bore,
And wherefore legendary fame
Baptized them thus of yore,
He told in words so sweet and true,
I wish that he could tell it you.
A puissant Seigneur, who in wars
And tournays had renown,
With wealth from prudent ancestors
Sloping unbroken down,
Dwelt in these towers, and held in fee
All the broad lands that eye can see.
162

He never tempered to the poor
Misfortune's bitter blast,
And when before his haughty door
Widow and orphan past,
Injurious words, and dogs at bay,
Were all the welcome that had they.
The Monk who toiled from place to place,
That God might have his dole,
Was met by scorn and foul grimace,
And oaths that pierced his soul;
'Twas well for him to flee and pray,
“They know not what they do and say.”
One evening, when both plain and wood
Were trackless in the snow,
A Beggar at the portal stood,
Who little seemed to know
That Castle and its evil fame,
As if from distant shores he came.
163

Like channelled granite was his front,
His hair was crisp with rime,—
He askt admittance, as was wont
In that free-hearted time;
For who would leave to die i' the cold
A lonely man and awful-old.
At first his prayer had no reply,—
Perchance the wild wind checkt it,
But when it rose into a cry,
No more the inmates reckt it,
Till where the cheerful fire-light shone,
A voice out-thundered,—“Wretch! begone.”
“There is no path,—I have no strength,—
What can I do alone?
Grant shelter, or I lay my length,
And perish on the stone;
I crave not much,—I should be blest
In kennel or in barn to rest.”
164

“What matters thy vile head to me?
Dare not to touch the door!”
“Alas! and shall I never see
Home, wife, and children more?”—
“If thou art still importunate,
My serfs shall nail thee to the gate.”
But, when the wrathful Seigneur faced
The object of his ire,
The beggar raised his brow debased
And armed his eyes with fire:
“Whatever guise is on me now,
I am a mightier Lord than thou!”
“Madman or cheat! announce thy birth.”—
“That thou wilt know to-morrow.”
“Where are thy fiefs?”—“The whole wide Earth.”
“And what thy title?”—“Sorrow.”
Then ope'ning wide his ragged vest,
He cried,—“Thou canst not shun thy guest.”
165

He stampt his foot with fearful din,—
With imprecating hand
He struck the door, and past within
Right through the menial band:
“Follow him, seize him,—There—and there!”
They only saw the blank night air.
But He was at his work: ere day
Began the work of doom,
The Lord's one daughter, one bright may,
Fled with a base-born groom,
Bearing about, where'er she came,
The blighting of an antient name.
His single son, that second self,
Who, when his first should fall,
Would hold his lands and hoarded pelf,
Died in a drunken brawl;—
And now alone amidst his gold
He stood, and felt his heart was cold.
166

Till, like a large and patient sea
Once roused by cruel weather,
Came by the raging Jacquerie,
And swept away together
Him and all his, save that which time
Has hoarded to suggest our rhyme.
 

I am indebted for this legend, and part of its conduct, to Jean Reboul, the baker-poet of Nismes, the Burns of modern France.

THE END.
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