A Day at Tivoli :: :: University of Virginia Library

TO HIS BROTHER, EDWARD KENYON, COMPANION AND GUIDE OF THE JOURNEY HERE COMMEMORATED; THESE VERSES ARE, WITHOUT NOTICE OR PERMISSION, AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED, BY THE AUTHOR.

We loved that Upper Austrian land;
And who, that knows, would love it less?
Which, as it seems, alike the hand
Of God and man conspire to bless.
His stream-dispensing hills, that tower,
Man's happy, lowly, household bower,
On sunny slope, in quiet dell,
These well may win a fond farewell.

How may we e'er forget the power
Of those huge hills, at sunset hour?

Peak and black ridge upheaved on high
Athwart the gorgeous evening sky,
While brightest waves beneath were rolled
In amethyst or living gold.
Or how the beams that loved to wake
With morning touch Gemunden's lake;
Or that pale moon which paused to light
Dark Traunstein's solitary height?

Nor more, Fair Land! may we forget
Thy Happy with thy Lovely met.
Those rural dwellings snug and warm,
And strong to meet the winter storm.
With casement green, and vine around;
Each in its plot of garden ground.
The most—beneath. But some that creep
Where the sun beckons up the steep;
Near neighbours to the beechen grove,
Which mingles with the pines above.

And every little mountain-plain,
Of herb profuse or waving grain;
Where all that eye beholds is rife
With signs of well-contented life.

O Liberty! thou sacred name!
Whate'er reproach may thee befall,
From judgment just or spiteful blame,
To thee I cling—on thee I call.
And, yet, thou art not All in All;
And, e'en where thou art worshipp'd less,
In spite of check, in spite of thrall,
Content may spring, and happiness.

And tho', man's rightful claim to cheer,
Thy fuller beams be wanting here;
Yet happy they, if right I spell,
The folk within this land who dwell.

Here no hard look, no dogged eye,
Meets, to repel, the passer by;
But observation loves to scan
Mild greetings sped from man to man;
Bland courtesies; kind words that fall
From each to each, and all to all.
And here is woman's bending grace,
That bends reply; and answering face,
With servile smile not falsely deckt,
But honest smile from self-respect.
While peasant boy, with curly pate,
And arm surcharged with book and slate,
Gives frank reciprocating look,
The fruit—I ween—of slate and book.

Nor lack there signs to speak a sense
Imbibed of holier influence.

For if there be or nook or spot
More lovely than the rest;
Beside the brook, beneath the grot,
Some chapel neat is drest;
Whenceforth the Virgin-Mother seen,
In azure robe depict' or green,
From that her ever-blessed face
Sheds softer beauty o'er the place.
Or He, who died on holy-rood,
Is there, with thoughts of deeper mood
To sanctify the solitude.

'Tis true—for me their accents rung
In fact, as name, a stranger-tongue.
A cloud, if words alone could speak,
Thro' which no ray of thought might break.
But soul of ready sympathy
Finds semaphore in silent eye.

And smiles that play from silent lips
Clear what were else the heart's eclipse.

And One was with me, who could spell
Whate'er each tongue might say,
And oft, I ween, their sense would tell
In better phrase than they.
And all that German land was known
To him, familiar as his own.
Their states, their dynasties he knew,
Their folk, how many or how few;
Each tale of conquest, battle, siege,
Right, custom, tenure, privilege,
With all that appertaineth; down
From Cæsar or from King to Clown;
And all that priest or jurist saith
Of modes of law or modes of faith.

And he had comment, full and clear,
The fruit of many a travelled year;
But more, by meditation brought
From inner depths of silent thought;
Or fresh from fountain, never dry,
Of undisturbed humanity.

When first among these hills we came,
The Autumn lingered bright;
But winter now begins to claim
His old ancestral right.
He speaks intelligible speech
In the red yellow of the beech;
And mingles with the breeze a touch
Of polar air; in sooth not much;
But such as serves to hint the day,
When he shall rule, not far away.

Fall'n leaves are straggling down the brook,
With something of prophetic look;
Whose little eddies circle round
With more, methinks, than summer sound.
While the strong rivers, now more strong,
With dimmer current sweep along.
And frequent gust and chilling rain,
That meet the traveller on the plain,
Are telling tale of wintry war
Amid the topmost peaks—afar.

Scarce longer, Hills of whitening brow!
Man's summer day endures;
And snowy flakes are falling, now,
On other heads than yours;
And colder, dimmer currents roll
From Time or Chance to chill the soul.
Our fervent youth's adventurous blood
Defies or place or clime,

And dares the mountain or the flood,
Thro' winter's stormiest time.
When sober eld, grown weak or wise,
Seeks gentler scenes and milder skies.

So we will seek a milder sky,
By where slow roads up creep
Atween the summits, cresting high,
Of some huge Alpine steep;
By easier way thenceforth to glide
Adown the smooth Italian side.

With choice before us, shall we go
Where Stelvio winds his road,
Above the realms of thawless snow,
To where green things refuse to grow,
Primeval frosts' abode?

Then—beating cloud, and bitter wind,
And torrent fierce left all behind—
lDrop down to Como's southern bowers,
And drink the breath of orange flowers?
Or else, in idle boat reclined,
Hang loitering round that little bay,
Where erst inquiring Pliny lay
Thro' long observant hours;
Or haply nursed some inner dream,
Beside his intermitting stream?

Or rather shall we follow, now,
The waters as they roll
From rugged Brenner's lowlier brow
Adown the steep Tyrol;
To where Catullus loved to wake
His sweetest harp on Garda's lake?

Rich is the land, (all own its power,)
The land for which we part,
Italia!—rich in every dower
Of nature and of art.
And rich in precious memories—more—
From fragrant urns of classic lore.
But whether 'mid Etrurian bowers,
Where gallery spreads and palace towers;
Or where, beneath cerulean day,
Bright Naples clasps her double bay;
Or where steep-fallen Anio roves,
All peaceful now, thro' Tibur's groves;
On thee, contentment's happy home,
Land of bright stream and hill!
Fair Austrian land! where'er we roam,
Our hearts shall ponder still.

TO H. M. W.

ON READING HER POEMS.

Blest is the bard, whose modest pride,
Unlured by vapour gleams of wit,
Still clings to nature as a guide
With following feet, that fear to quit.

And blest are they, who o'er life's road,
Too often treacherous or abrupt,
Tho' guile betray and malice goad,
Move kindly on and uncorrupt.

But doubly blessëd is thy part,
Who, 'mid bad taste—bad world—still true,
Preserv'st simplicity of heart,
As woman, and as poct, too.

SONNET

WRITTEN AFTER HAVING READ A. F. RIO'S ,PETITE CHOUAUNERIE.

Call not our Bretons backward. What if rude
Of speech and mien, and rude of fashion—drest;
Yet dwells firm faith beneath each simple vest;
With valiant heart, that scorns all servitude,
But to the Right. When France's fickler blood
Crouch'd to the crownëd pageant of the day,
New-fangled homage These disdained to pay;
But kept old vows in truth and hardihood.
And with no surface-glare, no facet-light,
But the rich inward lustre of the gem,
When tried in shade, were yet more deeply bright.
And therefore, Traveller! call not backward—Them,
Found never yet, in worst extremity,
Backward to bear—nor backward when to die.

INSCRIPTION FOR AN EAGLE'S FOOT,

BROUGHT TO ENGLAND BY SIR CHARLES FELLOWS, AND NOW PART OF THE FURNITURE OF HIS LIBRARY TABLE.

Me—Lycia nursed amid her blaze of day;
Me long, on strengthening plume I winged my way
To every peak around her mountain coast,
But o'er Phoenicus loved to hover most;
And watch, at eve, the ever-burning flame,
That from his storied summit quivering came
Or stooped to scan, amid the valleys lone,
Once famous cities, now but fabling stone.
At last to earth down circling, all too nigh,
Chimæra's birth place, Cragus, saw me die.—
What here remains was borne, on British prow,
By Xanthian Pilgrim—home. I serve him now.

GROWING OLD.

AFTER THOMAS CAREW — 1630.

Shyest Lady!—say not so;
Say not you are growing old.
'Tis a tale that, well you know,
Fits me most if truly told.
Then, shy Lady! be more bold—
Say not you are growing old.

Bloomy faces, surface graces,
Pretty prattle, yea or nay;
Smiles all empty, meant to tempt ye,
These indeed may fade away.
But the smiles that beam from sense;
But the eyes' intelligence;
But the voice with feeling fraught;
But the word of serious thought;

With self-judgment ever lowly;
These be charms that fade but slowly.

In yonder new-found world, they say,
When summer-suns have passed away,
And autumn-cloud and fog and rain
And wind and cold are come again;
'Mid all this tristful weather-strife
Doth a new summer start to life.
Their Indian summer call they this,
And calm (they say) and bright it is.
More calmly bright, more sweetly gay,
Than that which late hath passed away.

Lady, thou hast felt the touch
Of sickness and of sorrow much;
But they now shall both be past,
Like that singing autumn-blast,

Which yet singeth augury
Of good season, soon to be.
Brighter suns shall rise before thee,
Softer breezes shall flit o'er thee.
Thou shalt have thine Indian summer;
And we will welcome the New Comer.

[They choose not ill their lot who choose]

[_]

Listed as A Paraphrase of Horace in the contents list.

“NEC VIXIT MALE QUI NATUS MORIENSQUE FEFELLIT.” Horat.

They choose not ill their lot who choose
All quietly to live and die,
By Science sheltered or the Muse,
In unpretending privacy.

Proud epitaph—the world's acclaim—
These ask thou not; if, in their room,
Some few but love thy living name,
And household tears bedew the tomb.

TO AN ÆOLIAN HARP.

Oh! breezy harp! that, with thy fond complaining,
Hast held my willing ear this whole night long;
Mourning, as one might deem, that pale moon's waning;
Sole listener, oft, of thy melodious song;

Sweet harp! if hushed awhile that tuneful sorrow,
Which may not flow unintermitted still,
A lover's prayer one strain, less sad, might borrow
Of all thou pourest at thine own sweet will;

Now when, her forehead in the moonlight beaming,
Yon dark-tress'd maid, beneath the softening hour,
As fain to lose no touch of thy sad streaming,
Leans to the night from forth her latticed bower;

And this low whispering air, and thy lorn ditty
Around her heart their mingled spell have wove;
Now cease awhile that lay, which plains for pity,
To wake thy bolder song that tells of love.

LOVE'S AUCTION.

Could pretty Jane be put to sale,
I'd have no auctioneer in vogue;
Not Christie should her charms detail,
But Truth should dress the catalogue.

Within the leaves no falsehood slid;
No grace hitch'd in which Jane hath not.
Then all the world would come and bid;
But only Love should buy the lot.

RUFUS'S TREE.

O'er the New Forest's heath-hills bare,
Down steep ravine, by shaggy wood,
A pilgrim wandered; questing where
The relic-tree of Rufus stood.

Whence, in our England's day of old,
Rushing on retribution's wing,
The arrow—so tradition told—
Glanced to the heart of tyrant-king.

Some monument he found, which spoke
What erst had happen'd on the spot;
But, for that old avenging oak,
Decayed long since, he found it not.

Yet aye, where tyrants grind a land,
Let trees, like this, be found to grow;
And never may a Tyrrel's hand
Be lacking there—to twang the bow!

FRAGMENT.

[Crotchets—odd mixings up of soul and sense—]

Crotchets—odd mixings up of soul and sense—
(Sense, if the truth were told, oft mastering Soul)
Full sure he had; but we did suffer them,
For they were gentle and obeyed the rein.
Nay—wayward fantasies, that come and go
From nerve or brain, and link and cling together
At their own will (and surely such were his)
'Twere hard, methinks, to blame!

SECOND LOVE.

The ne'er-forgetting! him who loves but once!
Romance may laud, but Cupid dubs for dunce;
And jeers, and mocks him on from pain to pain.
Who but hath sworn him ne'er to love again,
Then forged, himself, new links and chafed at his own chain?

There are who drink, intoxicate to be;
And some because intoxicate already.
E'en like these last, I snatched the cup from thee,
And hurried to my lip with hand unsteady.
A draught it was, from whence fond hopes, at first,
Bead round the heart, and then, like bubbles, burst.

But tho' I knew the treachery of the cup,
Thou wert the Hebe, and I drained it up.
And now, as all repentingly I lie,
Like some slow-sobering quaffer—wonder why.

IN A PORTRAIT GALLERY.

In vain, Bright Girl! you bid us mark
Each charm of portrait round us thrown,
When sight and soul alike are dark
To every face—except your own.

And while yon connoisseurs eschew
All “Perfect”—save in the “Ideal;”
To prove them false we turn to you,
And find our “Perfect”—in the “Real.”

SAPPHO.

Two graceful portals led to Sappho's bower;
Two fitly graceful portals. By the one,
A winning group, the Syren Senses stood,
Chanting their sweet temptation; while the other
Was fondly guarded by the Muses nine.
Love chose, for so it seemed, the wiselier part,
And prayed the gentle Muses. But, no sooner,
In bland compliance with that prudent prayer,
Were the valves opened, than those wayward Senses
Fled their own gate, and thrust them in with him;
Proud of the freak—a gay, tumultuous throng.
Then first He found that 'twas delusion—All;—
Must such delusions hold him evermore?—
Those separate groups—his own fantastic dream;
And that the double gates—in sooth—were One.

LA PIQUANTE.

Quoth Flavilla, “Think I can't
Why they will call me “piquant.””

Yet, Flavilla! should we try,
We might find the reason why.
Be thy mien “devout and pure,
“Sober, steadfast, and demure;”
Yet—if something in thy smile
Contradict it all the while,
Is'nt this, Flavilla!—grant—
Is'nt this to be piquant?

Be thy talk not gay o'er much;
Yet—if serious-seeming touch

Stirreth ever more the string
Of some fond imagining,
Is'nt this, Flavilla!—grant—
Is'nt this to be piquant?

If when deeplier we would look
Into that half-open book,
Thou dost close it, Slyest Saint!
More to tempt us by restraint;
Is'nt this, Flavilla!—grant—
Is'nt this to be piquant?

Would we know what else may serve
This—thy mantle of reserve—
Whether thou dost shroud in it
Loving thoughts, for lady fit,
Or but some provoking wit—

If, with pretty, wilful dealing,
Now—close veiled—now part revealing—
Thou, like some coquettish nun,
Mockest still our fancies on;
Then, just as we had hoped to win
Way the parlour-nook within,
Coolly turning, bidd'st us wait
Thy pleasure at the outer grate;
Isn't this, Flavilla!—grant—
Isn't this to be piquant?

APPARITIONS.

If, as they say, the Dead erewhile return,
Sent or permitted, from their shadowy bourn;
Yet not, or so we trust, shall every ghost,
In his old guise, reclaim our mortal coast.
Let Spurio, if once more among us thrown,
Come back in any shape—except his own.
While, Phyllis! you, the frank and debonnair,—
Do you return—the very thing you were.

THE GREEK WIFE.

This poem was written to illustrate an engraving.

I love thee best, Old Ocean! when
Thy waters flow all-ripplingly;
And quiet lake, in inland glen,
Might seem, well nigh, a type of thee;
And when long-lingering lights of eve
Float o'er thy waves that hardly heave.

And anchor'd vessels seen afar,
Athwart the bay, with slanting shroud,
And crossing line of rope and spar,
Hang pictured on the yellow cloud;
While Silence, from the placid shore,
May count each pulse of distant oar.

And Spirit-Airs—for so they seem—
Are whispering of some far-off land.
For then doth Fancy love to dream
Along thy visionary strand;
And winneth tender thoughts from thee,—
Perchance too tender, Gentle Sea!

No mother-home is world of our's
For dreamy tenderness alone,
But a rude school; and sturdier powers
That shrink not from the shock—the groan—
And hearts heroical and free
Are thy stern teaching, Stormy Sea!

Hence—from this shore we love to view,
Yet with no meanly-safe delight,
Yon chafing surge of inky hue,
Whose foams, all ominously white,

As the white shroudings of the grave,
Curl o'er the black and greedy wave.

And now, beneath this darken'd sky,
By lightning flashes shown more dark,
Watch silently, with eager eye,
All wildly tost that Grecian bark,
Whose stoutest hand scarce holds the helm
'Mid whirling waves that rush to whelm.

That bark to guide a torch's light
Is gleaming thro' the troubled air.
Who lifts it there? In pale affright
A wife—a mother—lifts it there,
For him; who, spite of coming wreck,
All calmly treads his splitting deck.

And yet one pang he scarce may brook:
He knows who lights that dangerous strand.

Oh! might he gather one last look!
But clasp once more that loving hand!
Cease, raging Demons of the Dark!
And spare the light, and spare the bark.

She too, might power, like wishes, fly,
Would fly to tread that deck with him.
Again she lifts the torch on high;
But, half extinct, the torch is dim;
Or flickers useless light behind,
Back-driven by the cruel wind.

If that brave bark may triumph yet,
No guardian Spirit comes to tell;
Or if the Fates, in conclave met,
Hang brooding now o'er yonder swell,
As when on that disastrous night
Abydos saw the failing light.

If that brave bark may triumph yet,
We know not how 'tis doomed above;
But this for lesson sure is set,
That Courage firm and faithful Love,
Or if they live, or if they die,
Have each fulfilled their mission high.

Where faithful Love, where Courage glows,
The patriot virtues take their birth,
And thrive in home's serene repose;
Till bursting from the household hearth,
Throughout a land her every son,
At duty's call, up-starts as one.

Through what a dreary tract of time,
Hast thou not seen, Egean Wave!
Each dweller of thy storied clime
A struggler, now—and, now, a slave.

In war, in peace, struck down, or vext,
By Roman, first; by Moslem, next.

Yet Love hath never fled thy shore;
And Courage old still lingers there.
And them may Freedom more and more
Still nourish, with her new-born air,
In hearts of women and of men,
Till Salamis revive again.

THE RENEWAL.

I knew her, when my youthful time
Beyond the verge of manhood stood;
And she was in her glorious prime
Of freshly ripened womanhood.

And when her darkly radiant eye,
With longest lash of silken jet,
Glanced forth a double witchery,
Where sympathies and sense were met.

And o'er her rich embrownëd skin,
All richly brown as tropic rind,
The colour mantled from within.
As blushes told her secret mind.

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And voice, and smile, and whitest gleam
Of forehead high thro' raven hair
Awakened in each heart some dream,
Which, once awakened, lingered there.

Mine lingered long. Till, on a day,
I met her once again, to find
If Time may something take away,
He yet hath more to leave behind.

For hers was still that darkest eye,
And longest lash, and gleaming brow;
And smiles that won, in day gone by,
Were waiting still—to win us now.

And still that voice was hers; and grace,
Which more than youthliest bloom can thrall;
And sense, outspeaking from the face;
And goodness, beaming over all.

101

And if ecstatic hope now stirs
Less warmly, than in hour of youth,
Some airy visions still are hers,
'Mid many a lesson taught by truth.

And if, perchance, some hues be fled,
If eye or smile be radiant less;
Serener charm they own, instead,
And win new power from pensiveness.

'Tis thus, when hearts are swept along
Beneath some master minstrel's play,
The sweetest part of all the song
Is where the music dies away.

But is the Music past and gone?
Nay, listen! for it wakes again;
A lay prolonged, of tenderer tone;
A sweeter joy from softer strain.

102

And therefore do I prize the day
I met her once again to find,
If Time may something take away,
He yet hath more to leave behind.

FLOWERS FROM WATERLOO.

We sprang on no ignoble soil;
'Twas on the field of Waterloo.
Our culture was the battle-toil,
And many a hero's blood—our dew.

Yet, fair as other plants that breathe
Their peaceful sweets we flourish, now.
Oh! where to find a fitter wreath
For patriot's or for soldier's brow.

103

LINES SUGGESTED BY ODE XXIX. BOOK I. OF HORACE.

To ANTONIO PANIZZI, ESQ. AS THE WORTHY OCCASION, AND TO THE REV. CHRISTOPHER ERLE, AS THE PROMPT THROWER-OUT OF THE QUOTATION WHENCE IT HAS SPRUNG, THIS MERE TRIFLE IS INSCRIBED.

104

And so, dear Hicks! on “Nature's wealth”
Your new-found phrase—and rustic health
Intent, and cottage-life;
You scheme from town to steal away,
And chain yourself, or so they say,
To that grave joy—a wife.

What parish girl shall find employ
To deck the bride? what louting boy
Lead out the one-horse chair,
When, just at noon-day, forth you ride,
Correctly spousal, side by side,
And sadly take the air?

106

And can it be, dear Hicks! that you
For such dull raptures would eschew
The life we lead in town?
No, Hicks! I'd just as soon believe
One might hold water in a sieve,
Or make up-Thames run down,

As you desert the volumes rare
Panizzi buys up every where,
Or gets by hooks and crooks;

The law compels every new publication to deliver itself into the hands of the Keeper of the Books, unpaid for. And these are the “hooks and crooks” of which authors and publishers are prone occasionally to complain.

Or bear to lose your daily walk
To the Museum, and his talk,
Still better than his books.

108

LINES SENT TO ELIA,

AFTER READING HIS ESSAY ON ROAST PIG, WITH A TRIBUTARY BASKET.

Elia! thro' irony of hearts the mender,
May this pig prove like thine own pathos—tender.
Bear of thy sageness, in its sage, the zest;
And quaintly crackle, like thy crackling jest.
And—dry without—rich inly—as thy wit,
Be worthy thee—as thou art worthy it.

PS.

Beside the sty-born finding room to spare,
Begs kind acceptance of himself—a hare.
And since, being sylvan, he but ill indites,
Hopes he may eat much better than he writes.

109

THE GODS OF GREECE.

This paraphrase has been made through the medium of a literal English translation; the writer himself not knowing German.

Whether successful as a paraphrase, or not, at least it has been glorified as having called forth Miss E. B. Barrett's (now Mrs. Browning's) noble lyric of the “Dead Pan.”

[_]

PARAPHRASED FROM SCHILLER.

Ye Gods of Greece! Bright Fictions! when
Ye ruled, of old, a happier race,
And mildly bound rejoicing men
In bonds of Beauty and of Grace;
When worship was a service light,
And duty but an easy bliss,
And white-hued fanes lit every height;
Then—what a sparkling world was this.

Creation, then but newly born,
Felt all the glowing trust of youth;
And pulses, yet, were all unworn,
And poesy was very truth;

110

And Gods were spread thro' earth and air,
And looked or spoke, in sight or sound;
And who but loved to worship there,
Where they were mingling all around?

Not then was yonder radiant sun
Mere globe of fire, as now they say;
But Phoebus urged his chariot on,
A guiding God!—and made the day.
Each hoary hill, each thymy mount,
Some fond presiding Oread tended;
And Naiads bent by every fount
From which a gushing stream descended.

'Twas Daphne's voice—so taught the creed—
That murmur'd from yon laurel tree;
'Twas Syrinx from the hollow reed
Out-sighed her plaintive melody.

111

No bird sent forth that fervent trill;
'Twas Philomel the song supplying;
And Venus wept, on yonder hill,
O'er young Adonis, gored and dying.

And then, if perfumed airs came breathing,
At eve, from off th' Ægean shore,
While little waves, their white foams wreathing,
The green-hued deeps were fleecing o'er;
From mountain-cave, beneath the rock,
'Twas Zephyrus out-sped the breeze;
'Twas Proteus—leading forth his flock
To feed along the verdant seas.

The Gods—not then they held it scorn
To mate with old Deucalion's race;
And many a Demigod was born,
Fit progeny from such embrace.

112

And deeper faith—intenser fire—
Fed Sculptor's chisel—Poet's pen;
What nobler themes might Art require
Than Gods—on earth, and God-like Men?

Yea! Gods then watched with loving care,
(Or such, at least, the fond belief)
E'en lifeless things of earth and air,
The cloud—the stream—the stem—the leaf.
Iris—a Goddess!—tinged the flower
With more than merely rainbow hues;
Great Jove himself sent down the shower,
Or freshened earth with healing dews.

E'en Beauty's self more beauteous seemed,
When Ganymede a God could thrall;
And Youth, to fancy, youthlier beamed,
And Souls were more heroical.

113

Where Hymen stood for priest, the heart
In sweeter bonds than our's was wed;
Nay—life more gently seemed to part,
When 'twas the Parcæ cut the thread.

And temples shone like palaces,
And game, and victor's coronal,
And festal dance, 'mid flowers and trees,
And song and bowl were Sacred—all.
E'en at the last doomed hour of death
No terrors scared the death-bed room;
A kiss beguiled the parting breath,
A Genius welcom'd to the tomb.

If but the willing Graces bent
O'er deed or rite with smile approving;
If but the Muses gave consent
Or cheered, perchance, with accent loving;

114

The Gods forebade no pleasure—then—
Nor doomed it—sin; nor held it—folly;
But deigned to share the joys of men;
The Beautiful, was still the Holy!

And while those Gods so deigned to share
Our mortal pleasures, downward bending,
We too to their Empyrean air
In noble strife were upward tending.
Ah! generous Creeds, that blossom'd forth
'Mid southern Græcia's softer bowers,
What blight-wind from our bitter North
Hath seared your hues and shrunk your flowers?

Too proud for earlier leading-strings
Our world disdains each old Ideal;
And, clogged with mere prosaic things,
Plods heavily life's sullen Real.

115

Idalian smiles! Jove's lofty brow!
Pan! the Wood-nymphs! all are gone!
Bright as ye were, bright Fictions!—now—
Ye live in Poet's dream—alone.

This stanza not in the original.

BROOK OF SANGUINETTO,

NEAR THE LAKE OF THRASYMENE.

We win, where least we care to strive;
And where the most we strive—we miss.
Old Hannibal, if now alive,
Might sadly testify to this.

He lost the Rome, for which he came;
And—what he never had in petto—
Won for this little brook a name—
Its mournful name of Sanguinetto.

116

BORDIGHIERA.

(BETWEEN NICE AND GENOA)

[_]

RONDEAU.

Graceful Palms of Bordighiera!
Bending o'er the Riviëra;
Tho' by Devon's wave we've seen
Beechen grove, as brightly green;
And the light-leaved linden trees
Quivering in the soft sea breeze;
And have loved them all the more,
Clustering by our native shore;
Yet, ye Palms of Bordighiera!
Bending o'er this Riviëra,
Grove than yours was never fairer—
Graceful Palms of Bordighiera!

“Graceful Palms of Bordighiera,
Bending o'er the Riviera,
Grove than yours was never fairer —
Graceful palms of Bordighiera.“

These four lines were the graceful impromptu of a deceased female friend (whose mind was open to all forms of the Good and the Beautiful) as she passed along the cornice road from Genoa to Nice. They have been extended, as here printed, by the present writer.

117

ECLIPSE.

Moon! if e'er thy broader light
Helpëd lover's prayer by night;
Now Eclipse hath veiled thee over,
Doubly—doubly—help a lover.
Let thy beams, that shrouded be,
Win to a like mystery.
Now, when stars alone do shine,
Bid my Loved One's brow incline—
Sweet Obscurer!—over mine.
Then, while chaste avowal slips
From her—hereto—guarded lips,
I will bless each bland Eclipse.

Oct. 13. 1837.

118

ZOË: A PORTRAIT.

When Zoë turns to look or speak,
We feel a spell the heart beguile.
Dwells it in pure transparent cheek;
In laughing eye, or frolic smile?

Dwells it in frank, yet well-bred, air;
Dwells it in habit, choice, but simple;
Lurks it in ringlet of her hair;
Or shifts it with the shifting dimple?

No!—These are not her spells from Love;
Only the lesser charms he uses;
Slight witcheries the sense to move;
His baits—his pitfalls—and his nooses.

119

Yet these have oft betrayed the wise—
But she hath deeper spells than these:
A temper, gay as summer skies,
Yet gentle as the vernal breeze.

And blushes, quick that come—and go,
As feeling wakens or reposes,
When neck and cheek and forehead glow,
Like one wide bed of open'd roses.

And ready wit, of playful dealing;
Or—if some tale of grief betide—
As ready tear; which, while outstealing,
She—shyly still—attempts to hide.

120

RINGLETS.

Ringlets are net by Cupid spread,
And such will Abra's prove to thee.
So strong the mesh, tho' fine the thread,
In vain you'll struggle to be free.

But, soon, like fresh-snared falcon bold,
Who, fierce at first, his plumage swells,
You too shall learn to love the hold
Of lady's leash—and hood—and bells.

Or would you flee? She smiles: secure,
That, though awhile escaped the chain,
You'll still be watching for the lure
To perch upon her wrist again.

121

ON A PICTURE.

This pictured work, with ancient graces fraught,
(Or so they say) Albertinelli wrought.
He who that touching piece achieved, where meet
The Sisters twain, in Visitation sweet.
Of which the Tuscan city, 'mid her crowd
Of miracles, e'en yet is justly proud.

Oh! matchless line of years, whose generous strife
Reared the reviving arts to perfect life.
Then Petrarch's native lay refined on love;
Then Angelo the impetuous chisel drove;
Then oracles, that stirred young Raphael's breast,
Spoke forth in colours, clear as words, exprest.

122

Thou too, the pencil's scarce less gifted seer,
Fair is the dream thy hand interprets here.
How sweet yon infant Christ's down-beaming smile
On bright Saint John; who lifts his own the while!
That bliss of young maternity how sweet!
Where mildly mingling Saint and Mother meet.
Nay, more than mother's rapture; to behold
Her Saviour-Son, by prophet-bards foretold.

Or, if adoring meekness e'er had shrine
In human face, Fond Catherine! 'tis in thine.
In that one present joy of all possest;
Heedless of Future; and by Past—unprest.

But Her's, who stands a-near that elder boy,—
Margaret's—I ween is no untroubled joy.
In Her, methinks, the painter's hand hath sought
Meanings to plant of more than common thought.

123

A look, as if that calm, yet clouded, eye
Had glimpsed the minglings of futurity.
And, 'mid the glories of each final doom,
Foresaw, not less, the sorrows first to come.

124

ON A DOG.

Thy happy years of deep affection past,
Cartouche! our faithful friend, rest here—at last.
We loved thee for a love man scarce might mate;
And now we place thee here with sadness, great
As man may own for brute. Might less be given
To love so pure as thine and so unriven?

Love was thy very life. Thine every thought,—
Or instincts—all to that one impulse wrought.
Our words—our very looks—to thee were known;
The shade of feature like the touch of tone.
The pensive brow might some light sorrow press,
(Such as, erewhile, o'er hour of blissfulness

125

May flit, like summer-cloud, soon come and gone)
'Twas then the lifted eye, and wistful moan,
And head, laid gently on the sufferer's knee,
Told—plain as speech—how sad that grief to thee.
Or did some cheerier look, or word, betray,
How slight soe'er, the sadness passed away;
Soon the gay bound—fond crouch—or winning whine
As plainly said how much our joy was thine.

That flame of living love, to-day—to-morrow—
The same, thro' circling years of joy or sorrow;
That even, as revolving years went by,
Seemed but to glow with more intensity,
Say! could it be created but to die?

Must man's alone survive his earthly state?
And all of love beside wheel but a date
Ephemeral—to sink annihilate?

126

Vain questionings are these of “Is” or “Ought!”
Oh vain! perchance unholy strife of thought.
Chase, reasoning Brain! these doubts that creep and steal;
And cease to think—tho' not ashamed to feel.

127

MONUMENT AT LUCERNE,

TO THE SWISS GUARD MASSACRED AT THE ASSAULT ON THE TUILERIES, A.D. 1792.

When madden'd France shook her King's palace floor,
Nobly, heroic Swiss, ye met your doom.
Unflinching martyr to the oath he swore,
Each steadfast soldier faced a certain tomb.

Not for your own, but others' claims ye died:
The steep, hard path of fealty called to tread,
Threatened or soothed, ye never turned aside,
But held right on, where fatal duty led!

Reverent we stand beside the sculptured rock,
Your cenotaph—Helvetia's grateful stone;
And mark in wonderment, the breathing block,
Thorwaldsen's glorious trophy—in your own.

128

Yon dying lion is your monument!
Type of majestic suffering, the brave brute,
Human almost, in mighty languishment,
Lies wounded, not subdued; and, proudly mute,

Seems as for some great cause resigned to die:
And, hardly less than hero's parting breath,
Speaks to the spirit, thro' th' admiring eye,
Of courage—faith—and honourable death.

FROM ANACREON.
129

This is a slight attempt to translate Anacreon more briefly than is usually done, and it claims no merit beyond its brevity.

ODE I.

Sing the old Atridæ!
Sing, my Lyre, of Cadmus.
But the Lyre, refusing,
Only sang of Love.

Strings and Lyre I changed—to
Chaunt of great Alcides.
Still the Lyre responded
Nought but notes of Love.

Farewell! then—to heroes;—
For what time remains me—
Since my Lyre will echo
Thoughts alone of Love.

130

ASTRONOMY.

Lucinda! Lucinda! why all this abstraction?
May astronomy hold no communion with mirth?
Stars—comets—eclipses have these such attraction
To steal you from our mere pleasures of earth?

You, who lately would sportively “flirt it” and “fan it,”
At dinner or ball—grown so grave in a trice!
Have you found, pretty Plato! so fervid our planet,
You must needs flee to Saturn to borrow his ice?

Just so it once happened—I well can remember—
(For seasons, like souls, are erewhile out of tune)
That the frost and the fast-falling sleet of December
Came to cover the freshness and glory of June.

131

Like some beautiful prude, all coldness and brightness,
The landscape shone chill in its dazzle of snow.
Yet it was but a surface of froreness and whiteness,
For green herb and gay flowret were springing below.

Till the genial Spirit of Summer, indignant
That Winter should thus re-intrude on his reign,
Called Zephyr to aid; and with fervor benignant
Woke each valley to gladness and beauty again.

So too, Sweet Astronomer! thou shalt re-waken
From these visions remote amid comet and star;
And learn how you truants are ever mistaken
Home-pleasures who leave to find new ones afar.

Make but sign from the ark, and each joyful back-comer
O'er thy deluge of science shall speed, like the dove.

132

Fond beamings from friendship unfreeze thee, like summer;
Or, warmer than friendship, some breathing from love.

And when—telescope closed—and unpuzzled by Airy—
Thro' opera glass we win pleasanter view;
Should folk happen to smile at your sky-ward vagary,
Why—we'll swear that “the stars were in fault,” and not you.

133

EXPERIMENTUM CRUCIS.

With different colour glows each ray
That joins to feed the solar day.
Yet, each commingling as they pass,
They lose distinction in the mass,
Where Iris-hues, grown tintless quite,
Stand wondering at their own pure White.

Yet prove that White with sifting lens,
No more it cheats the dazzled sense;
But, re-transmuted to the view,
Beams back its red—or green—or blue.

Nor less, in every church gregarious,
Opinion's colours are as various.

134

Nor less each hue with other locks,
To form the pure white Orthodox;
That scorns all other shade—sectarian!—
Plain Quaker-drab, or half-tint Arian.

But if—as philosophic use is—
We try Experimentum Crucis;
To find if what so whitely beams
Be, in good sooth, the thing it seems;
From moral lens, in varying streak,
How soon the lines diverge and break!
Observe how rule of faith refracts
From doctrine—here; and, there, from facts.
How many a lurking tinge comes out;
What intersecting lines of doubt.
And that broad stripe of scepticism,
See, how it flashes from the prism.

135

In prudence, now, we break the glass;
We must view churches but in mass.
Nor split too nicely at the focus
Opinions, jumbled hocus-pocus.

MORAL.

Churches! Churches! hence take heed;
And give the tolerance which ye need.
Your whitest orthodox effulgence
Worth no one ray—from wise indulgence.

136

L'ENVOI, TO A POEM ON TOLERANCE.

Go! little Book, thine own disciple be,
And learn to tolerate those who turn from thee.
Or laughed to scorn, or in oblivion sunk,
Go! little Book, and learn to line a trunk.
Some rain-bound traveller, in ennui's despair,
May cast a moment's notice on thee—there.
Thy last sad hope (and pride deserves such shocks)
Like hers—of old—at bottom of a box.

STEAM TRAVEL.

137

139

Who hath not longed, by converse fired or book,
To break him sudden from his own home-nook,
(There, in cramp nest, too long, like dormouse curled)
And speed from land to land, and scan the world?
But Time and Space stood ready to forbid
Or Niagara—or the Pyramid.

“Soon shall thy arm, Unconquer'd Steam! afar
Drag the slow barge and drive the rapid car.”

140

Some twice five lustres since, so sang the bard:
Bold was the prophecy; the credence hard.
The jeerer jeered; the thinker stood aloof
In pause; “but now the time hath given it proof.”

Did Venus win from Vulcan, Mighty Power!
That thou shouldst strain a day within an hour?
And lend her thy twin spirits, Force and Speed,
To break down distance for some gentle need?
And did Minerva join Cythera's prayer?
Or bribe thee with some gift of science rare,
For her young sages, or of state or law,
Within vacation half a world to draw?
And (not as when, of old, men plodded slow
“To Pyrenean or the river Po”)
Fling forth each acolyte, as suits him best,
To Moslem East, or Transatlantic West?

141

Then snatch the senator, o'er land and main,
Home to his voters and the house—again?
Or from his poetry and picturesque
Whirl back the future chancellor to his desk?

The fire-wheeled bark would part. Storm saith her “Nay”

Since this was written the author's accomplished friend, the Rev. John Eagles, has pointed out to him a somewhat similar passage in Ariosto's Orlando, Canto 2, Stanza 28, 29.

Il vento si sdegnò, &c.
“Non convien', dice il vento, che io comporti
Tanta licenza, che v' avete tolta.”

The same learned friend has also indicated some passages very curiously applicable to steam-boats in Homer's description of the ships of the Phæacians. See Homer's Odyssey, 1. 554, and onwards. There are persons who assert, and others who have assented to the assertion, that all the discoveries of the moderns are to be found in the writings of the ancients; for, as good provers can prove — so — good believers — can believe — anything. To such persons these passages will be a “God-send.”

With blustering throat; yet lo! she bursts away.
In vain around her curl the landward seas;
In vain—to stop her—strains the landward breeze.
Not like you white winged loiterers, taken aback
By the fierce blast, and foiled of skilful tack;
At anchor tossing still, with close-reefed sail,
Sick of delay, yet bondsmen of the gale;
She, in mad surf tho' forced awhile to reel,
And heave and dive, from bowsprit down to keel,
Asserts, full soon, her self-selected course,
And conquers wind and wave by inner force.

142

And while swift smoke, as from volcano's mouth,
(Such Pliny saw) is hurried, north or south,
By the head wind; (the swiftlier driven back,
The more to show what power would thwart her track)
She, leaving coast and bay far, far, behind,
As all contemptuous of that bullying wind;
And fluttering round to unresisting spray
Each coming wave, that would contest her way;
Unoared, uncanvassed, marches on, until
Instinct almost she seems with human will.
Like some strong mind, that, shipped on fortune's bark,
Holds onward still, unflinching to the mark;
And loves, or so might seem, to breast and urge
Thro' life's worst seas, and scoffs at wind and surge.

But now her prow hath touched the foreign strand;
And harnessed, lo! the iron coursers stand.

143

Fire hoofed, with fuming nostril; us to bear,
Swift as swift arrow, thro' the whistling air.
We mount the car. And what our course may stay,
Strength—Victory—Companions of our way!
On—on we rush. A hundred leagues forecast,
And lo! a hundred leagues already past.
On—on we rush. A hundred pictures tost
On the quick eye—right—left—and yet not lost.
For as fast eagle, fastest when he flies,
Battle or prey, the things he loves, descries;
So the brief pictures We; as sudden caught
By rapid eye for yet more rapid thought.

And not alone shall glancing vision win
Each larger feature of the sweeping scene,
Wood, stream, or hill; but many a smaller charm,
Croft,—garden,—lowly roofs of village farm;

144

(Which from some causeway lowlier, lovelier seem;
Fond homes for fancy; landscape in a dream;)
With mowers beside their noon-side flagon gay;
And children, tumbling in the tedded hay.
Or—as for contrast—the slow-furrowing plough;
Or feeding kine, that (all accustomed, now)
On as we flash along the echoing ways,
Lift not their quiet heads; but calmly graze.

Tall ship! proud steed! let loftier poets dream;
I plod for thee, most unpoetic Steam!
Thou used, yet scorned! till thro' some chance we find
A poesy in man's all-conquering mind.

Darwin's Botanic Garden, book i.

145

SACRED GIPSY CAROL.

PROLOGUE.

Refuse not, Reader, the brief mysterie-play,
Which our poor Gipsy-trio here enacts;
For thoughtful spirits love such legend lay,
Oft true to feeling, false albeit to facts.

Nay, judging reason yet more true shall hold
Such fabling tale, to gentle heart when true,
Than stricter fact, with dogma harsh and cold,
Oft falsified; to harden me or you.

146

Faith, like yon liberal sun's impartial power,
Where'er her genial ray, like his, shall strike,
Wakes forth from every soil its fitting flower;
If not alike each flower—all flowers—alike.

And tho' erewhile she cleave empyreal air,
Not less 'mid such as lowly valleys give
She loves to float and pause; and every where,
Or high or low, in sympathies can live.

Then, thoughtful spirit! hold thou not in scorn
Her votive gift of very humblest weed.
That humblest weed hath comeliness, where born;
Tis still the heart which consecrates the creed.

Nor take our speech in mockery or despite,
Tho' strange it be, or ruder than thine own.
Where equal justice rules, with equal right
Each tribe—each tongue—hath access to the throne.

1849.

147

[_]

Written in the Provençal dialect, by a priest of Aix, in Provence. Ann. 1680.—See “Millin's Voyage dans le Midi de la France,” vol. iv. part 1. page 163.

Millin gives the original Provençal, and also a literal French translation of it, from which latter (here given) the present English translation has been made.

FIRST GIPSY.
Gipsies Three, Gipsies Three;
Roamers wide o'er field and fell;
Farers free, where'er we be;
Such are we, such are we;
Fortunes also we can tell.
Pretty child! so sweet and mild,
Would you choose your lot to know,

149

Weal or woe—weal or woe—
Cross our hands, for we can show.
Janan! why a-loitering stand?
Come and read the Infant's hand.

SECOND GIPSY.
Thou art, thou art, as I can see,
The equal of the Deity,
His well-belovëd progeny,
And born to be adored.
Yea—I can see that Thou art He,
Co-partner of the Deity;
Fore-born for me, fore-born for me,
Ere chaos felt the Word.
For Love it was that gave thee birth;
Boundless Love for All on earth.
With Virgin-Mother—Father—none.
This—all this—in thy palm is shown.

151

FIRST GIPSY.
Yet, still a secret lags behind,
Which Janan hath not cared to tell.
Yet still a secret lags behind,
Which soon shall work its marvel well.
Messiah dear! put here—put here—
A silver piece, to make us cheer;
Then—Janan tells it, Darling Dear!

SECOND GIPSY.
Yet, 'mid this bliss, yet mid this bliss,
Something of very hard there is,
For our behoof, to do.
Yea—yea—I wis, 'mid all this bliss,
Something of very hard there is,
To work our safety through.
That Cross—Salvation's Cross—I see;
And if of thy sad martyrie

153

My tongue the cause may dare to touch,
It is—that Thou hast loved too much.

FIRST GIPSY.
But still at the end of the vital line
A secret untold remains to divine.
Give again, sweet Babe! thy palm to spell,
And a charming secret we can tell.
But, first, the tester we must hold;
Without it, nothing can be told.

SECOND GIPSY.
Thou art God and Mortal too;
And, as such, shalt live—not much—
On this earth, our human birth.
Thou art God and Mortal too;

155

And, being so, full soon shalt go
From thy sojourn here below.
Nought a nature, thus divine,
From Eternity can sever;
Endless life a gift of thine,
And thine essence lives for ever.

FIRST GIPSY.
But dost thou not wish, as fit it is,
We should speak a word to thy mother dear;
And in our homely gipsy guise
Make our compliment to her?
Already, fair Lady, we understand
That a mystery lurks in that beautiful hand.
Do thou, Janan, thou,
Who so well knowest how,
Say a somewhat to pleasure the lady's ear.

157

SECOND GIPSY.
Lady, thou art of royal blood;
Thy house in glory long hath stood;
The world hath loftier—none.
Thou art, in sooth, of royal blood,
Thy house in glory long hath stood;
All this to me is known.
Thy Lord—thy Son! Thy God—his Father!
What would blessed woman rather?
Sainted Daughter of thy Lord!
Happy Mother of thy God!

FIRST GIPSY.
But thou, old Man! who by the manger,
Quietly dost take thy stand,
Let us see, respected stranger,
Let us see and read thy hand.

159

And think'st thou, then, that, plotting sly,
We shall steal yon ass that is feeding by?
Old Man! Old Man! far better pelf
Would be the blessed babe himself.
But first, kind Master! hand your groat,
And let us quench a thirsty throat.

SECOND GIPSY.
I see by that hand, I see full sure,
That thou art great and just and pure.
By that hand dost thou stand full clearly proved
Great and pure and well-beloved.
Husband! wisely mastering sense
With a saint-like abstinence,
Thou to Providence didst bow;
And art thou not rewarded now?

161

FIRST GIPSY.
But now, Sweet Babe! full well we wot
That thou art born with little store;
Thy lot—a naked—lowly lot;
Therefore—of pence we talk no more.
And didst thou fear, my darling Dear!
To see the scarecrow gipsy near?
Yet wherefore start? for God thou art!—
Then hear our prayer—before we part.

CHORUS OF THE THREE GIPSIES.
If with too much liberty,
We have dared thine ear importune;
If with too much liberty,
We have dared to read thy fortune;
Humbly We pray to Thee,
Build thou for us a destiny;
And be it one, Immortal Son
Blessing us Eternally.

Marseilles, 1829.

163

EPILOGUE TO GIPSY CAROL.

DEVOTION.

Where shall Devotion find her fitting food?
'Twas asked; and it was answered, “Every where.”
Whate'er the region, bring but thou the mood,
And, high or low, her nutriment is there.

Her's—road-side chapel; her's—cathedral roof;
Her's—Christ—Bambino; her's—Jehovah—King;
The holy reverence, which bends—aloof;
The love familiar, that delights to cling.

164

Her's—purest Godhead, veiled in depth of skies;
The Being, unapproachable—unseen;
And her's—the visible; for peasant eyes
By village painter robed in red or green.

Come, lead me thou to yonder ancient pile,
Where the built organ, through its thousand flutes,

Then from one chord of his amazing shell
Would he fetch out the voice of quires and weight
Of the built organ.”

These lines will be found in Mr. Leigh Hunt's exquisite fragment, entitled “Paganini;” among his Poetical Works, Moxon, 1844.

Peals majesty; and incense, all the while,
Is circling up 'mid arches and volutes;

And as we wander thro' the wond'rous fane,
Or kneel us, trust me! I shall feel, like thee,
Chaunt—censer—picture—statue—rubied pane—
Nay, cope and robe. But come thou too, with me,

To where yon worshipper, more picturesque
Than graceful, in his coat of many a flaw,
Is humbly hymning to that Saint grotesque,
“From forth his scrannel-pipe of wretched straw.”

Lycidas.

165

And then avouch, (not bearing less in mind
The glorious strains that roll these roofs along,)
That there Devotion too fit food may find
In the rude notes of that street-chaunted song.

So deemed our elder race. Their faith—they knew—
Was strong for daily wear; a stuff to trust.
No flimsy robe, hung up the whole week thro',
“And but for Sunday-service cleansed from dust;”

Rhymed Plea for Tolerance.

But a stout faith, that free from formalism,
(On which Devotion's name too oft we dub,)
In week-day life nor found, nor sought, a schism;
But mingled with it; and could bear the rub.

Or, must we come in smoother phrase array'd,
(Tho' truth, I ween, might spare such silken grace,)
Their faith (like Una, wheresoe'er she stray'd)
Could make “a sunshine in the shady place.”

Spenser.

166

And far above, as abstract thought may reach,
And far beneath, as human instincts go,
Could find congenial atmosphere in each;
No theme too lofty, as no love too low.

With such interpretation would I leaven
That ladder-vision, erst by Jacob seen;
Its foot on common earth; its top in heaven;
And God's mild angels on each step between.

1849.

167

TRUTH.

“Truth may lie fossil in some cave, no doubt;
But 'twere a mad success to win her out.” Rhymed Plea for Tolerance.

A stripling Bonze (from Eastern clime
We bring the tale we have to tell)
Was standing, once upon a time,
Beside the margin of a well.

Down which he peer'd him wistfully,
As if all deeply pondering
On matter which therein might be,
Some curious or some precious thing.

There while he paused, an old Fakir
Observing, as he wandered by,
Thus spake him, “What dost thou do here?
To whom the stripling made reply.

168

“Good Father! I have heard them tell
How truth, our angel-friend in doubt,
Doth hold her dwelling in a well,
And I full fain would win her out.”

“Nay, prythee, Boy! lift not that rope,
If grey experience may advise.
The very best we e'er may hope
From truth, when won, is compromise.”

“Or, scorning that, make sure, fond youth!
Thou now art sowing years of strife.
Who needs will battle for the truth
Shall lead a mighty sorry life.”

The stripling heard; the rope let go;
And never from that hour applied
To such unthankful task; and lo!
Became Chief Bonze before he died.

169

TIME.

Like as one, erewhile pursuing,
Shouts him o'er his captured foe,
“Spite of all thy fleetest doing,
Now, thou Slave! behind me go.”

So doth Time, austere transmuter,
Following, following, fast and fast,
Lay strong hand on forward Future;
Then consigns him to the Past.

170

MEMENTO VIVERE.

When life was young, in pensive guise
I made it a fantastic glory,
To pause and sentimentalize
O'er every sad “Memento Mori.”

Dear fourscore friend! in their dull place
How gladlier now I turn to thee,
With all thy cheery wit and grace,
Thou bright “Memento Vivere.”

171

AGE.

Full oft you're plaining that in age
Our faculties and feelings die.
And it may be that thinkers sage
Do think like you. Yet plain not I.

When sick we've grown of pride and show,
Why should our striving strength live on?
Or why should love forbear to go,
When all we cared to love—are gone?

172

GOSSIP.

Gossip right and left you're strowing,
Never heeding what you do;
Tho' each idle word you're sowing
Friend and neighbour long may rue.

When we marked you lately loosing
Stone from yonder green hill's side,
You but in your sport were choosing
Swift adown to see it glide.

You look'd pale tho', when in fury,
Like a mad thing just releas'd,
Threatening work for judge and jury,
Wild it whirred o'er man and beast.

173

Think then, Chatterer! 'mid your doing,
If for others nought you rue,
How the very seed you're strewing
May spring up—ill seed for you.

Yon maim'd traveller, you behold him,
Smitten sore by avalanche;
Wiser heads in vain had told him
On to move, in silence staunch.

Now his own sad cup he's drinking;
Word of his provoked the fall,
Which so lamed; and left him thinking
How that word was cause of all.

174

WINDS OF DOCTRINE.

By winds diverse of doctrine blown,
Old Spurio, lately bigot fix'd,
Hath now no creed to call his own,
But slants him on, some two betwixt.

So when, cross-meeting, force and force
Have smote some stationary ball,
It takes no longer straightway course,
But sidles to diagonal.

175

CASA MIA.

“Casa mia, casa mia,
Per piccina che tu sia,
Tu mi pari una badia.”

Thou wert born where huge Missouri,
Rushing heretofore alone,
Bears to Mississippi dowry
Of more waters than his own;
But hast never learn'd, like me,
From the years of infancy,
With unsated love to look
On one own dear little brook.

Thou hast felt the treeless prairie
In its awful sameness spread;
Countless leagues, that never vary;
Wide well nigh as ocean's bed;

176

But hast never learned, like me,
From the years of infancy,
How to prize the hedge-row bound
Of one tiny plot of ground.

Thou hast dreamed where endless forest
Clusters on, a realm of trees;
And, to hear thee, half abhorrest
Any woods less vast than these;
For thou ne'er hast learned like me,
From the years of infancy,
How to love, with love unbroke,
Some one tree, this own old oak.

Vaunt thou then, if such thy notion,
Prairie—forest—flung afar;
And thy streams, whose mighty motion
Meets the tides with equal war;

It is said that the voyager “going out to sea and sailing with a good breeze for hours, sees nothing on any side but the white and turbid waters of the Mississippi, long after he is out of sight of land.”—Description of the Mississippi.

177

But accord meanwhile to me
What I've loved from infancy,
This one tree—this hedge-row nook—
And my own dear little brook.

Holly Bush, Oct. 1848.

TRANSLATION.

[I've found a port. Hope—Fortune—Farewell ye!]

I've found a port. Hope—Fortune—Farewell ye!
Cheat others now. Enough ye've cheated me.

178

GRAMMARYE.

“Argantyr! awake—awake—
Hervor bids thy slumbers fly.
Magic chords around thee break;
Argantyr! reply—reply.”

In vain had they striven—those Beldames three—
With all their might of grammarye,
And many a mutter and many a hum,
To make the Dead Man from his tomb forth come.
For they had vowed by force of spell,
The reason why I dare not tell,
To drag him once more to light of day,
And bring him far and far away
From that his silent house of clay:
Which, ere he came there, in grave-clothes dress'd,
He had sighed for, so oft, for his home of rest.

179

“Away, away, ye Mumblers three!
Away, quoth the Wizard, and leave him to me!
Ay, leave him to me, and I'll play him a stave,
That, I warrant, shall force him to stir in his grave,
And fumble from 'neath his coffin lid,
And, up, follow me wheresoever I bid.”

“But first, ye old Hags! go bring me my viol,
Which from Living—nor Dead—brooked never denial.
And my bow, which I strang, to suit such song,
Of a drowned witch's locks, both lank and long.
And deep howsoever his grave it may be,
Were it deep as a well, he shall list him to me.”

They have tottered them back and brought him the viol
Which from Living—nor Dead—brooked never denial;
And they cower them close to witness the trial;

180

Grinning and gibbering “Now we shall see
If he, with his stave, doeth better than we.”

And that magical viol, oh! how was it made?
From a gibbeted skull which the winds had flayed
Of its dark flowing locks and each crinkle of skin,
Brown-shiny without, and hollow within.
With eye-holes for sound-holes; with neck-bone for neck;
While the strings to bridge up 'twas the nose gave its wreck.
For, somehow or other, nose, mouth, brow and chin,
Each ghost of a feature chimed wond'rously in,
To fashion the form of that strange violin;
Which, looking its player full up in the face,
Would mock him, erewhile, with a wickéd grimace,
As much as to hint “Ere 'tis long—in my place.”

181

Yet the Wizard—he bated no jot of his pride;
But smiled him in triumph the head-stone beside.
For he felt 'neath his bow the throb of the stave
All eager to summon the Dead from his grave.
Then thus to his mocker, “To-day I sway thee;
Come to-morrow what will—'tis small matter to me.”

And he bade forth the song. Nor sad—nor slow—
Like prophet's, who, constrained to show,
Reluctantly denounceth woe;
But brisk, as in merriment on it did go,
And we knew he was gibing the sleeper below.

And we saw, ere 'twas long, the round turf upride,
And split in the middle and fall on each side;

182

And lo! on his feet the Dead Man stood!
First—pausing awhile, as in puzzled mood,
Then—followed wherever the Wizard would.
While those Beldames three, in hideous glee,
Shouted and laughed the sight to see.

183

PUNNING—AFTER COWLEY.

TO AQUILIUS.

Pun and Wit do both surprise;
Yea, but with a difference.
Offspring foolish—offspring wise—
This—of sound; and that—of sense.

Easy pun, like plaister mould,
E'en when best, may scarce assure a
Fragile fame; while Wit doth hold
Bravely on, piëtra dura.

Yet when Pun to Wit allied,
Close to Wit doth take his station,
Why, his presence we'll abide
For the sake of his Relation.

184

Or when thou thro' every fytte
Dear Aquilius! hast been running;
Wisdom—poetry—and wit,
Then dost drop to sheerest Punning.

Tho' with sound he ill agree;
Tho' with sense sad war he wage;
Still we'll greet him for his glee;
And love him for his parentage.

185

TO A FEMALE FRIEND,

RETURNING TO AMERICA.

Lady! you ask a farewell verse;
Reluctant I obey.
Far, gladlier far, would we rehearse
Some rhyme to bid thee stay.
For, if but lately we have met,
We all shall lose thee with regret.

But if full surely thou must go
From us, who fain would keep,
May westering breezes cheerly blow,
Rewafting o'er the Deep
To where thine own dear land imparts
Its bliss of loved and loving hearts.

186

Of late, like some full cargoed ship,
Thy mind did voyage forth;
Transporting on no vulgar trip
Its freight of precious worth;
And bartering on, from shore to shore,
Or thought for thought, or lore for lore.

Yet tho' from Gaul and Rome's own clime
Rich memories thou hast borne
For home-reflection's after-time,
I know thou wilt not scorn
To muse erewhile on Britain's bowers;
Thy native land scarce less than ours.

Blood, that was once our English blood,
No more let seas divide.
A mightier power hath stemmed the flood,
The old Atlantic tide;

187

And wide and wider hence shall roll
The glorious traffic—soul with soul.

Lady! not easily withstood!
Thy frolic wish is won;
And, if in somewhat pensive mood,
Behold five stanzas done.
But, Lady! only come agen,
For stanzas five—we'll write thee ten.

189

PAST AND FUTURE.

191

Our Past—how strangely swift! Its years—mere months!
Months—clipped to weeks! and longest day—an hour!
But oh! how slow the Future; slow to all
Of every age and being. Yon school-urchin,
Fresh from his Christmas-home, as now he bends him
With saddened brow o'er the black greasy slate;
Or strains himself, at stroke of early clock,
His all-unwelcome bedtime, to confront
Cold touch of wiry sheet, ah! not like home's;
How vainly would he pierce the dim half year

192

To his next holidays; and asks himself,
“And will they—will they—can they ever come?”

Youth too, who sighs for the proud masterdom
Of one and twenty; his great holiday;
When he may satisfy intense desire
With horn and hound and golden racing-cup;
Maturer toys! Or he, young too, who wends him
From Eastern warfare, on some gallant ship,
Home to his bride affianced, whom he hath loved
From their late school-hood; tho' the willing prow
Cut cheerily on; and the still-steady breeze
Stiffen each sail; and that long lively wake
May tell to all but him how fast she goes;
He too (and each in turn) exclaims “How slow!”

Yea, Middle-Age not less, tho' oft he hath proved
How Time, the crawling tortoise, as he deemed,

193

Hath, all that while, been Time, the fleet of foot;
Who—having won the Future all too soon—
With sudden turning, as of wheel reversed—
Unwinds that Future back into the Past;
Spite of experience, he too holds the Coming
A long, long tract; blank space interminable,
On which to inscribe his plans; wealth to be won;
Or honours added; or field joined to field;
Or glory achieved thro' arms, or art, or song;
Till, on a day, he finds his head a-whitening;
Yet, even then, his plans all unfulfilled,
May scarce yield credence to his own grey hairs.
So surely is the Future long to All!

Nay, not to All. A certain hill there is,
Not like the mighty Tuscan's obscure wood,
“In the mid-way of this our mortal life,”

Cary's Dante.

But one third further on; which whoso climbs,

194

Should pensive thought disown him not, there finds
If brief the Past, how brief the Future too.
Thence marks he what scant slip doth lie between
Him and that fated sea, that gulfeth all.
So near, he views distinct the thin surf-line,
Narrowing yet more and more the narrow strand.
And even may hear the onward-stealing wave,
Which pulses, ah! how regular; if faint
As his own pulse, which soon shall cease to beat.

Sad lore to learn! which he, who once hath learned,
Forgets not; but henceforward walks his life
Ghost-beckoned by the Future. Like to him,
(Of such men tell) some second-sighted seer,
For whom the very merriest village bells,
That ever pealed for new-born babe, or bride,
Have yet, within, a haunting under-note,
That saith “Ere long we toll.” Or yet more like

195

Yon felon-wretch law doomed; to whom yet mercy
Hath granted some brief respite; if, in sooth,
It be a boon of mercy, that sad leave
To pause awhile, and shudder o'er th' abyss,
And then “Farewell.”

So 'tis—that every age
Doth make its own believings. Things, so named,
But seemings; and our very solidest facts
Mere shadows from the will; or standing-place
Shapes the whole vision. Sculptor young was he,
And teeming with the thoughts of his own years,
Who first devised yon figure of old Time.
He knew him old; and gave him withered limbs;
Yet sinewy, and strong for work withal;
(For Youth believeth in long working day,)
And those firm wings; for he had far to fly;
And that stout scythe; for he had much to mow;

196

Then with one forelock, and ('twas Art's caprice)
A chrystal hour-glass in the marble-hand,
The statue stood complete.

And stood around
A group—as young—regarding. Hopes and Fears—
Nay—Fears were none; but gratulating Hopes;
Each for his own glad prospect. While the gayer
Were jeering him. As “Go thy way, Old Grey-beard!
Thou of the chrystal cone admonitory!
With thy long scythe and longer wings, go mow
All, if thou wilt, the steppes of Tartary;
Or fly thee, if thou choose, from pole to pole;
For what art thou to us? Unless indeed
We clutch—as sooth we will—the jocund moral
Of thy short forelock, and enjoy the Present.”

That Present long had passed. Years were flown by;
And lo! there stood beside that self-same statue

197

Another group; another yet the same;
A few grey-headed men; the scant remains
Of those who had gazed before. The rest—where were they?

But now, methinks, not only were their locks,
But eye-sights changed,—to which no more appeared
The same—that statue; or had changed, like them.
For that broad chrystal cone, down which, of old,
When shifted to reverse by curious hand,
The sands had seemed to drawl, (like some rich unguent
From forth the narrow neck of golden vase
Dripping reluctantly, when dark-locked beauty
Impatient craves it for her clustering hair,)
They now beheld it dwarfed and tapered down
To minute-glass; through which the glittering grains,
Too swift almost for aged eyes to follow,

198

Leapt twinklingly; as if in turn to jeer,
With “Now, good friends! we sure run fast enough!”

So too that scythe, whose length of curvature
Had seemed full fit to sweep uncounted fields,
(And which, or whether plied thro' rough or smooth,
—For rough and smooth to Time are all the same—
Had stirred the heedless ear of youth no more
Than doth the mower's, who, on some sweet June morn,
Steals silently amid the dewy grass,)
Was now a short hooked sickle; fit not less
For its cramped breadth of harvest; and they heard it,
Or thought they heard it, rasping audibly
With brisk sharp rustle 'mid the dry sere stalks;
Themselves as dry and sere!

While each long wing,
Down pointed from spare back to skinny heel,

199

—Which might have borne strong eagle on his quest
From realm to realm—was clipped and rounded now,
As those which only just suffice to bear
The whirring partridge on from brake to brake;
If swift, yet soon to fall. Or like the plumes
Fan-shaped and hardly fledged; which sculpture hangs
On the sleek shoulders of the little Loves.
They too, as many a maiden's tear attests,
They too, who take short flights—and drop too soon.

But lo! beside that figure of old Time
Stood now another figure; which, whilom,
Had not stood there; or which they saw not then,
When youth is busied more to feel than see.
Figure it was with loosely-folded arms,
And bended brow, and introspective eye,
Which seemed as if it pondered on the Past.
The young, had any such been mingling there,

200

Might well have marvelled what such form should mean.
But of that gray-haired group, which clustered round,
Not one there was but knew the name—and sighed—
When—asking—it was answered them “Regret.”

1849.

201

ASPASIA.

TO ------.

Bright Aspasia! say—how is it?
Tell us with what spell is rife
Smile of thine, whose briefest visit
Wakes each dullest clod to life?

Zephyr shall we type thee, thawing
Vernal flower from Arctic block?
Or some Attic sun-beam, drawing
Hidden oil from rudest rock?

Or believe thee sprite of ages?
Very Her, whom Socrates
Worshipped more than all the Sages,
All the vaunted Seven of Greece.

202

And their systems throwing over
For the lessons of her eyes,
Happy pupil! happier lover!
Doubly won his name of “Wise.”

So come thou, delicious preacher!
Orator—of sparkling looks!
Come, like Her, and be our teacher;
Better far than all the books.

Book-worm pedants but benight us;
Cumbrous setting clouds the gem.
Bring but thy bright smile to light us,
And who'd go for fogs to them?

203

HINT TO POETS.

Brother Bard! if dream thou nourish,
Thro' new fancy or new truth,
'Mid the sons of fame to flourish,
Thou must lean on heart of youth.

Youth is eager; youth—elastic;
Plieth both to old and new.
Age deems all, but old, fantastic;
And doth “novel gaud” eschew.

Youth, as yet of time unthrifty,
Poet's song will stay to hear.
Bent on business grey-beard Fifty
To the charmer stops his ear.

204

Bring us back your wandering Homer!
Glorious pedlar—poem-pack'd!
Midas old shall greet the Roamer
With a clause from Vagrant Act.

Count not on your fresh creation!
Living Homer begged his bread.
'Twas a second generation
Twined its wreath for Homer—dead.

205

RAISING THE DEAD.

207

We all have heard, and marvelled as we heard,
Of seers, who have raised the Dead from out their tombs,
And made them parley. Nor would I gainsay
Such story. For who knows the invisible links,
Mysterious sympathies of life with life,
Or life, perchance, with death? Or guesses what
Thessalian spells, or what divining rod
The soul erewhile may have weird gift to use,
And, with strange power, interrogate the grave,
Yet leave the turf unbroke? Or even may reach
Up the blue regions, where freed spirits dwell,

208

With her far-finding telescope of love;
Or, may be, hate!

Nay, are our nightly dreams
But fancies of the brain? some straggling shreds
From memory? or, meaner still, mere jet
From stomach or nerve? Or, rather, do we not,
(So sometimes I have deemed) what time we sleep,
—If sleep it be, and not a wider waking—
Within the close-drawn curtains, face to face,
Hold actual commerce with the living Dead?
Who stand beside us; and do look upon us;
And well nigh touch us with their stony hands;
And see themselves in our fixed lineaments:
Fit comradeship! dead life with living death!
And then, when morn hath come, with crow of cock,
Or early swallow, twittering by the lattice,
To summon them back to their lonely homes,

209

And us to all the over busy doings
Of this world's life; we, in our ignorance,
Because they have left no foot-prints on the night,
Do swear we have dreamed.

Nor doth it hap alone
Within the silent and the dim domain
Of sleep; that doubtful confine laid between
The Here and the Hereafter; nor where deed
Of guilt doth hold some troubled mind awake
At midnight; nor where mist, obscure as night,
Hath wrapt the Gaël upon his mountain moor,
And the pale wraith doth prophesy him woe;
Not in such moments only do the Dead
Revisit earth. Go thou and throw thyself
On some hill side, beneath the bluest sky
And cheeriest sun; or—better—when the touch
Of twilight eve hath sanctified the air,

210

And very earth thou liest on; and surrender
Thy spirit to old memories; and 'tis chance
If then thy half-closed eyes behold them not.
Uncalled they come; or led by threads of thought
Too fine to scan. Thy dearest objects once,
And now, behold! they come to thee again,
And hang around thee, sweetly visible,
And real as life itself. If life itself
Be a real thing; and not—as some have deemed—
A dream of shadows; sequel to a drama
Acted before; and we (its actors, then,
But, now, forgetful of the parts we played)
No creatures of fresh breath, but the stale ghosts
Of former Being; doomed to walk once more
This weary earth; and fret the appointed years,
In penance of some evil we have done;
But when—and what—and where—we must not know.

211

Uncalled they come. But we can call them too,
(I speak but what I know) and make them pass
Before us. If not alway, yet by fits,
When the strong will and planet hour have met
In apt conjunction. But why only then,
Or not to all accorded, who may find?

Then may be seen the newly-gifted seer,
With steadfast eye, yet outward nought beholding,
Like one in presence of some lofty thought
Or deed; absorbed in it, and it alone;
Or prophet so may have gazed in his strong hour.
For now he feels his spirit privileged
All strangely (how—he knows not, yet he knows it)
To hold communion with the parted life;
And from that very spot where now he stands,
To speed (as if along some chargëd wire,

212

That mocks at far and near, and rough and smooth)
His swift invisible message to the tomb.

I speak but what I know. Of late I found me
Where I had dwelt of yore; and stood to gaze
On the once well-known scene. Behind me rose
The quaint old town; its square cathedral tower
Lifted above; while all before and round
Lay spread the lovely landscape. Those smooth meads;
And the bright sparkling river, bright as ever,
Gliding amid; and bearing white-sailed bark
To the near sea. And green hills sloping up
On the other side; with woods and homes ancestral;
And many a cheery prospect-tower, that told
How man had loved the region; and the purple
Of heathy moors beyond them. And I thought me
Of all their little valleys, folded in;
Each with its vagrant brook. Sweet solitudes!

213

Which I had roamed with Her, who made them all
Sweeter than solitude; from whom I had dreamed
Never to part. But on that baffled vision
I dared to think no more.

Yet still I longed
To muse on some whom I had known—with Her—
In that spring-hour of life, (They were not all
Deceivers!) and who now, like Her, were gone!
And never on this earth to meet again,
Save only in such vision—memory-led.

So, all the less distrubedly to dream,
I stood and leaned, with closëd eyes, against
That lingering fragment of the old town-wall,
Where I had leaned of old—but not alone!
And memory came to aid me, the whole spot
Re-peopling; and I caught, or secmed to catch

214

Familiar looks; and heard, or seemed to hear,
Familiar tones; first—one's; and then—another's.
The best beloved came first. Relations dear,
Part of whose life I was, as they of mine;
And friends—as dear. And then acquaintances,
More or less strict. And foremost among these,
(For now—as then—the church had due precedence)
The well-bred dean; and jovial prebendary;
And wife prebendal, with her stately look
Dwarfing wife secular. And, next, town-member,
From his near seat, aye welcome; liberal ever
Of hare and pheasant; or with blandest smile
Winning constituent. And young barrister
From the great city; at provincial board
Predominant; with legal tale and jest
From Westminster or circuit. And the staid
Physician; and the brisk apothecary,
Rapping from door to door; with news from each

215

Regaling convalescent. Gossip rare!
Yet kindly ever by the poor man's bed.
There too the youthful curate, with white brow
And chiselled lip; and mild, yet fervent eye;
Full oft descanting with ingenuous warmth
On type or prophecy; while hectic cheek
All the sad time too plainly spoke its own.

Now wherefore was it? (for I sought it not)
That on a sudden stretched its length before me
The old town ball-room; lit as it was wont
At races or assize time. And behold!
Thro' the wide double doors came flitting in
Fair white-robed Misses; separate or in bevies;
Now, ones—and twos—and threes; then, thick together,
(Like gradual snow flakes) whitening the whole floor.
Or rather shall we say, for fitter type,

216

Like orange-blossoms, which some summer-breeze
Is fluttering from amid the glossy boughs
To blanch the beds beneath. So in they streamed,
A galaxy of muslin.

Those white robes
Had long been shrouds! and that gay dance—what since,
Let Holbein tell us!

Yea, I saw them all,
As I had seen of yore. Here the young heir,
Not quite unconscious. There, the matron-mother
Of those three youthful Graces; eagle eyed;
From the side benches, her tall eyrie, brooding
O'er park and manor. And flirtations thin,
Meant for the general eye; and deep-souled looks
Of silent love, the lookers fain would hide.

217

And wreathëd smiles—some, hollow; and the sneer
Forecast to wound; and petty rivalries,
And pettier leagues; and all the worthless doings
Of this our daily life—done by the Dead!

Them too I saw, those three deep-wrinkled hags,
Pink-rouged; dark-ringletted; and diamond-decked;
Yet hag-like still. Beneath whose baleful breath
The fairest fame would wither; whose dim hints,
And counsels shrewd, and worming confidences
Had art to melt the firmest plighted faith
Of youthful bride affianced. There they stood,
With snake-like eyes; sharp voices; finger up;
Those ball-room beldames! And I heard them gibber,
E'en as ghosts gibber; or as they themselves
Had gibbered here on earth. I heard, and scarce
Forbore to curse them.

218

Say, had wrath such power
To quicken memory? for it now seemed freshened
To a new strength. We all have read, when earthquake
Hath smote some ancient city's street of tombs,
Disrupting their foundations, how come forth
Graven sarcophagus, and pictured urn,
And the grey ashes of forgotten men
Five hundred lustres buried. Even so,
Stirred by some influence, be it what it might,
Did now the long-sealed chambers of the brain
Give up their Dead. And, lo! before me stood
All of the Parted I had known from when
I first began to know; (for of the Quick
None came to mingle). And not those alone
Whom I had sought to see, but all, yea all,
Or separate, or in clusters. Mother—nurse—
Preceptor. Next, school-comrades—college-friends—
(Ah! little had we dreamed to part so soon)

219

And then the yet more numerous host, 'mid whom
Our after-life hath thrust us. More and more,
Swifter and swifter. Till there grew a sense
Confused and ill at ease, as if it now
Were all too cramp for those who there would enter.

Hast thou not heard erewhile some gentle music?
(If thro' similitudes I speak (perchance,
Usque ad nauseam) 'tis that speech direct
Might fail to tell my story; nor boast I
Wide masterdom of words.) But as some music,
Slowly preluding with soft notes and few,
Swells by degrees; and other instruments
Join in; till finally the whole orchestra,
Like some freshed river, swollen with tributaries,
Hath gathered up the multitudinous minglings,
Then flings them all with unresolvable speed
In one broad crash upon the shrinking ear;
So shrank I at that moment, as all these,

220

Poured forth from East and West and North and South,
Were round and round me eddying, till the brain spun.

Nor was I any longer in the Present;
(For time itself seemed reeling with the brain)
My Present was the Past! Life's actual hour
Supplanted by the vanished! As they tell
Of drowning men,

The author's attention was drawn to this remarkable fact early in his life. Since then, through personal intercourse and miscellaneous reading, he has more than once come into contact with the same statement, and has sometimes regretted that he has made no notes of the authorities. But he is aware of two distinguished living witnesses. The one, the present Admiral Beaufort, Hydrographer to the Navy, whose statement will be found in the late Sir John Barrow's Autobiography, p. 398. — The other, the author's personal friend, Sir Charles Fellows. He narrowly escaped death by drowning at Naples — and, at the present writer's request, has more than once related to him the intensely rapid passage of thought which he then experienced.

with whom all former memories;
All they have done or suffered; known or felt;
Childhood and manhood; loves and enmities;
Nay, things that were, or seemed to be, forgotten,
Are all whirred back upon the sharpened sense,
To be compressed within that struggling minute;
Thus suddenly, (I may not say unrolled,
But, somehow, flung before me) in that instant
Flashed a whole life.

How may words paint to thee
What thou hast never felt? Or how I stood

221

(There was no time for fear) but all-amazed,
Like one who hath oped a sluice he may not stop.
Till, in a moment of collected will,
Quivering the while, but stronger than I knew,
I bade them—and they went!

What went? mere visions?
Were these, so real, so distinct, but visions?
Or were they—could they be (I dare confess
Such thought was glancing by me) no—not shadows!
But they—the Dead—come back in body again?

“Yea, visions”—thou wilt tell me — “shadows mere—”
“Such stuff as dreams are made of;” when the mind
Diseased, or else in sport, is peopling space
With shapes of matter. (If that mind and matter
In sooth be twain.) Or thou wilt tell how fancy

222

Is still most potent when the soul is stirred;
As mine was then. Or else wilt hold wise descant,
In metaphysic guise, of filmy links
Associative; and echoes—tho' unheard—
From thought to thought. And think'st thou then that I
Not thus philosophized? Yet 'twas not these:
I speak but what I know—and 'twas not these.

Now listen to a tale incredible!
And yet most true. Nay, 'tis no jesting story;
Nor was I drugged with opium; nor was it
Some wild hallucination of a brain,
Thou'lt say—o'erwrought. But it was given me,
(I tell thee a true tale, believe or not)
But it was given me in that hour to know
Distinct, as e'er distinctest knowledge stood,
(Yet how or whence such knowledge came, I knew not;

223

Nor if to tempt or punish, that I know not;)
But it was given me in that hour to know
That they, the Parted—wheresoe'er they were—
That they should feel and hear me in their graves!
Not merely in yon church-yard, but wherever
Their bones did house them. And should leave awhile,
(No, not mere phantoms, but the very Dead)
Those graves all tenantless—to march before me!

'Twas a strange power. A ghastly dream to shrink from,
If it had been a dream; but, being a power,
I cared to use it; and with will perverse
(For power corrupteth will), did choose to see
Her, whom but now my heart had shrunk to think of.

And She did come! and I beheld her what
She was when last we parted. Was it love

224

Or anger made me call that vision up?
I might not stay to know; but this I know,
That all of wrath, long cherished—and revenge—
(For that thought too, all hideous as it was,
Had yet been there) did melt them fast away
Before that once loved presence; till (each wrong
Forgiven) the old affection ruled alone.

One other was there in that church-yard laid,
Whom I had loved the least (why did She love him?)
My foe; and him—the next—I willed to see.
And will was now compulsion; and I saw him;
Yea, with these very bodily eyes I saw him
Stir in his shroud, beneath the coffin-lid!
And staring upward with wide helpless eyes,
He moaned—I heard him—wherefore dost thou wake me?

225

Then too I saw—nay 'twas no fantasy—
Two other eyes—eyes unmistakeable—
Gazing reproachfully. And all at once,
With a most swift revulsion of the heart,
I started from my own unnatural power,
And knew that I had done a deed unholy.
Ay, started every limb; and so aroused me!
And, lifting with that start the closëd lids,
Beheld, oh blessed! just beneath me lying
That alway lovely landscape; lovelier now
Than ever; while, like ghost before the day,
The unholy power had vanished.

As some dreamer,
Amid the wanderings of his troubled dream,
All on a sudden finds himself in-coiled
In some strange guilt; tho' how it was he knows not;
Nor even if his; yet, nathless, shame and fear

226

Are all around him; if by chance, just then,
From forth the sweetly dawning East, some ray
Slant to his eye-lids, heavenly visitant!
He, leaping up with inexpressible joy,
Finds himself shrieved; or as some noble spirit,
Who, lured by pride, (oh! if such tale be true,
May heaven from us avert the dire temptation)
Hath plighted with the Demon, dreadful pact!
And sold his soul for power; and, having tested,
Succeeds; then shudders at his own success;
And flings him on his kness in agony
Of prayer; if that, with penitence, may melt
The seal from off the accursed bond; and lo!
His prayer is heard. Like him—like him so saved
In such a mortal hour, ev'n so felt I;
When, starting from that gift of horrible might,
(Or be it dream, if dream thou still wilt have it)
I did behold again the cheery sun
On that up-sparkling river. Mother Earth!

227

To me thou ne'er wert dearer. Rather say,
Never so dear. Oh! how I joyed to see
Those blue-eyed children, lightly gamboling
On the shorn turf anear. That loving dog,
Who seemed as if he ne'er could love enough,
Fond frolicking beside them; every bird,
How small soever, that with tiny rustle
Burst from the bushes. Ay, and those grave daws,
Now, musing on the old cathedral tower;
Now, wheeling round and round in the clear air.

Oh! what a calming bliss to be once more
(Escaped such fearful fact—or mocking vision)
Amid these mild realities of life!
Then first it was I comprehended how
Complacently might king resign his crown.
Nor marvelled any longer at the tale
Of potent wizards, who had burned their books.

1849.

University of Virginia Library

OCCASIONAL VERSES.

UPPER AUSTRIA.

TO H. M. W.

ON READING HER POEMS.

SONNET

WRITTEN AFTER HAVING READ A. F. RIO'S ,PETITE CHOUAUNERIE.

INSCRIPTION FOR AN EAGLE'S FOOT,

BROUGHT TO ENGLAND BY SIR CHARLES FELLOWS, AND NOW PART OF THE FURNITURE OF HIS LIBRARY TABLE.

GROWING OLD.

AFTER THOMAS CAREW — 1630.

[They choose not ill their lot who choose]

TO AN ÆOLIAN HARP.

LOVE'S AUCTION.

RUFUS'S TREE.

FRAGMENT.

[Crotchets—odd mixings up of soul and sense—]

SECOND LOVE.

IN A PORTRAIT GALLERY.

SAPPHO.

LA PIQUANTE.

APPARITIONS.

THE GREEK WIFE.

THE RENEWAL.

FLOWERS FROM WATERLOO.

LINES SUGGESTED BY ODE XXIX. BOOK I. OF HORACE.

LINES SENT TO ELIA,

AFTER READING HIS ESSAY ON ROAST PIG, WITH A TRIBUTARY BASKET.

PS.

THE GODS OF GREECE.

BROOK OF SANGUINETTO,

NEAR THE LAKE OF THRASYMENE.

BORDIGHIERA.

(BETWEEN NICE AND GENOA)

ECLIPSE.

ZOË: A PORTRAIT.

RINGLETS.

ON A PICTURE.

ON A DOG.

MONUMENT AT LUCERNE,

TO THE SWISS GUARD MASSACRED AT THE ASSAULT ON THE TUILERIES, A.D. 1792.

FROM ANACREON. 129 This is a slight attempt to translate Anacreon more briefly than is usually done, and it claims no merit beyond its brevity.

ODE I.

ASTRONOMY.

EXPERIMENTUM CRUCIS.

MORAL.

L'ENVOI, TO A POEM ON TOLERANCE.

STEAM TRAVEL.

SACRED GIPSY CAROL.

PROLOGUE.

EPILOGUE TO GIPSY CAROL.

DEVOTION.

TRUTH.

TIME.

MEMENTO VIVERE.

AGE.

GOSSIP.

WINDS OF DOCTRINE.

CASA MIA.

TRANSLATION.

[I've found a port. Hope—Fortune—Farewell ye!]

GRAMMARYE.

PUNNING—AFTER COWLEY.

TO AQUILIUS.

TO A FEMALE FRIEND,

RETURNING TO AMERICA.

PAST AND FUTURE.

ASPASIA.

TO ------.

HINT TO POETS.

RAISING THE DEAD.

FROM ANACREON.
129

This is a slight attempt to translate Anacreon more briefly than is usually done, and it claims no merit beyond its brevity.