Chapter XV

Soft smiling, in the burnish’d west,
Where Phoebus’ orb has sunk to rest,
Shines heavenly Venus’s goddess light,
(Propitious beam to lovers sight:)
Thick starry throngs pervade the skies,
And, on the gentle water lies
The semblance of the lovely heaven,
Drest in the hues of comeing even’;
And, as the Zephyr stirs the breast
On which the starry myriads rest,
The mighty band, in tumult tost,
Now glimmer, now they fade away;
In seeming, wild confusion lost,
Like glitt’ring spears in mortal fray.
Then, as the semblance struck my eye.
Came the long tale across my mind,
Of conq’ring hosts, and victory,
That proud ambition’s votries blind
To evils reason can descry.

XVI

Or upland, from the ocean’s surge,
I turn’d my eye, the landscape’s verge
(As twilight’s lovely hour come on,
And faint along the horizon,
Bland nature’s soft, and tender dye,
Seemed mingling with the hues of sky,)
“Was drest in softest livery.
When all around was sweet and still,
Its distant note the Whip-poor-will
Sigh’d on the zephyr’s airy sail,
That softly swept along the vale,
And o’er the stream, in magic swell,
The echo fondly loved to dwell;
As if, beneath its chrystal wave,
It sought a calm and tranquil grave;
’Till wak’d, the softly solemn strain
Renew’d its music wild again,
And echo, still, the note repeated,
And vale, and hill, its numbers greeted.

XVII

Far off, upon the village green,
The children at their sports are seen;
Beneath fair Cynthia’s argent ray,
In mazy squadrons mix’d, they play.
Now, to the ranks of mimic war
They rush, beneath the martial star,
Its red rays beaming from afar;
And brandish high the edgeless brand,
And poise the musket at command,
While every bosom, frought with ire,
Feels all a hero’s glowing fire:--
Or o’er the plain, in panting chace,
The football-sports provoke the race;
And hark! the wild and clam’rous shout,
That hails the victors of the rout,
The boyish note, of rapt’rous glee,
The joy of bloodless victory.--