Chapter XXIX: Part II (8)

_Her._ Abdullah falls! He falls!
The man of blood!--the spoiler!--he hath sunk
In our king’s path! Well hath that royal sword
Avenged thy cause, Gonzalez!
They give way,
The Crescent’s van is broken! On the hills,
And the dark pine-woods, may the infidel
Call vainly, in his agony of fear,
To cover him from vengeance! Lo! they fly!
They of the forest and the wilderness
Are scatter’d, e’en as leaves upon the wind!
Woe to the sons of Afric! Let the plains,
And the vine mountains, and Hesperian seas,
Take their dead unto them!--that blood shall wash
Our soil from stains of bondage.

_Gon._ (_attempting to raise himself._) Set me free!
Come with me forth, for I must greet my king,
After his battle-field!

_Her._ Oh, blest in death!
Chosen of heaven, farewell! Look on the Cross,
And part from earth in peace!

_Gon._ Now, charge once more!
God is with Spain, and Santiago’s sword
Is reddening all the air! Shout forth “Castile!”
The day is ours! I go; but fear ye not!
For Afric’s lance is broken, and my sons
Have won their first good field!
[_He dies._

_Elm._ Look on me yet!
Speak one farewell, my husband!--must thy voice
Enter my soul no more! Thine eye is fix’d--
Now is my life uprooted--and ’tis well.

[_A sound of triumphant music is heard, and many Castilian
Knights and Soldiers enter._]

_A Cit._ Hush your triumphal sounds, although ye come
E’en as deliverers! But the noble dead,
And those that mourn them, claim from human hearts
Deep silent reverence.

_Elm._ (_rising proudly._) No, swell forth, Castile!
Thy trumpet music, till the seas and heavens,
And the deep hills, give every stormy note
Echoes to ring through Spain! How, know ye not
That all array’d for triumph, crown’d and robed
With the strong spirit which hath saved the land,
E’en now a conqueror to his rest is gone?
Fear not to break that sleep, but let the wind
Swell on with victory’s shout!--_He_ will not hear--
Hath earth a sound more sad?

_Her._ Lift ye the dead,
And bear him with the banner of his race
Waving above him proudly, as it waved
O’er the Cid’s battles, to the tomb wherein
His warrior sires are gather’d. [_They raise the body._

Elm. Ay, ’tis thus
Thou shouldst be honour’d! And I follow thee,
With an unfaltering and a lofty step,
To that last home of glory. She that wears
In her deep heart the memory of thy love,
Shall thence draw strength for all things; till the God
Whose hand around her hath unpeopled earth,
Looking upon her still and chasten’d soul,
Call it once more to thine!

(_To the Castilians._) Awake, I say!
Tambour and trumpet, wake! And let the land
Through all her mountains hear your funeral peal.
--So should a hero pass to his repose.

[_Exeunt omnes._

[284] This circumstance is recorded of King Don Alfonso, the last of that name. He sent to the Cid’s tomb for the cross which that warrior was accustomed to wear upon his breast when he went to battle, and had it made into one for himself, “because of the faith which he had, that through it he should obtain the victory.”--Southey’s _Chronicle of the Cid_.

[CRITICAL ANNOTATIONS ON THE “SIEGE OF VALENCIA.”

“Of ‘The Siege of Valencia’ we say little, for we by no means consider it as the happiest of Mrs Hemans’s efforts. Not that it does not contain, nay, abound with fine passages; but the whole wants vigour, coherence, and compression. The story is meagre, and the dialogue too diffuse.”--_The_ Rev. Dr Morehead _in Constable’s Magazine for September 1823_.

“The ‘Tales and Historic Scenes,’ ‘The Sceptic,’ ‘The Welsh Melodies,’ ‘The Siege of Valencia,’ and ‘The Vespers of Palermo,’” says Delta, “may all be referred to this epoch of her literary career, and are characterised by beauties of a high and peculiar stamp. With reference to the two latter, it must be owned, that if the genius of Mrs Hemans was not essentially dramatic, yet that both abound with high and magnificent bursts of poetry. It was not easy to adapt her fine taste and uniformly high-toned sentiment to the varied aspects of life and character necessary to the success of scenic exhibition; and she must have been aware of the difficulties that surrounded her in that path. If these cannot, therefore, be considered as successful tragedies, they hold their places as dramatic poems of rich and rare poetic beauty. Indeed, it would be difficult, from the whole range of Mrs Hemans’s writings, to select any thing more exquisitely conceived, more skilfully managed, or more energetically written, than the Monk’s tale in ‘The Siege of Valencia.’ The description of his son, in which he dwells with parental enthusiasm on his boyish beauty and accomplishments--of his horror at that son’s renunciation of the Christian faith, and leaguing with the infidel--and of the twilight encounter, in which he took the life of his own giving--are all worked out in the loftiest spirit of poetry.”--_Biographical Memoir_, p. 16-17.

“‘The Siege of Valencia,’ ‘The Last Constantine,’ and other poems, were published in the course of the year 1823. This volume was marked by more distinct evidences of originality than any of Mrs Hemans’s previous works. None of her after poems contain finer bursts of strong, fervid, indignant poetry than ‘The Siege of Valencia;’ its story--a thrilling conflict between maternal love and the inflexible spirit of chivalrous honour--afforded to her an admirable opportunity of giving utterance to the two master interests of her mind. It is a tale that will bear a second reading--though, it must be confessed that, as in the case of ‘The Vespers of Palermo,’ somewhat of a monotony of colouring is thrown over its scenes by the unchanged employment of a lofty and enriched phraseology, which would have gained in emphasis by its being more sparingly used. Ximena, too, all glowing and heroic as she is, stirring up the sinking hearts of the besieged citizens with her battle-song of the Cid, and dying as it were of that strain of triumph--is too spiritual, too saintly, wholly to carry away the sympathies. Our imagination is kindled by her splendid, high-toned devotion--our tears are called forth by the grief of her mother, the stately Elmina, broken down, but not degraded, by the agony of maternal affection, to connive at a treachery she is too noble wholly to carry through. The scenes with her husband are admirable; some of her speeches absolutely startle us with their passion and intensity--the following, for instance:--

‘Love! love! there are soft smiles and gentle words,’” etc.

--Chorley’s _Memorials of Mrs Hemans_, p. 110-12.

“‘The Siege of Valencia’ is a dramatic poem, but not intended for representation. The story is extremely simple. The Moors, who besiege Valencia, take the two sons of the governor, Gonzalez, captive, as they come to visit their father, and now the ransom demanded for them is the surrender of the city: they are to die if the place is not yielded up. Elmina, the mother of the boys, and Ximena, their sister, are the remaining members of a family to which so dreadful an option is submitted. The poem is one of the highest merit. The subject is of great dignity, being connected with the defence of Spain against the Moors; and at the same time it is of the greatest tenderness, offering a succession of the most moving scenes that can be imagined to occur in the bosom of a family. The father is firm, the daughter is heroic, the mother falters. She finds her way to the Moorish camp, sees her children, forms her plan for betraying the town, and then is not able to conceal her grief and her design from her husband. He immediately sends a defiance to the Moors, his children are brought out and beheaded, a sortie is made from the besieged city: finally, the king of Spain arrives to the rescue; the wrongs of Gonzalez are avenged; he himself dies in victory; and the poem closes with a picture of his wife, moved by the strongest grief, of which she is yet able to restrain the expression. The great excellence of the poem lies in the description of the struggle between the consciousness of duty and maternal fondness. We believe none but a mother could have written it.”--Professor Norton, in _North American Review_ for April 1827.

“The graceful powers of Mrs Hemans in the same walk which had been trodden so grandly by Miss Baillie, were manifested in her ‘Vespers of Palermo’, and her ‘Siege of Valencia.’ The latter is a noble work, and as a poem ranks with her highest productions, though it is filled too uniformly perhaps with the spirit of her own mind, to be very distinctively dramatic. It has indeed variety, but less of the variety of human nature, than of a godlike and exalted nature, which belongs to few among mankind, and to them, perhaps, only in strange and terrible crises. The steadfastness of the paternal chieftain, the sterner enthusiasm of the priest, the mother’s maddening affection, and the gentle heroism of the melancholy Ximena are drawn with individuality, but it is the individuality of a common greatness, the apparent appropriation to many of an essence really the same in all. In her own heart the poetess found this pure essence; and when she created her Christian patriots at Valencia, she but translated herself into a new dialect of manners and motives. Of this one elevated material she has, however, made fine dramatic use. The language, while faultless in its measured music, has passion to swell its cadences; the loftiness is never languid; and the flow of the verse is skilfully broken into the animated abruptness suitable to earnest dialogue. There are many, too, of those sudden glimpses of profound truth in which the energy of passion seems to force its rude way, in a moment, into regions of the heart that philosophy would take hours to survey with its technical language. Thus, when the iron-hearted monk is telling the story of his son’s disgrace,--

’Elmina. He died?

Hernandez. Not so!
--Death! death! Why, earth should be a paradise
To make that name so fearful! Had he died,
With his young fame about him for a shroud,
I had not learn’d the might of agony
To bring proud natures low! No! he fell off----
Why do I tell thee this? What right hast thou
To learn how pass’d the glory from my house?
Yet listen. He forsook me! He that was
As mine own soul forsook me!--trampled o’er
The ashes of his sires!--ay, leagued himself
Even with the infidel, the curse of Spain;
And, for the dark eye of a Moorish maid,
Abjured his faith, his God! Now, talk of death!

“The whole of the scene to which the passage belongs, is moulded in the highest spirit of tragic verse. The bewilderment of the mother betrayed into guilt by overpowering affection, and the death of the beautiful enthusiast Ximena, are sketched in a style of excellence little inferior; and the peculiar powers of Mrs Hemans’s poetry, less dramatic than declamatory, have full scope in the spirit-stirring address of the latter to the fainting host of Valencia, as she lifts in her own ancient city the banner of the Cid, and recounts the sublime legend of his martial burial. Spain and its romances formed the darling theme of Mrs Hemans’s muse; and before leaving the subject, she gives us her magnificent series of ballads, the ‘Songs of the Cid,’ which meet us at the close of the drama, as if to form an appropriate chorus to the whole.”--William Archer Butler, _Introductory Notice to National Lyrics and Songs for Music_. Dublin: 1838.]

Miscellaneous Poems.

SONG.

FOUNDED ON AN ARABIAN ANECDOTE.

Away! though still thy sword is red
With life-blood from my sire,
No drop of thine may now be shed
To quench my bosom’s fire;
Though on my heart ’twould fall more blest
Than dews upon the desert’s breast.

I’ve sought thee midst the sons of men,
Through the wide city’s fanes;
I’ve sought thee by the lion’s den,
O’er pathless, boundless plains;
No step that mark’d the burning waste,
But mine its lonely course hath traced.

Thy name hath been a baleful spell,
O’er my dark spirit cast;
No thought may dream, no words may tell,
What there unseen hath pass’d:
This wither’d cheek, this faded eye,
Are seals of thee--behold! and fly!

Hath not my cup for thee been pour’d
Beneath the palm-tree’s shade?
Hath not soft sleep thy frame restored
Within my dwelling laid?
What though unknown--yet who shall rest
Secure--if not the Arab’s guest?

Haste thee! and leave my threshold-floor
Inviolate and pure!
Let not thy presence tempt me more,
--Man may not thus endure!
Away! I bear a fetter’d arm,
A heart that burns--but must not harm.

Begone! outstrip the swift gazelle!
The wind in speed subdue!
Fear cannot fly so swift, so well,
As vengeance shall pursue;
And hate, like love in parting pain,
Smiles o’er _one_ hope--we meet again!

To-morrow--and th’ avenger’s hand,
The warrior’s dart is free!
E’en now, no spot in all thy land,
Save _this_, had shelter’d thee;
Let blood the monarch’s hall profane,--
The Arab’s tent must bear no stain!

Fly! may the desert’s fiery blast
Avoid thy secret way!
And sternly, till thy steps be past,
Its whirlwinds sleep to-day!
I would not that thy doom should be
Assign’d by heaven to aught but me.

ALP-HORN SONG.

TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN OF TIECK.

What dost thou here, brave Swiss?
Forgett’st thou thus thy native clime--
The lovely land of thy bright spring-time?
The land of thy home, with its free delights,
And fresh green valleys and mountain heights?
Can the stranger’s yield thee bliss?

What welcome cheers thee now?
Dar’st thou lift thine eye to gaze around?
Where are the peaks, with their snow-wreaths crown’d?
Where is the song, on the wild winds borne,
Or the ringing peal of the joyous horn,
Or the peasant’s fearless brow?

But thy spirit is far away!
Where a greeting waits thee in kindred eyes.
Where the white Alps look through the sunny skies,
With the low senn-cabins, and pastures free,
And the sparkling blue of the glacier-sea,
And the summits clothed with day!

Back, noble child of Tell!
Back to the wild and the silent glen,
And the frugal board of peasant-men!
Dost thou seek the friend, the loved one, here?--
Away! not a true Swiss heart is near,
Against thine own to swell!

THE CROSS OF THE SOUTH.

[The beautiful constellation of the Cross is seen only in the southern hemisphere. The following lines are supposed to be addressed to it by a Spanish traveller in South America.]

In the silence and grandeur of midnight I tread,
Where savannahs in boundless magnificence spread,
And bearing sublimely their snow-wreaths on high,
The far Cordilleras unite with the sky.

The fir-tree waves o’er me, the fire-flies’ red light
With its quick-glancing splendour illumines the night;
And I read in each tint of the skies and the earth,
How distant my steps from the land of my birth.

But to thee, as thy lode-stars resplendently bum
In their clear depths of blue, with devotion I turn,
Bright Cross of the South! and beholding thee shine,
Scarce regret the loved land of the olive and vine.

Thou recallest the ages when first o’er the main
My fathers unfolded the ensign of Spain,
And planted their faith in the regions that see
Its unperishing symbol emblazon’d in thee.

How oft in their course o’er the oceans unknown,
Where all was mysterious, and awful, and lone,
Hath their spirit been cheer’d by thy light, when the deep
Reflected its brilliance in tremulous sleep!

As the vision that rose to the Lord of the world,[285]
When first his bright banner of faith was unfurl’d;
Even such, to the heroes of Spain, when their prow
Made the billows the path of their glory, wert thou.

And to me, as I traversed the world of the west,
Through deserts of beauty in stillness that rest;
By forests and rivers untamed in their pride,
Thy hues have a language, thy course is a guide.

Shine on!--my own land is a far distant spot,
And the stars of thy sphere can enlighten it not;
And the eyes that I love, though e’en now they may be
O’er the firmament wandering, can gaze not on thee!

But thou to my thoughts art a pure-blazing shrine,
A fount of bright hopes and of visions divine;
And my soul, as an eagle exulting and free,
Soars high o’er the Andes to mingle with thee.

[285] Constantine.

THE SLEEPER OF MARATHON.

I lay upon the solemn plain,
And by the funeral mound,
Where those who died not there in vain,
Their place of sleep had found.

’Twas silent where the free blood gush’d,
When Persia came array’d--
So many a voice had there been hush’d,
So many a footstep stay’d.

I slumber’d on the lonely spot
So sanctified by death;
I slumber’d--but my rest was not
As theirs, who lay beneath.

For on my dreams, that shadowy hour,
They rose--the chainless dead--
All arm’d they sprang, in joy, in power,
Up from their grassy bed.

I saw their spears, on that red field,
Flash as in time gone by--
Chased to the seas without his shield,
I saw the Persian fly.

I woke--the sudden trumpet’s blast
Call’d to another fight:
From visions of our glorious past,
Who doth not wake in might?

TO MISS F. A. L. ON HER BIRTH-DAY.

What Wish can Friendship form for thee,
What brighter star invoke to shine?--
Thy path from every thorn is free,
And every rose is thine!

Life hath no purer joy in store,
Time hath no sorrow to efface;
Hope cannot paint one blessing more
Than memory can retrace!

_Some_ hearts a boding fear might own,
Had Fate to _them_ thy portion given,
Since many an eye, by tears alone,
Is taught to gaze on heaven!

And there are virtues oft conceal’d,
Till roused by anguish from repose;
As odorous trees no balm will yield,
Till from their wounds it flows.

But fear not _thou_ the lesson fraught
With Sorrow’s chastening power to know;
Thou need’st not thus be sternly taught
“To melt at others’ woe.”

Then still, with heart as blest, as warm,
Rejoice thou in thy lot on earth;
Ah! why should Virtue dread the _storm_,
If _sunbeams_ prove her worth?

WRITTEN ON THE FIRST LEAF OF THE ALBUM OF THE SAME.

What first should consecrate as thine,
The volume, destined to be fraught
With many a sweet and playful line,
With many a pure and pious thought?

It should be, what a loftier strain
Perchance less meetly would impart;
What never yet was pour’d in vain,--
The blessing of a grateful heart--

For kindness, which hath soothed the hour
Of anxious grief, of weary pain,
And oft, with its beguiling power,
Taught languid Hope to smile again.

Long shall that fervent blessing rest
On thee and thine; and, heavenwards borne,
Call down such peace to soothe _thy_ breast,
As _thou_ wouldst bear to all that mourn.

TO THE SAME;

ON THE DEATH OF HER MOTHER.

Say not ’tis fruitless, nature’s holy tear,
Shed by affection o’er a parent’s bier!
More blest than dew on Hermon’s brow that falls,
Each drop to life some latent virtue calls,
Awakes some purer hope, ordain’d to rise,
By earthly sorrow strengthen’d for the skies;
Till the sad heart, whose pangs exalt its love,
With its lost treasure, seeks a home--above.

But grief will claim her hour,--and He whose eye
Looks pitying down on nature’s agony,
He, in whose love the righteous calmly sleep,
Who bids us hope, forbids us not to weep!
He, too, hath wept--and sacred be the woes
Once borne by Him, their inmost source who knows,
Searches each wound, and bids His Spirit bring
Celestial healing on its dove-like wing!

And who but He shall soothe, when one dread stroke
Ties, that were fibres of the soul, hath broke?
Oh! well may those, yet lingering here, deplore
The vanish’d light, that cheers their path no more!
Th’ Almighty hand, which many a blessing dealt,
Sends its keen arrows not to be unfelt!
By fire and storm, heaven tries the Christian’s worth,
And joy departs, to wean us from the earth,
Where still too long, with beings born to die,
Time hath dominion o’er Eternity.

Yet not the less, o’er all the heart hath lost,
Shall Faith rejoice, when Nature grieves the most.
Then comes her triumph! through the shadowy gloom,
Her star in glory rises from the tomb,
Mounts to the day-spring, leaves the cloud below,
And gilds the tears that cease not yet to flow!
Yes, all is o’er! fear, doubt, suspense are fled--
Let brighter thoughts be with the virtuous dead!
The final ordeal of the soul is past,
And the pale brow is seal’d to heaven at last![286]

And thou, loved spirit! for the skies mature,
Steadfast in faith, in meek devotion pure;
Thou that didst make the home thy presence bless’d
Bright with the sunshine of thy gentle breast,
Where peace a holy dwelling-place had found,
Whence beam’d her smile benignantly around;
Thou, that to bosoms widow’d and bereft
Dear, precious records of thy worth hast left,
The treasured gem of sorrowing hearts to be,
Till heaven recall surviving love to thee!

O cherish’d and revered! fond memory well
On thee, with sacred, sad delight, may dwell!
So pure, so blest thy life, that Death alone
Could make more perfect happiness thine own.
He came: thy cup of joy, serenely bright,
Full to the last, still flow’d in cloudless light;
He came--an angel, bearing from on high
The all it wanted--Immortality!

[286] “Till we have sealed the servants of God in their foreheads.”--_Revelation_.

FROM THE SPANISH OF GARCILASO DE LA VEGA.

Divine Eliza!--since the sapphire sky
Thou measur’st now on angel wings, and feet
Sandall’d with immortality--oh, why
Of me forgetful? Wherefore not entreat
To hurry on the time, when I shall see
The veil of mortal being rent in twain,
And smile that I am free?

In the third circle of that happy land,
Shall we not seek together, hand in hand,
Another lovelier landscape, a new plain,
Other romantic streams and mountains blue,
And other vales, and a new shady shore,
When I may rest, and ever in my view
Keep thee, without the terror and surprise
Of being sunder’d more!

FROM THE ITALIAN OF SANNAZARO.

Oh! pure and blessèd soul,
That, from thy clay’s control
Escaped, hast sought and found thy native sphere,
And from thy crystal throne
Look’st down, with smiles alone,
On this vain scene of mortal hope and fear;

Thy happy feet have trod
The starry spangled road,
Celestial flocks by field and fountain guiding;
And from their erring track
Thou charm’st thy shepherds back,
With the soft music of thy gentle chiding.

Oh! who shall Death withstand--
Death, whose impartial hand
Levels the lowest plant and loftiest pine!
When shall our ears again
Drink in so sweet a strain,
Our eyes behold so fair a form as thine!

APPEARANCE OF THE SPIRIT OF THE CAPE TO VASCO DE GAMA.

(TRANSLATED FROM THE FIFTH BOOK OF THE LUSIAD OF CAMOENS.)

Propitious winds our daring bark impell’d
O’er seas which mortal ne’er till then beheld,
When as one eve, devoid of care, we stood
Watching the prow glide swiftly through the flood,
High o’er our heads arose a cloud so vast,
O’er sea and heaven a fearful shade it cast:
Awful, immense, it came! so thick, so drear,
Its gloomy grandeur chill’d our hearts with fear,
And the dark billow heaved with distant roar,
Hoarse, as if bursting on some rocky shore.

Thrill’d with amaze, I cried, “Supernal Power!
What mean the omens of this threatening hour!
What the dread mystery of this ocean-clime,
So darkly grand, so fearfully sublime?”
Scarce had I spoke, when lo! a mighty form,
Tower’d through the gathering shadows of the storm;
Of rude proportions and gigantic size,
Dark features, rugged beard, and deep-sunk eyes;
Fierce was his gesture, and his tresses flew,
Sable his lips, and earthly pale his hue.
Well may I tell thee that his limbs and height,
In vast dimensions and stupendous might,
Surpass’d that wonder, once the sculptor’s boast,
The proud Colossus of the Rhodian coast.
Deep was his voice--in hollow tones he spoke,
As if from ocean’s inmost caves they broke;
And but that form to view, that voice to hear,
Spread o’er our flesh and hair cold deadly thrills of fear.

“O daring band!” he cried, “far, far more bold
Than all whose deeds recording fame has told;
Adventurous spirits! whom no bounds of fear
Can teach one pause in rapine’s fierce career;
Since, bursting thus the barriers of the main,
Ye dare to violate my lonely reign,
Where, till this moment, from the birth of time,
No sail e’er broke the solitude sublime:
Since thus ye pierce the veil by Nature thrown
O’er the dark secrets of the Deep Unknown,
Ne’er yet reveal’d to aught of mortal birth,
Howe’er supreme in power, unmatch’d in worth--
Hear from my lips what chastisements of fate,
Rash, bold intruders! on your course await!
What countless perils, woes of darkest hue,
Haunt the vast main and shores your arms must yet subdue!

“Know that o’er every bark, whose fearless helm
Invades, like yours, this wide mysterious realm,
Unmeasured ills my arm in wrath shall pour,
And guard with storms my own terrific shore!
And on the fleet, which first presumes to brave
The dangers throned on this tempestuous wave,
Shall vengeance burst, ere yet a warning fear,
Have time to prophesy destruction near!

“Yes, desperate band! if right my hopes divine,
Revenge, fierce, full, unequall’d, shall be mine!
Urge your bold prow, pursue your venturous way--
Pain, Havoc, Ruin, wait their destined prey!
And your proud vessels, year by year, shall find
(If no false dreams delude my prescient mind)
My wrath so dread in many a fatal storm,
Death shall be deem’d misfortune’s mildest form.

* * * * *

“Lo! where my victim comes!--of noble birth,
Of cultured genius, and exalted worth,
With her,[287] his best beloved, in all her charms,
Pride of his heart, and treasure of his arms!
From foaming waves, from raging winds they fly,
Spared for revenge, reserved for agony!
Oh! dark the fate that calls them from their home,
On this rude shore, my savage reign, to roam,
And sternly saves them from a billowy tomb,
For woes more exquisite, more dreadful doom!
--Yes! he shall see the offspring, loved in vain,
Pierced with keen famine, die in lingering pain;
Shall see fierce Caffres every garment tear,
From her, the soft, the idolised, the fair;
Shall see those limbs, of nature’s finest mould,
Bare to the sultry sun, or midnight cold,
And, in long wanderings o’er a desert land,
Those tender feet imprint the scorching sand.

“Yet more, yet deeper woe, shall those behold
Who live through toils unequall’d and untold!
On the wild shore, beneath the burning sky,
The hapless pair, exhausted, sink to die!
Bedew the rock with tears of pain intense,
Of bitterest anguish, thrilling every sense;
Till in one last embrace, with mortal throes,
Their struggling spirits mount from anguish to repose!”

As the dark phantom sternly thus portray’d
Our future ills, in Horror’s deepest shade,--
“Who then art _thou_?” I cried. “Dread being, tell
Each sense thus bending in amazement’s spell!”
--With fearful shriek, far echoing o’er the tide,
Writhing his lips and eyes, he thus replied:
“Behold the genius of that secret shore
Where the wind rages and the billows roar--
That stormy Cape, for ages mine alone,
To Pompey, Strabo, Pliny, all unknown!
Far to the southern pole my throne extends,
That hidden rock, which Afric’s region ends.
Behold that spirit, whose avenging might,
Whose fiercest wrath your daring deeds excite.”

* * * * *

Thus having said, with strange, terrific cries,
The giant-spectre vanish’d from our eyes;
In sable clouds dissolved--while far around,
Dark ocean’s heaving realms his parting yells resound!

[287] Don Emmanuel de Sonsa, and his wife, Leonora de Sà.

A DIRGE.

Weep for the early lost!--
How many flowers were mingled in the crown
Thus, with the lovely, to the grave gone down,
E’en when life promised most!
How many hopes have wither’d! They that bow
To heaven’s dread will, feel all its mysteries now.

Did the young mother’s eye
Behold her child, and close upon the day,
Ere from its glance th’ awakening spirit’s ray
In sunshine could reply?
--Then look for clouds to dim the fairest morn!
Oh! strong is faith, if woe like this be borne.

For there is hush’d on earth
A voice of gladness--there is veil’d a face,
Whose parting leaves a dark and silent place
By the once-joyous hearth;
A smile hath pass’d, which fill’d its home with light,
A soul, whose beauty made that smile so bright!

But there _is_ power with faith!
Power, e’en though nature o’er the untimely grave
Must weep, when God resumes the gem He gave;
For sorrow comes of Death,
And with a yearning heart we linger on,
When they, whose glance unlock’d its founts, are gone!

But glory from the dust,
And praise to Him, the merciful, for those
On whose bright memory love may still repose
With an immortal trust!
Praise for the dead, who leave us, when they part,
Such hope as she hath left--“the pure in heart!”

1823.

TRANSLATIONS FROM HORACE.

TO VENUS.

BOOK I., ODE XXX.

Oh! leave thine own loved isle,
Bright Queen of Cyprus and the Paphian shores!
And here in Glycera’s fair temple smile,
Where vows and incense lavishly she pours.

Waft here thy glowing son;
Bring Hermes; let the Nymphs thy path surround,
And youth, unlovely till thy gifts be won,
And the light Graces with the zone unbound.

TO HIS ATTENDANT.