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 THE LIBRARY 
 
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 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
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 LOS ANGELES 
 
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 SOUTHERN BRANCH, 
 
 IINIVFRSITY OF CALIFORNIA, 
 
 LIBRARY, 
 
 irJOS ANGELES, CALIF.
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY,
 
 THE 
 
 FLOOD OF THESSALY, 
 
 THE 
 
 GIRL OF PROVENCE, 
 
 AND 
 
 OTHER POEMS. 
 
 BY BARRY CORNWALL, pse 
 
 LONDON : 
 PRINTED FOR HENRY CQLBURN AND CO. 
 
 11 1 , ' i' . ' 'ill ) , ' ' ' I ' ' ', 1 ', ' ' ' ' 
 
 U.J7I 
 
 o;r 

 
 a i 
 
 A ■ ■/:. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 SHA.KKLI, A\'l) ARUOWSIMITH, JOHNSON'S COURT. 
 
 
 1 1. I- I I
 
 ^ 
 
 J 
 
 N 
 
 ADA^ERTISEMENT. 
 
 • 
 
 ;| The reader will consider the first Poem in 
 
 .^ this volume (" The Flood of Thessaly *') as a 
 slictch onli) of the great event which desolated 
 tlie earlier world. Having abandoned my 
 original intention of publishing a more elabo- 
 rate Poem on this subject, I am only induced 
 to mention the fact here, in order to account 
 for the chasms which occiu", in one or two 
 instances, in the present production. — All re- 
 j! ference to the Mosaic account of the Deluge 
 has been purposely avoided. 
 
 Mnnh, 1823.
 
 WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR, 
 
 1. Dramatic Scenes, and other Poems. Third Edition, 7s. 
 
 2. A Sicilian Story. Third Edition, 7s. 
 
 3. Marcian Colonna, an Italian Tale. Second Edition, 7s. 
 
 4. MiRANDOLA, a Tragedy, in Five Acts. Third Edit.,8vo. 4s. Gd.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Dedicatory Stanzas . . . . ' . 
 
 1 
 
 The Flood of Thessaly 
 
 
 Part the First . . 
 
 . 13 
 
 Part the Second 
 
 . 39 
 
 The Girl of Provence .... 
 
 . 73 
 
 The Letter of Boccaccio .... 
 
 . 121 
 
 The Fall of Saturn ..... 
 
 . 159 
 
 Tartarus. A Sketch 
 
 . 181 
 
 The Genealogists. A Fragment 
 
 . 207 
 
 Miscellaneous Poems. 
 
 
 Babylon ; with the Feast of Belshazzar . 
 
 . 237 
 
 A War Song ....... 
 
 . 243 
 
 A Still Place 
 
 . 247 
 
 To the Sky-Lark 
 
 . 248
 
 DEDICATORY STANZAS. 
 
 If my 8lislit nmso do please these curious days, 
 The pain he iiiiiic, hut thine lie all the inaise." 
 
 SiiAKEsi'KARK, Sonnc'tSS. 
 
 L 
 
 Art thou still absent ? — Then, a strange brio-ht dream 
 
 Bore thee unto me in its shadowy arms. — 
 
 Ah ! come again, — so like a pleasant gleam 
 
 Of light, that I (free from unjust alarms) 
 
 May gaze on my illuminated theme, 
 
 And read thy varying smiles and many charms, 
 
 And swear by the great Love to love thee long, 
 
 JJeyond ambition, or tlie light of song. 
 
 B
 
 g DEDICATORY STANZAS. 
 
 II. 
 
 Come ! — I will crown thee with the fairest flowers 
 That ever sprang beneath the eyes of May, 
 When Flora and the wind (young paramours) 
 Were whispering caught in woods at dawn of day, 
 And those that blossom quick in April showers, 
 Or when the Autumn rivers run astray : — 
 All flowers thou shalt have which perfume yield. 
 From fountain, lake, or forest, — garden, — field. 
 
 III. 
 
 And first of all the rose ; because its breath 
 Is rich beyond the rest, and when it dies 
 It doth bequeath a charm to sweeten death. 
 And violets whose looks are like the skies, 
 And that sad flow'r for which, as story saith. 
 Echo the nymph once pined, until her sighs 
 Allured some god to charm her into stons. 
 And snow-drops winter-born, pining alone.
 
 DKDlt'ATOllY STANZAS. 
 
 IV. 
 
 And Hyacinth whom Zephyr''s jealous wing 
 Slew, and Apollo changed to some soft star : 
 The hly, of all children of the spring 
 The palest, — fairest too where fair ones are ; 
 And woodbines which Hke fondest lovers cling 
 Round trees tliat spread their sheltering arms afar ; 
 And flow''rs that turn to meet the sun-light clear, 
 And those which slumber wlien the night is near. 
 
 These and all others : — whatsoe"'er is best 
 Beloved by thee shall / refuse to claim ? 
 The sweetest shall between thy palms be prest ; 
 The nameless — thou shalt kiss and give them name ; 
 The whitest on thy bosom white shall rest, — 
 Alas ! not so, for then they lose their fame: 
 Not so ; but rather shall each flower be 
 Uank^d and high-honour'd as it aideth thee. 
 
 B 2
 
 4f DEDICATORY STANZAS, 
 
 VI. 
 
 Sweet friend ! my soul is haunted by a vow 
 
 To dedicate (frail Avork !) this book to thee : 
 
 With all its weakness — all its errors, thou 
 
 Wilt prize the wandering verse that comes from me. 
 
 Past its poor merit ; and perhaps thy brow — 
 
 Lovely beyond that old idolatry, 
 
 Which grew to life from marble, (so decreed 
 
 Venus) may lose a care as thou shalt read. 
 
 VII. 
 
 And yet thine eye, so summer-bright at times, 
 When sorrow is not (wherefore ever ?) there. 
 May melancholy wane before my rhymes. 
 And thy young heart may tremble in its lair. 
 And sigh for her, that girl of southern climes, 
 Who died because she loved a vision rare : 
 Pale heathen ! languishing like one whose brain 
 Is sun-stricken on some Tmshelter''d plain.
 
 DEDICATOKY STANZAS. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 — Said I not, maiden mine, that I would swear 
 Before bright Love, the God, to love thee long ? 
 Oh ! yes, and to the world proclaim how fair. 
 How very fair thou art, even among 
 Beauties who beautiful accounted are. 
 This duty to thy poet doth belong : 
 Therefore I swear to thee, by the sweet pain 
 Of love, to love thee ever, — though in vain. 
 
 IX. 
 
 I swear to thee by all who have famous been ! 
 By lovers who have died to live in song ! 
 By Ariadne pining near the green 
 Ocean, while Theseus' vessel skimm'd along I 
 By Dido left forlorn, — sad Carthage queen. 
 Who ended on the pile Love's bitter wrong ! 
 By riiaon's lover plunging from the steep ! 
 By pale Laodamia doomed to weep ! —
 
 DEDICATORY STANZAS. 
 
 X. 
 
 By all who reach'*d in life a happier fate 
 Thro' Love's dim mystic mazes ! By that day 
 When Peleus wedded Thetis in such state ! 
 And by those balmy nights when Cupid lay 
 By Psyche,- — tho'' at last he lingered late, 
 And she beheld, and so he fled away. 
 By all the moonlight hours when Dian lone 
 Drank in the breathings of Endymion ! 
 
 XI. 
 
 By this — by all — by every other tale 
 Fabled or true, happy or dark with woe ; 
 By that, which e'er it is, that doth prevail 
 Over the rest : and by twin hearts that know 
 Themselves so well that nought can e'er avail 
 To kill their faith or lay sweet passion low ; 
 (Yet lovers' hearts should armed be alway, 
 I^cst Love, when doubt is born, chance to decay.)
 
 DEDICATORY STANZAS. 
 
 XII. 
 
 — Yet wherefore thus ? Ah ! wherefore not have sworn 
 
 At once by thy fan* self, — tliy spotless truth, 
 
 By tliy quick sense of all that can adorn 
 
 Woman, thy modest pride, thy words that soothe 
 
 A brightness into beauty like the morn, 
 
 Which else might dim thy clear and gentle youth. 
 
 Or make the world forget that thou wert young — 
 
 Why by thyself have I not said or sung ? — 
 
 XIII. 
 
 I know not : — How I write or how have writ 
 
 The muse, who mistress is, alone can tell : ' • 
 
 Bright causer of the poet's pleasant fit, 
 
 Who when she well is cherisird, rhymeth well ; 
 
 A ftvir ally of thy most playful wit 
 
 Is she, and my true passion. Who may tell 
 
 But we may live, all three, famihai* friends, 
 
 As one dull colour with two brigliter blends I
 
 DEDICATORY STANZAS. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 Perhaps together we may journey soon 
 (Her wings are sinewy-strong and fit to bear) 
 Where once Astolpho went, and meet the moon 
 Tracking her desert — the blue boundless air, 
 Like thing half lost. 'Tis now but early June, 
 And time there is while days are long and fair 
 To taste the sights bards say are something worth : — 
 And who will miss us, sweet, from this dull earth ? 
 
 XV. 
 
 None, none : — Our course— ??^^/ course, at least, lias been 
 
 Humble and sad from my most childish time : 
 
 Tho' thou indeed hast plucked some pleasures green. 
 
 The offspring of a near, less-cloud v clime : 
 
 More hkely then to judge, from what thou'st seen, 
 
 Of things which hitherto have dwelt in rhyme ; 
 
 So shalt thou master, I the pupil be, 
 
 When we set sail to reach the lunar sea.
 
 DEDICATORY STANZAS. 
 
 XVI. 
 
 Perhaps we there may find bright creatures straying, 
 Whose Hght Avoiild ])crish in this clouded world, — 
 Like her who went thro' Athens' woods a-straying 
 By night, but slept by day in cowslips curl'd ; 
 Or Ariel, haunting sprite, who wept obeying 
 The frown of Prosper, and his blue wings furled 
 In sorrow when he met his master''s scorn : 
 That peerless spirit, — so true, tho"" beauty-born. 
 » « » « 
 
 XVII. 
 
 — Here rest I. — Sickness like a film hath spread 
 Over mine eye and dimmed its little light. 
 Since what is writ was writ — (not fable-bred. 
 But such as truest poets love to write) — 
 And now methinks I commerce with the dead, 
 And face the shadowy angel in his might. 
 — 'Tis gone ; and melancholy dreams and pain 
 And scorn of all I do alone remain.
 
 10 DEDICATORY STANZAS. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 And Fame doth seem a bubble that may burst, 
 Pierced by an ignorant pen or selfish hate ; 
 And Fortune like a vision vainly nursed, 
 Whose golden strength a breath may dissipate ; 
 And Love — yet am I not so sickness-cursed 
 As rail against the hoimty of my fate. 
 What I may never look on let me scorn ; 
 But tliou art to me like the risen morn. 
 
 XIX. 
 
 Thou livest in my heart, thro' distance — time, 
 'Midst fickle friendships and fantastic joys, 
 Alone a truth : — Like Love, whicli is sublime, 
 Thy sweet smile elevates and never cloys ; 
 And thou art all the beauty of this rhyme, 
 The brightness, and the spirit that now buoys 
 A verse which else would fall. — O lady mine ! 
 Gaze on it till it grows like thee, — divine.
 
 THE 
 
 FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 PART THE FIRST.
 
 THE 
 
 FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 PART THE FIRST. 
 
 Geinis mortale sub uiidis 
 
 rcifloro, et ex omni niintios diiiiittcre ccrlo. 
 
 Ovid. Met am. 
 
 In Tiiessaly, while yet the world was yo\in<T,- 
 Soon after Chaos, touched with lioht and form, 
 Lost its vague being, and sprung up alarni'd 
 To beautiful order, — in the pleasant vale 
 Of Tempe, where the meadows still are green, 
 The waters bright, the forests flourishing, 
 Lived Pyrrha and the young Deucalion. 
 — She was Pandora's child, who in gone days
 
 14 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Had for her doAyry that most deadly gift 
 
 Which filled the world with pain : His sire was called 
 
 Prometheus, the great Titan, who lay stretched 
 
 Huge as a mammoth on the barren edfire 
 
 Of Caucasus, where day by day, earth-lured, 
 
 Jove's bu-d, the ravenous vulture, like a cloud 
 
 Came sailing by the sun to feast on blood. 
 
 He was the Titan's son ; yet did he bow 
 
 To Themis and before great Jove who reisrned 
 
 Supreme upon the hills Olympian : 
 
 Fii-st God and reigning spirit was he who hurled 
 
 The scythed Saturn from his ancient throne, 
 • And cast him with an arm unfilial 
 
 Headlong from out the skies, to walk the earth 
 
 Undeified, where as a man he taught 
 
 The Latian people many an useful art. 
 
 And shed the golden time o'er Italy. 
 
 Pyrrha and young Deucalion ! — fair names 
 As ever shone in fable or old sono- 
 Tradition or recording history : . 
 In green youth were they lovers, tho' scarce known
 
 THE FLOOD OF TllESSALY. 15 
 
 The bud Avhich after blossoni'd into love ; 
 Still lovers, tho*' now wedded with consent 
 Of their own gentle hearts, before the face 
 Of all the stars that crowd the summer sky. 
 How beautiful they were may not be told ; 
 Yet both were beautiful, and one so fair 
 That when her glossy ringlets downwards fell, 
 Serpenting o'er her shoulders smooth and Avhitc 
 As marble, (such the Parians wi'ought) she seemed 
 A happy Dryad from the woods escaped, 
 Or Naiad who had left her watery cave 
 Content to dwell with man : —Deucalion trod 
 The green earth as the feathered herald trod, 
 (Jove's son and stairy IMaia's, — always young) 
 And round about his temples the black curls 
 Hung thick, and clustering left his forehead bare. 
 His eye was like the eagle's, wild and keen. 
 And his mouth parted but to speak of love : 
 Not huge, yet giant-sprung, his towering youth 
 Rose into manhood, like a Titan born. 
 
 Careless of all the world save one sweet care. 
 And in each other lost they dreamt away
 
 \Q THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 The hours, well pleased on fragrant lawms to stray 
 
 In balmy autumn, or thro' summer groves, 
 
 Or beside fountains where the noonday heat 
 
 Came never ; gentlest Pyrrha silent then. 
 
 And listening to her lover's voice so low. 
 
 Which, while it languished or spoke soft reproach, 
 
 Hung; like sweet music in her charmed ear. 
 
 At last they wed : No voice of parent spoke 
 Ungentle words which now too often mar 
 Life's first fair passion : then no gods of gold 
 Usurping swayed with bitter tyranny 
 That sad domain the heart. Love's rule was free, 
 (Ranging through boundless air and happy heaven. 
 And earth) when Pyrrha wed the Titan's son. 
 — The winds sang at their nuptial gentle tunes, 
 And roses opened, on whose crimson hearts 
 The colour of love is stamped ; and odours rare 
 Came steaming from the morn-awakening flow'rs_, 
 Which then forgot to close : Thessalian pipes 
 Were heard in vallies, and from thickets green 
 The Sylvans peeped delighted, then drew back 
 And sliouted thro' the glades : Wood nymphs lay then
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 17 
 
 Beside the banks of running rivers, glad 
 
 For once to hear tlie sheplierd'^s simple song ; 
 
 And many a pleasant strife that night was liad 
 
 On oaten reed and pastoral instrument, 
 
 Beneath the mild eye of the quiet moon. 
 
 *' Joy to Pandora's child ! Suj)reme delight 
 
 To the great Titan's son !"" — all shouted forth. 
 
 *' Joy !" and the words went through the far vales 
 
 sounding, 
 And thro*" the forests tall, and over hills 
 And dells, where slumberous melancholy streams 
 Awoke and gave an echo. In dark woods 
 The wild horse started from his midnight sleep, 
 And shook his mane and shrilly spoke aloud. 
 The Nightingale lay silent in the leaves. 
 For joy was grief to her : the timorous sheep 
 Were silent ; and the backward-glancing hare 
 Lay close, and scarce the wild deer stirred the fern. 
 
 O happy amorous hours ! O gentlest night ! 
 When Pleasure left her home with Avingcd Love : — 
 How often was that night in after times 
 
 e
 
 Ig THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Brought back ! How often looks all light went 
 
 forth. 
 And kisses pressed on lips glistening with dew, 
 And words more soft than zephyr ever breathed 
 In May, and sighs more soft than any word. 
 On the swift pinions of untired delight 
 Passed the bright year ; and one fair infant, while 
 On the young mother''s swelling breast it lay, — 
 Lay like a sleeping flower, blooming lone 
 In beauty, with no sweet companion nigh, 
 Drew heart to heart, and with unconscious power 
 Breathed pleasures new, pure, and ineffable. 
 — A lovely sight it was, wlien from his toil 
 Returning, or grave thought, or mountain sport, 
 Deucahon reached his home. By the rude door 
 Grew sycamore and limes whose branches hung 
 Like amorous tresses, and arovmd whose trunks 
 The honey-suckle wound its fragrant arms ; 
 And laurels always green and myrtle-flowers 
 Were there, which shook their white buds to the 
 
 moon, 
 And there, long waiting his return, was she.
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. I9 
 
 The gentlest Pyrrha, who each hai)py day 
 Gathered her fairest fruits to welcome him. 
 
 Thus did the God-descended Titan dwell 
 Thro' hours and months of joy ; Pyrrha the while, 
 Meek handmaid, happy mother, fondest wife 
 And faithful, to her most harmonious thoughts 
 Gave voice, and uttered music to the morn ; 
 And told how grateful was she to the skies. 
 To silence, and the air, which on its wings 
 Carried her sweet thanks past the farthest tops 
 Of Pclion, and grey Ossa, and beyond 
 Lone Athos, thro' the golden gates of Jove, — 
 Where on imperial cloud he singly sits. 
 Pavilioned by the rainbows, but uncrowned 
 Save by his hyacinthine locks which hang 
 Down like a cloud, and cast for ever out 
 Quick splendours, fiercer than are seen at noon 
 When bright Apollo wears his Syrian rays. 
 There sits he in his state, and there around 
 Stand all the Olympian gods and shapes, save one, 
 Juno his Queen, who near his feet reclines. 
 
 c2
 
 2Q THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 — From that high station Jove doth watch the world : 
 Its happiness and woe ; its good and evil ; 
 Its many hopes, and dumb unspoken doubts, 
 And the first births of error ; lonely pain ; 
 Madness, and mirth, and heart-corroding care ; 
 And fears which plough the forehead Avith deep lines. 
 Like wisdom ; and electric thought that springs 
 Like lightning from the inspired poet's brain. 
 
 Thus, bound in amorous chains, the lovers lived. — 
 Meantime, in Thessaly the times were rank : 
 Men grew degenerate ; women sank abased ; 
 And childhood lost its smile, and age its claim 
 To honour. Jove upon his skiey throne 
 Heard now no incense rise, no prayer, no thanks ; 
 But, in their stead, commotions that shook towns, 
 Curses and vain defiance laughing loud : 
 And black abominations and foul Uioughts 
 Were bred and nourished, till the heart became 
 
 Spotted as with a plague. 
 
 Then Falsehood first was known, lean Avarice, Hate, 
 Hot Vengeance, and the virgin s ravishment.
 
 THK FLOOD OF THESSALY. 21 
 
 Cunning, and Theft ; and Murder stalked abroad. 
 Till sleep forsook the night and Fear was born. — 
 Such sin was never done nor stain beheld 
 Thro"* wide creation since the world began, 
 Save when Jehovah shot his fiery rain 
 Down on Gomorrah, and that city razed 
 And ruined, and its tenants all destroyed. 
 
 Jove saw the sin, and o'er his forehead large 
 (Whereon, as on a map, the world is seen) 
 There passed the shadow of a storm. — ^Bclwldr 
 He said ; and as he spoke the vassal skies 
 Trembled, and white Olympus to its heart 
 Sickened and shook : then, stretching wide abroatl 
 His sceptre which doth compass land and sea, 
 He pointed towards the ocean caverns, where 
 Upon his coral bed the sea-god lay 
 Reposing : — thro' the hollows of the deep 
 Where tempests come not, and thro' all the caves 
 Of that green world and watery palaces, 
 The word resounded : — from his bed uprose 
 The brother of Jove, and with a sign re])lied.
 
 22 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Then in a moment from tlieir quartered homes 
 
 The winds came muttering, — West and blighting East, 
 
 And South ; while Boreas prison-doomed and mad 
 
 Flew to the North, and shivering branch and trunk 
 
 Lifted the billows till their curling heads 
 
 Struck the pale stars. — At last the wet South liung 
 
 Brooding alone, down-weighed by cloud and shower. 
 
 And bound in black, mourning the coming doom. 
 
 And with his raven wings and misty breath 
 
 Allured the storms. Wide-stretching clouds around 
 
 (A dark confederacy) in silence met. 
 
 Hiding all Heaven. Towards the glooming shore 
 
 The tempest sailed direct, and on the top 
 
 Of Pelion burst and swept away its pines 
 
 By thousands : — Where it burst a way was made 
 
 Like that torn by the avalanche, when it falls 
 
 Louder than crashing thunder, amidst smoke 
 
 And ruin, bounding from the topmost Alps 
 
 O'er chasm and hill, and strips the forests bare. 
 
 Oh ! woe, deep woe to fruitful Thessaly ! 
 That tempest-shock sounded all o'er the land,
 
 THE FLOOD OF THKSSALY. ^ 
 
 And men left their low dwellings, and came forth 
 And saw the sheeted cataracts gush from Heaven, 
 Like rivers that had burst their bonds, and fall 
 Darkening the day, until those ceaseless floods 
 Drowned and destroyed the herbs and bended corn, 
 Flowers and fruits, the wealth of all the year. — 
 For a time the earth drank in the mighty rains ; 
 For a time, — but sated soon, morasses shone 
 Where plains had stretched, and ripling rivers left 
 Their channels old and wandered far away. 
 Upon a hilly slope lay Pyrrha's home 
 i^till safe from the rising waters ; yet she feared. 
 " Deucalion I*" — (on theu' mossy bed they lay, 
 And heard without the hissing rain descend.) 
 " Deucalion ! Ah ! I fear, Deucalion, 
 The gods are angered ; not with thee, dear friend. 
 For, tho' the Titan's son, thy vows have been 
 Constant, thine actions holy. Unto Jove 
 And Themis have we bowed and prayed — in vain : 
 For lo ! the storms are out, and Heaven is dark 
 Perpetually. Apollo now no more 
 Rises at morning nor at evening fades ;
 
 ^ THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 And Dian, who when the year was wasting looked 
 But pale amidst the fighting elements, 
 Hath vanish''d quite : the stars are gone ; the day 
 Hath died : — the earth itself passeth away." — 
 Thus spoke that gentle woman and lay still. 
 Weeping and full of fears : Deucalion took 
 Her nearer to his heart : — " Themis is just," 
 Sighing he said, " and kind, and tho' a frown 
 Hath hung vipon the forehead of great Jove 
 Awhile, yet clearer light will come at last. 
 And he will smile and we rejoice again. 
 Beheve it, love : and know, a dream — a thought 
 How thou may'st yet be saved hath come to me. 
 And I will labour long and shape a raft 
 Wherein upon the rough wave thou shalt pass 
 To happier shores, sweet Pyrrha." — Still she sighed, 
 While he, still soothing, from her forehead pale 
 Parted the dark brown hair, and pressed thereon 
 His lips in silence. Thus, heart-folded close 
 She wept away her fears, and slumber fell 
 Like snow-down on her : — Quietly she slept 
 Without a dream until the morning came.
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 25 
 
 Morn came : but that broad light which hung so 
 long 
 In heaven forsook the showering firmament. — 
 The clouds went floating on their fatal way. 
 Rivers had groAvn to seas : the great sea swoFn 
 Too mighty for his bound broke on the land, 
 Roaring and rushing, and each flat and plain 
 Devoured. — Upon the mountains now were seen 
 Gaunt men, and women hungering with their babes. 
 Eying each other, or with marble looks 
 Measuring the space beneath swift-lessening. 
 At times a swimmer from some distant rock 
 Less high, came struggling with the waves, but sank 
 Back from the slippery soil. Pale mothers then 
 AVept without hope, and aged heads struck cold 
 By agues trembled like red autumn leaves ; 
 And infants moaned and young boys shrieked with fear, 
 Stout men grew white with famine. Beautiful girls 
 Whom once the day languished to look on, lay 
 On the Avet earth and wrung their drenched hair ; 
 And fathers saw them there, dying, and stole 
 Their scanty fare, and while they perished thrived.
 
 26 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Then Terror died, and Grief, and proud Despair, 
 Rage and Remorse, infinite Agony, 
 Love in its thousand shapes, weak and sublime. 
 Birth-strangled ; and strong Passion perished. 
 The young, the old, weak, wise, the bad, the good 
 Fell on their faces, struck, — whilst over them 
 Washed the wild waters in their clamorous march. 
 
 Still fell the flooding rains. Great Ossa stood 
 Lone, like a peering Alp, when vapours shroud 
 Its sides, unshaken in the restless waves ; 
 But from the weltering deeps Pelion arose 
 And shook his piny forehead at the clouds. 
 Moaning, and crown'd Olympus all his snows 
 Lost from his hundred heads, and shrank aghast. 
 Day, Eve, Night, Morning came and passed away. 
 No Sun was known to rise and none to set : 
 'Stead of its glorious beams a sickly light 
 Paled the broad East what time the day is born : 
 At others a thick mass vaporous and black. 
 And firm like solid marble, roofed the sky ; 
 Yet gave no shelter.
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 27 
 
 — Still the ravenous wolf 
 Howled, and wild foxes and the household doer 
 Grown wild, upon the mountains fought and fed 
 Each on the other. The great Eagle still 
 In his home brooded, inaccessible. 
 Or, when the gloomy morning seemed to break. 
 Floated in silence o'er the shoreless seas. 
 Still the quick snake unclasped its glittering eyes, 
 Or shivering hung about the roots of pines ; 
 And still all round the vultures flew, and watched 
 The tumbling Avaters thick with bird and beast ; 
 Or, dashing in the midst their ravenous beaks. 
 Plundered the screaming billows of their dead. 
 
 Ne'er has such ruin been or such despair 
 Since, in records or tales of Thessaly. 
 Earth shook, great Mother, and from all her limbs 
 Sent signs of terror and unnatural pain : 
 The vallies trembled, and great lakes unlocked 
 Their dark foundations, and laid bare to day 
 Naiads with watery locks and elfish shapes. 
 Half sylvan, such as loved of old to haunt
 
 28 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 On the fresh edge of forest-girded pools, 
 And shook the gladed echoes with their laugh. 
 Whole plains heaved up : meadows were torn and 
 
 turn'd 
 Downwards, and ancient oaks whose crooked feet 
 Were riveted in rocks were wrenched away 
 And bared to the wild blast and sullen rain. 
 Wonder grew plain as truth. Etna, far off — 
 Terrible Etna, spuming, cast abroad 
 Her blazing rivers with loud groaning sounds 
 That tore the amazed heart of Sicily : — 
 Such noise was never bred on the great shores 
 Where Orinoco, huge sea-creature, comes 
 Rolling his shining train, o'er rapids and gulphs 
 Descending swift, and for a thousand leagues 
 Ravages wood and wild, and mad at last 
 Dashes his watery scorn against the breast 
 That fed him : — She, fond ocean-mother, still 
 Receives him to deep calm within her arms. 
 
 Higher and higher fled the wasted throngs, 
 And still they hoped for life, and still tliey died.
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. gg 
 
 One after one, some worn, some liungcr-mad : 
 Here lay a giant's Innbs sodden and shrunk, 
 And there an Infant's, wlilte hke wax, and close 
 A matron with grey hairs, all dumb and dead : — 
 Meanwhile, upon the loftiest summit safe, 
 Deucalion laboured tlirough the dusky day, 
 Completing as he might his floating raft. 
 And Pyrrha, sheltered in a cave, bewailed 
 Her child which perished. 
 
 * 
 
 Still the ruin fell : 
 No pity, no relapse, no hope : — The world 
 Was vanishing like a dream. Lightning and Storm, 
 Thunder and deluoinjic rain now vexed the air 
 To madness, and the riotous winds laughed out 
 Like Bacchanals, whose cups some God has charmed. 
 Beneath the headlong torrents towns and towers 
 Fell down, temples all stone, and brazen shrines ; 
 And piles of marble, palace and pyramid 
 (Kings' homes or towering graves) in a breath were 
 
 swept 
 Crumbling away. Masses of ground and trees 
 Uptorn and floating, hollow rocks brute-crannned,
 
 •.V 
 
 30 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Vast herds, and bleating flocks, reptiles, and beasts 
 Bellowing, and vainly with the choaking waves 
 Struggling, were hurried out, — but none returned : 
 All on the altar of the giant Sea 
 Offered, like twice ten thousand hecatombs, 
 Whose blood allays the burning wrath of Gods. 
 — Day after day the busy Death passed on 
 Full, and by night returned hungering anew ; 
 And still the new morn filled his horrid maw, 
 With flocks, and herds, a city, a tribe, a town. 
 One after one borne out, and far from land 
 Dying in whirlpools or the sullen deeps. 
 All perished then : — The last who lived was one 
 Who clung to life because a frail child lay 
 Upon her heart : weary, and gaunt, and worn. 
 From point to point she sped, with mangled feet, 
 Bearing for aye her little load of love : — 
 Both died, — last martyrs of another'^s sins, 
 Last children they of Earth's sad family. 
 
 Still fell the flooding rains. Still the Earth shrank 
 And Ruin held his strait terrific way.
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. gj 
 
 Fierce lightnings burnt the sky, and the loud thunder 
 (Beast of the fiery air) howled from liis cloud, 
 Exulting, towards the storm-eclipsed moon. 
 Below, the Ocean rose boiling and black. 
 And flung its monstrous billows far and wide 
 CrumbUng the mountain joints and summit hills ; 
 Then its dark throat it bared and rocky tusks. 
 Where, with enormous waves on their broad backs. 
 The demons of the deep were raging loud ; 
 And racked to hideous mirth or bitter scorn 
 Hissed the Sea-angels ; and earth-buried broods 
 Of Giants in their chains tossed to and fro. 
 And the sea-lion and the whale were swung 
 Like atoms round and round. — 
 
 Mankind was dead : 
 And birds whose active wings once cut the air. 
 And beasts that spurned the waters, — all were dead : 
 And every reptile of the woods had died 
 Which crawled or stung, and every curling worm : — 
 The untamed tiger in his den, the mole 
 In his dark home — were choaked : the darting ounce. 
 And the blind adder and the stork fell down
 
 32 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Dead, and the stifled mammoth, a vast bulk. 
 
 Was washed far out amongst the populous foam : 
 
 And there the serpent, which few hours ago 
 
 Could crack the panther in his scaly arms, 
 
 Lay lifeless, like a weed, beside his prey. 
 
 And now, all o'er the deeps corpses were strewn, 
 
 Wide-floating millions, like the rubbisli flung 
 
 Forth when a plague prevails ; the rest down-sucked, 
 
 Sank, buried in the world-destroying seas. 
 
 Confusion raged and ruled. At last, up-grew 
 A minghng of Earth, Sea, and Heaven and Air ; 
 All one they looked, impenetrable, black 
 As Chaos, when the salient atoms flew 
 Around the abyss and made all space a Hell. 
 Nature lay drowned and dead. Fens, moors, and 
 
 bogs. 
 And pleasant vallies and aspiring hills, 
 Rivers and trees were lost, mountains and lakes : 
 Even Heaven eternal, whom no cloud before 
 Utterly barred, thro' its serene domain 
 Kept captive all the Gods and lucid stars,
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 3tJ 
 
 Mcrcurius and Apollo and the rest ; 
 And hid their beauty from the fainthig world. 
 — A mass like the great ocean when all winds 
 Blow and lay bare its hollows, and shake forth 
 The century-sleeping sands, until the foam 
 Grows thick and dark, rolled over sea and land, — 
 A perilous mass of floods, fierce as the North 
 In March, when scything blasts strip all the bones, 
 And loud as when the riven air proclaims 
 Earthquakes at Hecla, or once bright Peru. 
 
 —It is a task beyond the Muse, — and yet 
 
 Sometimes she -\VTiteth with a golden pen, — 
 
 Witness those tales breathing of Paradise 
 
 And all that sinful mirth of Circe's son, 
 
 And where the mightiest poet open lays 
 
 Red Pandjemonium to eternal view. 
 
 And numbereth out the Peers of Satan, all 
 
 Tossed on the fiery waters, and bewailing 
 
 Their frightful fall ; from Heaven's precipitous bounds 
 
 Cast like the refuse, to find out their way 
 
 Thro' depths and dark abysses, and the jar 
 
 D
 
 34 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Earlier than Order, till the mouths of Hell 
 
 Received them flaming, — a tremendous home. 
 
 It is a task beyond the Muse, too far, 
 
 To paint that leaden darkness which obscured 
 
 The world, or that wide horror which was born 
 
 When every element forsook its name 
 
 And nature, and all dumb and innocent things 
 
 Perished, because imperial man had erred, — 
 
 A dreariness there is which chills the heart, 
 
 When tlie sun dies on some ice-barren plain, 
 
 Cheerless and wintry-pale ; and when the wind 
 
 Waileth in loud December, calling ghosts 
 
 To feed the sight of credulous age ; and when 
 
 The hail-storm comes ; and when the great sea chafes. 
 
 And the wild horses of the Atlantic shake 
 
 Their sounding manes and dash the foam to Heaven. 
 
 These sights are vanquished by the painter's toil : 
 
 But when the intolerable flood prevailed, — 
 
 That watery massacre, which quite destroyed 
 
 Thessaly, man and woman, and children frail, 
 
 Birds, beasts, the very worm, the tree, the flower, 
 
 When nothing was — but ruin, and nought seen
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 35 
 
 But one monotonous dreary waste of waves 
 Tumbling in monstrous eddies, and a liglit 
 Like an eclipse complete when day is hid, 
 The painter's pencil and the poet's pen 
 Must fail, confounded at a scene so dire. — 
 
 On a drear morning, ague-cold and dark, 
 Deucalion from the mountain's lonely top 
 Launched his frail raft, rich with its living freiglit 
 And laden full : Scarce lifjht enoudi was seen 
 To show that quarter of the sky 'neath which 
 The green Parnassus (when that mount was green) 
 Held station ; yet with hands which trembled not 
 He struck his piny oar against the soil 
 And floated on the waters. — 
 
 — So he left 
 The failing land, and then loud gusts uprose 
 Curling the billows with unnatural rage. 
 Till on the summit of the desert hill 
 They rushed, and in the Titan's sight tore up 
 
 D 2
 
 36 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 The knarled oaks, washing and wasthig all 
 The ruinous earth until no trace was seen. 
 
 " Whither, ah ! whither — to what happier sliore 
 Steer' St thou thy way, Deucalion ?" Pyrrha spoke. 
 He, glancing at the sky, just where the North 
 Is cut by the eastern light at early dawn, 
 (The mid-point of the compass) bade her gaze : 
 *' What see^'st thou — nought ? — Poor girl, thine eye 
 
 is dim : 
 For hope still lives. — Come ! Bride of my despair, 
 (Now of my hope,) we''ll live or die together. 
 Along the desarts of the deep we'll go, 
 Along the wide and wave-blown wilderness, 
 Undaunted and untiring. Some fair land 
 There is which Jove designs shall be our home : 
 Believe it. O Thessalian Pyrrha ! — Thou, 
 Child of the ocean, canst thou fear its rage .?" — 
 So spoke he, smiling thro*" deep sorrow, — filled 
 With fear which yet he kept hid in his heart ; 
 And with prevailing looks and voice all love 
 Cheered the sad Pyrrha on her watery way.
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 37 
 
 — ]\Iorn passed, and noon, and eve along ; and niglii 
 Over their heads hung hke a pall, through which 
 No minute star nor glimpse of faintest light 
 Could pierce ; but all was dark, — dark like the grave. 
 
 — And so they floated on their fated track. 
 Borne onwards till the overwhelming rains had ceased, 
 And the wild winds were sleeping : and around 
 No noise was heard, save from their beating hearts, 
 And the lone dashings of the endless seas. 
 
 501) 4 2
 
 THE 
 
 FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 PART THE SECOND. 
 
 I
 
 THE 
 
 FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 I'ART THE SECOND. 
 
 Some have believed the Deluge never was : 
 And some that, ere it was, man walked the world 
 With a sight more near to iinniortality, 
 Than e'er hath shone since those diluvian days : 
 Others have guessed that monstrous tribes, now dead. 
 Blackened the air, once, or with ponderous bulks 
 Trod down the soil, — Phanix and eastern Roc, 
 And Sphinx whose words perplex'd the wit of Thebes, 
 And Behemoth, vast birth, (almost a fable) 
 That fed like Famine on the streams and hills, — 
 A breathing wonder, — a strange truth, confirmed. 
 — To me the records of the days of old
 
 42 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Are starred with a diviner character. 
 Fable, historian page, or sager verse 
 I mar not nor reject ; nor now enquire, 
 Bent on a tale of ancient years, how far 
 The wonders of past times be false or true. 
 
 Whether the bright and rolling world came forth, 
 A thing of life, from Darkness or blind Chance, 
 Chaos or utter Nought ; or sprung from Aw, 
 Fire or innumerable atoms, charmed 
 Into harmonious motion, or dependeth 
 On star or comet, is not now my care : 
 Nor whether in the earth''s deep heart there hides 
 A mighty abyss of waters, casting out 
 From inmiemorial time, beautiful things 
 In its revolving. 'Tis enough for me 
 To gaze on its great regions, — boundless plains, 
 Continents, flourishing isles, and desarts rude, 
 Forests old as the world and falling floods. 
 And mountains, east and west, which kiss tlie moon, 
 Andes, and Himalayans, and bright Alps ; 
 And fiery Etna in her purple pride
 
 THE FLOOD OK THKSSALY. 43 
 
 Rising from meadows of a thousand hues. 
 
 Nor these alone transport mc ; gentler siglits 
 
 Are mine, deep groves and fountains and calm lakes. 
 
 And murmuring waters and lone silent shores, 
 
 The ail-, the golden sun, the visiting cloud 
 
 Which comes and goes; Night and her crowds of stars 
 
 And that ne'er-sleeping wilderness of waves 
 
 The sea, — tlie populous sea, which circleth all, 
 
 And the wide arch of everlasting Heaven. 
 
 Free Nature in her bounty ofFcreth these 
 To man, and hence I worship. I may dream 
 That the great earth unshapen, was indeed 
 First, co-eternal with the supreme God ; 
 Thus Plato taught : or by a single word 
 (Born like a thought, and smit with light and sound 
 At once) was called to wear this perfect form, 
 This dress of bluest air and sylvan shade : 
 Or with thy fables, old Pythagoras, 
 (Gathered in sandy Egypt, or derived 
 From bearded Magi in the Chaldee lands) 
 Cheat for awhile my soul: — But Truth will come,
 
 44 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 And cloudless seasons and serener hours, 
 
 And then how vain it is I learn, to send 
 
 Among earth"'s secrets and confusions, forth 
 
 A thought unwing'd, to search and ask what was 
 
 The dread Beginning ! Like a pilgrim worn 
 
 By toil and blinded on the burning sands, 
 
 The baffled Speculation home returns, 
 
 Drooping and glad to rest. Therefore no more : 
 
 O Muse ! no longer loiter in thy way ; 
 
 For thou, ere thou hast done thy toil, must scale 
 
 The empyrean with undroopiug wings. 
 
 And look upon the bright haunts of the Gods. 
 
 High in that middle region, where, it seems, 
 Olympus and his hundred heads are lost 
 In air — (tho"* clouds hang round and make the jTlacc 
 Holy, cerulean vapours rare and fine,) 
 'Tis storied Jove's Saturnian palace sprung. 
 — It was a mighty dome, whose blue arch shone 
 With a thousand constellated lights that rained 
 Ricli, endless day, and gentlest warmth like spring 
 The present and the past were there, — the Signs
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 45 
 
 Scorpion and Cancer and Aquarius, 
 
 And all who belt the sky, and all the throng 
 
 That flame along the tropics, or like gems 
 
 Live in the foreheads of the hemispheres, 
 
 Sirius and Taurus and tiie starry twain, 
 
 (Leda's) and fierce Orion who, between 
 
 Phoenix and Hydra, on the nights of May 
 
 Shakes over southern seas his watery beams ; 
 
 And northwards shone Canopus, and the lights 
 
 Cassiopeia, and the great fix'd star 
 
 Arcturus, and Andromeda, long chained 
 
 And haunted on the cold and sea-beat rock 
 
 Others were there, since known. Below, withdrawn, 
 
 And seen as thro' a vista clear and wide, 
 
 Gleam'd squares and arches, streets, range after range, 
 
 Temples and towers and alabaster spires. 
 
 Which ran up to infinitude, and pierced 
 
 With sharp and glittering points the highest air. 
 
 And terraces crown'd with pavilions, which 
 
 Outshone the sun, and with their light made base 
 
 All that of old Nebuchadnezzar hung 
 
 Towering above his Babylonian halls.
 
 46 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Making great wonder dumb. Nearer, all round 
 
 That lustrous dome colossal figures stood, 
 
 Like pillars, with vast sinewy arms outspread, 
 
 And golden shapes between, with finer care 
 
 Wrought than e'er Phidias us'd, whose carved thoughts 
 
 Threw beauty o'er the years of Pericles. 
 
 Typhon was there — {his spirit, the corporeal mould 
 Lay under Etna, crushed,) and Atlas huge, 
 Phorcys, and Briareus, tho' spared from toil. 
 And prone Enceladus, whom Pluto trod 
 Down with his chariot wheels, when thro'' the heart 
 Of groaning earth he wound his dusky way,* 
 And raped Proserpina : and a'll the rest. 
 Titans, and giants, and amphibious things, 
 Whose hate grew strong when Saturn ceased his reign. 
 Fixed on their pedestals of glowing gold 
 (Figured with all the actions of the sky) ** 
 They stood, — proud perfect works, and thro' iheir veins 
 
 * Jamque per anfractus animarum rector opacos 
 
 Sub terris querebat iter, gravibusque gementem 
 
 Enceladum calcabat equis. — Claud. De raptu Proserpin.
 
 THE FLOOn OF THKSSALY. 47 
 
 Transparent the ethereal fluids ran : 
 
 While in eacli space curtains of trembling mist 
 
 And azure- woven air came flowing down, 
 
 0''er-shower''d with stars, — between whose waving folds 
 
 The delicate Zephyrs with their odorous loads 
 
 Passed in and out, and girls, like Flora fair, 
 
 Sprinkled the veined floor with amaranth blooms. 
 
 — And there the laughing Hours flew round and round 
 
 In airy circles, while outspread below 
 
 The wood-nymphs lay and Fauns, whose haunts were now 
 
 Flooded, and at their head tlie sylvan Pan, 
 
 Married to Echo, who received his words 
 
 As wisdom, and to all the listening Eartii 
 
 Told the deep secrets of his springs and caves.* 
 
 And Jupiter, eternal Spirit, was there. 
 
 Like a Divinity beyond the rest 
 
 Enthroned: — Apart, and as imperial kings 
 
 Sit reigning Compassed by their pomp and arms, 
 
 * " Echo, the wife of Pan, is no other than genuine Philosophy 
 which faithfully repeats his word, or only transcribes as Nature 
 dictates, thus representing the true image and retloction of the 
 world," — Lord Bacon, on Learning.
 
 48 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 So, amid clouds and amethystine fires, 
 
 He ruled ; not fierce as when thro"* heaven he chased 
 
 Saturn, but milder than the first born Love. 
 
 And near him stood Apollo, — Cybele, 
 
 Juno, and zoned Aphrodite crown'd 
 
 With flowering myrtles, and the palest maid' 
 
 Of heaven, — Diana ; and bright numbers more. 
 
 Suddenly — (for till then whispers had been. 
 And smiles prevailing and melodious tones. 
 And Eolus in distance far was heard 
 Sounding his trumpet over lands and seas) 
 Silence came forth : — The circling Hours then ceased 
 Their round, and from Jove's throne a silver light 
 Flowed to the zenith, mild as what is seen 
 At morning, when the westering stars are gone. 
 And young Apollo still delays the day. 
 Every bright eye was filled, and quickly turned 
 Its radiance towards the supreme king, who raised 
 His head and shook his cloudy hair aside, 
 Smiling in beauty throughout heaven. — 'Twas then 
 The Gods rejoiced, and knew the world was saved.
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 49 
 
 The world is saved, — Millions of spirits sang 
 All around the skiey halls — The World is saved ; 
 From Deluge ; from the immeasureablc tvraih 
 Of Jove ; from Desolation ; from Decay ! 
 They sang, and all the murmuring Zephyrs shook 
 From off their wings harmonious airs, and sounds 
 Came streaming from immortal instruments, 
 All heaven attun'd, and as by Muses' hands 
 Touched in diviner moments, when the choir 
 Of Phoebus, from long listening to his lyre, 
 Are equalled for a space with mightiest Gods. 
 Even he himself, the Lord of light and song. 
 For once descending from his sublime state, 
 Swept in the madness of the hour, such chords 
 As stung to ravishment and finer joy 
 Gods, and all else : — The constellations flashed 
 And trembled : the fierce Giants lost tlieir frown ; 
 And the Fauns shrieked, while thro' Olympian 
 
 veins 
 Like light, the quick nectarean spirit flew, 
 Till each stood forth betrayed — a brighter God, 
 Startled at his full-shewn Divinity. 
 
 £
 
 ^0 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. • 
 
 The World is saved ; J^rom Deluge ; from Decay ! 
 Still sounded thro' the vast Satiirnian halls, 
 Like echoes which the mountains multiply 
 From rock to rock, sending their cries abroad 
 O'er barren moors and the dumb solitudes, 
 And thro** the watery dells and hollow caves, 
 Which, shaking off the ancient silence, give 
 Great answer, in their own fantastic voice 
 Familiar to the listening air alone. 
 Still the words sounded : Still ' The Woi^ld is saved P 
 Rang all around ; but as the echoes died, 
 Fainter, — and fainter still with every cry, 
 The vision of the Gods which lately filled 
 The circuit of Olympus with its light, r "' no 
 Receded: — The great Juno shrank, eclipsed, 
 And Venus lost her smile, and Dian waned : 
 Ceres had fled, and Mars ; and Phccbus now 
 Shook softer lustre from his dewy hair ; 
 And Jupiter, the greatest and the last 
 Of all to lose his brightness, in a cloud 
 Shrouded the light of his Elysian eyes, 
 And seemed to fade away. One after one
 
 THK FLOOD OF THKSSALY. 
 
 Departed : — Wliitlicr ? Oh ! enquire no more ; 
 No more the Muse may tell who saw that sight 
 Thousands of years ago. Whether there be 
 An inner conclave or diviner seat 
 Removed, or if the embracing elements 
 Then each received its own peculiar God, 
 Who lost his incarnation, or put oiF 
 A shape which was his limit, — ask no more. 
 All that is told is this — They vanished, — all. 
 Statues and pillars and cerulean domes 
 Vanished, and lustrous stars and crowned Gods, 
 And Giants shrank to dissolution, like 
 The watery pageant which the morning sun 
 Breeds on Sicilian shores, and buildeth up 
 Tow'r and vain column and Palladian arch, 
 And capital, upon the alarmed floods : 
 Or such as travellers note at break of day 
 On Pambamarca, where the shapes of men 
 Stand forth like ghosts, and vanish. So the 
 
 Gods, 
 Great visions ! through the wide empyrean fled. 
 And faded, — wasting all to azure air. 
 
 K 2 
 
 51
 
 52 THE FLOOD OF THESS\LY. 
 
 Yet, ere tliey vanished, two bright creatures left 
 The skies, commissioned to declare by signs 
 The will of Jove to man, — wingfooted, light, 
 And young, Caducean Mercury, who like 
 A diver plunging from some rocky height. 
 Flung himself headlong from the chrystal walls 
 Of Heaven, and thro' the airy wilderness 
 Shot like a star ; and with him streaming went 
 Iris, arrayed in all her many hues. 
 With power to spread or hide her coloured wings. 
 And amid sunshine or in rain throw out 
 Her storm-dissolving bow, and check the floods. 
 Over the water-covered hills they flew, 
 Which once looked fair in Greece, — over the tops 
 Of Athos and the mountain-peaks that stand 
 Close by the Bosphorus, whose {quickening stream 
 Was drowned and lost, and he no longer rushed 
 Forth as of old, to clasp his shrinking bride, 
 The pale Propontic, in his foaming arms. 
 
 All was wide waste and water. Far and near 
 The skiey twain (like as two planets spin
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 58 
 
 Round in their orbits, yet with gentler speed) 
 
 Circled, and still descended, and delayed. 
 
 Hovering attentive as each floating wreck 
 
 Passed onwards, by the currents charmed along : 
 
 At last, not far from where Parnassus lies, 
 
 They saw, contending with the awaken'd wind, 
 
 And tossed, and worn, and struggling with the streams, 
 
 A little raft, whereon two creatures lay, 
 
 Wreck of the world. The man, with haggard eyes 
 
 And sinews loosen'd by unnatural toll. 
 
 Strove yet to cherish his companion pale. 
 
 And with high tender courage, such as springs 
 
 From fountains only where the heart is pure, 
 
 Soodied her and spoke, and with his arm around 
 
 Her fainting figure, seemed to ward away 
 
 Evils, both watery perils and despair. 
 
 " Art thou so weary, Pyrrha .^" in soft voice 
 
 Deucalion spake—" so weary, so forlorn ?"" 
 
 " Pity me, my sweet husband ; thou art brave, 
 
 But I am weaker than an infant's sigh.* 
 
 • '« JUit 1 am weaker than a woman's tear."— T'ro. and Cressid.
 
 U4 THE FLOOn OF THESSALY. 
 
 Oh ! I have weighed thee clown : Alone thou might'st 
 
 Have held great war Avith Fate ; but I liave been 
 
 Thy ruin."" — " Dear perdition !" he returned, 
 
 " Not golden Fortune on her turning wheel 
 
 Was so to be desired as thou by nie : 
 
 Oh ! thou art fairer than all fortune. — Love ! 
 
 Pyrrha ! Thou tenderest creature ever born, 
 
 Cheer thee : — Behold, day breaks at last, and hark ! 
 
 How all the music of the morning comes." 
 
 He spoke and smiled, — When, like a curtain torn 
 
 Suddenly from the East, the parted glooms 
 
 Withdrew, South, West and to the howling North : — 
 
 Thus daemons driven from some holy shrine. 
 
 By incantations, or a God's bright frown. 
 
 Forsake the temple, and with desperate shrieks 
 
 Cast them upon the wild and boundless winds. 
 
 The storm grew silent ; and the thunder spake 
 
 No more ; but in their place visions arose, 
 
 Meteors and floating lights and glancing stars, 
 
 And splendours running to and fro, amidst 
 
 Heaps of dissolving cloud, trembling, confusM. 
 
 But joy is slow-believed, where grief hath lived
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. gg 
 
 I.onnj a familiar : so despair still sate 
 
 And sorrow on the downcast Pyrrha's eyes. 
 
 At last, she look'd — and lo ! the East grew pale 
 With morning, and then flushing (like some bride 
 Whose ear expects yet fears eacli distant tread 
 To seek her chamber when the feast is done) 
 Threw out its fiery colours, and became 
 Crimson and burning red. Apollo's steeds, . . 
 
 Which wait his coming at the eastern gate, 
 Harnessed were there, and champed their chrystal bits, 
 And threw their flaming foam upon the air. 
 Then first, in all its radiant beauty shone 
 The Rainbow, shadowy arch, of every hue 
 Of light inwove, in Heaven's immortal loom ; 
 Gay, rich, illustrious colours mingled there. 
 And shone and were involved each within each. 
 Atoms of loveliest light, orange and blue, 
 Yellow and glowing red and soothing green ; 
 Lying across the sky, but vanishing 
 As the clear day came on, the arch was seen. 
 Over Parnassus far the vision hung ;
 
 gQ THE FLOOD OF THKSSALY. 
 
 And thither, borne along by tide or swell 
 Glided the raft, until a sound like waves 
 Breaking on some rough strand alarmed the air. 
 Then Pyrrha trembled, and Deucalion knew 
 Peril was near, and from his face the smile 
 Faded, and lowering care his eyes o'erspread. 
 No word he uttered, but with straining arms 
 Toiled, — but in vain : the loud and hurrying stream 
 Forced them along, till thro^ the whitening waves 
 The horrid rocks peered up as black as death ; 
 And the hoarse pebbles rattled on the strand 
 A stormy welcome ; and the winds blew loud ; 
 And the sea rose and sank, and round the raft 
 Curled with a hungry noise, ""till one huge wave 
 Dashed them along the shore. — 
 
 There wrecked they lay ; 
 The woman in her husband's guardian arms, 
 (Clasped like a jewel in its sterner case,) 
 But lost to life, and dumb, and motionless : 
 And then that husband, faithful to the grave, 
 Strung once more his worn nerves, and with deep sobs, 
 And staggering steps, and sighs, bore her beyond
 
 TllK FLOOD OF THESSALY. 57 
 
 The tyranny of the seas. " Roar on," he said — 
 " The treasure of the world is saved at last." 
 So, pressing those cold lips, her head he raised 
 Upon his knee : — ' She will revive'— he sighed. 
 And fell, half-swooning ; and sleep, long-delayed. 
 Came hke a cloud and wrapped his limbs in rest. 
 
 There, on the strand they lay, — Deucalion, 
 Father of this fam\l world, progenitor. 
 And Pyrrha the sad mother, goddess-born ; 
 Both wrecked, tho' saved, because their brothers did 
 Antediluvian sins, — because the wrath 
 Of the high God, great Jove, lay on the earth. 
 And was not to be quenched, unless by blood. 
 There lay they, long-time sleeping ; while a Sea— 
 To which the Atlantic with its waste of waves 
 Is poor, tho' from its warring depths it flung 
 Alarums to the moon, and that broad belt 
 Of waters where the Baltic storms are bred 
 Is nought, nor where the Arabian snake is seen 
 Wasting; the Nubian coast — A boundless Sea, 
 
 *» 
 
 Paved like the dreamer's brain with livid looks,
 
 58 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Rolled far and near, and shook its hideous loads 
 At Heaven ; and ever, as the billows bared 
 Their mountain backs and sank, worn with the toil, 
 Howled to the dreaming winds, and the winds sent 
 Fierce answers back and dashed the waves to snow.— 
 So, ere it slumbered in entire repose, 
 Antick'd the Ocean : then, by great degrees 
 Descending from its cloudy strife, tamed down 
 The plunging billows and impetuous depths. 
 Roaring for prey. — And now great Heaven had shut 
 Her windows, and the fountains of the world 
 Damm'd with a word ; — and gentle calm came down. 
 And a power arose, which to the earth's deep heait 
 Sucked the vast floods, till vales and hills appeared. 
 
 — Recovered from their trance, and so refreshed 
 As the tired spirit is by food and sleep, 
 The wanderers looked around. On one fair side 
 Rose hills, and gentle waters murmured near, 
 And vurnal meadows where the wild rose blew
 
 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 5y 
 
 Spread their fresh carpets. In the midst upsprnng 
 
 A mountain, whose green head some ancient storm 
 
 Had struck in twain : rich forests deck'd its heiglits, 
 
 And laurel wildernesses clothed the sides, 
 
 And round it flew harmonious winds, whose wings 
 
 Bore inspiration and the sound of song. 
 
 Lower, and in the shade of that great hill, 
 
 A temple lay ; untouched by storm or flood 
 
 It seemed, and wliite as when, just hewn, it caught 
 
 Ionian beauty from the carver's skill. 
 
 Thither they went, perhaps by some strong star 
 
 Drawn, or the spirit of the place unseen, 
 
 To ask their doom or own the ruling God : — 
 
 Thither they went, first parents, whom no child 
 
 Solaced, yet with hearts lighter than of yore ; 
 
 The woman paler than when first she flung 
 
 Her curhng arms around Deucalion's neck, 
 
 And lie more gravely beautiful, less young. 
 
 But nearer heaven and like a dream of Jove. 
 
 They entered. — On a marble pedestal 
 A veiled figure sate, sybil or sage.
 
 go THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Or breathing oracle, whose inspired words 
 Were fate — immutable like Death or Love.* 
 And near her, from an altar, whose soft flame 
 Was cedar-fed, fumed spice and frankincense, 
 Sandal-wood, aloes, and Arabian gums, 
 Warm odours yielding like the suns of May 
 Wlien blooms are starting, and the fresh green grass 
 Laughs thro' its April tears and hums with life. 
 They knelt, the rough stones kissing, and with fear 
 Prayed ; and each took bright leaves of the rich bay 
 There lying, and with low imploring sounds 
 Cast them upon the flame : — And then uprose 
 That figure, which was Justice, and the Queen 
 Of prophecy, and mother of the Hours, 
 Daughter of Earth and Heaven, and bride of Jove, 
 Great Themis. She, unveiling her bright eyes 
 And brow pale as the marble, with a voice 
 Sounding from awful distance, slowly spoke. 
 ' Children of Dust ! ' she said, ' Hear and revive : 
 The wrath of Heaven has passed, and ye arc saved. 
 
 ' Love is not love 
 
 Which alters when it alteration finds.' — Shakespeare.
 
 THE FLOOD OF Ti'IFSSALY. , (jl 
 
 Go from my temple, and with garments loosed* 
 
 And faces hidden, your great parent's bones 
 
 Gather, and cast them o''er your backs.' — They stood 
 
 Mute with amaze : each to the other looked 
 
 For help, bewildered ; and when sense came back 
 
 The altar and the goddess were no more. 
 
 ' Themis immortal ! O return, return! 
 
 Hear us, O vanished Themis !' (so they moaned) 
 
 ' Hear us, and shed thy lustre on our minds, 
 
 Now dark. We see not, and are very sad. 
 
 We have endured much fortune, and, though spared, 
 
 We are alone : — no kin, no friends are ours. 
 
 None, — no companions save the senseless stones.' 
 
 The stones ! — ^'Twas then the riddle of the skies 
 
 Dissolved. They left that temple, and obeyed 
 
 Its queen and prophetess: — Deucalion first 
 
 Plucking from out the earth (which sighed) a stone. 
 
 • Discedite templo ; 
 Et velate caput ; cinctasque resolvite vestes ; 
 Ossaque post tergum magnae jactate parentis. 
 
 Ovid Mftovi.
 
 (J2 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Threw it against the wind : It fell, — and lo ! 
 
 Slowly as when the moon iinclouds her face, 
 
 Swelled and grew human ; yet not man at once, 
 
 But leaving like the worm its outer scale, 
 
 And shooting, as the flower puts forth its leaves. 
 
 Flexible arms (yet firm,) limbs apt for strength. 
 
 Muscles and sinuous shape, and streaming veins. 
 
 And last — the crowning head ; which (cold at first, 
 
 And stiff like some pale mask,) relaxed to life, .' ■ » * 
 
 Unclosing its bright eyes, and in warm cheeks 
 
 Receiving the first blush of living youth. " . • i . 
 
 O wonder ! Happiest Pyrrha, \^^th what speed 
 
 She cast a stone, which like the first up-grew, - "-il 
 
 Yet fairer, — female, with such waving form < ■ • ■ 
 
 As Circe or Cal3^pso, free from harm ; — > i - . . 
 
 Slowly the change went on, from limb to limb, 
 
 From waist to bosom, swelling like a cloud, ' ■ • 
 
 White-turning neck, and then the awakening face, 
 
 And last the eyes unclosed. * Immortal Heaven !' — 
 
 The mother spoke, and for a moment stood 
 
 Duml), and witli anns outspread then flew along 
 
 And clas})ed the new-born vision in her arms.
 
 . THE FLOOD OF THKSSALY. (jjj 
 
 There hung she, and so gazed as mothers do 
 Who clasp pale children gathered from the grave, 
 And saved when hope had perished. ' Oh !' she s])oke, 
 In low and hurrying tones, ' Oh ! leave me not 
 Agam; lone ! — my sole child ! — and yet • • > : 
 Art thou indeed, with all this skiey grace, 
 Mine own, made perfect without aid of time ? 
 Thou stranger on the earth ! Heaven's child (and mine) — 
 Oh ! vision, die not until Pyrrlia dies.' / 
 
 Thus, to her child restored, the mother spoke ; 
 Thus for awhile, yet not her toil forsook : • i.. 
 
 But still, obeying their gi'cat oracle, ' ■- 
 
 Those early parents cast on high the stones, . 
 And ever where they cast the fragments rose " ' 
 
 Men, strong and young, or women beautiful, — 
 Born by some great enchantment, such as lifts , 
 The earth from darkness or dissolves the moon, 
 Or clothes the proud sun in eclipse. 
 
 —At last, 
 Wearied with toil and new emotion, both 
 Retired, and in a cave o'er which the rose >
 
 g4 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Shook his immortal blooms, and lilies near, 
 
 Jasmine and musk, daisies and hyacinth, 
 
 And violets, a blue profusion, sprang 
 
 Haunting the air, they lay them down and slept. 
 
 And with soft sleep came dreams, a glittering brood, 
 
 Its progeny, like stars from darkness bred : 
 
 And Themis, so it seemed, before them stood, 
 
 A tow'r-crowned goddess, — a Saturnian shape. 
 
 Whose forehead mocked the clouds, which round about 
 
 In throngs came fawning, like aerial slaves ; 
 
 While she, outstretching her right hand, and pale 
 
 With power call'd upwards from prophetic depths, 
 
 (Which like a passion shakes immortal frames) 
 
 Spoke to the Future, — a strange language, born 
 
 Of Time and Nature, then not understood. 
 
 And then she touched Deucalion's brow ; unsealing 
 
 With her cold finger, cold as winter ice, 
 
 The Promethcan's sight, — while still he slept. 
 
 In a moment straight before his eyes there thronged 
 Visions, — vast moving sights. Ocean and Land, 
 Palaces, towns, and temples, — sea-girt isles
 
 THK FLOOD OF THIiSSALY. 6-'. 
 
 Floating-, and navies of a thousand ships, 
 Armies of steeled men, and shapes that wore 
 Their panther spoils, (nought else) — fierce savages, 
 Rivers and desart wastes, and grassy slopes 
 Crowned with the liranching palm, and cedars such 
 As stood on Lebanon and kissed the mnd 
 At morning, — and strange scenes and shapes beside. 
 — For a time he looked bewildered ; but at last 
 His eye accustomed saAv each shape distinct. — 
 First, on rich moving thrones, sceptred and crown'd 
 With oriental gold, dazzling as day, 
 And studded o'er with gems, passed slowly along 
 The kings of Thebes, and ocean-girded Tyre, 
 And Memphis old, and shrunken Babylon, — 
 Huge warrior men, upon whose lips, tho' sad, •' 
 Hung scorn, and pride in every wrinkled front. 
 Then came a bearded king more mild than they. 
 Father of many sons, all fjiir and brave, 
 And daughters, one a prophetess : This was 
 The Trojan Priam, at whose city gates 
 The Grecians watched for ten long bloody years, 
 And entered at the last old Ilium. 
 
 F
 
 66 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Near him sate one with laurels crown'd, but blind, 
 Who, pausing for a time, spoke forth at last 
 With a voice more solemn than the trumpet's tune 
 Calling armed men to battle : Terrible strife 
 In which the Gods once mingled filled his song, 
 Until descending unto gentler tones, 
 A gentler chord he pressed, and Love was made 
 His theme, — how on the Asian sands a dame 
 Loitered with him she loved and left her lord^ 
 (Lacedemonian Helen) — how she stole 
 From Sparta then the sightless poet sung. 
 With the boy Paris, Priam's shepherd son, 
 And how Achilles angered, and the prince 
 Of barren Ithaca was led astray. 
 For ten long Avretched years o'er land and wave 
 Wandering in grief and could not reach his home. 
 
 Following, and as the Magi walk, came two, 
 Hermes and Zoroaster, deemed sim-born. 
 Wise as the ever-watching stars, grave, pale. 
 And shrouded roinul by superstitious breath. 
 Which bade believe that each one was a God,
 
 THK FLOOn OF THKSSALY. 67 
 
 No less, and could dispense empire and death, 
 lliche-s, large joy, and charms from every ill. 
 These passed ; when, like some iVicture where each 
 
 shape 
 Looks so o'er-mastered that life stirs in all, 
 Atiiexs from out a circular cloud up-sprang 
 Bravely, and shewed her temples all and streets, 
 Thro' which proud glorious men walked — one by one, 
 Else in bright throngs, as ages brought them forth 
 With exultation and no painful throes : 
 Kings, princes, and the soldiers of all states 
 (Not Athens alone, but Thebes and Macedon, 
 Corinth and Sparta and the rest) were seen 
 Conspicuous in their shining steel, but most 
 Great poets and grave-eyed ])hilosophers 
 Shone thro' the dream like stars, and lit the land 
 AVith beauty and truth ; for well sage Themis knew 
 Virtue is first and knowledge before arms, 
 Or power, or wealth, or strength in liattlc shewn. 
 — Cadmus, of that immortal throng the head 
 And leader, (for we pass all meaner tribes) 
 Stood with those wondrous letters in his liand 
 
 I- o
 
 6*8 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 By which bright thought was in its quick flight stopped, 
 
 And saved from perishing. Amphion next 
 
 Came with his lute, and Linus fiercely slain, 
 
 And Orpheus, Thracian shepherd, who made stay 
 
 Swift rivers in their flow, until too cold 
 
 The lewd Bacchantes down the Hebrus** stream 
 
 Rolled his dissevered head, which uttered stUl 
 
 ' Eurydice i"" — and then Alcseus passed, 
 
 Thales, and Sappho, whose so passionate song 
 
 Failed, tho' all fire, to stir the senseless boy 
 
 Phaon, and so the amorous Lesbian died. 
 
 Next came the Macedonian who bestrode ' 
 
 Bucephalus (whose spirit, till then untamed, 
 He broke by turning to the blinding sun) — 
 Yet not alone in steeds or in fierce arms 
 Delighted he, but much he loved rich song. 
 And fed his mind upon the talcs of Troy : — 
 Then Plato, musing, whose most great delight 
 Was wisdom, which he taught by streams and groves, 
 Makina; Ilissus and its banks renowned ; 
 And Socrates, whose earnest aim was truth,
 
 THE l'L()t)l) OK I IILSS.VLY. t)9 
 
 And the star-blinded sage Pytliagoras; 
 
 Praxiteles, and Phidias, and the rest 
 
 AVhose Promethean touch awaken^l life 
 
 In the cold marble ; and that king who died 
 
 Self-martyr\l in thy strait Thermopylae ! 
 
 And he who taught retreat o'er woods and plains 
 
 So well, and desarts strange, and hostile shores ; 
 
 And Archimedes whose fierce art brought down 
 
 Ruin on cities ; and that tragic Three, 
 
 Athenians, wiio the dream of life unveiled, 
 
 Winning men''s wondering hearts by speech and verse, 
 
 And gave this world its best philosophy : — 
 
 Then passed Demosthenes ; and he whom Fame 
 
 Slanders, sage Epicurus, on whom leaned 
 
 A youth well fitted for aught wise or good, — 
 
 Vahant, but wanton Lais bound him down 
 
 By amorous magic and enchanted toils ; 
 
 And Pericles then, and then Aspasia came, 
 
 Whose midnight study by some eastern lamp 
 
 Had paled her cheek, but filled her eyes witli thought. 
 
 Then followed countless endless throngs, hke leaves
 
 TO THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Crowning a woody wilderness,^ — unnamed, 
 Unknown, save some, on whom chance or the time 
 Fell with redoubled light and made distinct ; — 
 Crowd after crowd, — enormous living trains, 
 Men, women, of every shape, and age, and mind 
 (Bright generations) passed along, some robed 
 Like seers, but most with spear or helmet armed, 
 Or in equestrian state, as still we see 
 Graven on gems or marble, and some wreathed 
 With Delphian laurel like Diana''s maids, 
 Or roses Cytherean ; some with bays 
 Apollo's gift and some the gift of Mars. — 
 Beyond all piercing of the sight they reached 
 Into the future, like a jirophet's thought ; 
 And still they passed, and still no end was seen, — 
 Heroes, and sages, and fair shapes unborn. 
 Vast towns and towers, temples and aqueducts. 
 Pillar and arch and trophy, all were seen ; 
 And Bacchanalian mirth like that which stunned 
 Persepolis, when I'hilip's son, grown mad. 
 Fired the great city, — around which came sounding- 
 Battles and triumphs, and the rage of war,
 
 THli I LOOl) OF THKSSALY, 71 
 
 'I'lio roui, the )iot, and the eloiul of arms, 
 
 Tiic coiKjucst, and captivity, — and death. 
 
 Such throngs of old were never known to stream 
 
 From Babylon or Susa, nor when last 
 
 The xVssyrian met the Mede, and marked the bounds 
 
 Of empire by the gates of Nineveh ; 
 
 Nor when old Rome was highest ; nor when more late 
 
 The Scythian through the Indian valleys broad 
 
 Swept like a storm. 
 
 All that has been, and is, and is to come 
 
 ^Vas tlierc, made plain, — Avrit down clear as the stars; 
 
 A grand Array, beyond all which the grave 
 
 Could shew, though from its populous arms it threw 
 
 The treasures of past time, great, wise, and good, — 
 
 Beyond all thought, all guess or large belief, — 
 
 Beyond Imagination's widest dreams. 
 
 — The.se things, so Themis bade, assumed britf life : — 
 liut whither they fled, or when the Titan shook 
 That rich sleep off, and in the awakening light 
 liathed liis flushed forehead, still remains unsung 
 In story ; — yet, before his sight, 'tis tokl, 
 Stootl Pyrrha, fairest of earth's visions still. 
 Who on his tranced slumber long had looked,
 
 72 THE FLOOD OF THESSALY. 
 
 Whispering the Gods for comfort. He awoke; — 
 And o'er him, gently bending, children hung, 
 (He their creator) and a new-born world 
 Opened upon his sense, — a Paradise 
 Of flowers and fruits, sweet winds and cloudless skies, 
 And azure waters winding to the main. 
 And forest walks, and (far off) sounds which break 
 The sun-set silence, and the songs of birds 
 Chanting melodious mirth: — Vernal delights 
 Haunted the air, and youth which knew no pang- 
 Ran through all living veins, and touched all eyes 
 With beauty : — the tall branches waved their plumes ; 
 The water trembled ; and the amorous sun 
 Came darting from his orb : Eagles and doves, 
 Paired in the ether, and the branching stag 
 Fled from his shadow on the grass-green plain. — 
 O golden hours ! O world ! now stained with crime, 
 Immaculate then, methinks thy perfect fame 
 Should live in song ! Methinks some bard, whose heart 
 Traces its courage to Promethean veins. 
 Should build in lasting verse, firmer than mine, 
 Deucalion's story, — (upon Delphi's steep 
 Saved from the watery waste,) and Pyrrha's woe. .
 
 THE 
 
 GIRL OF PROVENCE.
 
 The following passage (which occurs in " Collinson's 
 Essay on Lunacy"") suggested tlic poem of the " Girl of 
 Provence." The reader will perceive, however, that it 
 forms the material of only the concluding stanzas. 
 
 " The enthusiasm of a Girl from Provence had lately occupied 
 my mind. It was a singular occurrence which I shall never forget. 
 1 was present at the national Museum when this Girl entered the 
 Salle d' Apollon: she was tall, and elegantly formed, and in all the 
 bloom of health. 1 was struck with her air, and my eyes involuntarily 
 followed her steps. I saw her start as she cast her eyes on the statue of 
 Apollo, and she stood before it as if stmck with lightning, her eyes 
 gradually sparkling with sensibility. She had before looked calmly 
 around the Hall ; but her whole frame seemed to be then electriiied as 
 if a transformation had taken place within her ; and it has since ap- 
 peared, that a transformation had taken place, and that her youthful 
 breast had imbibed a powerful, alas ! fatal passion. I remarked, that 
 her companion (an elder sister it seems) could not force her to leave 
 the statue, but with much entreaty, and she left the Hall witli tears in 
 her eyes, and all the expressions of tender sorrow. 1 set out the very 
 same evening for Montmorency, 1 returned to Paris at tiie cud of
 
 76 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 August, and visited immediately the magnificent collection of 
 antiques. I recollected the Girl from Provence, and thought perhaps 
 I might meet with her again ; but I never saw her afterwards, though 
 I went frequently. At length I met with one of the attendants, who, 
 I recollected, had observed her with the same attentive curiosity which 
 I had felt; and I enquired after her. 'Poor Girl!' said the old man, 
 ' that was a sad visit for her. She came afterwards every day to look 
 at the statue, and she would sit still, with her hands folded in her lap, 
 staring at the image, and when her friends forced her away, it was 
 always with tears that she left the Hall. In the middle of May she 
 brought, whenever she came, a basket of flowers and placed it on the 
 Mosaic steps. One morning early she contrived to get into the room 
 before the usual hour of opening it, and we found her within the grate, 
 sitting within the steps almost fainting, exhausted with weeping. The 
 whole Hall was scented with the perfume of flowers, and she had 
 elegantly thrown over the statue a large veil of India muslin, with a 
 golden fringe. We pitied the deplorable condition of the lovely-girl, 
 and let no one into the Hall until her friends came and carried her 
 home. She struggled and resisted exceedingly when forced away; 
 and declared in her frenzy that the god had that night chosen her to 
 be his priestess, and that she must serve him. We have never seen her 
 since, but have heard that an opiate was given her, and she was taken 
 into the country !' I made further enquiries concerning her history, 
 and learned that she died raving." — 
 
 Related by Madame de Iluster, a German lady.
 
 THE 
 
 GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 A (lipaiii of Love 
 
 Shaped by soim' solitary iiyinpli, whose breast 
 Longed for a deathless lover from above. 
 
 Lord. Dyron.—Ch. Harold. 
 
 I. 
 
 If there be aught witliin tliy pleasant land, 
 Fair France, which to the poet help may be- 
 If thou art haunted by a Muse, — conunand 
 That now she cast her precious spell on me : 
 Bid that tlie verse I write be fair and free ; 
 So may I, an untravellcd stranger, sing 
 Like one who drinkcth of Apollo's sjiring.
 
 78 THE CIKL OF PilOVENCK, 
 
 II. 
 
 For,— tlio' I never beneath eastern suns 
 
 Wandered, nor by Parnassus hill so high, 
 
 Nor where in beauty that bright fountain runs » 
 
 Struck by the winged horse that scaled the sky, 
 
 Nor ever in the meads of Arcady, 
 
 In flowery Enna, or Thessalian shade, 
 
 Heard sweet the pastoral pipe at evening played, — 
 
 III. 
 
 Yet have I chosen, from the throngs of talc 
 Which crowded on me in life's dreaming hours, 
 One — sad indeed, but such as may not fail 
 To attest the peerless king^'s undying powers, 
 "Who, like a light amongst Elysian bowers 
 Still moveth, while the sun (his empty throne) 
 Floats onwards, in its weary round, alone. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Ages and years have been and passed away, 
 
 And Mirth with light and Hope with rain-bow wings 
 
 Have flown, and Grief borne slow on pinions gray,
 
 Till'. (iillL Ol' PllOVKNCK. (I 
 
 Since thou wast worshIpp''d at the Dcl})liian springs, 
 Whereby no longer now a poet sings : 
 Yet hast thou been, O Pliccbus ! well repaid 
 By the deep love of one Provcncj-al maid. 
 
 V. 
 
 Come ! — with thy raven tresses loosely hung, 
 
 Thou nym})h translated to the skies ! Breathe ! Sigh ! 
 
 Let thy dark odorous hair be round me flung 
 
 And twined (rich inspiration !) till I die 
 
 For love of thee — a shadow ; so may I, 
 
 Stung to ctherial life, declare thy pain : — 
 
 Till then, whatever I sing — I sing in vain. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Eva ! — pale rose of Provence ! wliere art thou ? 
 Thy harp is silent, — gone, thy home forlorn : 
 Mute anguish lieth on thy sister's brow : 
 Thy father's eye, (once proud and like a morn 
 Of sparkling June) is emptied of its scorn : — 
 Ah ! bid me (and thou aid) in gentle verse 
 And words fa\r as thyself, thv talc rehearse.
 
 80 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 VII. 
 
 In France — in sunny France, the fields are gay ; 
 Earth's fruits are richest there, and ripen soon : 
 The shrill lark welcometh a brighter day, 
 And, free and sheltered from the fiery noon, 
 The summer-sweet Acanthis sings her tune ; 
 Or in the glassy waters looketh long, 
 Until the nightingale begins her song. 
 
 I VIII. 
 
 O Provence ! in thy groves and vine-hung bowers 
 Doth still that creature pine— that little bird 
 Who weeps her very soul away in showers 
 Of music, — only at the nightfall heard, 
 Yet sweeter far than any human word ? 
 Still doth it pine .'* — or are the rose and tliou 
 Deserted for some happier region now ? 
 
 IX. 
 
 Once, how it used to fill the fragrant air '''' - 
 With melancholy sounds that touched the brain ! 
 But that was when pale Eva bound her hair
 
 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. g| 
 
 Witli flowers, that blushing into bloom again 
 Alarmed the bird to most melodious pain. 
 Those days are gone. — Oh! is the twilight pale 
 Made amorous still by the lone nightingale ? — 
 
 X. 
 
 Fair Eva was De Varenne's gentle child, 
 Most gentle, from a rugged sire descended, 
 As April springeth from the winter wild, 
 A thing of rain and light gracefully blended, 
 Weeping inheritor ! whose Hfe is ended 
 Almost before the trump of March is dumb : 
 Dying in showers ere green Spring hath come. 
 
 XL - 
 
 Scarce eighteen summers by the Durance' side, 
 Which freshens the Provencal vallies green 
 With its bright waters, did that maid abide, 
 Rehcld by few, yet loved as soon as seen. 
 And ripening as her mother once had been, — 
 Scarce eighteen summers, ere a sorrow strange 
 Fell from the sky, and wrought mysterious change.
 
 8J^ THE GIRL OF PRdVENCE. 
 
 ? XII. 
 
 How gracefully she lived can many tell ; 
 How meekly too she bore her father*'s frown ; 
 Though seldom on his patient child it fell, 
 And quickly then she smiled and soothed it down. 
 Or else would in harmonious measures drown 
 His wrath, (as water quells the angry flame) 
 Till Love returned, or slow Oblivion came. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 Two children, — Eva and young Heloise, 
 Were all that fortune to De Varenne gave. 
 When from his wars beyond the Pyrenees 
 He came to mourn upon Aurelia's grave. 
 Oh ! why should sorrow weep and never save ! 
 She died, sad mother, and her husband wept 
 When closer to his heart lier chikh-en crept. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 For once he wept ; but quickly from his eye 
 The fire that flashed therein dried u]) tlie tear. 
 And he assumed again tliat conduct high
 
 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. ^{^ 
 
 Which bred a duteous love, not freed of fear. 
 Hallowing the lives of those his daughters dear : 
 Better perhaps if Love alone had dwelt 
 Within, and awed their young hearts while they knelt. 
 
 XV. ' :■ ' ■' 
 
 For her who bore them, when she drooped and died, 
 
 Exceeding sorrow did those children feel. 
 
 And oft they wished to slumber by her side, 
 
 And to her ear their pretty griefs reveal ; 
 
 At last a delicate bloom began to steal 
 
 Over their cheeks, and beauty waved and spread 
 
 About them, and with grace their every motion fed. 
 
 XVI. 
 
 In Heloise a blither glance was seen, 
 A firmer step, a brighter, darker eye ; 
 Her words were clear, hke sounds that run between 
 The forest branches when some brook is nigh ; 
 And scorn sat smiling on her forehead high. 
 " Thou art De Varenne"'s girl," the father said : 
 *' And Eva?" — sighed that chlltl, and hung her head. 
 
 g2
 
 ^: THE GIRL OF PROVENCE, 
 
 XVII. 
 
 " Eva ! thy sister thou resemblest not ; 
 She cheers my soul, and is ashamed to pine : 
 Her grief has died ; why is not thine forgot ? 
 Thou art thy mother"'s all, and she is mine. 
 My peerless child, I kiss thee, — my divine ! 
 What a clear beauty laughs through her disdain ! 
 My joy I" he said, and kissed his child again. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 And so — (one favoured, and the other worn 
 By harsh neglect, and care before its time,) 
 Fled on life's early hours, until its morn : 
 Then gleamed the eyes of one sad and sublime, 
 And in the other's laughed a sunnier clime, 
 A paradise of beauty bright and young. 
 And over all a heaven of love was flimg. 
 
 XIX. 
 
 Oh ! radiant creature, fairer than the sun. 
 How dim was she beside thee, — bow dismayed ! 
 Tliou like the east where dancing splendoin-s run.
 
 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. g|| 
 
 She like the quivering alder's deepest shade ; 
 Yet peerless in your wild- wood leaves arrayed 
 Were both, — sweet children of the sylvan hours, 
 Subjects of Love, who dies in courts and costly bowers. 
 
 XX. . 
 
 In courts, where revel reigns, and passionate song 
 Floats like a triumph on the Bacchant's breath. 
 Ah ! what hath love to do, — unless prolong 
 Its rare existence to a lino-erino; death ? 
 And die it must in war, the soldier saith ; 
 Its voice is shivered by the trumpet"'s tone : 
 It sees the fiery fight, — and lo I 'tis flown. 
 
 XXI. 
 
 It hath no home upon the weltering seas; 
 
 Or if it hideth there, on bitter food 
 
 It feeds, lone, trembling at each idle breeze, 
 
 Until 'tis blasted by the battle rude, 
 
 A gentle tiling with gentle strength endued, ', 
 
 By absence kill'd, — by scorn;— as often slaia 
 
 By poisonous pleasure as the sting of pain.
 
 8() THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 . • ' XXII. 
 
 Fair Love ! — Beside the fountains and bright fields. 
 By running waters and in mossy glades, 
 (Tasting whatever the green quiet yields) 
 He roams, from morning till the evening shades 
 Fall, and the world like a phantasma fades : 
 There roams he, like a Sylvan, whom the air 
 Worships, — unwing''d, and making all his care. 
 
 XXIII. 
 
 There, night and day are his. The radiant sky 
 Is doubly beautiful, and sun, and shower, 
 And rainbows which upon the mountains lie, 
 And twice its common odour hath the flower. 
 And doubly filled with joy is every hour ; 
 And music hangeth on the winds and floods, 
 And lingereth in the caves and desart woods : 
 
 XXIV. 
 
 And in the populous forests tlnck with life. 
 Which (deep and cool as Faunus ever knew) 
 Are haunted only by melodious strife,
 
 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 87 
 
 Of birds or insects, when the year is new 
 
 Feeding upon the fragrant summer dew : 
 
 And there the untiring seasons bring, for aye, ' 
 
 To niglit rich slumber, and fresh hfe to day. 
 
 XXV. 
 
 And Beauty, in her own eternal form, 
 
 (The same that witch'd the Dardan shepherd young) 
 
 Abideth. — Art doth never there deform 
 
 The amaranthine hues which life hath flung 
 
 ©""er lips and cheeks to crimson blushes stung ; " 
 
 But free as is the elemental air - . . 
 
 Nature and Beauty live, — ami both arc fair. "• 
 
 XXVI. : 
 
 And both might in De Varenne*'s home be seen. 
 For there his daughters wore the early day. 
 The one entranced by some high perilous scene, 
 The other, fonder of a gentler lay, 
 Read how the Gods from their celestial way 
 Would wander for the Naiads' loves, or take 
 An earthly form, — and all for Beauty's sake.
 
 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 XXVII. 
 
 She read how Jove from out the gates of light 
 Came downwards, shining like a mist of gold. 
 And how fond Semele became star-bright. 
 And Anaxarete a statue cold, 
 Prisoned, tho' dead, within her mortal mould : 
 She read of eyes made lovelier than the morn 
 Through love, and blinded by excess of scorn. 
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 And so her gentle spirit, fed by time 
 
 With radiant fable, from its earth up-grew, 
 
 (As mountain clouds float, erring but sublime. 
 
 Thro' the blue air) and hung on visions new. 
 
 Like wing'd Imagination false yet true : 
 
 And that imperial passion that doth reign 
 
 Cer every nerve, grew bright within her brain. — 
 
 XXIX. 
 
 — How beautiful is morning, when the streams 
 Of light come rimning up the eastern skies ! 
 How beautiful is life, in those young dreams
 
 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. gg 
 
 Of joy, and faith, — of love that never flies, 
 Chained like the soul to truth ; — but ah ! it dies 
 Sometimes, and sometimes, with the adder's spite 
 Stings the tr\ie heart that nursed it, day and night. 
 
 XXX. 
 
 And beautiful is great Apollo's page : 
 But they who dare to read his burning lines 
 Go mad, — and ever after with blind rage 
 Rave of the skiey secrets and bright signs : 
 But all they tell is vain ; for death entwines 
 The struggling utterance, and the words expire 
 Dumb, — self-consum\l, like some too furious fire. 
 
 XXXI. 
 
 — One night a revel had been held, and dance 
 And song had sounded in the ear of night, 
 And many a gallant that had grasped a lance. 
 And been the foremost in a bloody fight. 
 Then moved a measure with his lady bright, 
 And pressed her jewelfd arm and told his pain. 
 Alas ! that Love should ever speak in vain !
 
 ^ THE GIRL OF PROVENTCE. 
 
 XXXII. 
 
 Only the lonely Eva sate apart, — 
 While young Chatillion in her sister's ear ■ 
 Poured his love music, till her beating heart, 
 And eyes that glittering grew and large and clear,. 
 And the strange transport and the crimson fear 
 That stained the beauty of their cheeks, betrayed 
 How much the lover loved, and how the maid. 
 
 XXXIII. 
 
 The midnight lamps were o'er them, and the flare 
 Of light, which shone at times and died away. 
 Glanced like the shifting sunshine on her hair^ < 
 And brought her ringlets out in rich array : 
 And there the lover^'s looks, like break of day. 
 Were seen, fixed — helpless : — Oh ! a radiant spelt 
 Was on him, and he knew its perils well. 
 
 XXXIV. 
 
 But Eva, in the shadow dim, like one 
 
 Who sought her husband in the clouds, reclined ; 
 
 A vestal of the world, — because the Sun .. .
 
 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. g| 
 
 Hid his tyrannic beauty : — there she pined, 
 Pale as a prophetess whose labouring mind 
 Gives out its knowledge ; but her up-raised eyes 
 Shone with the languid light of one who loves or dies. 
 
 XXXV. 
 
 So, in one bright creation (through the earth 
 Unmatched) is love writ down : — no words are there. 
 But all is clear like some eternal birth 
 Of heaven^— a golden star, — the azure air : 
 Oh ! I remember well how soft, how fair, 
 That vision shone, — how like a dream of youth. 
 How full of life, and love, and burning truth ! 
 
 XXXVI. 
 
 Masses of living cloud were there, — and are ; 
 And Love is there, unseen ; and amorous light 
 Fills the dim ether ; and the passionate war 
 Of kisses, like the silence of the night. 
 Is heard; and every branch and leaf is bright 
 W^ith love ; and in the trembling waters near. 
 Tamed by some presence, drinks the bending deer.
 
 92 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 XXXVII. 
 
 And in the midst O ffirl ! whose curling limbs 
 
 A god has breathed on till they sting the brain 
 With beauty — Look ! how in her eye there swims 
 Intolerable joy — * * * # 
 
 * * * *■ * ^ 
 
 * * * * *. * 
 ^ * * * *-■-*. *. 
 
 XXXVIII. 
 
 lo! — fair lo ! — thou didst dearly earn, 
 
 By after wanderings and transformed hours, 
 
 The love of Jove. — Fair Eva i thou didst burn 
 
 Self-martyred in thy green Proven9al bowers. 
 
 Consumed to dust before Apollo's powers. 
 
 Both fell from too much love. — Sweet woman, stilt 
 
 Is thy love- harvest filled with so much ill.? 
 
 XXXIX. 
 
 — That night of revelry the victim's mind 
 
 Shook in its height : firm reason and clear thought 
 
 Forsook her, and her soul awhile grew blind,
 
 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 93 
 
 Seared by the light of love, and wandering sought 
 Its way through perilous regions now forgot, 
 Through haunts of death and life, and the throng'd way 
 Of darkness, — to insufferable day. 
 
 XL. 
 
 That night she lay within her silken nest. 
 White creature, dreaming till the golden dawn ; 
 When riia'bus, shaking off his skiey rest. 
 Descended. Trembling, like a frighted fawn, 
 She lay, bewildered, pale : — The orient morn 
 Wept, and the Hours blushed scarlet, and the array 
 Of Heaven, (stars, moon, and clouds,) were swept away^ 
 
 XLI. 
 
 No presence in the o'cr-arching vault was seen 
 
 Save his, — Apollo's ; who, unlike a God, 
 
 Quitted his fiery height, and on the green 
 
 Starr'd with white hyacinths and daisies, trod : 
 
 And wheresoever he stepped the flushing sod 
 
 Threw flowers from out its heart, and from her room 
 
 Came odours, like the heliotrope's perfume.
 
 94 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 XLIL : 
 
 Awhile he stayed : — he gazed, — perhaps a thought 
 Tliat so much beauty was not born to die, 
 Assailed him ; but not long that pity wrought, 
 For through his brightening form and his large eye 
 Shot passion, shaming the immaculate sky, 
 Where kindness lives with love, and hate is known, 
 Like mortal follies, by its name alone. 
 
 XLIII. 
 
 He took her, gently, in his radiant arms, 
 And breathed on her, and bore her through the air, 
 Hushing from time to time her sweet alarms. 
 And whispering still that one so good and fair 
 Should dread no evil thought and know no care : 
 And still they flew, and around a lustre played. 
 Near them, as near a figure plays its shade. . 
 
 XLIV. 
 
 Their course seemed pointed to some southern shore. 
 Over the waters where the trade-winds blew 
 They passed, and wliere men find the golden ore.
 
 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 95 
 
 And where long since the Hesperian apples grew ; 
 While, far beneath, the Old world and the New 
 Stretched out their tiny shapes, and their thick chain 
 Of islands, spangling like bright gems the main. 
 
 XLV. 
 
 And then they moved beneath a lovelier sky. 
 O'er green savannahs where cool waters rmi ; 
 O'er hills and valleys ; o'er vast plains that lie 
 Flat, — desarts bhstered by the Afric sun ; 
 Over spice-groves and woods of cinnamon ; 
 By Siam and Malay ; and many a fair 
 Bright country basking in the Indian air. 
 
 XLVI. 
 
 AVhilher they journeyed then, ah, who may tell ! — 
 
 Beyond all limits that the sailor knows ; 
 
 Beyond the ocean ; and beyond the swell 
 
 Of mountains ; and beyond the Antarctic snows : 
 
 To some sweet haunt, 'tis told, where softly glows 
 
 Perpetual day, — some island of the air : 
 
 We know its beauty ; but we know not where.
 
 • s 
 
 96 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE, 
 
 XLVII. 
 
 — Eternal forests, on whose boughs the Spring 
 Hung undecajdng, fenced tlie place around, 
 And amorous vines, (like serpents without sting) 
 Clung to the trees, or trailed on the green ground^ 
 And fountains threw on high a silver sound. 
 And glades interminably long, between 
 Whose branches sported the grey deer, were seen. 
 
 XLVIII. , > 
 
 And from the clustering boughs the nightingale 
 Sang her lament ; while on a reedy stream. 
 Which murmured and far off was heard to fallj 
 The swan went sailing by, like a white dream ; 
 And somewhere near did the lone cuckoo call, 
 But none made answer ; and his amorous theme 
 The thrush loud uttered till it spoke of pain ; 
 And many a creature sang, but seemed to sing in vain. 
 
 XLIX. 
 
 There, rich with fruits, tlie tree of Paradise 
 (The plantain) spread its large and slender leavesj 
 And there the picturM palm was seen to rise,
 
 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 97 
 
 And trcmbliiif^ aspen, and the tree that grieves, 
 (The willow) and sun-flowers like golden sheaves ; 
 The lady lily paler than the moon, 
 And roses, laden with the breath of June. 
 
 L. 
 
 And in the midst a crystal palace stood 
 
 On pillars shining with immortal gold : 
 
 Its gates were golden, and some artist good 
 
 Had carved them till each nook and corner told 
 
 Some wonder of the Sun or story old ; 
 
 And rainbow landscapes copied from the skies 
 
 Shone in the metal with a thousand dies. 
 
 LL 
 
 Upon those gates no sounding horn was hung : 
 No wai-der answered from his watchin<r tower : 
 But silence over all the place Avas flung, 
 flaking it holy as Egeria's bower. 
 And gentle splendour, like the evening hour, 
 ]\Iingled with shadows fine its finer ray. 
 And k'i.\ die place with beauty night ai^l day- 
 
 H
 
 98 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 LII. 
 
 All these the lover to his love displayed : — 
 
 The palace whose bright top was hid in heaven, 
 
 The lustrous pillars and the long arcade, 
 
 The statue, — where it seemed some God had striven 
 
 With immortality, — and failed, yet given 
 
 The marble hkeness of Apollo's smile. 
 
 His grace, his glance almost, — but not his guile. 
 
 LIII. ■ 
 
 There, a vast hall far spread and high was seen, 
 So high — the falcon might have tired his wing 
 Nor touched the roof, whereon, with stars between 
 Shone Heaven's Avide kingdoms, all, — a radiant ring. 
 And from the midst Apollo seemed to spring — 
 (Was he the phantom of her hopes, — no more .'') 
 She trembled, — wept, — but still he seemed to soar. 
 
 IJV. 
 
 And, far away from out that central ball 
 
 Ran arched passages diverging far, 
 
 Each with its doors and rring*" of room?!, snd all
 
 THE GIRL OP PROVENCE. 99 
 
 (Self-liglited as by some presiding star) 
 Shone spacious and tlie most harmonious jar 
 Of voices and irregular footsteps near 
 And busy words, hke hfe, broke on her ear ; 
 
 LV. 
 
 And music, hke the dissonance of Gods, 
 Rich, — Bacclianahan, as when Hebe crowns 
 Their cups with kisses, and through all the abodes 
 Of Heaven a sudden shout breaks forth that drowns 
 The air Avith laughter, and shakes earthly towns 
 To dust, — inunortal Music in her bower 
 Sung, till Apollo struck the golden hour. 
 
 LVI. 
 
 Then, in that stillness, Eva heard a voice 
 
 From one unseen beside her. Thus it said : 
 
 * Welcome my sovereign lady, and rejoice ! 
 
 Fear not : but on the flowery pavements tread. 
 
 Or on these downy pillows rest your head, 
 
 Or bathe your beauty in the waters near, 
 
 Or drink, — behold, the nectarous draught is here,' 
 
 B S
 
 too THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 LVII. 
 
 She gazed, — and slowly from the marble ground 
 0"'er-strewed Avith flowers a golden table sprung, 
 Where fruits of matchless fragrance did abound. 
 And nameless dainties all together flung, 
 And on their boughs Hesperian apples hung. 
 And nectar ravishing to taste, — like gleams 
 From Circe's eyes, or love-enchanted dreams. 
 
 LVIII. 
 
 Fair girl, she left untouched that nectarous wine, 
 FruiLs and ambrosian food, and strayed along 
 The pictured rooms, all fair (and some divine) 
 With skiey stories since made plain by song. 
 And women, an imperishable throng. 
 Lifted from earth to heaven by force of love. 
 And purified by light and the glance of Jove. 
 
 LIX. 
 
 There ceiUngs spread abroad their cloudless hues. 
 And stars shone from them, and the sounds of \vings 
 Wei'e heard like rusliing waters, when they lose
 
 THE (iIRL OF FHOX'ENCE. lUl 
 
 Their life in foam, and down the pillars springs 
 llan like the fluid liohtnlng, when it clings 
 (Or seems) around some pine or shattered oak, 
 And every room some bright and different marvel 
 spoke. 
 
 LX. 
 
 Through all the palace, — pillars, and arches wide, 
 
 And floors, and roofs, (it seemed a mystic plan, 
 
 And only by the curious eye esjiied) 
 
 Instinct with light a living splendour ran, 
 
 As blood goes streaming through the heart of man. 
 
 And every hinge and joint was fed by fire, 
 
 Which flowed half hidden like some veilwl desire. 
 
 LXI. 
 
 All day she traversed her imperial home, 
 With wonder gazing, and strange mute delight ; 
 And then she prayed her absent love to come. 
 And bade him hurry the too slow twilight; 
 And then the coming of immortal night 
 She dreaded, its sublime and dark array ; 
 And thus, "'tween fears and })leasare, fled the day.
 
 103 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 LXIL 
 
 Twilight is come, — calm mournful hour, for those 
 Whom years have quelled, whom cold dread thoughts 
 
 ' engage, 
 But life hath fires before we reach its snows, 
 And youth treads fiercely on the ground that age 
 Sliuns with a timid glance and sad presage ; 
 And twilight hath no terrors, no repose. 
 For hearts where Love"'s impetuous spirit glows. 
 
 LXIII. 
 
 Twiliirht is come : but where is he whose word 
 Should be as holy as the Heavens ? — Afar 
 Through all the empyreal air no noise is heard, 
 Nor vision seen, nor bright descending star ; 
 No siglit, no sound ; only the ebb and jar 
 Of meeting passions in one heart, until 
 A hymn arose which broke that silence chill. 
 
 1. 
 
 Apollo ! — king Apollo ! 
 In what enchanted region dost thou stay ? — 
 Is it in the azure air
 
 THE GIKL OF PROVENCE. 103 
 
 Or in ihc caverns hollow, 
 Which Thetis at the set of day 
 In the sea waters far away 
 Buildeth up, as blue and fair 
 As thy own bright kingdoms are? 
 
 2. 
 
 Oh, King of life and light ! 
 
 O peerless Archer ! O triumphant God ! 
 Behold ! — the golden rod 
 
 Now pointeth to the promised hour, — tv,ilight ; 
 And she who loves thee so 
 Is pale and full of woe. — 
 No wave nor throne have I, • 
 No bower nor golden grove, 
 No palace built on high, 
 To tempt thee not to rove, 
 But truth, and such a love 
 As would not shame the sky, — 
 If these be nothing, Time 
 Shall teach mc how to die.
 
 104 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 Yet come not, great Apollo ! come not here ; 
 
 The hour has vanished, and thou needs must stay 
 
 In those sea waters far away : — 
 
 For me, — neglect and fear 
 
 Are my fit bridal cheer : 
 
 An earthly creature what had I to do 
 
 With sights of heaven or pleasures of the skies ! 
 
 Oh I master and my king, thy slave despise ! 
 
 Now from thy station Avheresoe'er it be — 
 
 Within the waving sea 
 
 Or in the pathless blue — 
 
 Look down, in thy divine 
 
 Disdain, and from thy ]\\)s 
 
 Shed darkness and eclipse. 
 The fit requital for a love like mine ! — 
 
 LXIV. 
 
 She ended ; and above, as from a cloud. 
 
 The eternal sun broke forth :— no shajie was there. 
 
 No voice, but soft wlmls all the branches bowed.
 
 THE GIUL OF PKOVENCE. 105 
 
 And wide illuminations filled the air, 
 And beauty looked so lovely that despair 
 Fled, and innocuous warmth and cheerino: light 
 Fell on the n)ournful girl hke some late lost delight. 
 
 LXV. 
 
 No tear now stained her cheek ; no failino; tones 
 Telling of anguish hid, or dull with pain ; 
 But prief is given to the wind that moans 
 Amonsrst the forest bou"hs, and to the main 
 And to the rivers all who must complain 
 Yet feel no sorrow to the end of time — 
 As years all filled with blood are freed of crime. 
 
 LXVI. 
 
 But when the twilight fell, that gentle child 
 Felt a strange terror, till a voice she knew 
 (It was Apollo's) spoke, but oh I so mild, 
 So like familiar tones we know are true ! 
 And his too fiery glance was quenched in dew : 
 
 Eva, my mortal love, the day has bin^ned 
 To its decline, and io ! I have returned." 
 
 a
 
 106 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 LXVII. 
 
 So spake he, and the maid with downcast eyes, 
 And flushing forehead which had lost its snow, 
 Him answered, (while her breast like summer-skies 
 Spread out its breathing paradise below. 
 And rose and fell as billows swell and flow) — 
 " My master ! art thou here ?" — and with a sigh 
 liaising her eyes, she saw him smihng nigh. 
 
 LXVIII. 
 
 Oh ! never was a smile so full of scorn 
 As that which glanced along his curved lip ; 
 And his eyes sparkled like the approach of morn ; 
 Yet sweeter were his words than winds that sip 
 The dew from hyacinths : — Oh ! canst thou strip 
 Thy bird of plumage, and her sweet despair. 
 Which flowed in music to thee, never spai'e ? — 
 
 LXIX. 
 
 " Apollo! king Apollo !"— That wild cry 
 Was heard in Ilium when its end was near, 
 From Priam's Sybil daughter, who with an eye
 
 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 107 
 
 Made bright by proplict dreams and wise by fear, 
 Saw the red ruin and the flashing spear 
 Tlirough all the darkness of the untold to-morrow, 
 And heard the Spartan's cry, tlie Trojan's sorrow. 
 
 LXX. 
 
 Apollo ! king Apollo ! — Is thy scorn 
 
 Not dead, — and were Cassandra's tears in vain ? 
 
 Her words (an oracle) — her life forlorn. 
 
 Stung throu2;h bv unbelief and fierce disdain ? — 
 
 Her crowned exile and her death of pain ? — 
 
 Still dost thou ask new love and fresh despair, 
 
 And hopes born but to perish ? — Spare ! O spare ! 
 
 LXXI. 
 
 I speak in vain : — The chariot of the hour 
 Is rolling onwards, — over kings and slaves, 
 Passionate spirits, and the crimson flower 
 Of love, which Hermes' magic never saves, — 
 Over rebellions and the gloom of graves, — 
 Through light and darkness, and the eternal woo 
 Of life, — to regions which no thought may know.
 
 108 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 LXXII. 
 
 Older tlian ruin, or the dust that hides 
 
 Persepohs or Balbec, and yet fair 
 
 Like early manliood, the great Phantom rides 
 
 (Time or the Hour) above us: — Where, O where ? — 
 
 Through Hell, and Heaven, in Earth, and the wide Air ; 
 
 Invisibly he goes, and without sound, 
 
 Like Death, a tyrant, — shapeless but uncrowned. 
 
 LXXIII. 
 
 He passes : — Oh ! not all the suns that shine. 
 Not all the Autumn floods nor Winter''s rain, 
 Nor all that poets tell of, though divine. 
 Shall clear thy annals of so foul a stain : — 
 He passes, and is gone ; — and I complain 
 Unto the silence; and return dismayed 
 To tell thy latest grief, sad Provence maid ! — 
 
 LXXIV. 
 
 The hour has passed; — and Night, who laughs at time, 
 
 Shakes out her spangled hair in loose array. 
 
 And, clas])ed with coronets of gems sublime, i
 
 THE GIRL OF PFIOVENCE. 109 
 
 Sits like a queen, to whom, at death of Day, 
 (She bright successor) a whole world must pay 
 Low adoration, — while the sleepless care 
 Must watch her glittering vigils shining fair. ^ 
 
 LXXV. 
 
 That nioht — Oh ! never shall its silent hours. 
 
 Its love — its darkness be profaned by me : 
 
 If I m^ist tell, be it of vine-leaf bowers 
 
 AVhcrc Bacchanal delight is loud and free. 
 
 Or Aphrodite's home hung round with flowers. 
 
 Or coral branches from her native sea ; 
 
 For love is her wide boast : but clouds should hide 
 
 The young hot blushes of a human bride. 
 
 LXXVI. 
 
 And yet night came (voluptuous night I) and sleep 
 Weighed down the eye-lids of Apollo''s bride. 
 Who sank into a tremulous slumber deep, 
 Believing now his falling locks she spied. 
 Or heard him breathing odours by her side. 
 Or felt his burning kisses on her lips, 
 Or saw his eyes bent o'er her, in eclipse.
 
 no THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 LXXVII. 
 
 And once she dreamed he said " Awake ! arise. 
 Daughter of clay : Behold ! the truth is plain : 
 Thou hast looked love on me with impious eyes, 
 On me — a God, and with enchantments vain 
 Bound me, and thou must die." A thrilling pain 
 Traversed her heart, while thus the Pythian spoke. 
 And sleep was scared by terror, and she woke. 
 
 LXXVII I. 
 
 She rose, and saw him in his beauty laid 
 
 Beside her : O'er his limbs a tender light 
 
 Hung floating, and his head looked all arrayed 
 
 With a halo, as the glow-worm looks by night, 
 
 Or like a lunar rainbow pale and bright, — 
 
 Encompassed and enshrined by the clear breath 
 
 Of Heaven, which saves immortal frames from death 
 
 LXXIX. 
 
 And on his lips there lay a rose-red leaf 
 Courting the kiss she gave, and did not fade — 
 (How could it feel a touch so soft and brief?)
 
 THK GIRL OF PROVENCE. Ill 
 
 And then she pressed the violet veins that strayed 
 Over his throat, and then shrank, back afraid 
 Gazing ujion tlie God — who calmly slept, 
 While to her couch the trembling creature crept. 
 
 LXXX. 
 
 This past she slept, and of sky-piercing towers 
 She dreamed, and banquets held beneath the moon, 
 And trod on stars, and through illumined bowers 
 Paced like a dancer, whom some eager tune 
 liCads on to pleasure which must perish soon : 
 Yet still by her white side Apollo lay, 
 (She dreamed) 'till darkness faded inro day. 
 
 LXXXI. 
 
 The morning broke, and she was Phoebus'" bride : 
 
 And evening fell : — IJut did the God return ? — 
 
 He came not, — he came never to her side ; 
 
 But her bright Dream {^for ''txcas a dream) did burn 
 
 Madness upon her, and the world did spurn 
 
 Her story for a folly : — yet she believed ; 
 
 And o"'er her widowM passion meekly grieved.
 
 *• 
 
 1 12 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 LXXXII. 
 
 Like Ariadne, when in pale despair 
 The Athenian left her, — so sad Eva pined, 
 And so she went complaining to the air, 
 And gave her tresses to the careless wind : — 
 The colour of her fate was on her mind. 
 Dark, death-like, and despairing; — and her eye 
 Shone lustrous like the light of prophecy. 
 
 LXXXIII. 
 
 Over the grassy meads,— beside lone streams, 
 To perilous heights which no weak step could reach 
 She wandered, feeding her unearthly dreams 
 With musing, and would move the tremulous beech 
 And shuddering aspen with imploring speech ; 
 For nothing that did live, save they (who sighed) 
 Pitied the downfall of her amorous pride. — 
 
 ***** 
 * * » - * *
 
 THE GIRL OF IMIOVKNCE. 118 
 
 * « « « » « 
 
 LXXXIV. 
 
 — There is a story : — that some lady came 
 To Paris ; and while she — ("'tis years a<^o !) 
 Was gazing at tlie marbles, and tlic fame 
 Of colour which threw out a sunset glow, 
 A tall girl entered, with staid steps and slow. 
 The immortal hall where Phoebus stood arrayed 
 In stone,— and staited back, trembling, dismayed. 
 
 LXXXV. 
 
 Yet still she looked, tho' mute, and her clear eye 
 Fed on the image till a rajiture grew, 
 Chasing the cloudy fear that hovered nigh. 
 And filling with soft light her glances blue; 
 And still she trembled, for a pleasure new 
 Thrilled her young veins, and stammering accents ran 
 Over her tongue, as thus her speech began : — 
 
 I
 
 114 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 LXXXVI. 
 
 " Apollo ! king Apollo ! — art thou here ? 
 Art thou indeed returned ?" — and then her eyes 
 Outwept her joy, and hope and passionate fear 
 Seized on her heart, as tow^ds the dazzling prize 
 She moved, like one who sees a shape that flies, 
 And stood entranced before the marble dream, 
 Which made the Greek immortal, like his theme. 
 
 LXXXVII. 
 
 Life in each limb is seen, and on the brow 
 Absolute God ; — no stone nor mockery shape 
 But the resistless SuJi, — the rage and glow 
 Of Phoebus as he tried in vain to rape 
 Evergreen Daphne, or when his rays escape 
 Scorching the Lybian desart or gaunt side 
 Of Atlas, withering the great giant's pride. 
 
 LXXXVIII. 
 
 And round his head and round his limbs have clung 
 Life and the flush of Heaven, and youth divine, 
 And in the breathed nostril backwards flung,
 
 THE GIRL OF PROVENTE. 115 
 
 And in tlie terrors of his face, that sliine 
 Right througli tlie marble, wliich will never pine 
 To paleness though a thousand years have fled, 
 But looks above all fate, and moeks the dead. 
 
 LXXXIX. 
 
 Yet stands he not as when blithely he guides 
 Tameless Eoiis from the golden shores * • 
 
 Of morning, nor when in calm strength he rides 
 Over the scorpion, while the lion roars 
 Seared by his burning chariot which out-pours 
 Floods of eternal light oVt hill and plain, 
 But, like a triumph, o'er the Python slain : 
 
 XC. 
 
 He stands with serene brow and lip upcurlM 
 By scorn, such as Gods fell, when on the head 
 Of beast or monster or vain man they hurled 
 Thunder, and loosed the lightning from its bed, 
 Where it lies chained, by blood and torment fud ; 
 His fine arm is outstretched, — his arrow flown, 
 And the wrath flashes from his eyes of stone, 
 
 I 2
 
 116 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 XCI. 
 
 Like Day — or liker the fierce morn, (so youno) — 
 Like the sea-tempest which against the wind 
 Comes dumb, while all its terrible joints are strung 
 To death and rapine : — Ah ! if he unbind 
 His marble fillet now and strike her blind — 
 Away, away ! — vain fear ! unharmed she stands, 
 With fastened eyes and white beseeching hands. 
 
 XCIL 
 
 — Alas ! that madness, like the worm that stings, 
 Should dart its venom through the tender brain ! 
 Alas ! that to all ills which darkness brings 
 Fierce day should send abroad its phantoms plain. 
 Shook from their natural hell, (a hideous train) 
 To wander through the world, and vex it sore, 
 Which might be happy else for ever-more. 
 
 XCIII. 
 
 Lust, and the dread of death, and white Despair, 
 (A Avrcck, from changed friends and hopes all fled), 
 Ambition which is sleepless, and dull care
 
 THK GIRL OF PROVENCE. 117 
 
 Which wrhikles the young brow, and sorrows bred 
 From love wliich strikes the heart and sears the head. 
 The h^htning of the passions, — in whose ray 
 Eva's bright sjiii-it wasted, day by day. 
 
 XCIV. 
 
 « 
 
 she was Apollo's votary, (so she deemed) 
 His bride, and met him in his radiant bowers, 
 And sometimes, as his priestess pale beseemed, 
 She strewed before his image, like the Hours, 
 Delicate blooms, sj)ring buds and summer flowers, 
 Faint violets, dainty lilies, the red rose, — 
 What time his splendour in the Eastern glows. 
 
 xcv. 
 
 And these she took and strewed before his feet. 
 And tore the laurel (his own leaf) to pay 
 Homage unto its God, and the plant sweet 
 That turns its bosom to the simny ray. 
 And all which open at the break of day, 
 And all which worthy arc to pay him due 
 Honour, — pink, saffron, crimson, pied, or blue.
 
 118 THE GIRL OF PROVENCE. 
 
 XCVI. 
 
 And ever, when was done her flowery toil, 
 She stood (idolatress !) and languished there, 
 She and the God, alone ; — nor would she spoil 
 The silence with her voice, but with mute care 
 Over his carved limbs a garment fair 
 She threw, still worshij)ping with amorous pain. 
 Still watching ever his divine disdain. 
 
 XCVII. 
 
 — Time past : — and when that German lady came 
 
 Again to Paris, where the image stands, 
 
 (It was in August, and the hot sun-flame 
 
 Shot thro' the windows) — midst the gazing bands 
 
 She sought for her whose white-beseeching hands 
 
 Spoke so imploringly before the stone, 
 
 (The Provence girl) — she asked; but she was gone. 
 
 XCVIII. 
 
 Whither none knew ; — Some said that she Avould come 
 Always at morning with her blooming store. 
 And gaze upon the marble, pale and dumb,
 
 Till-: tiUa OF PROVENCE. 119 
 
 But thai, they thought, the tender worship wore 
 The gh-l to death ; for o'er her eyes and o'er 
 Her paling cheek hues like the grave were spread : 
 And one at last knew further ; — She was dead. 
 
 XCIX. 
 
 She died, mad as the winds, — mad as the sea 
 Which rages for the beauty of the moon. 
 Mad as the poet is whose fancies flee 
 Up to the stars to claim some boundless boon. 
 Mad as the forest when the tempests tune 
 Their breath to song and shake its leafy pride, 
 Yet trembling like its shadows : —So she died. 
 
 C. 
 
 She died at morning when the gentle streams 
 
 Of day came peering thro' the far east sky, 
 
 And that same light which wrought her maddening 
 
 dreams. 
 Brought back her mind. She awoke with gentle cry, 
 And in the light she loved she wished to die : — 
 She perished, when no more she could endure, 
 Hallowed before it, like a martyr pure.
 
 ■I,
 
 THli 
 
 LETTER OF JiOCCACClO.
 
 -x
 
 As the followiiifT ' Letter' involves a few particulars 
 of the early life of the famous Italian novelist, it may 
 be as well to state briefly what are and what arc not 
 facts. 
 
 Of Giovanni Boccaccio, the great author of the 
 ' Decameron,"' little seems to be known. He was born at 
 Certaldo, (or Florence) about the year 13 13, and when 
 he arrived at manhood, was, according to some accounts, 
 placed under the law professor Cino de Pistoia. His 
 father dying soon after, Boccaccio gave himself up to 
 poetry, and studied also the classics and the sciences with 
 great effect. He himself says, in one of his letters, (to 
 Petrarch I believe) that he was the means of introduc- 
 in(j the Greek lano;uase into Etruria. 
 
 The circimistance of Boccaccio having led a dissolute 
 life at Florence, and having been reproved by a Carthu- 
 sian friar, are stated as facts, if I recollect rightly, in 
 Mrs. Dobson's Life of Petrarch ; and that he was inti- 
 mate with the famous lover of Laura is known tt) all. 
 The story which I have admitted, of his having been in
 
 124 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 
 
 love with a lady near Florence, is the fiction of the 
 authoress of ' Petrarque ct Laure :' although he was 
 actually attached to a female, whom he celebrates under 
 the name of Fiametta. Some persons say that this lady 
 was Mary of Auragon, (daughter of Robert, King of 
 Naples) whom Boccaccio first saw in the church of the 
 Cordeliers. Whether this be the absolute fact or not, I 
 leave to others. It is sufficient at least for the origin of 
 this ' Letter,"" which the reader will suppose to be ad- 
 dressed to her.
 
 THE LETTER 
 
 OF 
 
 BOCCACCIO. 
 
 O Tiiou, before wliose beauty my young spirit 
 Hath bowed, — so long oppressed by amorous pain ; 
 If I have sold the thoughts which I inherit 
 From my free nature, do not tJiou arraign 
 That now, poor slave, I bear Lovers glittering cliain ! 
 It wears me, — it consumes me ; yet / love. 
 And that is my reward. — Shall I return 
 Into the past, and quench the fires that burn 
 AVithin and hallow me, (as some dark grove 
 By ever-living lamps is made most pure) ? — 
 Can I return, — I who have dwelt with Love, 
 And fed on passionate dreams ? Can I endure 
 That tyranny of thought which strips the heart 
 Bare of its hope, and gives it — barren truth ? — 
 
 Thou wast the virgin idol of my youth : —
 
 126 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 
 
 Thou wast ? — thou art ; and shall a weak dismay 
 
 Of possible ill lure my weak heart to stray ? 
 
 Shall I be told that woman is not true ? — 
 
 That Love hath died who was a god of yore ? — 
 
 That Fortune is a sea without a shore. 
 
 Where they who venture not have nought to rue ?- 
 
 Shall I believe all this and look on thee ? — 
 
 It cannot be, — it may not, if I array 
 
 My mind with faith, as in my better day : — 
 
 So with a bright belief I look on thee. 
 
 Thou beauty of the South, as on the Sun, 
 
 Who deigns to gild the slave he looks upon. 
 
 — Shall nothing but thy shadow fall on me ? 
 
 'Tis true I have not much that can adorn 
 Thy conquest, — not in fortune, — not in name ; 
 But I may prostrate still the little fame 
 I have, and even this thou wilt not scorn ; 
 Thou wilt not, for thine eye is like a morn 
 Whereby men augur of the day to come. 
 And in thy silence thou wast never dumb; 
 So, spirit sweet, will I of thee foretell.
 
 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 127 
 
 Thy young voice is a truer oracle 
 
 Than that which in the old Saturnian days 
 
 Sounded at Delos in Apollo's praise, 
 
 And did the tasks of Pagan prophets well ; 
 
 And thy white beauty is (for never yet 
 
 Could Nature mould such creature and forget 
 
 The perfect soul) assurance unto me 
 
 Of thy unuttered fidelity : — 
 
 Therefore, by yellow Hymen, do I swear 
 
 To make thee my reliance, my sweet care, 
 
 My all of memory, my extremest hope : — 
 
 Fool that I am, methinks I cannot cope 
 With my antagonist ills : the idle shade 
 Of joy stalks forth and straight I am betrayed. 
 Hope has fled far : the future, which was late 
 Dream-bright, is now a calm unaltering fate ; 
 And Friendship has usurped the name of Love ; 
 And passion, bright as the fire the Titan stole. 
 Has burned to its decline. Do not reprove ; 
 For still, at times, it flames beyond control. 
 And is again the madness of my soul.
 
 128 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCTO. 
 
 I will not change : or if I wander, soon 
 Shall I return, and be as is the moon 
 Who, tho' she change, returneth, nothing loth, 
 And faithful to the beauty of her youth ? 
 Like her my peerless love shall shine, — yet not 
 On altars or in sepulchres, but where 
 My faith to thee shall never be forgot : — 
 It shall be holy as the autumnal air, 
 And fashioned into music, and along 
 The tides of time be borne, with things as fair, 
 In all the immortality of song. 
 
 It shall live unalarni'd by hint or jest. 
 The one great virtue of Boccaccio"'s breast :— 
 For 'tis not erring v\ ishes, nor the shock 
 Of doubts which force the changing man to mock 
 Love in his temple, — 'till he dies of shame. 
 But 'tis the laughing lie — the petty blame 
 That frets and turns the human milk to gall. 
 And, tho' it scarce seem bitter, poisoneth all. —
 
 THE T.F.TTFR OF BOCCACflO. ^oy 
 
 II. 
 
 When last I saw thee — (following in thy train 
 Was I) — O would those times might be again I 
 They were too happy, sweet ! and therefore brief, 
 And withered, like an earl}' budding leaf, 
 AVhich, while its cold associates still are seen 
 Flourishing, having lived its age, (in hours !) 
 And wasted on the wanton Spring its })owcrs, 
 Doth die upon its stem of summer green : 
 Therefore it may not be. — () princely maid ! 
 AVhen last I saw thee, was not ])romise made 
 That I should tell my story (all) to thee ? 
 Yes, — we were sitting underneath a tree 
 Which shook its odours on the Baian waves. 
 Thou must remember it : — We gazed together 
 Enchanted by the glassy sea that laves 
 The Cape and islands, in that simny weather 
 Seen plainly from the Pausillippo hill. 
 Hast thou forgotten how we talked of him 
 Whose ashes slumber there, holy and still ? 
 From which his name, that never shall grow dim,
 
 130 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 
 
 Sprang like a lunar glory, gently driven 
 Across the many-coloured plains of Heaven, 
 Until, as stars whose glittering toils are o'er, 
 It sank into its place, and moved no more. 
 
 Now, hearken to my story ! — When I came 
 First to this world, and saw the morning flame 
 From the grey East, streaking the sky with bars 
 Of light — (this while the shepherd of the stars, 
 Great Lucifer, was busied in the West) — 
 Imaginations strange perplexed my breast, 
 Like ghosts some ancient house untenanted : 
 And, after this, pale Learning sowed her seed 
 Within my memory, and I became 
 Such as I am. This, and no more, I claim 
 From the remembrance of my childish time: 
 Yet 'twas so like the period of my prime 
 (The interval was nothing, — buried years 
 Of boyhood, — idle, full of pains, and fears) 
 That the first germ of what may never bloom 
 Was born, it seems, in me, — a sweet pcrfinne 
 Clinging about my birth, and making still
 
 THK LKTTKR OF BOCCACCIO. |;3| 
 
 Those years seem sage, — not comprcliensiblc 
 
 To me or others ; but "'tis often so ; 
 
 In buckling, happiness is hkest woe : 
 
 Great thought is pain until the strengthen'tl mind 
 
 Can lift it into light : the soul is blind 
 
 Until the suns of years have cleared away 
 
 The film that hangeth round its wedded clay. 
 
 ThcnI.ove came — Love ! — How like a star it streamed 
 In infancy upon me, — till I dreamed, 
 And 'twas as pure and almost cold a light, 
 And led me to the sense of such delight 
 As children know not ; so, at last I grew 
 Enamoured of beauty and soft pain, 
 And felt mysterious pleasure wander through 
 My heart, and animate my childish brain ; 
 And thus I rose (for patient still was I 
 And a true worshipper) — to poetry. 
 
 Thou radiant spirit of the Muses ! never 
 Will I profane thee with adulterate rhyme : 
 Love is thy theme, or Glory. Never, never 
 
 K 2
 
 132 """HE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 
 
 Will I mix up the cavils of my time 
 
 (Things of an instant, which a day disarms 
 
 Of woith) or this my petty state's alarms, 
 
 Or jealousies, or vulgar tricks of need. 
 
 With ' peerless Poesy,'' — a poor base breed 
 
 Are they, not children whom the stream of song 
 
 Should clasp in its bright arms, as slow along 
 
 It winds into Eternity. The theme 
 
 Whereon my charmed spirit loves to dream 
 
 Is tliou^ — Queen ! — pi'incess of that sunny throne 
 
 Seated upon the waters, where alone 
 
 The glory of the world is not a name : 
 
 Even in Florence it is not the same ; 
 
 Yet here are woods and rivers, and tlie swell 
 
 Of hills, — the pastoral mead, and lawny dell : 
 
 But here lives not the Sea : — The ocean waters 
 
 Wander not here, nor lash our sylvan ground, 
 
 Making inmiortal noise, nor sound for sound 
 
 Send back to our mountain echoes when the daughters 
 
 Of the pine-forests shout in storm and gloom : 
 
 And we have not thy skies, nor thy perfume 
 
 Winging the azure air, — yet through green vales
 
 THE LKTTER OF BOCCACCIO. 331 
 
 Our Arno runs, and where the slope prevails 
 CUngs with brijvht kisses, till the yielding earth 
 Gives forth its coloured sweets, a cloudy birth ! 
 
 III. 
 
 Now shall I pass unto my boyhood ? — no : 
 It is enough, pei'haps, that thou shouldst know 
 That time was moiu'nf'ul to me : — It is gone ; 
 And manhood like a radiant morning shone, 
 And Keauty lit her lamps that I might see 
 Intenser day : Then life was Heaven to me : 
 My soul was perfected by passion, — pure 
 As marble ere the Parian pierced the mine 
 Wherein the carv'd Diana lay secure, 
 Yet lovely as that shape which is divine 
 Tho' mortal, being born and warmed to life 
 By hght as is the rainbow, (when the roar 
 Of rain hath passed) which was but cloutl before. 
 
 I loved: — I tell thee thou art not the first 
 (Tho' fairest) of the creatures of my love:
 
 134 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO, 
 
 For early did the floods of passion burst 
 
 My veins and overwhelm me, — yet I strove 
 
 Never to tamper with my nature then, 
 
 Nor call back my desire into the den 
 
 Wherein it had reposed for twenty years ; 
 
 For I had hope ('twas mixed I own with fears) 
 
 That the strong lustre of my love would lead 
 
 My thoughts unto their fountain springs, and feed 
 
 My soul Avith light : — 'Twas then I penned some tales 
 
 Where Beauty is the bride and her son ever 
 
 The God and master of my poor endeavour. 
 
 O mistress ! thou shalt read the tales I have writ, . 
 
 For love is there, and reason, and a wit 
 
 Which though it be abandoned at its birth, 
 
 And vanish for a time, shall rise again, 
 
 And in remoter places of this earth 
 
 Shall be a treasure to great men,* whose fame 
 
 Shall be commingled with my lasting name, ■ 
 
 Co-heritors of bright futurity. 
 
 O light of my Renown, I see thee on high ! 
 
 * Shakspeaie, Beaumont and Fletcher.
 
 THE LETTER OF liOCCAft'IO. ] 35 
 
 Tliis is not vanity : it hath (hriglit faitli !) 
 Its birth in darkness as the Lightning hath, 
 And yet it shall be seen from shore to shore, 
 And lieralded by spirits who shall soai- 
 On their own wings and mine unto the sky, 
 Siipremest poets, who can never die ; 
 For Genius, which looketh like the light 
 Is as the earth eternal, and for aye ' 
 
 Is busy with the brain, and still at night 
 Breathes beauty on the poet as he Ues 
 In thought, and doth submit to be compressed. 
 And languisheth or brighteneth as is best; — 
 And so is verse conceived which never dies. 
 
 IV. 
 
 In youth, I read (with Cino) serious law. 
 And should have read till now, but that 1 saw- 
 How dull and selfish the civilian's toil, 
 Ne'er ranging from his desk unless to spoil ; 
 And then they placed a cowl upon my head ; 
 111 change, and vain ! for I was forest-bred,
 
 13(J THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 
 
 And loved to wander in mine infancy, 
 
 And made a young acquaintance with the sky, 
 
 With rocks and streams, rich fruits and bhishing flowers, 
 
 And fed upon the looks of Morning, when 
 
 She parteth with the beauty of the Hours ; 
 
 And so I quitted the most holy men 
 
 With whom I herded, and (thus willed my sire) 
 
 I sought fair Florence : — Here I did aspire 
 
 Unto a base renown, and gave my all 
 
 Of passion to a faithless woman's thrall. 
 
 I revelled ; and (with riot and bright wine 
 
 Mad) did assert that span of life divine. 
 
 And shouted in the stern Carthusian's ear, 
 
 (Who having learned his lesson taught me mine) 
 
 " Love is but slavery and Faith a fear." 
 
 shame ! for then I knew not Love nor Faith : 
 No knowledge of them had I more than hatii 
 He who is mute, or deaf, or blind from birth, 
 Of speech or graceful motion. On the earth 
 
 1 lived as doth the hermit, who hath given • 
 His wisdom here away for hope of Heaven, 
 
 And shut the fountains of his thought with prayer :
 
 THE LETTER OF BOt'CACClO, i;^7 
 
 So, misted by a strange voluptuous air, 
 I travelled on in intellectual gloom. 
 Forgetting the dull poison in perfume; 
 But I awoke : — I saw a face as fair 
 As Dian''s,^-or thine own ; yet touched witli care 
 And pale, my princess, — tho' thy cheek is pale ; 
 And with eyes downcast,— thus do tliine prevail ; 
 Her voice was silvered, — like my Naples'" queen, 
 And her hair braided as thine own hath been. 
 When on some lamped feast, solely arrayed 
 In thy own costly beauty, thou hast strayed 
 (Like some white creature of the upper air) 
 Amongst us, marvelling at sight so fair. 
 
 This girl of whom I tell thee ( — she is dead^ 
 And thou wilt anger not at what is said) 
 I loved as I love thee. Less calm, perhaps. 
 Was that regard than the one now which wrap& 
 My senses in its clear unchanging light ; 
 And yet it yielded me most great delight : 
 But I was very young, and scarcely knew 
 Love's quick gradations, tho' it fanii'd and Hew
 
 138 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO, 
 
 Round and around me, and my heart was fire. 
 Until borne onwards by my wing'd desire 
 I traversed an Elysium. — 
 
 There may be 
 Passion like mine, — as true, certain more free. 
 But never was delight so large as mine 
 When I lay panting at Olympiads feet, 
 And she — she smiled ! It was a smile heav'n-sweet, 
 Like Juno''s when by Jove she did recline 
 Clasped in the Cytherean zone. I sprung 
 Into her arms and there bewildered huno- 
 On her red lip and gazed •within her eye. 
 Which turned and misted when my own was nigh : 
 — Why do I tell thee this ? — why, but because 
 I love thee, and submit to all the laws 
 Which the sweet tyranny of Love has sealed. 
 And Truth is one, — and lo ! I have revealed. 
 
 V. 
 
 When first I saw her — (young Olympia I) 
 Slic lived not far from Florence. One may stray
 
 THK LKTTKR OF BOC'CACUO. i;JO 
 
 Unto the valley where her cottage stood 
 
 On a britrlit morning-, be the season good, 
 
 Summer or latest spring : Her dwelling was 
 
 Fenced round by trees which shattered the fierce air 
 
 To fragments, pine and oak ; and ash was there 
 
 Wliich leaves its offspring berries to the grass. 
 
 And citron woods that shook out vast perfume, 
 
 And myrtles dowried with their richest bloom. 
 
 There dwelt she, sylvan goddess ! — there she first 
 
 Swam on my sight : I thought my heart would burst 
 
 With transport as I saw her float along 
 
 Towards me, and slowly read the carved song 
 
 Which on the oaken rind my knife had writ : 
 
 There was some idle praise, but more of wit 
 
 Had grown and mingled with that forest verse. 
 
 And I would often with a laugh rehearse 
 
 The song, thinking at times that some weak maid 
 
 ]Miglit love such incense if she thither strayed : 
 
 But / was to be victim : I had gone 
 
 Like an erratic fire upon my course, 
 
 Over the Heaven of beauty, all alone. 
 
 And now I felt Love's chaste and supreme force
 
 140 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO, 
 
 Press on my very heart, until in pain 
 I utter'd consecrated vows, — in vain. 
 — She perished in her youth ; nor should I now 
 Have told thus much, but that upon thy brow 
 I saw forgiveness — ('twas in fancy this) 
 And smiles that recognized my vanished bliss 
 As a thing risen from the grave, and bright 
 As ever in the summer of thy sight. 
 
 When pale Olympia died my heavy mind 
 Grief-smitten languished to a deep echpse ; 
 Yet brief, for I arose, half sorrow-blind, 
 And on her marble-pale (but lovely) lips 
 Laid the last benediction of true faith, 
 And grew an alter'd man. Great misery hath 
 A lustre in it, like the clouded moon, 
 When, of her darkness unattired soon, 
 She streams illuminating land and sea : 
 So grief soon cast vmdazzling light on me ; 
 I saw the many faults, the many ills. 
 The purer pleasures too that liaunt sweet life, 
 And I determined me to (piit the strife
 
 THE LKTTER OF BOCCACCIO, 141 
 
 And fever of rebellious joy, which fills 
 The mind with dull oblivion and sad care, 
 And scorn of all things here, gracious or fair. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Now will I tell thee how I kissed the air 
 Of Naples, and first faced its visions fair, — 
 Its blue skies and Palladian palaces, 
 (Like Eastern dreams,) — statues and terraces, 
 And cohimns lustrous with poetic thought; 
 All filled with groups arrayed in antique dress, 
 (Nymphs and Arcadian shapes, gods, goddesses) 
 From base to palmy capital marble- wrought, 
 And colonnades of marble, fountain-cool. 
 Amongst whose labyrinthine aisles tlie breeze 
 Roamed at its will, and gardens green, and trees 
 Fruited with gold, and walks of cypresses. 
 Where Revel held her reign (a gay misrule) 
 Nightly beneath the stars. And there the seas 
 Which wander in and out thy sunny bay, 
 Soothe Ischia and the crowned Procida, 
 Bright islands, with a thousand harmonies,
 
 142 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 
 
 Or answer ^vith rich cries, from shore to shore, 
 The anguish of the great Vesuvian roar, 
 When that eartli-tempest, scattering dust and fire 
 From its red heart in torment, doth aspire 
 To Heaven, as did an angel. — Many sights 
 I saw, beneath the softest sun that hghts 
 The Italian world to morning, tho' thine eartli 
 Was then not teeming with its fiery bhth, 
 But lay in huge repose, outstretched far. 
 Like a giant slain, or sad, or worn with war. — 
 
 But wherefore do I lend to thoughts like these 
 My perplex''d soul ? — Thy calm-enchained seas 
 Arc nothing now : thy purple Appenines 
 (Hither they stretch, clothed all Avith gloomy pine.< 
 From head to foot) are notliing : Summer now 
 Is nought ; and Spring is gone ; and Winter rears 
 His head and shakes the frost-locks on his brow, 
 And laughs at by-gone days and perish Yl years : 
 O days ! — yet one is my perpetual care, 
 I'iVen now : I cannot lose that day so fair 
 (It sliineth as a precious diamond set
 
 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. I43 
 
 In my poor round of thought) wlien first I met 
 In the Cord »' her church, thee, — hke a dream — 
 A fascination, into hght or air 
 Dissolving, — cliauuting tliy melodious tliemc. 
 Ah, peerless princess ! do not tliou forget I — 
 
 Oh ! with what weary steps my feet had trod 
 Street, square, and murmuring beech, and garden sod. 
 Till harassed by the languor of the hour, 
 I stole for refuge to thy church : — The power 
 Of music was awake, and to the wind 
 Just stirring, the most solemn organ pined, 
 And spoke, and seemed in sorrow to complain, 
 While, mingling with its mystic tones, a strain 
 Of song fell dying from a priestess"" lips, — 
 Such song it was (so sweet) as must eclipse 
 All sounds for ever. My dull spirit grew 
 Brigh ter — more tranquil ; and I paced through 
 The stone-cold aisles and touched the altar steps : 
 There saw I — what ? — a vision ! in the depths 
 Of holy aspiration lost : Her eye — 
 Thine eye— (oh ! thine it was) journeyed on high
 
 X44 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 
 
 Amongst the Avondrous Heavens, with such a glance 
 
 As might allure a seraph from his trance 
 
 Of adoration, when the rebel kino; 
 
 Passes the constellations, and dares fling 
 
 Delusion in the eyes of angels bright. 
 
 I saw thy soft eye wander, like a light 
 
 Starry, — meteorous ; at last it w^ept 
 
 Rich, happy tears, and midst its lashes slept. — 
 
 I stood — (how often have I told thee this !) 
 
 Enchanted to a vague oblivious bliss. 
 
 Like one who in a heedless hour hath drank ' 
 
 Odours Circean, and brain-charmed sank , n 
 
 Into some sweet futurity of joy : — , <. , 
 
 He, waking from his dream, with sore annoy .1 .- 
 
 Feeleth that still he stands a thing world born. 
 
 Heart-smitten, self-despised, alone, forlorn. 
 
 Yet not thus I : — for, when my alarmed heart 
 Turned, like a bird to some magician's spell, 
 Tow'rd thee, — I saw thee still in beauty dwell 
 Before me, with rais'd eyes, — silent, — aj)art. 
 As though the sense of song would not depart.
 
 THK LKTTKK OF HOlCACClO. 145 
 
 — At last, a fine and undulating motion, 
 
 Like that of some sea^blooni which with the ocean 
 
 Moveth, sinprized thee in thy holy lair. 
 
 And stole thee out of silence, lady fair ! 
 
 I saw thee go, — scarce touching the cold earth, 
 
 As beautiful as Beauty at her birth, 
 
 Sea^goddess, when from out the foam she sprung 
 
 Full deity, and all the wide world hung 
 
 ]\Iute and in marvel at perfection born. 
 
 I languish while I think of thc^ : The morn 
 
 Was not more bright, nor balmy eve as soft, ' ' ■ 
 
 Nor music heard in dreams wandering aloft : ■ 
 
 Thy cheek outblushed the sunset, and thy hand — 
 
 O white enchantment ! I have read and scanned 
 
 Its page, and tasted (once) its perfect bliss : — 
 
 VII. 
 
 Fair creature pardon ! Those were happy days 
 (Were not they, princess ?) when within thy gaze 
 I basked as dotli a snake beneath the sun : 
 ■ — Yet, wherefore, after all that I have done 
 
 L
 
 146 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 
 
 Of folly, call me like the serpent grey, 
 
 Which hath been wise esteemed from earliest day ! 
 
 I only on the flowers of thought have hung 
 
 As yet, and I have not the adder''s tongue, 
 
 Nor am I wary as that creature is : 
 
 Yet have I stolen from thee the poor bliss 
 
 Of ignorance, and wedded thy fine mind 
 
 To intellectual shapes and fancies bright, 
 
 And taught thee to look at the dazzling light 
 
 Of Truth, which striketh the dull sinner blind. 
 
 We two have read together glorious rhyme 
 
 Which Homer old and his great brothers writ, 
 
 In Attica and Greece, and the world lit 
 
 With Fame through everlasting thought and time.- 
 
 And we have read my master Petrarch's lays, 
 
 And fed his learned lamp with words of praise 
 
 Whereat he kindly smiled. Gracious is he : 
 
 (Like a good spirit liath he been to me, 
 
 A light in the perilous dark ;) his soul is full 
 
 Of all that is wise and great and beautiful. 
 
 And wheresoever, princess, thou shalt go, 
 
 Wear thou his well-lamented songs of woe
 
 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 147 
 
 Close to thy soul : — to mine they are a calm ; 
 
 A shadow to my passion, — (like the palm 
 
 Which hangetli cool above the Indiana's brow:) 
 
 A fountain where my brain may bathe its fever : 
 
 A refuge which is sure and tireth never ; 
 
 And to my wounded thought sweet and perpetual balm. 
 
 Would I might call unto thy heart the hours, 
 Those pleasant hours, when we roamed so free, 
 Listening and talking by the Naples' sea ! 
 Or gathering from thy father's gardens flowers 
 To braid thy hair on some feast-coming night : — 
 Oh ! still most dear are those gone hours to me ; 
 Yet dearer those when at the young eve-light, 
 Seated familiar near thy cedar tree, 
 We watched the coming moon, and saw how she 
 Journeyed above us on her sightless track, 
 And chased with serene looks the fleecy rack. 
 Or smiled as might the huntress-queen of Heaven 
 Floating, attended by her starry court. 
 O'er plain and mountain where their shadowy sport 
 Is again revealed,— or when all passion-driven, 
 
 L 2
 
 148 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 
 
 Leaving the azure moors she seeks her way 
 Through cloud and tempest and the peal'd alarms 
 Of thunder, and the lightning's quivering wrath, 
 Guided by Love unto the Latmian's arms. — 
 Oh ! so wast thou by love and duty guided, 
 And we were ruled by thee ; for each one prided 
 Himself upon obedience, — not in vain, 
 For thou wast as a virtue without stain, - • 
 A visible perfection shining clear, ' - 
 A creature fairer than man worships here. 
 
 — Mammon is worshipped here, an idol base ; 
 And Belial, cozener, (varnished round with grace 
 And smiling sin) — and the blood-hungry God 
 Black Moloch, whose large stained feet have trod 
 Temples dowTi to the dust and holy towers, 
 And ravaged the green fields and peasants'* homes. 
 And filled the river whercsoe''er it roams 
 And the great Sea with gore : The forests deep 
 He hath cursed, and startled from their innocent sleep 
 And cast upon their tops his red rain showers ; 
 And he hatli killed the oak that stood iov ages
 
 TIIK LETTER OK JJOCCACC'IO. I 11) 
 
 To bear his slaupjliters on the ocean wide, 
 
 And he hath torn the books of saints and sages, 
 
 And struck the house of Science in liis pride, ;•, ■ > 
 
 And drained the widow of her refuse tear, ' . • • 
 
 (The last) and bade the young bride hve alone, 
 
 And mocked the sire's grey hairs, the orphan's moan : — 
 
 Fierce war, in whatsoever shape he comes 
 
 A curse — 13ellona-like, or fiery-red, '-" 
 
 Or like a comet staring kingdoms dead, — ■ ' • 
 
 Or heralded by steeds and stormy drums, 
 
 Blood and the fear of death and pennons flying, 
 
 And close behind the murdered dead, and dying, " 
 
 Insolent ever,— hateful in all hues • :* ' 
 
 Figures and mocks and signs wherewith the Muse 
 
 Hath hid him i'vom the execrating world; 
 
 Whether witli flashing arms and flags unfurPd 
 
 He stands outnumbering the thick leaves at noon. 
 
 Or sends his trumpets braying at the moon, 
 
 Or runs from rank to rank, like courage caujiht 
 
 From A'ictors grey by those who never fought : — 
 
 ****** 
 
 But thou — O ]jrincess ! thou wast born to save
 
 150 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 
 
 The frail world from oblivion . Thou didst give 
 A light more lovely than did ever live 
 On earth or the wide waters, or in air, 
 Or such as are upon the blue sky lying, 
 To lift low passion from its brute despair, 
 And save the poetry of love from dying. 
 
 I thought that beauty was a fable, framed 
 To enchant the soul of boyhood into day, 
 Lest it should lie in slumbers dark alway ; 
 I thought that life would such chained dreams dissever ; 
 But tlum didst shine upon me : — T was shamed 
 And struck to adoration dumb, for ever. 
 Thou wonder of the earth ! fable or dream 
 Never entranced like thee : no thought, nor theme. 
 Vision however wild nor loneliest mood. 
 Imagination, with her airy brood 
 Of spirits that go mad beyond the stars 
 (But here are chained and fettered by the bars 
 Of earthly things too palpable) — ev''n She 
 Cannot from out her empire wide and free
 
 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 161 
 
 Call up a beauty beautiful like mine: — 
 
 I kiss thee from the distance, Queen divine ! 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Why did I lose thee ? — Wherefore was I sent 
 (Gently, 'tis true) away to banishment, 
 With such a passion clinging to my soul ? — 
 I cannot tell thee half its huge controul, 
 Its liery folly, — its so proud despair, 
 Its scorn, — aye of itself; nay, scorn of thee ! 
 Dost thou not marvel how such things should be ? 
 They were ; but I am well ; — and yet not thine ! 
 
 . . . And thou hast passed from me ! — Do I repine? — . 
 
 I ask my heart in vain ; — it answcreth not. 
 
 My soul hath but one sight : — It looks alone 
 
 Into the future, and the past which shone 
 
 So bright is now (save some few dreams) forgot. 
 
 — A change now as I write is happening. 
 
 My mind doth re-assume its strength, and fling 
 
 Away Hate, Envy, Melancholy, — blind
 
 162 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 
 
 Errors which hung Uke clouds upon my mind, 
 And now I stand strong- and with new born power 
 Arrayed, fit champion for a darker hour ; ' 
 My sight is piercing bright : my reason free, 
 Unfettered, even by love for thee : — 
 
 Yet often, methinks, as I lie pondering 
 Under the evening boughs at sunset pale, 
 I hear thee,— like that strange voice wandering 
 Amongst the vernal thickets, ere winds bring 
 Perfume from roses or across the vale ' 
 Enchantments come from the lost nightingale, 
 Before the morn-fed lark her matin weaves, 
 Or the thrush Avhistles, or the stock-dove grieves, 
 I hear thee,— sweeter than all sounds that be ; 
 I see thee, too, waving along : — I see , 
 
 Thy black Itahan glances, and they flash 
 Amorous delight upon me, till I dash . ... . ■ , 
 My burning forehead in the fringed stream. 
 And then I find thee (what thou ai't)— a dream ! 
 This frets me, shakes me ; but at last I rise 
 Emboldened by the pain, and througli the skies
 
 THE LETTKH Ol' |{()('(AC('I(). ^^f^ 
 
 All starry tracking my sublunar way, " J 
 
 Utter, — as poets used when Pindus lay ' . • 
 
 Open to Heavenly cars, and verse was strong 
 
 Witii fate and peril, — some pr()])hetic song. — ([■'■! ! t, '', 
 
 I 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 Farewell ! — The bars which hang around our prison ■ , 
 
 Are nijih dissolved : The sun hath set and risen 
 
 Again, and flung new morning on my world. 
 
 The aspect of the future is all wonder : 
 
 Innocuous lightnings, unallied to thunder,, .,j ^^y ., ■ ■ '■, ^ 
 
 Are every where in sport lustrously hurled. 
 
 A Vision of the Deep, of Earth and Heaven, 
 
 Is opened on me, — and my sight is driven 
 
 Amongst the tombs and towers of men to be ; 
 
 Eternity flows back with all her fountains, 
 
 And scythed Time lays bare the horizon mountains. 
 
 That hide the world to come even from thee.
 
 154 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 
 
 I see a Paradise where peerless flowers 
 Laugh in perpetual light, and crystal bowers 
 Fashioned for lovers whispers always sweet ; 
 And rich paviHons by the green woods shaded, 
 And airy shapes whose bows are violet-braided, 
 And forest walks trodden by delicate feet. 
 
 I see the lion and the lamb together. 
 The white dove hiding by the falcon's feather, 
 And the fierce vulture near his victim lie : 
 I see the peasant and the prince adorning 
 Equality and peace : I hear the warning 
 Of Earth, loud-telling her futurity. 
 
 1 see the Deep, and midst its caverns hoary. 
 Gold, helmets, statues, famous once in story, 
 And jewels brighter than in Ormus"* mine : 
 I see the shadows of the Deep (its daughters) 
 Floating afar amongst the azure waters, 
 Or streaming by my eyes in dance divine.
 
 THE LETTER OF BOCCACCIO. 155 
 
 And in the air I see illustrious treasures 
 (On summits higher than the eagle measures) 
 Of amethystine light, and rainbow shapes ; 
 And voices touch my ear, like running rivers 
 When first the Spirit of the Spring delivers 
 The world, and Winter like a dream escapes. 
 
 And now, a cloud, so vast no thought may span it, 
 
 Comes travelling on, and — as when some huge planet 
 
 Doth deluge the next orb with black eclipse, 
 
 It overshadoweth the world : Its hour 
 
 Is come — is gone, like the wild Bacchant's power, 
 
 Who dies with the bright frenzy on her lips. — 
 
 — 'Tis past : — and the wide scenes are gone for ever 
 The past like some slow-fading lamp doth quiver : 
 And in the present only doth my soul 
 Live, like a spirit, — by the tempest shaken. 
 Yet full of that bright strength that shall awaken 
 The world from error, and its blind controul. —
 
 156 THE LKTTER OF BOCCACCIO. 
 
 Farewell ! — Ever the same, thy friend, thy lover, 
 Boccaccio liveth. Though the wide world over 
 Fate shall exile him, yet no change shall bend 
 His courage, or resolving firmly taken : 
 But, though by every friend and hope forsaken. 
 Still shall Boccaccio be thy hope, thy friend. 
 
 Thy home lies far away : but every feature 
 Of thy soft beauty, thou imperial creature, 
 Within my heart of hearts will I retain : 
 Thy fortunes and mine own are far divided ; 
 Thine to a throned chair, by duty guided, 
 Shines fair — Awaj-, unto the sunny Spain ! 
 
 Perhaps, with somewhat of my old emotion, -.,„ . . ' 
 My eye may glance at times across the ocean, 
 And through the cloud-fed billows when they flee 
 To Heav'n, and through the phantom-peo]i]ed ether, 
 I may behold thee still,— wandering hither .; j j- 
 
 An exile from thy olive shores, — to me. ' - .
 
 THE LETTF.K OF UOCTACCIO. 157 
 
 And slundd I see thee on the amorous waters 
 Treading with white feet bare, as once the daughters 
 Of wing'd magicians could by some fine spell, 
 I'll clasp thee, beauty of the world ! — though madness 
 Rain down, or dazzling death, or endless sadness 
 Cling like remorse to me. — Farewell, farewell ! —
 
 THE FALL OF SATURN. 
 
 A VISION.
 
 .': i-ii /-
 
 THIS VISION OF 
 
 THE FALL OF SATURN 
 
 IS INSCRIBED 
 
 TO CHARLES LAMB 
 
 BY HIS ADMIRER AND SINCERE FRIEND 
 
 riJE AUTHOR. 
 
 Good Friend ! whose spirit, like an April day, 
 Is full of" change, — bright flashes and some rain, 
 Fantastic, gay, — yet gentle more than gay. 
 And rich and deep as in the populous main. 
 Take— (if thou wilt) — my song. I build my fame 
 Beneath the shadow of thy rising name, 
 (Which shall not pass away while wit shall be,) 
 Proud to associate my verse with thee. 
 
 M
 
 THE FALL OF SATURN. 
 
 A VISION. 
 
 I Dili: AM — I dream — I dream — 
 
 Of shadow and light, — of pleasure and pain. 
 
 Of Heaven, — of Hell . — And visions seem 
 
 Streaming for ever athwart my brain. 
 
 The present is here, and the past that fled 
 
 So quick, is returned with its buried dead, 
 
 And the future hath bared its scrolls of fame. 
 
 And I see the ' is' and the ' was' die same. 
 
 In spirit alike, but changed in name. 
 
 I see the phantoms of Earth and Air, 
 
 A thousand are foul where one is fair, 
 
 (But that ' one ' is divine, and her blue eyes calm 
 
 Are shadowed by leaves of the branching palm,) 
 
 And I hear the yells of a million more, 
 
 Whose sins arc all written in stripes and gore : — 
 
 M 2
 
 164 THE FALL OF SATURN. 
 
 There''s one who the gem of his best friend stole, — 
 And a King half-hid in a beggar's soul, 
 And a Poet who lied for his earthly good, 
 And a Woman of glass, and a God of wood, 
 (Wrapped round like the idol-beast that treads 
 
 With murderous scorn on the Hindoos' heads) — 
 
 *♦***♦ 
 
 I see a Palace — enormous — bright, 
 
 Studded with stars like an August night ; 
 
 The pillars that prop it are based below, 
 
 But whence they come or whither they go 
 
 Who, with an eye like ours, shall know ! — 
 
 The shafts are embossed and golden, and graven 
 
 With letters of Earth and Hell and Heaven, 
 
 (A terrible mixture, — like the speech 
 
 Of the Sea when it bursts on a stormy beach :) 
 
 There are discord — melody — music, — hung 
 
 Like beads on a rosary oddly strung. 
 
 And words of a mighty forgotten tongue : — 
 
 There are lessons to curse and a few to bless. 
 
 And riddles beyond the Sphinx's guess ; 
 
 And follv, and passion, and proud despair.
 
 THE FALL OF SATl RN. 165 
 
 And all m(X)tls of the mind are sculptured there : 
 
 — The shafts are of gold, and they run so hifrh 
 
 That they pierce the floors of the far blue sky, 
 
 And a million of creatures, whose size is a span 
 
 Climb round and around them, and each is — man : 
 
 All toil, some rise, some hang in the air, 
 
 And some fall with a shriek in a terrible lair. 
 
 Which yawns hke the pit of the damn'd, or a cave 
 
 Where the brutes of the wilderness hunger and rave. 
 
 Fierce flames are up-rising, and rain is descending, 
 
 And o'er all the cloud-black Heaven is bending, 
 
 And the insolent winds are unloos"'d from their den. 
 
 To hiss their scorn in the ears of the men, 
 
 Who drop like leaves, when but few do hang 
 
 On the blight smitten boughs: — Hark ! a trumpet rang 
 
 Through my brain ; and, behold, all the pillars crack, 
 
 And the star-studded palace is gone to rack : 
 
 It totters — it falls — with a human scream 
 
 Like the whirlwind's cry. — 'Tis — an empty dream. 
 
 A dream ? — what is it — a birth or death 
 or thought? — 'Tis whatever the poet saith :
 
 166 THE FALL OF SATURN. 
 
 A figure (a prophecy) dark or dumb, 
 
 Yet breathing a tale of the vast ' to come,"' — 
 
 A fable, — a fact, — a cloud unfurled 
 
 From all that was done in the last good world, 
 
 And in truth as alarming as Plato's fear 
 
 (Or hope) of that mighty embracing year. 
 
 Within whose perilous grasp old Time 
 
 Should return, pulled back by his locks sublime. 
 
 And the Earth should gape, and the urns spice-fed, 
 
 Should give up (just as they were) the dead. 
 
 I dream — I dream — I dream; — 
 A waking fancy now becomes my theme. 
 I dream of pleasures old, 
 
 And of the age of gold. 
 
 When every river ran a happy stream; 
 
 Before " The Syrian'' raged : 
 Before red wars were waeed ;
 
 THE FALL OF SATURN. 1G7 
 
 Before a hero fought or Fame was born ; 
 
 Before the stars were shamed, 
 
 Or men each other blamed 
 For deeds the frowning night beheld in scorn. 
 
 And now — I see as in some magic glass 
 Radiant enchantments:— First, far streaming bright, 
 Dazzling the shining earth with looks of light, 
 A figure like a God : He seems to pass 
 
 From Heaven to Heaven, and from star to star. 
 
 Till all the depths and darkened worlds afar 
 Rise u}) apparelld in his joyful ray ; 
 
 And wheresoeVr he treads 
 
 Pale planets rear their heads. 
 And wheresoe"'er he smllelh— lo ! 'tis day. 
 
 But on what lonely mountain bare and old 
 Sitt'st thou beyond the sun, — paternal king ? 
 Why look'st thou, with large eyes so blank and cold, 
 As though tlie eternal year were on the wing ? 
 Why at thy feet are they, the Titan brood. 
 Like brown leaves of the autumn strewed ?
 
 168 THE FALL OF SATURN, 
 
 In mute enormous anguish lo ! they He : — 
 
 No wind nor sullen sound 
 
 That shakes the harren groimd 
 Can stir them from their trance. A wake, or die ! 
 
 The Sun now blazes overhead : Below, 
 
 A river filled Avith ruin and half hid, 
 
 But terrible as Ocean at his flow, 
 
 Rushes along: — Palace and pyramid 
 
 Gray with the spoils of years, and mighty towers 
 
 That cost the Titans (all) a thousand hours 
 
 Of toil to build them to the cloudy Heaven, 
 
 "i 
 
 Are rent, and tumble in the stream. 
 
 With their dark masters, while a scream 
 
 Runs thro' the earth, as tho' its inmost heart was riven. 
 
 And thou — Imperial terror ! —Eldest-born ! 
 Hoary Satmnius ! — thou whom Heaven and Earth 
 Flung from their rich embrace, as the dim morn 
 Sprang from the grave of night, a mingled birth, 
 Half light, half darkness, yet like both sublime, — 
 Awake ! Arise ! Else shall tliou, ancient Time,
 
 THE FALL OF SATURN. 169 
 
 Fatlicr of many years, be swept away, 
 
 And no bright record left 
 
 That the young world wept 
 When thou the Pati-iarch sank before usurping day ! 
 
 He falls, he falls ; His ancient reign is over : 
 
 And on his neck a golden chain is laid, 
 
 And on his eye an eye 
 
 Darts like the blinding sun ; and in his ears 
 
 Sounds Uke the morn, terrible harmonies, 
 
 Rage, as the ocean rages 
 
 Beneath the eclipsing moon. 
 
 Silence is gone: and Night, 
 
 Glittering with terror, for the first time bares 
 
 Her star-bexoildcredjace, and strangely smiles ; 
 
 And the winds laugh aloud ; and every pore 
 
 Of the blue air stung with a radiant life 
 
 Drops sweets; and nodding forests lose their gloom 
 
 And twilight caves are shining
 
 170 THE FALL OF SATURN. 
 
 Set round with splendours like the set of suns : 
 And Music (which had perish'd) is born again ; 
 And like a bird new-wakened in the night 
 Uttereth her liquid notes, from spangled streams 
 And fountains, — till the leaves are touched to tears; 
 And every valley sinks writhing with joy ; 
 And every hill aspires, 
 Ambitious to behold a new born God. 
 
 Saturn alone (Heaven's king and Earth''s) with scorn 
 
 Looks on the time ; and with impetuous strength 
 
 Tears his harmonious bonds and golden chains, 
 
 And spurning, with a shout, the obsequious ground, 
 
 Invades the shrinking air. 
 
 — He rises, like a ruin, 
 
 LoosenVl by earthquakes from its deep foundations. 
 
 And hung in the days of plague 
 
 O'er some bad city, whose wide streets are thronged 
 
 With millions, stained with death, yet fearing woe. 
 
 How, if he so descend ? — 
 
 He springs, — he rises : 
 
 His course is like the comet's, fierce and bright : —
 
 THE FALL OF SATURN, 171 
 
 So the cleat h-lumtcd serpent, crowned witli wrongs, 
 Springs from the reeds of Nile: — So that vast snake 
 Strong as a tempest, that lays waste whole lands, 
 Darts, like a wrath, from out his Asian haunts, 
 And gripes the groaning lion till he dies. 
 
 He rushes thro' the air : the sullen air 
 
 Avoids him, and his wings, out^spread in vain, 
 
 Flap on the void. His strength departs : — he falls. — 
 
 As some brave svvimmer whom the waves overmatch 
 
 Looks far to land — in vain, 
 
 So doth the aged Saturn's starting eye 
 
 Glare on the faithless sky its red reproach, 
 
 Its first, — its last. The fiery Phoebus 
 
 Sheds all his ire on that unsheltered brain. 
 
 He falls ; and not a voice 
 
 From Earth or Heaven is heard to speak for him : 
 
 No tears (tho' false) are shed : no heart is touched 
 
 With human ancruish for a God dethroned. 
 
 to" 
 
 He falls,— he falls -he falls, 
 Ten thousand fathoms down,
 
 172 THE FALL OF SATURN. 
 
 And the dusky crown 
 
 Is stripped for ever from his kingly brow. 
 
 His son ? — His son is King I 
 
 Hark ! — the Heavens ring : 
 
 Jove is elected Lord of life and woe : 
 
 His thunders speak ; liis liglitnings come and go 
 
 His pomps are all around ; 
 
 Bright light and mighty soimd 
 
 Attend him, and his radiant armies flow - 
 
 Like rivers round the throne ; 
 
 He is God alone. 
 
 And where is Satin-n ? — On what silent shore : 
 
 Doth he lament his wrongs and old exile ? 
 
 In what dull woods whereon no Sunimei-s smile, 
 
 And all the Springs (if any were) are (/or 'i 
 
 Where Autumn and her bounty arc not know n ; 
 
 Where Winter pineth for his icy crown, 
 
 And the long year, breathing one endless sigh, 
 
 Strij)ped of the seasons hath not learned to die.^ — 
 
 — ^?alurn the king is gone : -perhaps in vain
 
 THE FALI, OF SATURN. 173 
 
 He liowk'th to the heedless winds his pain. 
 
 No matter : — Sueh great end 
 
 Is surely worth a friend : 
 The Father falls, — but, k)()k ! the Son doth reign ! 
 
 O Saturn, fallen king ! 
 
 Older than the firmament : — Before the Sun, 
 Before the Moon, before the glittering Stars 
 Thou wast ; — and art thou gone ! — 
 
 Oh ! could I with my verse 
 
 Stay thy chained ruin, 
 
 Strait I would rehearse, 
 
 Though my own undoing 
 
 Followed, as the night 
 
 Followeth the bier of the pale twilight. 
 
 But, ah ! in vain, in vain ! 
 Down-smitten by the sim's 
 Hays, innnortal pain
 
 174 THE FALL OF SATURN. 
 
 Through thy furrows runs, 
 Like the fierce quick hghtning, 
 When the stonn is brightening. 
 
 And tears, as from huge fountains 
 Where the Sea is nursed, 
 Spring, — and lo ! the mountains, 
 Moan vuitil they burst : 
 The great throne that bore tliee 
 Shrinks to dust before thee. 
 
 Every thing that * was' 
 Pines its life away ; 
 So shall all things pass 
 Which have birth to-day : 
 What is joy or sorrow 
 But — To-day — To-morrow ? 
 
 Life shall re-assume 
 Its peculiar birth : 
 Thovigh it seek the tomb, 
 It shall seek the earth
 
 THK FALL OF SATURN. 175 
 
 Again ; and like a star, 
 
 Or as angels arc, 
 Winged with etherial beauty fair and free, 
 Shall through finer regions flee, 
 More bright, more soft, more green ; 
 Than ever hei'e were seen 
 In Tempe's valley or Idalian groves, 
 Yet there the Cretan doves 
 Sang to the silent branches without fear, 
 And not a voice was near 
 Save hcVs who for the boy Narcissus sighed, 
 And, too nuich loving, died. 
 
 Love in etherial light cannot outrave 
 
 Its strength, nor perish from excess of scorn : 
 
 But, like the zephyr to the wild sea-wave, — 
 
 Like echo to sweet music, — like the morn. 
 
 Whose pearl-bright sorrow doth the leaves adorn. 
 
 It giveth strength and grace. Its boundless range 
 
 Is all the blue dominion of the sky ; 
 
 It cannot pass away ; it cannot change ; 
 
 But like the })erfum\l ether spreads its power
 
 17C THE FALL OF SATURN 
 
 (^'er the celestial vales and azure hills, 
 And with immaculate passion stirs and fills 
 All hearts, while Beauty — the eternal dower 
 Of Heaven, grows brighter still thro' each tran^cendant 
 hour. 
 
 Here, on this dusty earth, perhaps the Spirit 
 
 Of Love may droop, or soil its radiant wings : 
 
 Perhaps a — something it may chance inherit 
 
 Of what is around : -and yet the bird that sings 
 
 In prison learneth a melodious strain, 
 
 And often its sweetest song is born of pain. 
 
 So, in the land of sorrows. Love may shine. 
 
 Thro' clouds — thro' tears perhaps, yet still divine. 
 
 Divine as beauty — as the light of truth, 
 
 And fed with passion and immortal youth. 
 
 And music, like some white enchanted bird 
 
 In old times on Arabian waters heard. 
 
 Oh ! then Imagination was a God, 
 
 And on the world with radiant steps he trod. 
 
 And every leaf he touched, and every hue 
 
 He glanced on became bright, and all was true :
 
 THE FALL OF SATURN. 177 
 
 And still — as soft as fable, Nature sings 
 
 Still in the shadowy woods and haunted springs : 
 
 And birds at break of morn still wake the sun, 
 
 And some (more sweet) still chaunt when day is done ; 
 
 And some the nifjht wind witch with amorous sighs : 
 
 Only the swan is mute — until it dies. 
 
 — No more — uu more — no more. 
 
 The hour of dream is o'er ; 
 
 And troubles of the world bloom out aneAv ; 
 
 But youth — and sunny day — 
 
 And beauty — where are they ? — 
 
 The earth has lost its green ; the sky its blue. 
 
 No more with pastoral pipe 
 
 Shall I, when the year is ripe, 
 
 (Falling in golden showers, and odorous drops 
 
 Red as the ruby''s light) 
 
 Solace the pale twilight : — 
 
 Alas ! the nu-lancholy music stops. 
 
 N
 
 THE FALL OF SATURN, 
 
 Tn vain the reed is blown : 
 
 No sorrows save her own, 
 
 The watery Syrinx will allow to rise ; 
 
 But, — as tho"* Pan still woo'd, 
 
 And she again (pursued) 
 
 Fled o'er the amorous shallows, — so she sighs. 
 
 She sighs — like winds at eve, 
 
 Like lovers' tongues that grieve. 
 
 Like tones— oh ! never to be heard again. 
 
 Like voices from the sea 
 
 Where the sea-maids be. 
 
 Like aught of pleasure with a touch of pain. 
 
 A more melodious tunc 
 
 Never beneath the moon 
 
 Was uttered, since the Dclfjhian girls were young, 
 
 And the chaste Dian, l)rlght 
 
 With beauty and delight. 
 
 Lay listening on the mountains, while they s\mg.
 
 THE FALL OF SATURN. 179 
 
 A more entrancing song 
 
 Was never borne alono- 
 
 The ethereal sky, when at gray openhig morn 
 
 The fiery horses rise, 
 
 Like victors from the skies, 
 
 Tram})hng the stars away till day is born. — 
 
 — Alas ! — no more may I, 
 
 Pale Syrinx, sigh fur sigh 
 
 Give thee : — Complaining not my song I cease. — 
 
 — A spirit came and led 
 
 My sold amongst the dead, 
 
 And vanish'd. What is left, — but silence — peace .'' — 
 
 N 2
 
 TARTARUS. 
 
 A SKETCH.
 
 1)1, qiiibtis inipoiium est animarum, Umbi;rf)ne sileiites, 
 Et Chaos, et Phlegotlioii, loca niicto tacentia late. 
 Sit milii fas audita loqiii ; sit, iiuniiiic vestro, 
 Paiulerc ics alia terra ct caligine incrsas.
 
 TARTARUS. 
 
 « 
 
 The first rvgion of Tartarus is seen. In the distayue 
 arc the Jour rivers ; and nearer, Just visible throui^h 
 the gloom, are the mousters asleep. A spirit of Death 
 is watch i Jig-. 
 
 Spirit. 
 
 He lingers. Is the Sybil's spell so weak ? 
 Or doth the haunted darkness breed great feais, 
 Which shake his manhood.^ — Hark ! our Furies howl, 
 Lock'd in Avernus, deep, lest their snak'd hair 
 Should hiss strange terror ; and grim Charon lies 
 Palsied by charms, and dumb ; and there the wild 
 Flame-breathing Hydra, and the brood of Dreams 
 (All chained to pillars of Tartarian black) 
 Lie still, — save some, let loose to point the path 
 Which skirts Cocytus' shore, and give the stranger 
 Welcome from Proserpine, — our Queen. Hark! — No: 
 'Tis but the lazy Styx, whose muttering waves 
 (Sadder than silence) to the populous strand 
 Talk till the ghosts are moved. Again ?— Away,
 
 184- TARTARU!*. 
 
 It is the vexed flood of Acheron, 
 Scatterhig its broken billows, till the din 
 Touches the arched Hell ; and moans, beside 
 Its waters rising, discourse tales of sin, 
 And human pain, and hope which will not die. 
 Ho ! who art thou ? — the Moor ? 
 
 GuioMAR enters. 
 
 Guiom. The Sybil's friend. 
 
 Spirit. The Moor ? 
 
 Guiom. The Spaniard, Spirit ; though descended 
 From the Miramolin, half, — the rest through veins 
 Which blushed to mix with Mauritanian fire. — 
 Look ! I have here a rare and glittering branch, 
 Plucked from an Indian mine, where once it grew 
 Dowried with precious fruits, — the emerald green, 
 And the flushed amethyst, white pearls, and rubies 
 Red as the dragon's blood, who watched (for Jove) 
 The fruit all gold in gardens far away. 
 Hesperian centinel ! — 
 
 Spirit. You come to see — 
 
 Gtiiom. I come to visit 
 Your kingdom, Spirit, where the ghosts abound ;—
 
 TAKTAllUS, IS.'j 
 
 To look upon your pale society. 
 
 Already have I o'erinatched the Sybil's art, 
 
 By darker spells that spotted the clear moon ; 
 
 And now I come to syllable my power 
 
 Here, — in your black domain. That haj;- — She caught 
 
 Her incantations from the dreaming winds, 
 
 liabblers of conmion tales : but / have words 
 
 The wealth of an Arabian wizard's brain, 
 
 Accents drawn from the thunder, — from eclipse ; 
 
 Interpretations of the rebel hills, 
 
 When Earth was in her anarchy ; from blasts 
 
 That blow hot death : From waves that kiss the clouds ; 
 
 From clouds that spit their spite out on gray hairs ; 
 
 From the dumb ice; from rains and hurricane: — 
 
 Thus am I armed, dull Spirit ; and beside 
 
 With poisonous unguents which no man uncharmed 
 
 Can touch and die not ; and with drops, like gall, 
 
 Wrunjj from the adder when its hate was hiohest ; 
 
 Parricide tears ; and rich Egyptian dust 
 
 (StoPn from a pyramid) — which once was flesh 
 
 And bore on 'ts swarthy brow a jagged crown. — 
 
 AVhat more? —
 
 186 TARTARUS. 
 
 Spirit. I claim the word. 
 
 Guiom. (mutters a xoord) Ha ! hearest thou ? — 
 
 Spirit. I obey. 
 
 Guiom. Come, then : We'll look 
 Upon your monstroiis boasts and giant lies, 
 And shadows made immortal by great pain, — 
 Death and the howling Titans, and proud kings 
 Who shook their heads at Heav'n, and beasts that cover 
 Acres of Hell, — insolent prodigies, 
 Whose fables cheat us into fear. 
 
 Spirit. Behold ! — 
 
 (The shadow of' Typhon is seen.) 
 
 What see'st thou ?— 
 
 Guiom. I see the shadow of a dusky snake, 
 Curling its leagues of scale, and Avrithing hither, — 
 Away ! — 'tis dragon-headed, with bright eyes 
 Fiercer than fire. 
 
 Spirit. This was the famous son 
 Of Terra, who once scared the Gods from Heaven, 
 And planted terror on 01ym})ian heights. 
 Begone !
 
 TARTARUS. 1 87 
 
 Guiom. 'Tis gone ; and from the oozing oartli 
 A man comes upwards. 
 
 (The .s'hadoros of Tantalus and his ch'ddn ii rise.) 
 
 Spirit. Ay, — this was the Lydian ; 
 (Pluto's dear of!s])ring too) — the same who sate 
 At the Gods' golden tables, and drank life ; 
 But stole the ambrosian clieer and nectarous wine : 
 And so he fell from Heaven. 
 
 Guiom. Hush those hoarse voices. Hark ! 
 
 Spirit. They ivill be heard. 
 
 CiioRtJS, (Furies.) 
 
 Arise ! O waters, rise ! 
 While we sing, and mock his eyes, 
 Touch his chin, and tempt his lips, 
 Quick ! — and vanish ere he sips. ^ • 
 
 Let the fruit before his eyes 
 A'Vither as the shadow flies 
 At a touch, until he scream 
 Maddened at the hungry dream. 
 Guioni. Why, this is mockery base enough for earth. 
 No more, no more. Methinks his pallid cheeks,
 
 188 TARTARUS. 
 
 Lean and drawn inwards, move my pain. Away I 
 See, from his children how he turns liis eyes, 
 Struck by the hissino- scorn. Alas, great tears ! 
 
 Spirit. Pass ; and come onwards thou, — Son of the 
 Winds ! 
 Who married the Atiantean Merope, — 
 AVho broke immortal oaths, — who tried to chain 
 
 Death in thy palace 
 
 (The Shade of Sysifhus is seen.) 
 
 Guiom. Ah ! See where he toils. 
 Plark ! how his sinews crack : and what a load 
 Of stone he struggles with — he strains — Away ! 
 Look ! where it thunders down. 
 
 Spirit. 'Tis Sisyphus. 
 
 Guiom. Let the sad shadow go. 
 
 Spirit. 'Tis gone. . " 
 
 (It passes, and the Tor7nent of Lvion appears.) 
 
 Guiom. Who's he, 
 That turns for over on yon angry wheel.'* 
 There ? 
 
 Spirit. The Thessalian ;— he who his friend decoyed 
 And burnt to dust; nnd when great Jove took pity
 
 T.ARTAJll S. 1S9 
 
 Tpoji Ills pain (for lie was scorn'd by men) 
 And raised him to blue heaven, and gave him to driiiL 
 Olynipian wine, gvevv mad. 
 Guioni. How mad P 
 Spirit. He looked 
 I.ust on the airy Juno, — the sky (lueon. 
 And on her white breast led his fiery eyes 
 Till sense forsook him. In mad ravishment 
 
 He clasped her 
 
 Giiiom. O a brave villain ! Clasp her ? what ? 
 Spirit. Her shape — a cloud it was, no more ; and yet 
 Fairer than Iris when June rains are gone : 
 And thence was born the Centaur. 
 
 Guiovi. 'Tis enough. 
 One more, but for her name, (beautiful name !) 
 Agave ! 
 
 Spirit. Ilise !— Arise, daughter of Cadmus ! 
 Nurse of the son of Semel(> ! (She appears.) 
 
 Guioni. Is this 
 Agave ? — Oh ! where is her cruel eye ? 
 Where is the flushing cheek, — the rage, — the lip*^ 
 Stained black bv Bacchanalian revelrv ? —
 
 190 TARTARUS. 
 
 Delicat'st thing ! has story done thee wrong, 
 Flower of Hermione, and hed away 
 Thy wliiteness ? Oh ! no purple drops are here : 
 Nothing, save beauty which might shame the skies, 
 And lustrous looks softer than starhght. — Hush ! 
 She fades — she fades : a phantom then ? — She's gone. 
 Where is she gone, — oh ! where ? 
 
 Chorus. 
 Into the air — into the air ; 
 Where the stricken shadows fly 
 Who must never face the skv. 
 To her endless tasks of woe 
 Sad Agave hies v 
 
 Downwards as the plummet flies 
 Through the watery worlds beloAV. 
 Guiom. Bid the scene alter. These jxde sights 
 
 oppress me. 
 Spirit. What comes ? 
 
 Guiom. Oh ! perilous crowds : — By scores, and scores, — 
 Hundreds, — and thousands, — on each other's heels 
 Treading like madmen or swart idiots, 
 Shrieking and bellowing, some, some with their hands
 
 TARTARUS. 191 
 
 Clasped on tlioirlicarts, some with fixed eyes, and teeth 
 Clenched like a vice. — Ha ! look ! 
 
 Spirit. The mad Cassandra : — 
 And he who follows, clad in shining arms, 
 Was madder : he could drink, and fight, and conquer, 
 Beyond his fellows : — He, — who tears his beard, 
 Was yet most wise ; and he who, following close. 
 Snarls like a hound and spits upon the wind, 
 Was a proud fool, — no sage. 
 
 Guiom. Diogenes ! 
 A beggar in his drink were better. Ha ! 
 Onwards comes a blind man with hoary hairs, 
 By a fair child attended. 
 
 Spirit. Antigone. 
 
 Guiom. INIatchless Antigone ! 
 Even in Hell thy fame is beautiful. 
 Why is she here ? 
 
 Spirit. She feels no pain ; but lives 
 Near to her father, here, who else would pine- 
 Though in Elysium. 
 
 Guiom. ""Tis a gracious doom. 
 Minos hath judged thee well. But who is (his ? 
 (The fihndoxo of Caesar comci.)
 
 102 TARTARUS. 
 
 Methinks I see a bald and laurelFd crown. 
 And fierce sad eyes beneath it. 
 
 Spirit. Tliis was he 
 Worshipped the dark Bellona. When he trod 
 Past the red river with ambitions step 
 Rome, his great country, fell. 
 
 Guiom. Ha ! — Few like he 
 Honoured the purple, and with swoi'd and pen 
 W^rit their so proud renown. A sadness lies 
 In his sunk eye, white lips, and temples pale : 
 Is it remorse ? 
 
 Spirit. Despair. 
 
 Guiom. He never knew 
 The coward pain on earth ; but your foul air 
 Engenders the bad passions, — craft and fear. •' - 
 
 Spirit. He is but what he was. Your earth hath 
 bounds 
 Wide enough for all passions. I^lke great Hell 
 Mounting Ambition has dethroned your Gods, 
 (Yoiu' Gods of dust) and laid them prostrate,— thus. 
 Pass to tliv home. 
 
 ( The fih(ahnvJk{Us.)
 
 TARTARUS. I9 
 
 Thou niuscst, Guiomar — 
 
 Thy thoughts are away, — on earth. 
 
 Guiom. Give me to see 
 Adramalech, — my father's slave, who taught me 
 First how to grasp a lance ; and my brown cheek 
 (Then scorch'd by fifteen summers) smoothed in praise 
 Whenever I struck the ring. He was a fellow 
 Fit to unlearn the Gods. Throat-deep in sin. 
 He led me vnih. him, through the frantic dance 
 And the red revel. — As the Trojan once 
 Waked Palinurus from his dream of death, 
 And bade him tell why he, a pilot sage, 
 Tumbled amongst the billows,— so will I 
 Ungrave the swarthy Moor. 
 
 Spirit. Arise, arise ! 
 
 (A shadow rises.) 
 
 Guiom. Ay, — this is he : Yet his rich colour's gone. 
 And he'd a speaking eye, — but these are dumb. 
 Sorrow has touch'd liim, here, perhaps despair. 
 Speak ! how is 't with thee now, Adramalech ? 
 Was there provided no Elysian iiome 
 For thee, old master, — none •'' 
 
 o
 
 194. TARTARUS. 
 
 Aclram. None, Guiomar. - 
 
 Guiam. What hast thou done for this ? 
 
 Adram. Oh ! spare me, spare me. 
 
 Gviom. Speak ! what hast done ? Hast made inso- 
 lent love 
 To the black queen ? — no matter ; thou 'rt forgiv"'n. 
 
 j4dram. Oh ! ask me not. I slew — 
 
 Guiom. Be dumb. A horror ' 
 
 Numbs me : — 'Tis but a guess, — but svich a guess ! 
 Adramelech ! — slavish Adramelech, 
 Whom my great father spared from stripes and chains ! 
 
 Adram. ]\Iy kin had ransomed me, but that he chose 
 To bury my life — • ;:-;■• ■ - 
 
 Guiom. Thou liest, base bloody slave : 
 He saved thee, cherished thee. 
 
 Adram. He gave me gold, - ' 
 
 But kept back freedom : Then I swore to cast 
 Vengeance upon liim : — Thee, his son, I trained 
 To devilish arts, and turned thy blood to sin ; 
 Thy thoughts to wishes wliich good men abhor ; 
 Thy love to lust ; tliy liopes to unbelief; 
 
 And him — I murdered. 
 
 o
 
 TAiiTAurs. 19:; 
 
 Spirit. Go. 
 
 (The shadoio fades.) 
 
 Gu'iom. Begone ! Fine spirit, 
 Lend me thy fire — tliy fire. Where is my sword ? 
 Gone ! then may the shar]) pangs 
 
 Spirit. His doom is writ ; 
 Burnt on the iron books, as firm as fate. 
 
 Guiorn. O murderous villain ! — 
 
 Sp)irit. Look ! I change the scene. 
 Awake, bold Guiomar. Lo ! we have siohts 
 Sliall shame thy Spanish boasts. Look up! 
 
 Guiom. I scarce can look. — AVhat is 't ? — 
 I see a city which some moaning flood 
 Clasps in its fretful arms : and now — words, like 
 The accents of a drowning swimmer's tongue, 
 Gurgle into mine ear, and stifled shrieks 
 Seem born amidst the billows and then die. 
 
 Spirit. List ! In this pool, (upon Avhose unsunn'd 
 waves 
 The city of Death is built, a haunted isle,) 
 The spirits of the danmed are, doomed to waste 
 
 • o 2
 
 196 
 
 TARTARUS. 
 
 An age. Its troubled waters, which no wind 
 Ever did fawn on, are stirred up by groans, 
 And struggling wretches whom the torment stings. 
 Look ! The white foam thou see'st — is theirs. 
 
 Guiom. Alas ! 
 
 Spirit. Pity not, thou whose art darkens the moon. 
 Did not the crafty Sybil teach thy soul 
 Courage as well as truth ? 
 
 Guiom. I tremble not : 
 But on my human ears some sounds will fall^ 
 Which sting me into pity- 'Tis the curse 
 Of my compassion that it meets with scorn. 
 Swear thou some monstrous oath and bid it die ! — 
 Methinks my soul, which now was bound about 
 By dauntless strength, shrinks in this evil air. 
 Look ! how the blasted flowers and curling shrubs 
 Droop their black heads ; and blood-red poppies weep. 
 And horrid di'ops stand like Maremma dew 
 Upon the sweating boughs, and from huge roots, 
 (Crook"'d like a vulture's claw) the poison runs. 
 I tread on ashes — Faithless, faithless Hell !
 
 TARTAIUJS. lyi 
 
 Give fortli your fragrance ! Bid your winds blow out ! 
 Rain balm on mc, and in my faint ears pour 
 Sidonian music, and the moonlit son^s 
 Of Syria, — till I sleep. If gums be here. 
 Fume the dull ether with their sweets, and let 
 Rise incense, — though to Heaven. 
 
 O Granada ! 
 Where are your mountains now, where are your green 
 Forests and dawning slopes, on which the day 
 Kisses his pearly food and odorous dew ? 
 O Granada, my country ! in whose arms 
 Sleeps the rich blessing that once filled my life 
 AVith love, (such love !) — upon what frightful shore 
 Am I forsaken ? — 
 
 Spirit. Droop not, Guiomar. 
 Still hast thou much to see in these dark realms. — 
 Thou hast adopted us and our pale race. 
 We're brothers ; think on that. For the base earth — 
 Forget it. 
 
 Guiom. Ha! — I see a man who flies, 
 And one Avho like a Fury follows him. 
 
 Spirit. That is a Dream.
 
 198.. TARTARUS. 
 
 Guiom. No more ? 
 
 Spirit. What AvouWst thou more ? 
 Sph'it to sph'lt is as flesh to flesh. 
 His torment is as great as theirs Avho.5e backs 
 Are cut by the knotted scourge ; and he thou see'st, 
 Who by yon flame-hke vapour wastes for days, 
 Suffers as martyrs do, when blood-fed crowds 
 Choke up the streets of Seville. There, look there ! 
 Shadows are touched by pity. They but dream 
 Of that fierce acting which now mocks thine eyes, 
 And yet they weep. The tears of Spain are hoarded : 
 But these — ha, ha, ha — 
 
 Guiom. Stop thy hollow laugh : 
 It rings like a death-peal tlirough me, — Why rejoice 
 That the dull Spaniards feed thy God with blood ? 
 
 Spirit. They feed the fools who sway tliem, priests 
 and kings. 
 
 Guiom. Rail not, infernal ! Thougli the lazy blood 
 Of the gross prelate and the filthy monk 
 Stagnate, unless 'tis moved by shrieks and tears, 
 The time shall come — I see a glorious time. 
 When the weak nursling, who luuli fed on groan?*
 
 TARTARUS. igQ 
 
 From his red cradle up, no more shall staunch '; ' . 
 His di'ivclling folly with the mourner's hair ; 
 Nor tlic fine patriot's spirit be trod to dust. 
 Ila ! look ! ■ — • what scarlet shame steals alonir, — 
 there? - , . , ,r^ i \ 
 
 Spirit. It is the Cardinal . ji •'. 
 
 Guiom. Ho, ho ! Justice has cauijht 
 A saint at last. But where are all your kings? 
 
 Spirit. They sleep, — and dream, 
 Bound down to fiery beds by golden chains. 
 We pay due honour here. ...;.. ■ i , 
 
 Guiom. Hast ^/i02i no king ? ' :■ - • 
 
 Spirit. Ay, — if thou darest behold. 
 
 Guiom. I dare. 
 
 Spirit. Then, fly — 
 Shadows and spirits ; and ye towers cloud-built 
 Shake into air ! Open your haunted gates I 
 
 Palace of the great Death ! Torments and Pains, 
 AVho rack the body, and make mad the mind, 
 Appear, appear ! And thou, by whose great will 
 1 am. Prince of the Grave ! Avhom sha])e or space 
 Never encompassed, but through Earlli and Air :' /.
 
 OQQ TARTARUS. 
 
 And the orbVl stars dost reign, and here in Hell, 
 
 Appear ! — 
 
 Now, Spaniard, brace thy heart, and gaze ! 
 
 Guiom. I seem to look on 
 A shapeless cloud ; — yet something mocks my sight 
 Behind. And now, metliinks, uprise two thrones. 
 And from the back of one out-flames a star ; 
 O'er that a phosphor glory hangs, — a crown, 
 All studded like Orion's blazing belt : 
 'Tis Lucifer's, — I know't: — the other's hid, 
 Clouded, — yet, midst the gloom, a brutish shape 
 (Like a shrunk mummy) sits. Is he your king ? 
 
 Spirit. Be patient: thou shalt see. Meanwhile, 
 look here. 
 
 Guiom. Ha ! On each side, — in ranks, like courtiers 
 drawn. 
 Before some war-propped monarch, stand fierce Shapes. 
 
 Spirit. Mark me : Yon figure with the adder's tongue 
 And tiger-headed, is the Pain whose touch 
 Rages hke fire : That thin shape, pale as stone, 
 Is Palsy : that — Despair, with cold blank eyes ; 
 And he who shakes is Ague, hand in hand
 
 TARTARUS. 201 
 
 Witli the flushVl Fever and blue Pestilence ; 
 And there, swoll'n like a biill, the Dropsy lies. 
 That — that is Madness. 
 
 Guiom. Which ? * 
 
 Spirit. That beast, whose brain 
 Is stung by hornets, till he mocks the moon 
 (Far off") with howling. Hark 1 dost thou not hear 
 How the wolf laiifjhs .'* 
 
 Gtiiom. A shuddering sound. No more. 
 
 Spirit. How ! Dost thou tremble ere thy time be come ? 
 Guiomar ! 
 
 Guiom. My Lord ! 
 
 Spirit. Ha, ha ! thy lord is here. 
 
 Guiom. 1 do not hear your Furies. Bid them howl. 
 Methinks their voices, though so fierce of late. 
 Would soothe me. 
 
 Spirit. Dost thou fear ? — The ground thou tread''st 
 Is holy. In the presence of great Death 
 None come, save these (his court,) and I who hunt 
 jNIyriads before him ; — for his food is flesh. 
 
 Guiom. Let's go. Stand thou abide, insolent slave ! 
 ril force my path.
 
 202 TARTARUS. ; 
 
 Spirit. By me ? — Look well upon me. . "^ 
 Giilom. Thou— thou art changing : Ha ! 
 Thy bulk is swelling to a giant's size, — 
 And thy face blackens, — Ah ! thou'it Death ? 
 
 Spirit. I am his minister. Once, — when I drank 
 Numidian air, I was a prince, anointed, 
 Crown'd, worshipped like a Fear. Thousands of slaves 
 Bent at my foot-stool, and I built up towers, 
 And razed great hills, and cut deep lakes that chained 
 Sea unto sea. I founded pyramids. 
 Which shook, when thunder spake, tlieir pointed heads 
 At Heaven, and through the cloudy midnight read 
 Black secrets, and did act alarming spells, - . 
 Ay, tempted the bright stars (they waned) and 
 
 dragged 
 A ])lanet from its path, Avhich rushed aside . 
 
 Flashing and flaming, ruining orbs and worlds, — • 
 / did it ; — but the pale Sickness bowed my soul. 
 And I, who was adored and called a God, 
 Felt myself fading : — then I prayed to Death 
 To linger, — and lie lingered : while I swore 
 To yield to him my immortality, ... " : -" --.
 
 TARTARUS. 
 
 20^. 
 
 ir lluit 1 was immortal, — and he smiled ; 
 And he agreed, — and lo! I am his slave, 
 
 Guiom. A potent slave : alas ! — Now let us go. 
 Ha I — look ! The shadows fly — tlie Piiins — tlicy fade. 
 They are not real I . . ■ - 
 
 Spirit. Nothing is real, save Death. 
 
 Guiom. And thou — ? 
 
 Sjnrit. I am the frenzy of thy brain, 
 A mockery : — See ! 
 
 Guiom. Thou fadest — Stay! — Diaholus ! 
 Thou cheater — Ha ! what storms arc these let loose ? 
 AVhat raging ! Hush ! — I hear sounds like a whirlwind 
 Sweeping along ; and oaths that drown the thunder ; , 
 And the gloom trembles where the lightning looks ; 
 And the parch'd ground doth quiver as I tread. 
 Spirit ! — He's gone: and all are gone— save Onk 
 Curtained behind yon cloud. — False Spirit ! — Ha! . . 
 Look at his fiery track ! How he bestrides 
 The hurricane, and througli the thick air darts 
 Back his bri"ht scorn! Hush! — Hark! — the Horror 
 laughs. . •
 
 fl04; TARTARUS. 
 
 A VOICE is heard 
 Guiomar ! 
 
 Guiom. Ha ! who whispers ! 
 
 Voice. Guiomar ! — 
 Be read?/ ! Thou hast earned imirwrtal life . 
 And I, thy Lord, expect thee. 
 
 Guiom. Hcay'ii ! ■ 
 
 Voice. Prepare ! — 
 Thy home is made : Thy labours are appointed: 
 Thy name is writ amongst my pomp of slaves. 
 Behold ! / bid thee welcome. Death, thy king ! 
 (The figure of Death is seen.) 
 
 Guiom. Ha ! Ghastly Pliantasm !— Turn thy pallid 
 leer 
 Away : it sickens me. Methinks I stand 
 Full in the leopard's eye:— What arrowy light 
 He shoots out— Ha ! Begone, thou blasting dream .' 
 Touch me not— come not— Ah ! my limbs are locked. 
 (The arrow stril-cs him as the figure fades.) 
 
 Oh ! 'Tis a wintry bolt,— colder than frost : 
 
 Butrankhng,— rankhng. Oh ! Who laughs above ?—
 
 TARTARUS. 505 
 
 I hear thee, spiteful Spirit : and I corne. 
 Down to the lower graves, o''er-scaled by crime, 
 I go, to make thee mirth, — leaving for aye 
 This strange and melancholy wilderness. — — 
 From the rich Spain I came, (a bright blue air) 
 To look upon these heaths and sunless shores, 
 With no companion : — but a wizard''s step 
 Must stop not, till it treads the lowest depths. ■ . 
 Oh ! how I dreamed that I might spread my name 
 (Once — once !) amongst a wide posterity ; 
 And build up a renown, hke lasting brass ; 
 And be hereafter told of, as a man 
 Who sold his birthright (pleasure) for great fimie — 
 And now I die, — AvitherM : yet will I die 
 Bravely, — for so I lived. 
 
 Infernal Halls ! 
 Ye everlasting halls of Grief and Shame ! 
 AVhere are your crowds, your shapes, your wild array 
 Of daemons, and Tartarian chivalry ? • . 
 
 Where are your Gods, — crownd Sin and the gaunt 
 
 Death, 
 To herald mo? — I claim all sovereign pomp.
 
 ^OQ TARTARUS. 
 
 For to your cloud-black kingdoms never came 
 
 A mightier than to-day. Ha! look !— I see 
 
 A flame of horsemen rush against the wind ; 
 And bony crowds pass by with clattering feet ; 
 Hydras and giants, and wide-gaping snakes; 
 And hissing dogs, and vultures that drop blood ; 
 And the wild women with their crawling hair, — 
 Avaunt ! — and look ! the enormous Briareus 
 Comes, and foul Typhon drags his scaly train 
 Here, — here ! — Away ! — Dash down your bvu-ning rain I 
 Stifle me,— slay me,— quick ! — (he falls.) 
 
 O Lucifer ! 
 
 Prince of the morning, to thy radiant arms 
 
 Take me, for noAv I die. To thee— {v^ho wast 
 
 Banished from all the Heavens to tread dark Hell) 
 
 Star of a stormy world ! alone I yield. 
 
 If there be pity left ""midst thy despair. 
 
 Pity me. 1 have erred — and dared--like tliee. 
 
 Ambition was my God ;— and it was thine. 
 
 Pity me— fallen fallen. (Dies.
 
 THE GENEALOGISTS. 
 
 A FRAGMENT.
 
 TO THOMAS HOOD, ESQ. 
 
 My dear Sir, 
 
 I offer this fragment to you ; 
 partly because you are a lover of the mirthful, as well as 
 of the serious ; but principally because I am anxious to 
 incite you, by this open acknowledgment of your rare 
 poetical powers, to exercise them for the gratification of 
 the public. 
 
 I would not be thouo-ht forward in thus becoming; the 
 herald of your reputation ; but I am nevertheless desi- 
 rous of saying (what I have never before said to you) 
 tliat believing your poetical faculty to be equal to very 
 high accomplishment, I shall venture, in case you enrol 
 your name amongst the living poets, to look forward 
 with confidence to your complete success. 
 
 I am 
 
 Very sincerely yours, 
 
 B. C.
 
 THE GENEALOGISTS. 
 
 A FRAGMENT. 
 
 Two China-men, some tliousand years ago. 
 
 Lived by, on, at, or near the Yellow River ; 
 
 The name of one was Phang-, and Mother's Foh, 
 
 And both (but 'twas in China) were deemed clever : 
 
 Some said, indeed, that Phang was rather slow, 
 
 Yet sure to do his best in each endeavour : 
 
 Others averred that Foh was like the sun, 
 
 (Not bright, but quick) — you wished? — your wish was 
 
 done. 
 
 p 2
 
 212 THE GENEALOGISTS. 
 
 II. 
 
 Now, Phang — (the slow man) \\as by taste and trade 
 A joiner, making chairs, stools, tools, and all 
 Those things ; and Foh an artist, ready made. 
 Who painted doors and pictures, great and small, 
 Signs, symbols, likenesses, both man and maid. 
 Making the crooked straight, the little tall : 
 He painted quick, and cheap, and dichft cozen, 
 And always gave in thirteen to the dozen. 
 
 III. 
 
 Phang had an only child, — a youth — a son; 
 Not like the Chinese things we see in town. 
 Poor wandering drones, on whom a frightful sun 
 Has cast its common kitchen colours down ; 
 But slim, genteel, tho"' not averse to fun. 
 And ©""er his back a tail hung half-way down. 
 He was a beau, in short ; his face was fair. 
 And quite uncopper'd, which is curious there.
 
 Till'. (iI.NIw\L()(iISTS. 213 
 
 IV. 
 
 Copper 's an odious colour — for a face : 
 Jt courts (l)ut never answers) observation; 
 Tlio' I can't say that it reflects disgrace 
 As is supposed by some more serious nation : 
 1 only mean, one might supply its place 
 (Suiting our age, of course, or the occasion) 
 With white or carmine, or some other hue. 
 rink, brown, or anything, in short,— but blue. 
 
 IMue — but I must not wander from my track : 
 
 I left off with, I think, Thang's ' only child,' 
 
 A hero with a tail half down his back, 
 
 At which the ladies of his country smded, 
 
 Siglied, furled their fans, unfurled, and made ""em crack: 
 
 (The pretty souls are easily beguiled : 
 
 A tail in China, and a sash and sabre 
 
 Here, save young gentlemen a world of labour.)
 
 214 THE GENEALOGISTS. 
 
 VI. 
 
 The name of tins Adonis was — but reader. 
 
 You must not think the East and West the same : 
 
 Tliere Love is led, and here he is a leader ; 
 
 Here beauty is a boast, and there a blame ; 
 
 In England with warm sighs, wild words we feed her ; 
 
 In China they prefer her cold and tame. 
 
 By this, I mean to say — the Chinese notion 
 
 Differs from ours on this side of the ocean. 
 
 VII. 
 
 The name of this Adonis was— Chang-ho, 
 Only sixteen, yet he was quite a man : 
 He loved the daugliter of the })ainter Foh, 
 And talk'd — (that is, as well as dandies can ; 
 Their talk at best is trashy, and below 
 Man's level, — reaching but the blockhead's span.) 
 He talked as lover should who love discloses. 
 Likening her neck to snow, her lips to roses.
 
 THE GENEALOGISTS. 215 
 
 VIII. 
 
 They met in secret. Tlirough the azure hours 
 Of night they changed soft vows and kisses sweet ; 
 And swore by all the heavenly (Chinese) powers. 
 They wmild, uix)n the feast of lanthorns, meet : — 
 (Their lanthorns, by the bye, are not like ours. 
 But made of paper, oil'd, and very neat: 
 The feast is like our holy annual dinners, 
 Fre(iucnted equally by saints and sinners.) 
 
 IX. 
 
 They met upon the feast of Lanthorns, — pale 
 
 As possible (in China) looked the maid : 
 
 Chang-ho, in yellow boots and plaited tail, 'i 
 
 Met her, half-fond and more than half afraid. ^ 
 
 The lady who came first began to rail ; 
 
 (And ladies, as we well know, can upbi'aid) : 
 
 On which Chang-ho swore out, by Fum and Fo-am ! 
 
 He wished to Gad, that lie had staved at home.
 
 216 THE GENEALOGISTS. 
 
 X. 
 
 This led to some discussion : — How it ended 
 
 I leave all folks who know the sex to guess. 
 
 He kissed her,— once ; she vowed she was offended 
 
 Another, — she was angry still, — but less. 
 
 He then said that he loved ; but, if she blended 
 
 Such acids with her sweets, why she must bless 
 
 Some happier man— (Our phrases are erratic — 
 
 Erroneous I should say — when weVe emphatic.) 
 
 XL 
 
 — They met upon the feast of Lanthorns. Love ! 
 In tliy dominion are not lovers' eyes 
 Enough to guide them.? — can they elsewhere rove 
 Save to each others arms ? — Old sacrifice ! 
 (Of time and lanthorns) is not Heaven above 
 'Shamed of its lustre by thy lights and lies, — 
 Thy scandals,— wonderings,— about Fum and Ho, 
 And all thy stupid wooden kings below 't—
 
 THE GKNEALOGISTS. '217 
 
 XII. 
 
 I hate all folly, — fuss: 1 hate pretence 
 
 'Bout ' honour,'' ' iieart,' and ' gentlemen,' and ' station,' — 
 
 And all that sort of thino-. I hate that men's 
 
 Poor noughts sjiould thus be thrust on observation : — 
 
 For me, I don't believe 'em — (no offence !) 
 
 Better a bit for all such protestation. 
 
 I think that men are bad, and women good, 
 
 And botli — I mean in China, made of wood. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 Tho' here I may be wrong : the wood may be 
 
 But in the head ; the body may be pliant, 
 
 And flesh, — it must be so, and pretty free, 
 
 Else how could Chinese lawyer round his client 
 
 Twist (while a ducat 's there) his gripe, and be 
 
 Like Hercules about the earth-born giant.'' 
 
 How could they dye cups, — saucers, — or paint stucco ? 
 
 Or pick our sailors' pockets of tobacco? , ■
 
 218 THE GENEALOGISTS. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 Yet now ray logic's bad : — the thing is plain : — 
 IVe drawn a false conclusion : — I confess it. 
 This owning costs me to be sure some pain ; 
 Tho' none perhaps but modest men would guess it 
 And yet the fault of which I here complain, 
 Might have been hidden, had I chose to dress it 
 In looser words, and made a large conclusion ; — 
 But I foi-got the thing in my confusion. 
 
 XV. 
 
 But to return ; — and, now I think on't, I 
 Have quite forgotten to describe the lady : - 
 Her name was Fohi, a brunette, and nigh 
 A black ; her eyelashes were long and shady ; 
 And 'ncath them did she peer —prim, shrewish, sly :- 
 And did Chang-ho know this ? — Why Fm afraid he 
 Did not : for Fohi seemed as she had twice his 
 Small stock of virtue, but without his vices.
 
 THE GENEALOGISTS. 219 
 
 XVI. 
 
 Her little feet, were cabined and confined 
 
 In swathes of linen, fine, and white, and thin ; 
 
 And as her feet were prisoned so her mind. 
 
 Her studies ending where our girls' begin. 
 
 She knew a few words, such as ' Men', ' Mankind', 
 
 * Love', ' beauty', ' tea', ' toys', ' virtue', * woman', * sin' : 
 
 But nothing more. Her looks were human faces : 
 
 She read, and put them in their proper places. 
 
 XVII. 
 
 Midst others came Chang-ho's — a blank ; without 
 
 A single letter upon any page : 
 
 And why 'twas ever made might cause some doubt 
 
 I certainly might guess ; — I might engage 
 
 To give the depth, perhaps, of any lout. 
 
 Beau, beast, or blockhead, with unerring guage : 
 
 But after all 'twould be Uke some disaster 
 
 Of birth, or wood-cut by a Gennaii master.
 
 ^120 THE GENEALOGISTS, 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 And what is that ? — what's any niglit maiv worth, 
 Except by Fuseh ? — A le<^ of veal, 
 A ham, a pig, a pudding ( 'neath the girtli) 
 Such things, and better, to our sleep reveal : 
 Some are of hell, 'tis said, and some of eartli, 
 And some are like — (for why should I conceal 
 The fact ?) — our friends ; who ride us in the dark. 
 And spur us thro' the day with some remark. 
 
 XIX. 
 
 Whatever Chang-ho and Fohi were, is not 
 
 Our task. They loved — or thought— or said they did ; 
 
 They kissed, and swore to share each other's lot. 
 
 And do whatever not their parents bid : 
 
 They vowed they wouldn't have a secret thought, 
 
 And then, as usual, all their secrets hid. 
 
 In fine, Chang-ho declared he'd manage so 
 
 As soon to get the full consent from Foh.
 
 THE r.ENEALOGlST?. 221 
 
 XX. 
 
 But Foil, thougli wild and hasty in some tilings. 
 Thought much of birth, as wc shall perceive soon ; 
 (Like German barons, or dull Spanish kings, 
 Who think that high birth is a heavenly boon :) 
 i\nd— for some folly to the wisest clings — 
 Traced, as he said, his fathers to the moon ; 
 Anil much of her biiuht madness cmdd one trace,— 
 Tho' really not her beauty, in his face. 
 
 XXI. 
 
 Fob's face was large, coarse, hard, and scjuarely cut ; 
 His red-brown checks like pears diat housewives bake ; 
 And through his brow a wrinkle like a rut 
 Ran, and beneath, two eyes— like what the snake 
 Shows when its prey is near, half-ope, half-shut, 
 Twinkled, — or like a young star just awake : 
 Ilis ears were wide : his beard was long: His tail ! — 
 Ikil no— I wont attempt it •- I mu.sl fail.
 
 2^2 THE GENEALOGISTS, 
 
 XXII. 
 
 I'll paint his mind — his soul ; for 1 suppose 
 They have those things in China as in Britain. 
 They've eyes, ears, mouth, and something like a nose, 
 And a language bigger than veas ever written ; 
 Whether it has much wisdom in't, God knows 1 
 Or freedom, — for no poor wretch eVr was smitten 
 Enough to learn : — We'll grant 'em wise and free ; 
 Altho' I chiefly know them liy — their tea. 
 
 XXIII. 
 
 His mind was like a windmill ; round and round 
 It went— and went — and went, from day to day. 
 And never reached the sky nor touched the ground, 
 But folly-blown was tossed about, mid-way, 
 Or else amid a cloud of projects bound: 
 And so he lived, — (not wisely, by the way,) — 
 A bubble, or a blow-ball, — fashion, — fame, 
 So they were idle all, were all the same.
 
 THE GENEALOGISTS. S23 
 
 XXIV. 
 
 Constant to nothing but the moon, and then 
 
 Tracking her course — * h'ls ' course I should say, rather, 
 
 For Foh believed the planets all were men, 
 
 And that the moon, in fact, was his own father, 
 
 Although but little of the ' where'' and ' when"" 
 
 Could possibly be known, by which to gather 
 
 So strange a notion, — (but I before said 
 
 That he had curious notions on that head.) 
 
 XXV- 
 
 — Thou huntress, wlio upon cerulean plains 
 Followest the stars, and with cold arrows bright 
 Dost pierce the green earth tho' it ne'er complains. 
 Because it worshippeth thy beauty. Night ! 
 See how a beggar, here, thy sex arraigns. 
 Are all the poets Avrong, and he aright ? 
 Sweet Dian, art thou wronged by painter Foh ? 
 Give me a speedy answer ; — * yes' or * no ?' —
 
 224 THE GENEALOGISTS. 
 
 XXVI. 
 
 — These goddesses in truth are somewhat odd :- 
 I waited for an answer full a minute. 
 I've half a mind to ask her brother god : 
 He has an ear, if I could hope to win it. 
 Tm told some poets in his house have trod : 
 I wonder whether there 's a parlour in it — 
 I wonder where he dines, — I wonder whether 
 He sits or stands,— or eats and di'inks togetlicr: 
 
 XXVII. 
 
 I wonder — no : Fll wonder nothing more 
 
 At aught above the moon or aught that 's under ; 
 
 Unless it be, standing on some wild shore, 
 
 To mark -the curling billows burst in thunder. 
 
 Or hear the burning mountain howl and roar 
 
 As though "'twould split its own fierce heait a&under. 
 
 While far below the ashes crack and burn, 
 
 J*recis(ly where you came,— and must return.
 
 THE GENEALOGISTS. 225 
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 That trembling of the ground beneath one's feet, 
 
 As the' 'twould swallow all in its red fury, 
 
 Is terrible; 'twould stretch a nerve of steel, 
 
 To be thus buried Avithout judge or jury : 
 
 The thing is not fictitious. Sir, but real, 
 
 A truth, a fact, and this I do assure yoii : 
 
 I learnt it (for I own I'm no unravellcr 
 
 Of Nature's secrets) from a friend — a traveller. 
 
 XXIX. 
 
 This traveller (whom I know, and know no coward) . 
 A short time since went u]) the flaming cone, 
 O'er dust, and lava rocks, and rivers dowered 
 With death, and on the summit lay alone 
 Midst the black ashes, whilst the crater showered 
 Its wrath, and there he heard the mountain groan, 
 And bellow hke a creature racked with pain, 
 And sigh and moan like one who grieves in vain. 
 
 Q.
 
 226 THE GENEALOGISTS. 
 
 XXX. 
 
 Oh ! that Vesuvian beast — whose mouth is full 
 Of fire, whose breath is like the furnace blast ; 
 What was the Ilian horse, or what the bull 
 (The brazen horror) that Perillus cast ; 
 What is the kraken's splash, or the strange dull 
 Cry of the crocodile when Nile has past 
 By with his floods and left his slimy veins 
 Bare to the — thing (what is it ?) that complains ! 
 
 XXXI. 
 
 It utters its red shouts, and all the shores 
 And hills and jilains — the vallies — tlie tost ocean, 
 Shake like a wild stag when the lion roars ; 
 And mighty forests totter in their emotion : 
 The shuddering billow lifts its head and pours 
 Its white strength out, — as tlKy it had no notion 
 Whither it went, nor care : — the vast noise drowns 
 The laugh of cities, and the strife of towns.
 
 THE GENEALOGISTS. 227 
 
 t 
 
 XXXII. 
 
 Slowly and slowly a bright river runs 
 Down the dark mountain's side, and takes its way- 
 Companioned by quick sliocks like minute guns, 
 To where a little village lies, — or lav, 
 Till at the last, light like a thousand suns 
 Singes the wind, and bursts abroad like day 
 Trebled, thrice trebled — a hundred times — In brief 
 Beyond all calculation or belief. 
 
 XXXIII. 
 
 And still the river runs, and still the ground 
 Shakes as in travail ; and the vineyard leaves 
 Grow black and wither with a crackling sound, 
 And here and there some cottage upward heaves 
 Itself and falls ; and nought is heard around 
 But cries of women, and the curse of thieves, 
 Who amidst plagues and earthquakes always plunder. 
 ( — How they can pilfer then to me 's a wonder!) 
 
 n <<>
 
 228 THE GENEALOGISTS. 
 
 XXXIV. 
 
 Hark ! to those noises,— like the rush of cars 
 And ]asliing thongs, and countless ratthng wheels, 
 As thougli deep earth were shook by ruinous wars 
 Within, while every flaring blast reveals 
 Bubbles all o'er the sea as thick as stars. 
 And wide-rent chasms yawn till the sick sense reels. 
 And rivers are sucked in, and marshes rise, — 
 And still the cloudless blue is in the skies. 
 
 XXXV. 
 
 iUit now Ocean begins to roar : — Its deeps 
 (Hitherto hid) are opened, and light fills 
 'I'he caverns where the lazy sea-horse sleeps. 
 Who startled from his trance comes u}) and swills 
 P^normous waves in fear, — the dolphin leaps 
 Out of his element, and from the hills 
 The beasts run howling, while the darkened sun 
 Frowii<^ ■.\?>. though Earth had lost .'uid Hell li.-id won.
 
 TIIK (iliNKALOGISTS. 229 
 
 XXXVI. 
 
 — And .still llic river ruiirs. At last it stops, 
 
 HudcUc-d and massed, against sonic fence or wall, 
 
 Piling its strength until the ruin drops, 
 
 And then another, and then others fall, 
 
 Then gardens, houses, trees, the blushing crops 
 
 Of grapes, and corn ; for nothing seems to pall 
 
 The a])petite of lire, until it hies 
 
 Into the hissing sea, — and there it dies. 
 
 XXXVII. 
 
 But to resume— for really after all it 
 Will never do and cannot be defended, 
 This — this digressing, or whatever you call it, 
 Where foreign stuff with homespun thus is blended ; 
 There may, and will, and must, some ill befall it, 
 Unless the system be soon dropped and ended : 
 if it go on there'll soon be, (there the bore is,) 
 No middle, and what's worse, no end to stories.
 
 230 THE GENEALOGISTS. 
 
 XXXVIII. 
 
 So to resume — O beauty ! O the light, 
 
 The love of women when they 're true — and young ! 
 
 Their smile 's like morning and their eyes like night ! 
 
 And that ambrosian bloom about them flung, 
 
 Rich as a rosy sunset, when the light 
 
 Is passing, and the vesper bell has rung 
 
 Mongst the white Alps ! — (the hue I mean is rose, 
 
 A blush — but pink, as every body knows.) 
 
 XXXIX. 
 
 What is there like sweet women, — like their bloom, 
 Their necks outshaming the white dove's in whiteness, 
 Their small words hallowed by such fine perfume, 
 And their eyes flashing forth such fearful brightness 
 As might the heaviest blockhead well illume. 
 And make him tread hke Zephyr in his lightness. 
 Their look, their lips, their clasjT — Oil ! thrilling touch, 
 ;Soft as — but really, I shall say too nuich.
 
 THE GENEALOGISTS. 231 
 
 XL. 
 
 So ril return to Foh : — Well, Foh was proud : 
 Not of his pallets, nor his paintings, no : 
 Such pride was poor, he said, — (This was aloud, 
 And therefore somewhat odd that 1 should know, 
 For secrets are the things to catch the crowd, 
 And a whisper travels miles where nought would go, 
 Save but a lie : — that beats it by some perches: 
 IVc lieard it tried in playhouses and churches.) 
 
 XIJ. 
 
 Yes, he was proud: — ' IMy only daughter,' said he, 
 ' My Fohi, my sweet darling/ (here he wept) 
 < I hope to Ho' (which means to Gad) * youVe steady : 
 ' For if not, — and some tales have hither crept, — 
 
 * Your friends have whispered — yes, I know they Ve ready 
 ' To waken stories that had better sle])t — 
 
 * I know all that, my darling: — but I know, 
 
 * That if you wed Phang's son my name's not Foh.'
 
 232 THE GENEALOGISTS. 
 
 ****** 
 Oh ! Fohi, gentle Fohi,— art thou bowed 
 By misery,— mad, — distract, — a broken flower ? 
 A China-aster covered by a cloud ? 
 Thy vapours — did they pass in sigh and shower ? 
 Thy anger — was it long and rather loud ? 
 Thy love — a taper lit to last an hour ? — , 
 Blown to and fro by sobs, and snuffed by doubt. 
 And damped by scorn, — it hissed and then went out. 
 
 LII. 
 
 And when "'twas dead, and when her grief was ended, 
 
 (Some fifteen minutes, by the Pekin clocks, 
 
 It ran away in tears) like one offended 
 
 By what had given her heart such shocking shocks, 
 
 She turned to spite from sorrow, and so blended 
 
 Her self-reprovings with such merry mocks, 
 
 That some believed she feigned, and some that strong 
 
 Passion had made her mud, — but they were wrong.
 
 TiiK »;I'Nkal()(tIsts. 233 
 
 LIII. 
 
 She was hut (what frlrls arc loo often) — fickle; 
 Easily moved without or with a reason. — 
 Oh ! would ye thrive, ye desperate lovers, tickle 
 Your mistress'' vanity, and in due season 
 Water your words with tears ; but let the sickle 
 Spare the gaunt folly-heads, and by degrees on 
 You'll get iiigh as her heart, — that crockery shelf, 
 And there find fifty figures like yourself: 
 
 LIV. 
 
 A sheiiherd, with his cro(;k lialf-benl (through age) ; 
 An Alderman in liquor from Portsoken, » 
 
 A soldier with his breast-plate crack'd; — a Sage 
 Who turns his leaves in vain for some love-token ; 
 A dandy, ' formed," as bards say, ' to engage,' 
 Mending his manners while his bones are broken ; 
 A dwarf, in body under height, ;nid blind ; 
 An officer of sappers- under mind :
 
 234 THE GENEALOGISTS. 
 
 LV. 
 
 There may be seen the miser, sad but sly. 
 Letting his yellow gods at discount go, 
 (Coin for bare kisses); and the poet shy 
 Turning his gold to love, his notes to woe ; 
 The high priest with the tenth pig o' the stye; 
 His amorous notions can no farther go ; 
 If he succeeds, "'tis well — the pig ""s forsaken, 
 And if he fails, at least ' he saves his bacon/ 
 
 LVI. 
 
 Fohi had lovers, though, ' she never told 
 
 Her love,' to any, save the joiner's son, 
 
 To whom she languished to be joined of old ; 
 
 And now she called them over, one by one, 
 
 How she made sad the gay, and tamed the bold. 
 
 And with the gamester played at hearts and won ; 
 
 A nd conquered cannoneers with bead-black glances ; 
 
 And mowed down crops (of fools) at routs and dances.
 
 THE GENEALOGISTS. 235 
 
 LVII. 
 
 Which should she choose ? — Duke Ilan she feared had 
 
 pride. 
 And thougli lie flattered well, he mifrht not wed: 
 Old Thong was palsy-struck from side to side, 
 And clumsy country Ching-ti too ill-bred : 
 The shaking Ho-ang she could not abide — 
 That very Mandarin from heel to head, 
 That thing, patcliM, painted, made of cork and wire, 
 Old (and almost as ugly) as her sire. 
 
 « » • « « » 
 
 *♦♦#*•
 
 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 
 
 n A B Y L O N, 
 
 WITH 
 
 THE FEAST OF BELSHAZZAR. 
 
 Mamy a perilous age hath gone. 
 Since the walls of Bahylon 
 Chained the ])road Eu])]irates"' tide, — • 
 (Which the great king in liis pride 
 Turned, and drained its channel barc)- 
 Since the Towers of Belus square 
 (Where the solid gates were hung 
 That on brazen hinges swung) 
 Mountain sized, arose so high 
 That their daring shocked the sky. 
 
 Famous city of the earth, 
 What magician gave thee hirtli ? — 
 What great prince of sky or air 
 Built thy floating gardens fair ?
 
 238 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 
 
 — Thee tlie mighty hunter founded : 
 Thee the star-\Wse king surrounded 
 With thy mural girdle thick 
 Of the black bitumen brick, — 
 Belus, who was Jove, the God : 
 He who each bright evening trod • 
 On thy marble streets, and came 
 Downwards like a glancing flame, 
 Love-allured, as fables tell. 
 But the last who loved thee well 
 Was the king whose amorous pride 
 (All to please his Median bride) 
 Fenced thee round and round so fast, 
 That, while the crumbling earth should last, 
 Thou, he thought, should be, and Time 
 Should not spoil thy look sublime. 
 
 He is gone, whose spirit spoke 
 To him in a golden dream : 
 He who saw the future gleam 
 On the present, and awoke 
 Troubled in his princely mind,
 
 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 239 
 
 And bade his magicians blind 
 From tlieir eyelids strip the scale, 
 And translate his hidden tale : — 
 He is gone : but ere he died. 
 He was tumbled from his pride. 
 From his Babylonian throne, 
 And cast out to feed alone, 
 Like the wild ox and the ass, 
 Seven years on the sprinkled grass. 
 — He is dead : his impious deeds 
 Are on the brass : but who succeeds ? 
 
 Over Babylon's sandy plains 
 Belshazzar the Assyrian reigns. 
 A thousand Lords at his kingly call 
 Have met to feast in a spacious hall, 
 And all the imperial boards are spread. 
 With dainties whereon the monarch fed, — 
 Rich cates and floods of the purple grape : 
 And many a dancer's serpent shape 
 Steals slowly u})on tlu'lr amorous sights. 
 Or glances beneath the flaunting lights ;
 
 5^40 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 
 
 And fountains throw up their silver spray, — 
 And cymbals clash,— and the trumpets bray 
 Till the sounds in die arched roof are hung ; 
 And words from the winding horn are flung : 
 And still the carved cups go round. 
 And revel and mirth and wine abound. 
 
 But Night has overtaken the fading Day ; 
 And Music has raged her soul away : 
 The light in the BacchanaFs eye is dim ; 
 And faint is the Georgian's wild love-hymn. 
 . " Bring fortli'' — (on a sudden spoke the king, 
 And hushed were the lords loud-rioting,)— 
 " Bring fortli the vessels of silver and gold ^ 
 Which Nelmchadnezzar, my sire, of' old 
 Ravished from proud Jerusalem; 
 And we and our Queens will drink from them."' ^ 
 And the vessels are brought, of silver and gold, 
 Of stone, and of brass, and of iron old. 
 And of wood, whose sides like a bright gem shine, 
 And their mouths are all fdled with the sparkling wine. 
 Hark ! — the king has proclaimed with a stately nod,
 
 MlSCEIiLANEODS POEiMS. 241 
 
 " Let a health he drank out unto Baal, the Gociy — 
 They shout and they drink :— ])ut the music moans, 
 And hushed are the reveller's loudest tones : 
 For a hand conies forth, and 'tis seen by all 
 To write strange words on the plastered wall ! 
 — The mirth is over; — the soft Greek flute 
 And the voices of women are low — are mute : 
 The Bacchanals'" eyes arc all staring wide : 
 And where's tlie Assyrian's pomp of pride ? — 
 — That night tlie monarch was stung to pain. 
 That night Belshazzar, the king, w\as slain! — 
 
 — INIany a silent age the prow 
 Of untiring Time— (dividing- 
 Years and days, and ever gliding 
 Onwards) has passed by : — And now, 
 Where's thy wealth of streets and towers r 
 Where thy gay and dazzling hours ? 
 Where thy crowds of slaves,— and things 
 That fed on the ricli breath of kinjvs ? 
 Where thy laughter-crowned times ? — 
 
 K
 
 242 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 
 
 Thou art — what ? — a breath, a fame^ 
 In the shadow of thy name 
 Dwelling, like a ghost unseen ; 
 Grander than if laurels green 
 Or the massy gold were spread, 
 Crown-like, upon thy great head : 
 Mighty in thy own undoing, 
 Drawing a fresh life from ruin 
 And eternal prophecy : — » 
 Thou art gone, but cannot die. 
 Like a splendour from the sky 
 Through the silent ether flung. 
 Like a hoar tradition huno- 
 Glittering in the ear of Time, 
 Thou art, — like a lamp sublime, 
 Telling from thy wave-worn tower 
 Where the raging floods have power. 
 How ruin lives, — and how Time flies,- 
 And all that on the dial lies.
 
 .IIiyCKI.LANEOlS POEMS. 243 
 
 A WAR SONG. 
 
 Are the white snows which crown thy hills initroclden, 
 Arc thy sons valiant still, — thy daughters pure, 
 Ceraunia ? — or hath War, which makes the world 
 Blush in its blood, stained all thy hills and valleys ? 
 Awake ! The Turk is coming : — from liis den 
 Where he once slept, lustful, intemperate, 
 He comes mad as the sea, and blind with hate. 
 Awake ! Bare all your weapons till their light 
 Dazzles the sky, now sick with coming woe. 
 Awake ! The Turk is on your heart. Awake ! — 
 
 Awake ! 'tis the terror of war ; 
 
 The Crescent is tossed on the wind ; 
 But our flag flies on high like the perilous star 
 
 Of the battle. Before and behind, ; 
 Wherever it glitters, it darts 
 Bright death into 1 yrannous hearts.
 
 £44 ^ MISCELLANEOUS POEMS, 
 
 Who are they that now bid us be slaves ? 
 
 TJiey are foes to the good and the free : 
 Go bid 'em first fetter the might of the waves ; 
 
 The Sea may be conquered, — but we 
 Have spirits untameable still, 
 And the strength to be free, — and the will. 
 
 The Helots are come : In their eyes 
 Proud hate and fiei'ce massacre biu-n. 
 
 They hate us, — but shall they despise ? 
 They are come ; — shall they ever return ? 
 
 O God of the Greeks ! from thy throne 
 
 Look down, and we'll conquer alone. 
 
 The world has deserted our need : 
 The eagle is prey to the hound ; — ■ 
 
 It may be ; but first we will battle and bleed. 
 And when we have crimsoned the ground. 
 
 We'll shout at the slaves of the earth, 
 
 And die, — 'tis the chance of our birtlu
 
 .MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 245 
 
 Our fathers, — each man was a god, 
 
 His will was a law, and the sound 
 Of his voice like a spirit's was worshipped : he trod^ 
 
 And thousands fell worshippers 'round : 
 From the gates of the West to the Sun 
 He bade, and his bidding was done. 
 
 And We — shall we die in our chains, 
 
 Who once were as free as the wind ? 
 Who is it that threatens, — who is it arraiirns ? 
 
 Are they princes of Europe or Ind ? 
 Are they kings to the uttermost pole ? — 
 They are dogs, with a taint on their soul. 
 
 Away ! — Though our glory has fled. 
 
 For a time, and Thermopylae's past ; 
 Let us write a ncxo name in the blood of oiu- dead. 
 
 And again be as free as the blast. 
 The lion, he reigns as t)f yore : 
 Shall the Greek be a slave ? — and no more?
 
 M& MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 
 
 Away ! for the fight may be ended 
 
 Before you arrive at your fame. 
 Your fathers the land and their dwelhngs defended, 
 
 And left them to you — with a name, 
 Oh ! keep it : it sounds like a charm : 
 It will guard you from terror, from harm. 
 
 For our life, — it is nothing, — a span : 
 'Tis the body, and Fame is the heart. 
 
 Is there one who rejects the bright lot of a man ? 
 Let him be the last to depart : 
 
 Let him die on his pillow, a slave, — 
 
 For us. We have conquered the grave.
 
 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 24' 
 
 SONNET. 
 
 A STILL PLACE. 
 
 Under what beeclien sliadc, or silent oak, 
 
 Lies the mute sylvan now, — mysterious Pan ? 
 
 Once (while rich Peneus and Ilissus ran 
 
 Clear from their fountains) — as the morning broke, 
 
 'Tis said, the Satyr with Apollo spoke, 
 
 And to harmonious strife, with his wild reed. 
 
 Challenged the God, whose music was indeed 
 
 Divine, and fit for Pleaven. — Each played, and woke 
 
 Beautiful sounds to life, deep melodies: 
 
 One blew his pastoral pipe with such nice care, 
 
 That flocks and birds all answered him ; and one 
 
 Shook his immortal showers ujx)n the air. 
 
 — That music hath ascended to the sun ; 
 
 Eiit where the ofliev ? — Speak ! ye dells and trees f
 
 248 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 
 
 SONNET. 
 
 TO THE SKY-LARK. 
 
 () earliest singer ! O care-charming bird ! 
 Married to morning, by a sweeter hymn 
 Than priest e''er chaunted from his cloister dim, 
 At midnight,— or veil'd virgins holler word 
 At sun-rise or the paler evening heard ; 
 To which of all Heaven's young and lovely Hours, 
 Who wreathe soft light in hyacinthine bowers. 
 Beautiful spirit, is thy suit preferr'd ? 
 — Unlike the creatures of this low dull earth. 
 Still dost thou woo, although thy suit be won ; 
 And thus thy mistress bright is pleased ever. 
 Oh ! lose not thou this mark of finer birth ; — 
 So may'st thou yet live on, from sun to sun. 
 Thy joy uncheckd, thy sweet song silent never. 
 
 TINTS. 
 
 LONDON: 
 SHACKKl.L A\D A KUOWSMITH, JOHNSON'S COURT, FLEET STRF.KT.
 
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