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ON A CELEBRATED EVENT IN

ANCIENT HISTORY

A ROMAN Master stands on Grecian ground,

And to the people at the Isthmian Games Assembled, He, by a herald's voice, proclaims

THE LIBERTY OF GREECE: -the words rebound

Until all voices in one voice are drowned; Glad acclamation by which air was rent! And birds, high-flying in the element, Dropped to the earth, astonished at the sound!

Yet were the thoughtful grieved; and still that voice

Haunts, with sad echoes, musing Fancy's

ear:

Ah! that a Conqueror's words should be so

dear:

Ah! that a boon could shed such rapturous

joys!

A gift of that which is not to be given
By all the blended powers of Earth and
Heaven.
1810.

UPON THE SAME EVENT

WHEN, far and wide, swift as the beams

of morn

The tidings past of servitude repealed,
And of that joy which shook the Isthmian
Field,

The rough Etolians smiled with bitter

scorn.

THE OAK OF GUERNICA The ancient oak of Guernica, says Laborde_in his account of Biscay, is a most venerable natural monument. Ferdinand and Isabella, in the year 1476, after hearing mass in the church of Santa Maria de la Antigua, repaired to this tree, under which they swore to the Biscayans to maintain their fueros (privileges). What other interest belongs to it in the minds of this people will appear from the following

SUPPOSED ADDRESS TO THE SAME

OAK of Guernica! Tree of holier power Than that which in Dodona did enshrine (So faith too fondly deemed) a voice divine Heard from the depths of its aërial bowerHow canst thou flourish at this blighting hour?

What hope, what joy can sunshine bring to

thee,

Or the soft breezes from the Atlantic sea, The dews of morn, or April's tender

shower?

Stroke merciful and welcome would that be Which should extend thy branches on the

ground,

If never more within their shady round Those lofty-minded Lawgivers shall meet, Peasant and lord, in their appointed seat, Guardians of Biscay's ancient liberty.

1810.

INDIGNATION OF A HIGH-MINDED SPANIARD

WE can endure that He should waste our lands,

"'Tis known," cried they, "that he, who Despoil our temples, and by sword and

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THE FRENCH AND THE SPANISH GUERILLAS

HUNGER, and sultry heat, and nipping blast From bleak hill-top, and length of march by night

Through heavy swamp, or over snow-clad height

These hardships ill-sustained, these dangers

past,

The roving Spanish Bands are reached at last,

Charged, and dispersed like foam: but as a flight

Of scattered quails by signs do reunite, So these,and, heard of once again, are chased

With combinations of long-practised art And newly-kindled hope; but they are fledGone are they, viewless as the buried dead: Where now?-Their sword is at the Foeman's heart;

And thus from year to year his walk they thwart,

And hang like dreams around his guilty bed. 1810.

EPITAPHS 1810.

TRANSLATED FROM CHIABRERA

Those from Chiabrera were chiefly translated when Mr. Coleridge was writing his Friend," in which periodical my "Essay on Epitaphs," written about that time, was first published. For further notice of Chiabrera, in connection with his Epitaphs, see "Musings at Aquapendente."

I

WEEP not, beloved Friends! nor let the air For me with sighs be troubled. Not from life

Have I been taken; this is genuine life And this alone-the life which now I live In peace eternal; where desire and joy Together move in fellowship without end.Francesco Ceni willed that, after death, His tombstone thus should speak for him. And surely

Small cause there is for that fond wish of

Ours

Long to continue in this world; a world That keeps not faith, nor yet can point a

hope

To good, whereof itself is destitute.

II

PERHAPS Some needful service of the State Drew TITUS from the depth of studious bowers,

And doomed him to contend in faithless

courts,

Where gold determines between right and wrong.

Yet did at length his loyalty of heart,
And his pure native genius, lead him back
To wait upon the bright and gracious Muses,
Whom he had early loved. And not in
vain

Such course he held! Bologna's learned schools

Were gladdened by the Sage's voice, and hung

With fondness on those sweet Nestorian strains.

There pleasure crowned his days; and all his thoughts

A roseate fragrance breathed.1-O human life,

That never art secure from dolorous change!
Behold a high injunction suddenly
To Arno's side hath brought him, and he
charmed

A Tuscan audience: but full soon was called
To the perpetual silence of the grave.
Mourn, Italy, the loss of him who stood
A Champion stedfast and invincible,
To quell the rage of literary War!

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To bow his forehead in the courts of kings,
Will tell of fraud and never-ceasing hate,
Envy and heart-inquietude, derived
From intricate cabals of treacherous friends.
I, who on shipboard lived from earliest
youth,

Could represent the countenance horrible Of the vexed waters, and the indignant rage

Fifty years

Of Auster and Boötes.
Over the well-steered galleys did I rule:—
From huge Pelorus to the Atlantic pillars,
Rises no mountain to mine eyes unknown;
And the broad gulfs I traversed oft and
oft:

Of every cloud which in the heavens might stir

I knew the force; and hence the rough sea's pride

Availed not to my Vessel's overthrow.
What noble pomp and frequent have not I
On regal decks beheld! yet in the end
I learned that one poor moment can suffice
To equalise the lofty and the low.
We sail the sea of life-a Calm One finds,
And One a Tempest-and, the voyage o'er,
Death is the quiet haven of us all.

If more of my condition ye would know,
Savona was my birth-place, and I sprang

Of noble parents; seventy years and three Lived I-then yielded to a slow disease.

In thy appointed way, and bear in mind How fleeting and how frail is human life!

V

TRUE is it that Ambrosio Salinero

With an untoward fate was long involved
In odious litigation; and full long,
Fate harder still! had he to endure assaults
Of racking malady. And true it is
That not the less a frank courageous heart
And buoyant spirit triumphed over pain;
And he was strong to follow in the steps
Of the fair Muses. Not a covert path
Leads to the dear Parnassian forest's shade,
That might from him be hidden; not a
track

Mounts to pellucid Hippocrene, but he Had traced its windings.-This Savona knows,

Yet no sepulchral honours to her Son

She paid, for in our age the heart is ruled Only by gold. And now a simple stone Inscribed with this memorial here is raised By his bereft, his lonely, Chiabrera.

Think not, O Passenger! who read'st the lines,

That an exceeding love hath dazzled me; No-he was One whose memory ought to spread

Where'er Permessus bears an honoured

name,

And live as long as its pure stream shall flow.

VI

DESTINED to war from very infancy
Was I, Roberto Dati, and I took
In Malta the white symbol of the Cross :
Nor in life's vigorous season did I shun
Hazard or toil; among the sands was

seen

Of Libya; and not seldom, on the banks
Of wide Hungarian Danube, 'twas my lot
To hear the sanguinary trumpet sounded.
So lived I, and repined not at such fate:
This only grieves me, for it seems a wrong,
That stripped of arms I to my end am
brought

On the soft down of my paternal home.
Yet haply Arno shall be spared all cause
To blush for me. Thou, loiter not nor
halt

VII

O FLOWER of all that springs from gentle blood,

And all that generous nurture breeds to make

Youth amiable; O friend so true of soul To fair Aglaia; by what envy moved, Lelius! has death cut short thy brilliant day

In its sweet opening? and what dire mishap

Has from Savona torn her best delight? For thee she mourns, nor e'er will cease to mourn;

And, should the out-pourings of her eyes suffice not

For her heart's grief, she will entreat Sebeto Not to withhold his bounteous aid, Sebeto Who saw thee, on his margin, yield to death,

In the chaste arms of thy beloved Love!
What profit riches? what does youth avail?
Dust are our hopes ;-I, weeping bitterly,
Penned these sad lines, nor can forbear to
pray

That every gentle Spirit hither led
May read them, not without some bitter

tears.

VIII

NOT without heavy grief of heart did He On whom the duty fell (for at that time The father sojourned in a distant land). Deposit in the hollow of this tomb

A brother's Child, most tenderly beloved! FRANCESCO was the name the Youth had borne,

POZZOBONNELLI his illustrious house;
And, when beneath this stone the Corse
was laid,

The eyes of all Savona streamed with tears.
Alas! the twentieth April of his life
Had scarcely flowered and at this early
time,

By genuine virtue he inspired a hope
That greatly cheered his country to his

kin

He promised comfort; and the flattering thoughts

His friends had in their fondness enter. tained,1

He suffered not to languish or decay.
Now is there not good reason to break
forth

Into a passionate lament ?-O Soul !
Short while a Pilgrim in our nether world,
Do thou enjoy the calm empyreal air;
And round this earthly tomb let roses rise,
An everlasting spring! in memory
Of that delightful fragrance which was once
From thy mild manners quietly exhaled.

IX

PAUSE, courteous Spirit!-Balbi supplicates
That Thou, with no reluctant voice, for him
Here laid in mortal darkness, wouldst prefer
A prayer to the Redeemer of the world.
This to the dead by sacred right belongs;
All else is nothing.-Did occasion suit
To tell his worth, the marble of this tomb
Would ill suffice: for Plato's lore sublime,
And all the wisdom of the Stagyrite,
Enriched and beautified his studious mind:
With Archimedes also he conversed

As with a chosen friend; nor did he leave
Those laureat wreaths ungathered which the

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Thy dissolution brings, that in my soul
Is present and perpetually abides
A shadow, never, never to be displaced
By the returning substance, seen or touched,
Seen by mine eyes, or clasped in my em-
brace.

Absence and death how differ they! and how

Shall I admit that nothing can restore
What one short sigh so easily removed?-
Death, life, and sleep, reality and thought,
Assist me, God, their boundaries to know,
O teach me calm submission to thy Will!
The Child she mourned had overstepped
the pale

Of Infancy, but still did breathe the air
That sanctifies its confines, and partook
Reflected beams of that celestial light
To all the Little-ones on sinful earth
Not unvouchsafed- -a light that warmed
and cheered

Those several qualities of heart and mind Which, in her own blest nature, rooted deep,

Daily before the Mother's watchful eye,
And not hers only, their peculiar charms
Unfolded, beauty, for its present self,
And for its promises to future years,
With not unfrequent rapture fondly hailed.

Have you espied upon a dewy lawn
A pair of Leverets each provoking each
To a continuance of their fearless sport,
Two separate Creatures in their several
gifts

Abounding, but so fashioned that, in all That Nature prompts them to display, their looks,

Their starts of motion and their fits of rest,

An undistinguishable style appears
And character of gladness, as if Spring
Lodged in their innocent bosoms, and the
spirit

Of the rejoicing morning were their own?

Such union, in the lovely Girl maintained And her twin Brother, had the parent

seen,

Ere, pouncing like a ravenous bird of prey,

Death in a moment parted them, and left The Mother, in her turns of anguish, worse Than desolate; for oft-times from the

sound

Of the survivor's sweetest voice (dear child,

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