And let him muse his fond deceit, REMEMBRANCE OF COLLINS. Where falls the purple morning far and wide In flakes of light upon the mountain side; Where with loud voice the power of water shakes The leafy wood, or sleeps in quiet lakes. Yet not unrecompensed the man shall roam, Who at the call of summer quits his home, COMPOSED UPON THE THAMES, NEAR And plods through some far realm o'er vale RICHMOND. GLIDE gently, thus for ever glide, O Thames! that other bards may see Vain thought!--Yet be as now thou art, Now let us, as we float along, DESCRIPTIVE SKETCHES TAKEN DURING A PEDESTRIAN TOUR AMONG THE ALPS. WERE there, below, a spot of holy ground Where from distress a refuge might be found, And solitude prepare the soul for heaven; Sure, nature's God that spot to man had given, *Collins's Ode on the Death of Thomson; the last written, I believe, of the poems which were published during his lifetime. This ode is also alluded to in the next stanza. and height, Though seeking only holiday delight; name. No gains too cheaply earned his fancy cloy, Though every passing zephyr whispers joy; Brisk toil, alternating with ready ease, Feeds the clear current of his sympathies. For him sod-seats the cottage door adorn; And peeps the far-off spire, his evening bourn! Dear is the forest frowning o'er his head, Moves there a cloud o'er mid-day's flaming By wisdom, moralize his pensive road. Host of his welcome inn, the noon-tide bower, To his spare meal he calls the passing poor lyre;t ing care Or desperate love could lead a wanderer Me, lured by hope her sorrows to remove, A heart that could not much herself approve, The lyre of Memnon is reported to have emitted melancholy or cheerful tones, as it was touched by the sun's evening or morning rays. O'er Gallia's wastes of corn dejected led, By secret villages and lonely farms, To where the Alps ascending white in air, And now, emerging from the forest's severe I heave a sigh at hoary Chartreuse' doom. tears; By angels planted on the aërial rock.* 'parting genius" sighs with hollow Vallombre, t'mid her falling fanes, deplores, From rock-hewn steps the sail between view As up the opposing hills with tortoise foot Here, half a village shines, in gold arrayed, There, all unshaded, blazing forests throw And steals into the shade the lazy oar; And amorous music on the water dies. How blest, delicious scene! the eye that greets Thy open beauties, or thy lone retreats : The unwearied sweep of wood thy cliffs that scales; More pleased, my foot the hidden mar-The never-ending waters of thy vales; Of Como, bosomed deep in chestnut groves, bound, Or lurk in woody sunless glens profound, *Alluding to crosses seen on the tops of the spiry rocks of Chartreuse, which have every appearance of being inaccessible. Names of rivers at the Chartreuse. treuse. Or, under rocks that from the water tower, chanted woods floods; Steal, and compose the oar forgotten retire The dull-red steeps, and, darkening, still aspire, -Thy lake, 'mid smoking woods, that blue | From the bright wave, in solemn gloom, and gray [morning's ray Gleams, streaked or dappled, hid from Slow travelling down the western hills, to fold [gold; Its green-tinged margin in a blaze of From thickly-glittering spires, the matin bell Calling the woodman from his desert cell, A summons to the sound of oars, that pass, Spotting the steaming deeps, to early mass; Slow swells the service, o'er the water borne, [of morn. While fill each pause the ringing woods Farewell those forms that in thy noontide shade, [glade; Rest, near their little plots of wheaten Those charms that bind the soul in powerless trance, Lip-dewing song, and ringlet-tossing dance. Where sparkling eyes and breaking smiles illume The sylvan cabin's lute-enlivened gloom. -Alas! the very murmur of the streams Breathes o'er the failing soul voluptuous dreams, [dwell While slavery, forcing the sunk mind to On joys that might disgrace the captive's cell, [marge, Her shameless timbrel shakes on Como's And winds, from bay to bay, the vocal barge. Yet arts are thine that soothe the unquiet And smiles to solitude and want impart. There by the door a hoary-headed sire Touched with his withered hand an ancient lyre; Beneath an old gray oak, as violets lie, Stretched at his feet with steadfast upward eye, [sound: His children's children joined the holy -A hermit with his family around! But let us hence, for fair Locarno smiles Embowered in walnut slopes and citron isles; Or seek at eve the banks of Tusa's stream,* While, 'mid dim towers and woods, her waters gleam ; The river along whose banks you descend in crossing the Alps by the Simplon Pass. To where afar rich orange lustres glow Round undistinguished clouds, and rocks, and snow, Or, led where Via Mala's chasms confine The indignant waters of the infant Rhine, Hang o'er the abyss :—the else impervious gloom His burning eyes with fearful light illume. The Grison gipsy here her tent hath placed, Her tawny skin, dark eyes, and glossy Sole human tenant of the piny waste; locks, [rocks. Bend o'er the smoke that curls beneath the O'er life's long deserts with its charge of A giant moan along the forest swells Protracted, and the twilight storm foretells, And, ruining from the cliffs, their deafening load [abroad; Tumbles, --the wildering thunder slips On the high summits darkness comes and goes, [snows; Hiding their fiery clouds, their rocks, and The torrent, traversed by the lustre broad, Starts like a horse beside the flashing road; In the roofed bridge,† at that terrific hour, She seeks a shelter from the battering shower. [ing wood -Fierce comes the river down; the crashGives way, and half its pines torment the flood; + Most of the bridges among the Alps are of wood and covered; these bridges have a heavy appearance, and rather injure the effect of the scenery in some places, still And red, above the melancholy hill. By the deep gloom appalled, the gipsy sighs, [eyes. Stoops her sick head, and shuts her weary She hears, upon the mountain-forest's brow, [below; The death-dog, howling loud and long, On viewless fingers counts the valley-clock, Followed by drowsy crow of midnight cock. The dry leaves stir as with a serpent's walk, And, far beneath, banditti voices talk; Behind her hill, the moon, all crimson, rides, And his red eyes the slinking water hides. --Vexed by the darkness, from the piny gulf Ascending, nearer howls the famished wolf, While through the stillness scatters wild dismay [prey. Her babe's small cry, that leads him to his On as we move, a softer prospect opes, Calm huts, and lawns between, and sylvan slopes. [gale, While mists, suspended on the expiring Moveless o'erhang the deep secluded vale, The beams of evening slipping soft between, Gently illuminate a sober scene; Winding its dark-green wood and emerald glade, The still vale lengthens underneath the shade; [recede, While in soft gloom the scattering bowers Green dewy lights adorn the freshened mead, On the low brown wood-huts § delighted sleep Along the brightened gloom reposing deep, While pastoral pipes and streams the landscape lull, | And bells of passing mules that tinkle dull, In solemn shapes before the admiring eye Dilated hang the misty pines on high, Huge convent domes with pinnacles and [showers, And antique castles seen through drizzling towers, Where'er below amid the savage scene woes; rear 'Mid stormy vapours ever driving by, Where ospreys, cormorants, and herons cry, Hovering o'er rugged wastes too bleak to [ear; That common growth of earth, the foodful Where the green apple shrivels on the spray, And pines the unripened pear in summer's kindliest ray; Even here Content has fixed her smiling With Independence, child of high Disdain. entwine, And, wildly-pausing, oft she hangs aghast, the blast. "Tis storm; and hid in mist from hour to Triumphant on the bosom of the storm But lo! the boatman, overawed, before The pictured fane of Tell suspends his oar; Confused the Marathonian tale appears, While burn in his full eyes the glorious [days tears. And who that walks where men of ancient Feels not the spirit of the place control, The old gray stones the plaided chief sur- of him whom passion rivets to the plain, And the last sunbeam fell on Bayard's eye; But now with other mind I stand alone A brook to murmur or a bough to wave, For most of the images in the next sixteen verses I am indebted to M. Raymond's interesting observations annexed to his translation of Coxe's Tour in Switzerland. |