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Such, haply, yon ITALIAN Maid,
Our Lady's laggard Votaress,
Halting beneath the chestnut shade
To accomplish there her loveliness:
Nice aid maternal fingers lend;
A Sister serves with slacker hand;

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Then, glittering like a star, she joins the festal band.

III.

How blest (if truth may entertain

Coy fancy with a bolder strain)

The HELVETIAN Girl-who daily braves,

In her light skiff, the tossing waves,

And quits the bosom of the deep

Only to climb the rugged steep!

Say whence that modulated shout!

From Wood-nymph of Diana's throng?
Or does the greeting to a rout
Of giddy Bacchanals belong?
Jubilant outcry! rock and glade
Resounded-but the voice obeyed
The breath of an Helvetian Maid.

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IV.

Her beauty dazzles the thick wood;

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Her courage animates the flood;

Her steps the elastic green-sward meets

Returning unreluctant sweets;

The mountains (as ye heard) rejoice
Aloud, saluted by her voice!
Blithe Paragon of Alpine grace,
Be as thou art-for through thy veins
The blood of Heroes runs its race!

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And nobly wilt thou brook the chains
That, for the virtuous, Life prepares;
The fetters which the Matron wears;

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The patriot Mother's weight of anxious cares!

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V.

Sweet HIGHLAND Girl!' a very shower
Of beauty was thy earthly dower,"
When thou didst flit before mine eyes,
Gay vision under sullen skies,

While Hope and Love around thee played,
Near the rough Falls of Inversneyd!
Have they, who nursed the blossom, seen,
No breach of promise in the fruit?
Was joy, in following joy, as keen
As grief can be in grief's pursuit ?
When youth had flown did hope still bless
Thy goings-or the cheerfulness

Of innocence survive to mitigate distress?

VI.

But from our course why turn-to tread
A way with shadows overspread;
Where what we gladliest would believe
Is feared as what may most deceive?
Bright Spirit, not with amaranth crowned
But heath-bells from thy native ground,
Time cannot thin thy flowing hair,
Nor take one ray of light from Thee;

The gift of immortality;

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For in my Fancy thou dost share

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And there shall bloom, with Thee allied,

The Votaress by Lugano's side;

And that intrepid Nymph, on Uri's steep descried!

XXIX.

THE COLUMN INTENDED BY BUONAPARTE FOR A TRIUMPHAL EDIFICE IN MILAN, NOW LYING BY THE WAY-SIDE IN THE SIMPLON PASS.

AMBITION

slope

following down this far-famed

'See address to a Highland Girl. P. 83.

Her Pioneer, the snow-dissolving Sun,
While clarions prate of kingdoms to be won-
Perchance, in future ages, here may stop;
Taught to mistrust her flattering horoscope 5
By admonition from this prostrate Stone!
Memento uninscribed of Pride o'erthrown,
Vanity's hieroglyphic; a choice trope

In Fortune's rhetoric. Daughter of the Rock, Rest where thy course was stayed by Power divine!

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The Soul transported sees, from hint of thine, Crimes which the great Avenger's hand provoke, Hears combats whistling o'er the ensanguined heath:

What groans! what shrieks! what quietness in death!

XXX.

STANZAS,

COMPOSED IN THE SIMPLON PASS.

VALLOMBROSA! I longed in thy shadiest wood To slumber, reclined on the moss-covered floor, To listen to ANIO's precipitous flood,

When the stillness of evening hath deepened its roar;

To range through the Temples of PESTUM, to

muse

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In POMPEII preserved by her burial in earth; On pictures to gaze where they drank in their

hues;

And murmur sweet songs on the ground of their birth!

The beauty of Florence, the grandeur of Rome, Could I leave them unseen, and not yield to regret?

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With a hope (and no more) for a season to come, Which ne'er may discharge the magnificent debt?

Thou fortunate Region! whose Greatness inured

Awoke to new life from its ashes and dust; Twice-glorified fields! if in sadness I turned 15 From your infinite marvels, the sadness was just.

Now, risen ere the light-footed Chamois retires From dew-sprinkled grass to heights guarded with snow,

Toward the mists that hang over the land of my Sires,

From the climate of myrtles contented I go. 20 My thoughts become bright like yon edging of Pines

On the steep's lofty verge: how it blackened the air!

But, touched from behind by the Sun, it now

shines

With threads that seem part of his own silver hair.

Though the toil of the way with dear Friends we divide,

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Though by the same zephyr our temples be

fanned

As we rest in the cool orange-bower side by side, A yearning survives which few hearts shall withstand:

Each step hath its value while homeward we

move;

O joy when the girdle of England appears! 30
What moment in life is so conscious of love,
Of love in the heart made more happy by tears?

XXXI.

ECHO, UPON THE GEMMI.

WHAT beast of chase hath broken from the

cover?

Stern GEMMI listens to as full a cry,

As multitudinous a harmony

Of sounds as rang the heights of Latmos over, When, from the soft couch of her sleeping

Lover,

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Up-starting, Cynthia skimmed the mountain

dew

In keen pursuit—and gave, where'er she flew,
Impetuous motion to the Stars above her.
A solitary Wolf-dog, ranging on

Through the bleak concave, wakes this wondrous chime

Of aëry voices locked in unison,—

Faint far-off- near deep-solemn and sublime !---

So, from the body of one guilty deed,

A thousand ghostly fears, and haunting thoughts, proceed!

XXXII.

PROCESSIONS.

SUGGESTED ON A SABBATH MORNING IN THE VALE OF CHAMOUNY.

To appease the Gods; or public thanks to yield;
Or to solicit knowledge of events,

Which in her breast Futurity concealed;
And that the past might have its true intents
Feelingly told by living monuments—
Mankind of yore were prompted to devise
Rites such as yet Persepolis presents

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