When melting clouds of music float
Down the dim aisles with blending note;
Now, with wild melodious thunder
The vaulted pavement echoes under,
Then, aloft in flights of sound,
The winged harmonies abound,—
Evanishing like birds that stray
And skyward sing their boundless way!—
For thus can Milton's numbers roll
Their cadence o'er the tranced soul.
NIGHT-SCENE-CAMPS OF ISRAEL.
ON yonder palmy mount,
Lo! sleeping myriads in the dewy hush
Of night repose: around, in squared array,
camps are set; and in the midst, apart, The curtain'd shrine, where mystically dwells Jehovah's presence!-through the soundless air A cloudy pillar, robed in burning light, Appears :-concenter'd, as one mighty heart, A million lie, in mutest slumber bound, Or, panting like the ocean, when a dream Of storm awakes her: Heaven and Earth are still; In radiant loveliness the stars pursue
Their pilgrimage, while moonlight's wizard hand Throws beauty, like a spectre-light, on all.
MOUNT ARARAT.
where Persia's beauteous clime extends,
How gloriously diluvian Ararat
Hath pinnacled his rocky peak in clouds !
He thrones a Winter on his awful head,
And lays the Summer laughing at his feet.
Time cannot mar his glory; grand he swells,
As when the Ark was balanced on his brow,
That saw the flashing of the far-off floods
Beneath, and heard the Deluge die away!
MORNING SCENE AT ELSINORE.
His torpid mind I envy not,
Though crown and kingdom were his lot,
Who here, amid this morning balm,
With Nature eloquently calm,-
With tender sky and tranquil sea,
Partook no inborn sympathy.
The canopy of heaven is hung
As blue as poet ever sung;
Though here and there serenely glide
Along the air's cerulean tide
Pale clouds, that seem too delicate
For breeze to touch their fairy state.-
Beneath a window, far away,
Oh, stranger, let thy fancy stray,
For seldom can thy dreams expand
Their wings o'er more delightful land :
The warble of yon distant waves,
As lightly oft the billow laves
The greenwood bank, and grassy shore,
That bounds the sea of Elsinore;
Yon mountain's dim and dusky form,
Which, like a dying thunder-storm,
Glooms on the air with awful swell;
The chiming of the castle bell,
From frowning turret faintly heard ;
The fruited boughs by breezes stirr'd;
With every sound that summer brings
From bird, and bee, and happy things,-
How exquisitely all combine
To make exulting morn divine!
And look adown yon dimpled sea,
As bright as liquid sun could be,
The tiny skiffs of Norway sail,
And glitter cloud-like in the gale;
While frequent oars with flashing stroke
Appear as oft the tide is broke
By fleet-wing'd bark, that gaily flies
To where the sand-girt Sweden lies.—
To him who loves a haunted scene,
Where grief or glory once hath been,
Grey Cronburgh lifts her storied pile,
And darkens o'er the Danish Isle;
Whose vaulty depths and caves profound
Have echoed to the wizard sound
Of clanging shield, and shaken lance,
With each grim voice of old Romance.
But, ere thou leave the castled height,
Survey o'er all a patriot sight,
A scene that makes the life-blood start,
And pictures England in his heart.
The banners Nelson thrill'd to see-
Behold them wave!-how gallantly
They flout the wind with haughty threat,
And show the deep her victor yet!
When bravely down the beauteoùs tide
The monarchs of the ocean ride;
Or, tranced amid the drowsing air,
They whiten in the noontide glare
Those wings that wait the driving breeze,
To waft them o'er a hundred seas!
E'EN now, while tragic Midnight walks the land;
And spreads the wings of darkness with her wand,
What scenes are witness'd by Thy watchful eye!
What millions waft to thee the prayer and sigh!
Some gaily vanish to an unfear'd grave,
Fleet as the sun-flash o'er a summer wave;
Some wear out life in smiles, and some in tears;
Some dare with hope, while others droop with fears.
The vagrant's roaming in his tatter'd vest,
The babe is sleeping on its mother's breast;
The captive mutt'ring o'er his rust-worn chain,
The widow weeping for her lord again,
While many a mourner shuts his languid eye,
To dream of heaven, and view it ere he die :
And yet, no sigh can swell, nor tear-drop fall,
But Thou wilt see, and guide, and solace all!
MAGIC POWER OF BEAUTY.
BEAUTY!-she hath been
The witching tyrant of the universe,
Since the young blush in Paradise began!
Time cannot shake her throne, great Wisdom bows
Before her, warriors are her slaves, and half
A sovereign world hath worshipp'd at her feet!
Her glance is magic; and the mind is moved
Like air by music haunted, when her name
Runs through the ear, and reaches to the heart!
Then curs'd be he that with unhallow'd eye
Can look on beauty, which is born of heaven,
The boast of nature, and the breath of souls!
MARY MAGDALEN.
BEHOLD a chamber: round a simple board,
On circling couches with unsandal'd feet
Reclin'd, a pharisaic throng convened;
Amid them,-the Redeemer: as He lay,
Behind him crept a penitential form
Of faded beauty; years had fiercely traced,
And chronicled with Time's disastrous pen,
The countless agonies of guilty woe
On her pale visage! from whose haggard eyes
The tears gush'd big and bright, while down her
In fine luxuriance, fell unheeded locks
Of blackest lustre :-in her hand appear'd
An alabaster box of rich perfume.
But, when her flood of anguish on the feet
Of Christ intruded, with her flowing hair
The tears she dried, and costly unction pour'd :-
Divinely humbled, That mysterious head
She would not dare profane! but, sin-abash'd,
Upon his feet alone, an ointment due
She pour'd, the sad and silent Magdalene!
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