Whom labour, never urged to toil,
Hath cherished on a healthful soil;
Who knows not pomp, who heeds not pelf; Whose heaviest sin it is to look
Askance upon her pretty self
Reflected in some crystal brook;
Whom grief hath spared, who sheds no tear But in sweet pity; and can hear Another's praise from envy clear.
Such (but O lavish Nature! why That dark unfathomable eye, Where lurks a spirit that replies To stillest mood of softest skies, Yet hints at peace to be o'erthrown, Another's first, and then her own?) 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;
Then, glittering like a star, she joins the festal band.
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.
Her beauty dazzles the thick wood; 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! And nobly wilt thou brook the chains That, for the virtuous, life prepares ; The fetters which the matron wears; The patriot mother's weight of anxious cares!
"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?
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; For in my fancy thou dost share
The gift of immortality;
And there shall bloom, with thee allied,
The votaress by Lugano's side;
And that intrepid nymph, on Uri's steep descried!
1 See address to a Highland Girl," p. 218.
THE COLUMN INTENDED BY BUONAPARTE FOR A TRIUMPHAL EDIFICE IN MILAN,
NOW LYING BY THE WAY-SIDE IN THE SIMPLON PASS
AMBITION-following down this far-famed slope 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. 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! 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!
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 PAESTUM, to muse 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? With a hope (and no more) for a season to come, Which ne'er may discharge the magnificent debt?
Thou fortunate region! whose greatness inurned Awoke to new life from its ashes and dust; Twice-glorified fields ! if in sadness I turned From your infinite marvels, the sadness was just.
Now, risen ere the light-footed chamois retires
From dew-sprinkled grass to heights guarded with
Towards the mists that hang over the land of my sires,
From the climate of myrtles contented I go.
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,
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!
What moment in life is so conscious of love, Of love in the heart made more happy by tears?
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 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 aery 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!
SUGGESTED ON A SABBATH MORNING IN THE VALE
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 Graven on her cankered walls, solemnities
That moved in long array before admiring eyes.
The Hebrews thus, carrying in joyful state
Thick boughs of palm, and willows from the brook, Marched round the altar, to commemorate
How, when their course they through the desert took, Guided by signs which ne'er the sky forsook,
They lodged in leafy tents and cabins low;
Green boughs were borne, while, for the blast that shook
Down to the earth the walls of Jericho,
Shouts rise, and storms of sound from lifted trumpets blow!
And thus, in order, 'mid the sacred grove Fed in the Libyan waste by gushing wells, The priests and damsels of Ammonian Jove Provoked responses with shrill canticles;
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