But boasts the shrine of demon War one charm, Save that with many an orgie strange and foul, Dancing around with interwoven arms, The maniac Suicide and giant Murder Exult in their fierce union! I am sad,
And know not why the simple peasants crowd Beneath the Chieftains' standard !" Thus the Maid
To her the tutelary Spirit said:
"When luxury and lust's exhausted stores No more can rouse the appetites of kings; When the low flattery of their reptile lords Falls flat and heavy on the accustomed ear; When eunuchs sing, and fools buffoonery make, And dancers writhe their harlot-limbs in vain ; Then War and all its dread vicissitudes Pleasingly agitate their stagnant hearts; Its hopes, its fears, its victories, its defeats, Insipid royalty's keen condiment ! Therefore uninjured and unprofited, (Victims at once and executioners) The congregated husbandmen lay waste The vineyard and the harvest. As along
The Bothnic coast, or southward of the Line,
Though hushed the winds and cloudless the high noon, Yet if Leviathan, weary of ease,
In sports unwieldy toss his island-bulk,
Ocean behind him billows, and before
A storm of waves breaks foamy on the strand.
And hence, for times and seasons bloody and dark, Short Peace shall skin the wounds of causeless War, And War, his strained sinews knit anew,
Still violate the unfinished works of Peace But yonder look! for more demands thy view!" He said and straightway from the opposite Isle A vapor sailed, as when a cloud, exhaled From Egypt's fields that steam hot pestilence, Travels the sky for many a trackless league, Till o'er some death-doomed land, distant in vain, It broods incumbent. Forthwith from the plain,
Facing the Isle, a brighter cloud arose,
And steered its course which way the vapor went.
The Maiden paused, musing what this might mean. But long time passed not, ere that brighter cloud Returned more bright; along the plain it swept ; And soon from forth its bursting sides emerged A dazzling form, broad-bosomed, bold of eye, And wild her hair, save where with laurels bound. Not more majestic stood the healing God, When from his bow the arrow sped that slew
Huge Python. Shriek'd Ambition's giant throng,
And with them hissed the locust-fiends that crawled
And glittered in Corruption's slimy track.
Great was their wrath, for short they knew their reign;
And such commotion made they, and uproar,
As when the mad tornado bellows through
The guilty islands of the western main,
What time departing from their native shores,
Eboe, or "Koromantyn's plain of palms,
*The Slaves in the West Indies consider death as a passport to their native country. This sentiment is thus expressed in the introduction to a Greek Prize-Ode on the Slave-Trade, of which the thoughts are better than the language in which they are conveyed.
'Ω σκότου πύλας Θάνατε, προλείπων
Ἐς γένος σπεύδοις ὑποζευχθὲν "Ατα Οὐ ξενισθήσῃ γενύων σπαραγμοῖς, Οὐδ ̓ ὀλολύγμῳ,
̓Αλλὰ καὶ κύκλοισι χοροιτύποισι, Κ' ἀσμάτων χαρᾷ· φοβερὸς μὲν ἐσσὶ Αλλ' ὁμῶς Ελευθερίᾳ συνοικεῖς, Στυγνὲ Τύραννε!
Δασκίοις ἐπὶ πτερύγεσσι σῇσι *Α! θαλάσσιον καθορῶντες οἶδμα Αἰθεροπλάγκτοις ὑπὸ ποσσ ̓ ἀνεῖσι Πατρίδ ̓ ἐπ ̓ αἰαν.
Ενθα μὲν Ερασαι Ἐρωμενῆσιν
̓Αμφὶ πηγῇσιν κιτρίνων ὑπ ̓ ἄλσων,
Οσσ ̓ ὑπὸ βροτοῖς ἔπαθον βροτοὶ, τὰ
Leaving the gates of darkness, O Death! hasten thou to a race yoked
The infuriate spirits of the murdered make Fierce merriment, and vengeance ask of Heaven. Warmed with new influence, the unwholesome plain Sent up its foulest fogs to meet the morn : The Sun that rose on Freedom, rose in blood!
"Maiden beloved, and Delegate of Heaven! (To her the tutelary Spirit said)
Soon shall the morning struggle into day, The stormy morning into cloudless noon. Much hast thou seen, nor all canst understand- But this be thy best omen-Save thy Country!" Thus saying, from the answering Maid he passed, And with him disappeared the heavenly Vision.
Glory to Thee, Father of Earth and Heaven! All conscious presence of the Universe!
Nature's vast ever-acting energy!
In will, in deed, impulse of All to All! Whether thy Love with unrefracted ray Beam on the Prophet's purged eye, or if
Diseasing realms the enthusiast, wild of thought, Scatter new frenzies on the infected throng, Thou both inspiring and predooming both, Fit instruments and best, of perfect end : Glory to Thee, Father of Earth and Heaven!"
And first a landscape rose
More wild and waste and desolate than where The white bear, drifting on a field of ice, Howls to her sundered cubs with piteous rage
with misery! Thou wilt not be received with lacerations of cheeks, nor with funeral ululation-but with circling dances and the joy of songs. Thou art terrible indeed, yet thou dwellest with Liberty, stern Genius! Borne on thy dark pinions over the swelling of Ocean, they return to their native country. There, by the side of fountains beneath citron-groves, the lovers tell to their beloved what horrors, being men, they had endured from men.
CUPID, if storying Legends tell aright, Once framed a rich Elixir of Delight.
A Chalice o'er love-kindled flames he fix'd, And in it nectar and ambrosia mix'd:
With these the magic dews, which Evening brings, Brush'd from the Idalian Star by faery wings: Each tender pledge of sacred Faith he joined, Each gentler pleasure of th' unspotted mind-
Day-dreams, whose tints with sportive brightness glow, And Hope, the blameless Parasite of Woe. The eyeless Chemist heard the process rise, The steamy Chalice bubbled up in sighs;
Sweet sounds transpired, as when th' enamored Dove Pours the soft murm'rings of responsive love. The finished work might Envy vainly blame, And "Kisses" was the precious compound's name; With half the God his Cyprian Mother blest, And breathed on Sara's lovelier lips the rest.
TO THE NIGHTINGALE.
SISTER of love-lorň poets, Philomel! How many bards in city garret pent,
While at their window they with downward eye Mark the faint lamp-beam on the kennell'd mud, And listen to the drowsy cry of watchmen, Those hoarse, unfeathered nightingales of time! How many wretched bards address thy name, And her's, the full-orbed queen, that shines above, But I do hear thee, and the high bough mark, Within whose mild moon-mellowed foliage hid, Thou warblest sad thy pity-pleading strains. O, I have listened, till my working soul, Waked by those strains to thousand fantasies, Absorbed, hath ceased to listen! Therefore oft I hymn thy name; and with a proud delight Oft will I tell thee, minstrel of the moon,
"Most musical, most melancholy" bird! That all thy soft diversities of tone, Though sweeter far than the delicious airs That vibrate from a white-armed lady's harp, What time the languishment of lonely love Melts in her eye, and heaves her breast of snow, Are not so sweet, as is the voice of her,
My Sara-best beloved of human kind! When breathing the pure soul of tenderness,
She thrills me with the husband's promised name!
WITH AN UNFINISHED POEM.
THUS far my scanty brain hath built the rhyme Elaborate and swelling;-yet the heart Not owns it. From thy spirit-breathing powers I ask not now, my friend! the aiding verse Tedious to thee, and from thy anxious thought Of dissonant mood. In fancy (well I know) From business wand'ring far and local cares, Thou creepest round a dear-loved sister's bed With noiseless step, and watchest the faint look, Soothing each pang with fond solicitude, And tenderest tones medicinal of love. I, too, a sister had, an only sister-
She loved me dearly, and I doted on her; To her I poured forth all my puny sorrows, (As a sick patient in a nurse's arms,)
And of the heart those hidden maladies
That e'en from friendship's eye' will shrink ashamed O! I have waked at midnight, and have wept Because she was not!-Cheerily, dear Charles! Thou thy best friend shalt cherish many a year; Such warm presages feel I of high hope!" For not uninterested the dear maid I've view'd her soul affectionate yet wise, Her polished wit as mild as lambent glories That play around a sainted infant's head. He knows, (the Spirit that in secret sees,
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