As was beseeming to their ardent love. It joined itself there in the song and music; And fixed on them my Lady kept her look, Even as a bride, silent and motionless. "This is the one who lay upon the breast *Of Him our Pelican; and this is he
To the great office + from the cross elected." My Lady thus; but therefore none the more Removed her sight from its fixed contemplation, Before or afterward, these words of hers. Even as a man who gazes, and endeavours To see the eclipsing of the sun a little, And who, by seeing, sightless doth become, So I became before that latest fire,
While it was said, Why dost thou daze thyself To see a thing which here has no existence? Earth upon earth my body is,§ and shall be With all the others there, until our number With the eternal proposition tallies;
With the two garments in the blessed cloister **Are the two lights alone that have ascended: And this shalt thou take back into your world."++ And at this utterance the flaming circle
Grew quiet, with the dulcet intermingling breath was made,
Of sound that by the trinal
As to escape from danger or fatigue
The oars that erst were in the water beaten Are all suspended at a whistle's sound. Ah, how much in my mind was I disturbed, When I turned round to look on Beatrice, At not beholding her, although I was Close at her side and in the Happy World.
Then saith He to that disciple, "Behold thy mother! and from that hour that disciple took her unto his own house." St. John, xix. 27.
§ "If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee?'
Till the predestined number of the elect is complete.
The two garments: the glorified spirit, and the glorified body.
**The two lights: Christ and the Virgin Mary.
++ Carry back these tidings.
The sacred trio of St. Peter, St. James, and St. John.
To noble heart Love doth for shelter fly, As seeks the bird the forest's leafy shade; Love was not felt till noble heart beat high, Nor before love the noble heart was made. Soon as the sun's broad flame
Was formed, so soon the clear light filled the air; Yet was not till he came :
So love springs up in noble breasts, and there Has its appointed space,
As heat in the bright flame finds its allotted place.
Kindles in noble heart the fire of love, As hidden virtue in the precious stone: This virtue comes not from the stars above, Till round it the ennobling sun has shone; But when his powerful blaze
Has drawn forth what was vile, the stars impart Strange virtue in their rays:
And thus when Nature doth create the heart
Noble and pure and high,
Like virtue from the star, love comes from woman's eye.
ITALY! Italy! thou who 'rt doomed to wear The fatal gift of beauty, and possess The dower funest* of infinite wretchedness, Written upon thy forehead by despair;
Ah! would that thou wert stronger, or less fair, That they might fear thee more, or love thee less, Who in the splendour of thy loveliness Seem wasting, yet to mortal combat dare! Then from the Alps I should not see descending Such torrents of armed men, nor Gallic horde Drinking the wave of Po, distained with gore,
Nor should I see thee girded with a sword
Not thine, and with the stranger's arm contending, Victor or vanquished, slave for evermore.
TRANSLATIONS FROM THE FRENCH.
FROM CHARLES, DUKE OF ORLEANS.
GENTLE Spring!—in sunshine clad, Well dost thou thy power display! For Winter maketh the light heart sad,
And thou,-thou makest the sad heart gay. He sees thee, and calls to his gloomy train,
The sleet, and the snow, and the wind, and the rain, And they shrink away, and they flee in fear, When thy merry step draws near.
Winter giveth the fields and the trees, so old, Their beards of icicles and snow;
And the rain, it raineth so fast and cold,
We must cower over the embers low;
And, snugly housed from the wind and weatner, Mope like birds that are changing feather. But the storm retires, and the sky grows clear, When thy merry step draws near.
Winter maketh the sun in the gloomy sky Wrap him round with a mantle of cloud; But, Heaven be praised, thy step is nigh; Thou tearest away the mournful shroud, And the earth looks bright, and Winter surly, Who has toiled for nouht both late and early, Is banihed afar by the new-born year, When thy merry step draws near.
SWEET babe! true portrait of thy father's face, Sleep on the bosom, that thy lips have pressed!
Sleep, little one; and closely, gently place Thy drowsy eyelid on thy mother's breast.
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