Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol III, No 13, 1851

Various

Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol III, No 13, 1851

ADVERTISEMENT

This Number closes the Third Volume of Harper's New Monthly Magazine. In closing the Second Volume the Publishers referred to the distinguished success which had attended its establishment, as an incentive to further efforts to make it worthy the immense patronage it had received: – they refer with confidence to the Contents of the present Volume, for proof that their promise has been abundantly fulfilled.

The Magazine has reached its present enormous circulation, simply because it gives a greater amount of reading matter, of a higher quality, in better style, and at a cheaper price than any other periodical ever published. Knowing this to be the fact, the Publishers have spared, and will hereafter spare, no labor or expense which will increase the value and interest of the Magazine in all these respects. The outlay upon the present volume has been from five to ten thousand dollars more than that upon either of its predecessors. The best talent of the country has been engaged in writing and illustrating original articles for its pages: – its selections have been made from a wider field and with increased care; its typographical appearance has been rendered still more elegant; and several new departments have been added to its original plan.

The Magazine now contains, regularly:

First. One or more original articles upon some topic of historical or national interest, written by some able and popular writer, and illustrated by from fifteen to thirty wood engravings, executed in the highest style of art.

Second. Copious selections from the current periodical literature of the day, with tales of the most distinguished authors, such as Dickens, Bulwer, Lever, and others – chosen always for their literary merit, popular interest, and general utility.

Third. A Monthly Record of the events of the day, foreign and domestic, prepared with care and with the most perfect freedom from prejudice and partiality of every kind.

Fourth. Critical Notices of the Books of the Day, written with ability, candor, and spirit, and designed to give the public a clear and reliable estimate of the important works constantly issuing from the press.

Fifth. A Monthly Summary of European Intelligence, concerning books, authors, and whatever else has interest and importance for the cultivated reader.

Sixth. An Editor's Table, in which some of the leading topics of the day will be discussed with ability and independence.

Seventh. An Editor's Easy Chair or Drawer, which will be devoted to literary and general gossip, memoranda of the topics talked about in social circles, graphic sketches of the most interesting minor matters of the day, anecdotes of literary men, sentences of interest from papers not worth reprinting at length, and generally an agreeable and entertaining collection of literary miscellany.

The object of the Publishers is to combine the greatest possible Variety and Interest, with the greatest possible Utility. Special care will always be exercised in admitting nothing into the Magazine in the slightest degree offensive to the most sensitive delicacy; and there will be a steady aim to exert a healthy moral and intellectual influence, by the most attractive means.

For the very liberal patronage the Magazine has already received, and especially for the universally flattering commendations of the Press, the Publishers desire to express their cordial thanks, and to renew their assurances, that no effort shall be spared to render the work still more acceptable and useful, and still more worthy of the encouragement it has received.

SUMMER

BY JAMES THOMSONrom brightening fields of ether fair-disclos'd,Child of the sun, refulgent Summer comes,In pride of youth, and felt through nature's depth:He comes attended by the sultry hours,And ever-fanning breezes, on his way;While, from his ardent look, the turning SpringAverts her blushful face; and earth, and skies,All-smiling, to his hot dominion leaves.Hence, let me haste into the mid wood shade,Where scarce a sunbeam wanders through the gloomAnd on the dark-green grass, beside the brinkOf haunted stream, that by the roots of oakRolls o'er the rocky channel, lie at large,And sing the glories of the circling year.Come, Inspiration! from thy hermit-seat,By mortal seldom found: may fancy dare,From thy fix'd serious eye, and raptur'd glanceShot on surrounding heaven, to steal one lookCreative of the poet, every powerExalting to an ecstasy of soul.And thou, my youthful muse's early friend,In whom the human graces all unite;Pure light of mind, and tenderness of heart;Genius and wisdom; the gay social sense,By decency chastis'd; goodness and wit,In seldom-meeting harmony combin'd;Unblemish'd honor, and an active zealFor Britain's glory, liberty, and man:O Dodington! attend my rural song,Stoop to my theme, inspirit every line,And teach me to deserve thy just applause.With what an awful world-revolving powerWere first the unwieldy planets launch'd alongThe illimitable void! thus to remain,Amid the flux of many thousand years,That oft has swept the toiling race of menAnd all their labor'd monuments away,Firm, unremitting, matchless, in their course,To the kind-temper'd change of night and day,And of the Seasons ever stealing round,Minutely faithful: such the All-perfect HandThat pois'd, impels, and rules the steady whole.When now no more the alternate Twins are fir'd,And Cancer reddens with the solar blaze,Short is the doubtful empire of the night;And soon, observant of approaching day,The meek-ey'd morn appears, mother of dews,At first faint-gleaming in the dappled east —Till far o'er ether spreads the widening glow,And, from before the lustre of her face,White break the clouds away. With quicken'd step,Brown night retires. Young day pours in apace,And opens all the lawny prospect wide.The dripping rock, the mountain's misty top,Swell on the sight, and brighten with the dawn.Blue, through the dusk, the smoking currents shine;And from the bladed field the fearful hareLimps, awkward; while along the forest gladeThe wild deer trip, and often turning gazeAt early passenger. Music awakes,The native voice of undissembled joy,And thick around the woodland hymns arise.Rous'd by the cock, the soon-clad shepherd leavesHis mossy cottage, where with peace he dwells;And from the crowded fold, in order, drivesHis flock, to taste the verdure of the morn.Falsely luxurious, will not man awake;And, springing from the bed of sloth, enjoyThe cool, the fragrant, and the silent hour,To meditation due and sacred song?For is there aught in sleep can charm the wise?To lie in dead oblivion, losing halfThe fleeting moments of too short a life;Total extinction of the enlighten'd soul!Or else to feverish vanity alive,Wilder'd, and tossing through distemper'd dreamsWho would in such a gloomy state remainLonger than nature craves; when every museAnd every blooming pleasure wait without,To bless the wildly devious morning-walk?But yonder comes the powerful king of day,Rejoicing in the east. The lessening cloud,The kindling azure, and the mountain's browIllum'd with fluid gold, his near approachBetoken glad. Lo! now apparent all,Aslant the dew-bright earth, and color'd air,He looks in boundless majesty abroad;And sheds the shining day, that burnish'd playsOn rocks, and hills, and towers, and wandering streams,High-gleaming from afar. Prime cheerer, light!Of all material beings first, and best!Efflux divine! Nature's resplendent robe!Without whose vesting beauty all were wrapp'dIn unessential gloom; and thou, O sun!Soul of surrounding worlds! in whom best seenShines out thy Maker! may I sing of thee?'Tis by thy secret, strong, attractive force,As with a chain indissoluble bound,Thy system rolls entire; from the far bournOf utmost Saturn, wheeling wide his roundOf thirty years, to Mercury, whose diskCan scarce be caught by philosophic eye,Lost in the near effulgence of thy blaze.Informer of the planetary train!Without whose quickening glance their cumbrous orbsWere brute unlovely mass, inert and dead,And not, as now, the green abodes of life —How many forms of being wait on thee!Inhaling spirit; from the unfetter'd mind,By thee sublim'd, down to the daily race,The mixing myriads of thy setting beam.The vegetable world is also thine,Parent of Seasons! who the pomp precedeThat waits thy throne, as through thy vast domain,Annual, along the bright ecliptic-road,In world-rejoicing state, it moves sublime.Meantime the expecting nations, circled gayWith all the various tribes of foodful earth,Implore thy bounty, or send grateful upA common hymn; while, round thy beaming car,High-seen, the Seasons lead, in sprightly danceHarmonious knit, the rosy-finger'd hours,The zephyrs floating loose, the timely rains,Of bloom ethereal the light-footed dews,And soften'd into joy the surly storms.These, in successive turn, with lavish hand,Shower every beauty, every fragrance shower,Herbs, flowers, and fruits; till, kindling at thy touch,From land to land is flush'd the vernal year.Nor to the surface of enliven'd earth,Graceful with hills and dales, and leafy woods,Her liberal tresses, is thy force confin'd —But, to the bowel'd cavern darting deep,The mineral kinds confess thy mighty power.Effulgent, hence the veiny marble shines;Hence labor draws his tools; hence burnish'd warGleams on the day; the nobler works of peaceHence bless mankind; and generous commerce bindsThe round of nations in a golden chain.The unfruitful rock itself, impregn'd by thee,In dark retirement forms the lucid stone.The lively diamond drinks thy purest rays,Collected light, compact; that, polish'd bright.And all its native lustre let abroad,Dares, as it sparkles on the fair one's breast,With vain ambition emulate her eyes.At thee the ruby lights its deepening glow,And with a waving radiance inward flames.From thee the sapphire, solid ether, takesIts hue cerulean; and, of evening tinct,The purple streaming amethyst is thine.With thy own smile the yellow topaz burns;Nor deeper verdure dyes the robe of Spring,When first she gives it to the southern gale,Than the green emerald shows. But, all combin'd,Thick through the whitening opal play thy beams;Or, flying several from its surface, formA trembling variance of revolving hues,As the site varies in the gazer's hand.The very dead creation, from thy touch,Assumes a mimic life. By thee refin'd,In brighter mazes the relucent streamPlays o'er the mead. The precipice abrupt,Projecting horror on the blacken'd flood,Softens at thy return. The desert joysWildly, through all his melancholy bounds.Rude ruins glitter; and the briny deep,Seen from some pointed promontory's top,Far to the blue horizon's utmost verge,Restless, reflects a floating gleam. But this,And all the much-transported muse can sing,Are to thy beauty, dignity, and use,Unequal far; great delegated sourceOf light, and life, and grace, and joy below!How shall I then attempt to sing of him,Who, Light himself! in uncreated lightInvested deep, dwells awfully retiredFrom mortal eye, or angel's purer ken,Whose single smile has, from the first of time,Fill'd, overflowing, all those lamps of heaven,That beam forever through the boundless sky;But, should he hide his face, the astonish'd sun,And all the extinguish'd stars, would loosening reelWide from their spheres, and chaos come again.And yet was every faltering tongue of man,Almighty Father! silent in thy praise,Thy works themselves would raise a general voiceEven in the depth of solitary woods,By human foot untrod, proclaim thy power;And to the quire celestial thee resound,The eternal cause, support, and end of all!To me be Nature's volume broad-display'd;And to peruse its all-instructing page,Or, haply catching inspiration thence,Some easy passage, raptur'd, to translate,My sole delight; as through the falling gloomsPensive I stray, or with the rising dawnOn fancy's eagle-wing excursive soar.Now, flaming up the heavens, the potent sunMelts into limpid air the high-rais'd clouds,And morning fogs, that hover'd round the hillsIn party-color'd bands; till wide unveil'dThe face of nature shines, from where earth seemsFar stretch'd around, to meet the bending sphere.Half in a blush of clustering roses lost,Dew-dropping coolness to the shade retires,There, on the verdant turf, or flowery bed,By gelid founts and careless rills to muse;While tyrant heat, dispreading through the sky,With rapid sway, his burning influence dartsOn man, and beast, and herb, and tepid stream.Who can, unpitying, see the flowery race,Shed by the morn, their new-flush'd bloom resign,Before the parching beam? So fade the fair,When fevers revel through their azure veins.But one, the lofty follower of the sun,Sad when he sets, shuts up her yellow leaves,Drooping all night; and, when he warm returns,Points her enamor'd bosom to his ray.Home, from the morning task, the swain retreats;His flock before him stepping to the fold:While the full-udder'd mother lows aroundThe cheerful cottage, then expecting food,The food of innocence and health! The daw,The rook, and magpie, to the gray-grown oaks(That the calm village in their verdant arms,Sheltering, embrace) direct their lazy flight;Where on the mingling boughs they sit embower'd,All the hot noon, till cooler hours arise.Faint, underneath, the household fowls convene;And, in a corner of the buzzing shade,The housedog, with the vacant grayhound, liesOutstretched and sleepy. In his slumbers oneAttacks the nightly thief, and one exultsO'er hill and dale; till, waken'd by the wasp,They, starting, snap. Nor shall the muse disdainTo let the little noisy summer raceLive in her lay, and flutter through her song,Not mean, though simple: to the sun allied,From him they draw their animating fire.Wak'd by his warmer ray, the reptile youngCome wing'd abroad; by the light air upborne,Lighter, and full of soul. From every chink,And secret corner, where they slept awayThe wintry storms – or, rising from their tombsTo higher life – by myriads, forth at once,Swarming they pour; of all the varied huesTheir beauty-beaming parent can disclose.Ten thousand forms! ten thousand different tribes!People the blaze. To sunny waters someBy fatal instinct fly; where, on the pool,They, sportive, wheel; or, sailing down the streamAre snatch'd immediate by the quick-ey'd trout,Or darting salmon. Through the greenwood gladeSome love to stray; there lodg'd, amus'd, and fedIn the fresh leaf. Luxurious, others makeThe meads their choice, and visit every flower,And every latent herb: for the sweet task,To propagate their kinds, and where to wrap,In what soft beds, their young, yet undisclos'd,Employs their tender care. Some to the house,The fold, and dairy, hungry, bend their flight;Sip round the pail, or taste the curdling cheese:Oft, inadvertent, from the milky streamThey meet their fate; or, weltering in the bowl,With powerless wings around them wrapp'd, expire.But chief to heedless flies the window provesA constant death; where, gloomily retir'd,The villain spider lives, cunning and fierce,Mixture abhorr'd! Amid a mangled heapOf carcasses, in eager watch he sits,O'erlooking all his waving snares around.Near the dire cell the dreadless wanderer oftPasses, as oft the ruffian shows his front.The prey at last ensnar'd, he dreadful darts,With rapid glide, along the leaning line;And, fixing in the wretch his cruel fangs,Strikes backward, grimly pleas'd: the fluttering wing,And shriller sound, declare extreme distressAnd ask the helping hospitable hand.Resounds the living surface of the ground.Nor undelightful is the ceaseless hum,To him who muses through the woods at noon;Or drowsy shepherd, as he lies reclin'd,With half shut eyes, beneath the floating shadeOf willows gray, close-crowding o'er the brook.Gradual, from these what numerous kinds descend,Evading even the microscopic eye!Full nature swarms with life; one wondrous massOf animals, or atoms organiz'd,Waiting the vital breath, when Parent-HeavenShall bid his spirit blow. The hoary fen,In putrid streams, emits the living cloudOf pestilence. Through the subterranean cells.Where searching sunbeams scarce can find a way,Earth animated heaves. The flowery leafWants not its soft inhabitants. Secure,Within its winding citadel, the stoneHolds multitudes. But chief the forest boughs,That dance unnumber'd to the playful breeze,The downy orchard, and the melting pulpOf mellow fruit, the nameless nations feedOf evanescent insects. Where the poolStands mantled o'er with green, invisibleAmid the floating verdure millions stray.Each liquid, too, whether it pierces, soothes,Inflames, refreshes, or exalts the taste,With various forms abounds. Nor is the streamOf purest crystal, nor the lucid air,Though one transparent vacancy it seems,Void of their unseen people. These, conceal'dBy the kind art of forming Heaven, escapeThe grosser eye of man: for, if the worldsIn worlds inclos'd should on his senses burst,From cates ambrosial, and the nectar'd bowl,He would abhorrent turn; and in dead night.When silence sleeps o'er all, be stunn'd with noise.Let no presuming impious railer taxCreative Wisdom, as if aught was form'dIn vain, or not for admirable ends.Shall little haughty ignorance pronounceHis works unwise, of which the smallest partExceeds the narrow vision of her mind?As if upon a full-proportion'd dome,On swelling columns heav'd, the pride of art!A critic fly, whose feeble ray scarce spreadsAn inch around, with blind presumption bold,Should dare to tax the structure of the whole.And lives the man whose universal eyeHas swept at once the unbounded scheme of things,Mark'd their dependence so, and firm accord,As with unfaltering accent to concludeThat this availeth naught? Has any seenThe mighty chain of beings, lessening downFrom Infinite Perfection to the brinkOf dreary nothing, desolate abyss!From which astonish'd thought, recoiling, turns?Till then, alone let zealous praise ascend,And hymns of holy wonder, to that Power,Whose wisdom shines as lovely on our minds,As on our smiling eyes his servant-sun.Thick in yon stream of light, a thousand ways,Upward and downward, thwarting and convolv'd,The quivering nations sport; till, tempest-wing'd,Fierce Winter sweeps them from the face of dayEven so, luxurious men, unheeding pass,An idle summer-life in fortune's shine,A season's glitter! thus they flutter onFrom toy to toy, from vanity to vice;Till, blown away by death, oblivion comesBehind, and strikes them from the book of life.Now swarms the village o'er the jovial meadThe rustic youth, brown with meridian toil,Healthful and strong; full as the summer roseBlown by prevailing suns, the ruddy maid,Half-naked, swelling on the sight, and allHer kindled graces burning o'er her cheek.Even stooping age is here; and infant handsTrail the long rake, or, with the fragrant loadO'ercharg'd, amid the kind oppression roll.Wide flies the tedded grain; all in a rowAdvancing broad, or wheeling round the field,They spread the breathing harvest to the sun,That throws refreshful round a rural smell;Or, as they rake the green-appearing ground,And drive the dusky wave along the mead,The russet haycock rises thick behind,In order gay: while heard from dale to dale,Waking the breeze, resounds the blended voiceOf happy labor, love, and social glee.Or rushing thence, in one diffusive band,They drive the troubled flocks, by many a dogCompell'd, to where the mazy-running brookForms a deep pool; this bank abrupt and high,And that, fair-spreading in a pebbled shore.Urg'd to the giddy brink, much is the toil,The clamor much, of men, and boys, and dogs,Ere the soft fearful people to the floodCommit their woolly sides. And oft the swain,On some impatient seizing, hurls them in:Embolden'd, then, nor hesitating more,Fast, fast they plunge amid the flashing wave,And panting labor to the farther shore.Repeated this, till deep the well-wash'd fleeceHas drank the flood, and from his lively hauntThe trout is banish'd by the sordid stream,Heavy and dripping, to the breezy browSlow move the harmless race; where, as they spreadTheir swelling treasures to the sunny ray,Inly disturb'd, and wondering what this wildOutrageous tumult means, their loud complaintsThe country fill – and, toss'd from rock to rock,Incessant bleatings run around the hills.At last, of snowy white, the gather'd flocksAre in the wattled pen innumerous press'd,Head above head; and rang'd in lusty rowsThe shepherds sit, and whet the sounding shears.The housewife waits to roll her fleecy stores,With all her gay-dress'd maids attending round.One, chief, in gracious dignity enthron'd,Shines o'er the rest, the pastoral queen, and raysHer smiles, sweet-beaming, on her shepherd-king,While the glad circle round them yield their soulsTo festive mirth, and wit that knows no gall.Meantime, their joyous task goes on apace:Some, mingling, stir the melted tar, and some,Deep on the new-shorn vagrant's heaving sideTo stamp his master's cipher ready stand;Others the unwilling wether drag along;And, glorying in his might, the sturdy boyHolds by the twisted horns the indignant ram.Behold where bound, and of its robe bereft,By needy man, that all-depending lord,How meek, how patient, the mild creature lies!What softness in its melancholy face,What dumb, complaining innocence appears!Fear not, ye gentle tribes, 'tis not the knifeOf horrid slaughter that is o'er you wav'd;No, 'tis the tender swain's well-guided shears,Who having now, to pay his annual care,Borrow'd your fleece, to you a cumbrous load,Will send you bounding to your hills again.A simple scene! yet hence Britannia seesHer solid grandeur rise: hence she commandsThe exalted stores of every brighter clime,The treasures of the sun without his rage;Hence, fervent all, with culture, toil, and arts,Wide glows her land; her dreadful thunder henceRides o'er the waves sublime, and now, even now,Impending hangs o'er Gallia's humbled coast;Hence rules the circling deep, and awes the world.'Tis raging noon; and, vertical, the sunDarts on the head direct his forceful rays.O'er heaven and earth, far as the ranging eyeCan sweep, a dazzling deluge reigns; and all,From pole to pole, is undistinguish'd blaze.In vain the sight, dejected to the ground,Stoops for relief; thence hot ascending streamsAnd keen reflection pain. Deep to the rootOf vegetation parch'd, the cleaving fieldsAnd slippery lawn an arid hue disclose,Blast fancy's blooms, and wither even the soul.Echo no more returns the cheerful soundOf sharpening scythe; the mower, sinking, heapsO'er him the humid hay, with flowers perfum'd;And scarce a chirping grasshopper is heardThrough the dumb mead. Distressful nature pants.The very streams look languid from afar;Or, through the unshelter'd glade, impatient, seemTo hurl into the covert of the grove.All conquering heat, oh, intermit thy wrath!And on my throbbing temples potent thusBeam not so fierce! Incessant still you flow,And still another fervent flood succeeds,Pour'd on the head profuse. In vain I sigh,And restless turn, and look around for night:Night is far off; and hotter hours approach.Thrice-happy be! who on the sunless sideOf a romantic mountain, forest-crown'd,Beneath the whole-collected shade reclines,Or in the gelid caverns, woodbine-wrought,And fresh bedew'd with ever-spouting streams,Sits coolly calm, while all the world without,Unsatisfied and sick, tosses in noon.Emblem instructive of the virtuous man,Who keeps his temper'd mind serene, and pure,And every passion aptly harmoniz'd,Amid a jarring world with vice inflam'd.Welcome, ye shades! ye bowery thickets, hail!Ye lofty pines! ye venerable oaks!Ye ashes wild, responding o'er the steep!Delicious is your shelter to the soul,As to the hunted hart the sallying spring,Or stream full-flowing, that his swelling sidesLaves, as he floats along the herbag'd brink.Cool, through the nerves, your pleasing comfort glides;The heart beats glad; the fresh-expanded eyeAnd ear resume their watch; the sinews knit;And life shoots swift through all the lighten'd limbs.Around the adjoining brook that purls alongThe vocal grove, now fretting o'er a rock,Now scarcely moving through a reedy pool,Now starting to a sudden stream, and nowGently diffus'd into a limpid plain,A various group the herds and flocks composeRural confusion! On the grassy bankSome ruminating lie; while others standHalf in the flood, and often bending sipThe circling surface. In the middle droopsThe strong laborious ox, of honest front,Which incompos'd he shakes; and from his sidesThe troublous insects lashes with his tail,Returning still. Amid his subjects safe,Slumbers the monarch swain: his careless armThrown round his head, on downy moss sustain'd:Here laid his scrip, with wholesome viands fill'd;There, listening every noise, his watchful dog.Light fly his slumbers, if perchance a flightOf angry gadflies fasten on the herd;That startling scatters from the shallow brook,In search of lavish stream. Tossing the foam,They scorn the keeper's voice, and scour the plainThrough all the bright severity of noon;While, from their laboring breasts, a hollow moanProceeding, runs low-bellowing round the hills.Oft in this season too the horse, provok'd,While his big sinews full of spirits swell,Trembling with vigor, in the heat of blood,Springs the high fence; and, o'er the field effus'd,Darts on the gloomy flood, with steadfast eye,And heart estrang'd to fear: his nervous chest,Luxuriant and erect, the seat of strength!Bears down the opposing stream; quenchless his thirst,He takes the river at redoubled draughts:And with wide nostrils, snorting, skims the wave.Still let me pierce into the midnight depthOf yonder grove, of wildest, largest growth;That, forming high in air a woodland quire,Nods o'er the mount beneath. At every step,Solemn and slow, the shadows blacker fall,And all is awful listening gloom around.These are the haunts of meditation, theseThe scenes where ancient bards the inspiring breath,Ecstatic, felt: and, from this world retir'd.Convers'd with angels, and immortal forms,On gracious errands bent: to save the fallOf virtue struggling on the brink of vice;In waking whispers, and repeated dreams,To hint pure thought, and warn the favor'd soulFor future trials fated to prepare;To prompt the poet, who devoted givesHis muse to better themes; to soothe the pangsOf dying worth, and from the patriot's breast(Backward to mingle in detested war,But foremost when engag'd) to turn the death:And numberless such offices of love,Daily and nightly, zealous to perform.Shook sudden from the bosom of the sky,A thousand shapes or glide athwart the dusk,Or stalk majestic on. Deep-rous'd, I feelA sacred terror, a severe delight,Creep through my mortal frame; and thus, methinks.A voice, than human more, the abstracted earOf fancy strikes, "Be not of us afraid,Poor kindred man! thy fellow-creatures, weFrom the same Parent-Power our beings drew —The same our Lord, and laws, and great pursuit.Once some of us, like thee, through stormy lifeToil'd tempest-beaten, ere we could attainThis holy calm, this harmony of mind,Where purity and peace immingle charms:Then fear not us; but with responsive song,Amid those dim recesses, undisturb'dBy noisy folly and discordant vice,Of nature sing with us, and nature's God.Here frequent, at the visionary hour,When musing midnight reigns or silent noon,Angelic harps are in full concert heard,And voices chanting from the wood-crown'd hill,The deepening dale, or inmost sylvan glade;A privilege bestow'd by us, alone,On contemplation, or the hallow'd earOf poet, swelling to seraphic strain."And art thou, Stanley, of that sacred band?Alas, for us too soon! Though rais'd aboveThe reach of human pain, above the flightOf human joy, yet, with a mingled rayOf sadly pleas'd remembrance, must thou feelA mother's love, a mother's tender woe;Who seeks thee still in many a former scene,Seeks thy fair form, thy lovely beaming eyes,Thy pleasing converse, by gay lively senseInspir'd – where moral wisdom mildly shoneWithout the toil of art, and virtue glow'd.In all her smiles, without forbidding pride.But, O thou best of parents! wipe thy tears;Or rather to parental Nature payThe tears of grateful joy – who for a whileLent thee this younger self, this opening bloomOf thy enlighten'd mind and gentle worth.Believe the muse: the wintry blast of deathKills not the buds of virtue; no, they spread.Beneath the heavenly beam of brighter suns,Through endless ages, into higher powers.Thus up the mount, in airy vision rapt,I stray, regardless whither; till the soundOf a near fall of water every senseWakes from the charm of thought: swift-shrinking back,I check my steps, and view the broken scene.Smooth to the shelving brink a copious floodRolls fair and placid; where collected all,In one impetuous torrent, down the steepIt thundering shoots, and shakes the country round.At first, an azure sheet, it rushes broad;Then whitening by degrees as prone it falls,And from the loud-resounding rocks belowDash'd in a cloud of foam, it sends aloftA hoary mist, and forms a ceaseless showerNor can the tortur'd wave here find repose:But, raging still amid the shaggy rocks,Now flashes o'er the scattered fragments, nowAslant the hollow'd channel rapid darts;And falling fast from gradual slope to slope,With wild infracted course, and lessen'd roar,It gains a safer bed, and steals at last,Along the mazes of the quiet vale.Invited from the cliff, to whose dark browHe clings, the steep-ascending eagle soars,With upward pinions, through the flood of day,And, giving full his bosom to the blaze,Gains on the sun; while all the tuneful race,Smit by afflictive noon, disorder'd droop,Deep in the thicket; or, from bower to bowerResponsive, force an interrupted strain.The stockdove only through the forest coos,Mournfully hoarse; oft ceasing from his plaint,Short interval of weary woe! againThe sad idea of his murder'd mate,Struck from his side by savage fowler's guileAcross his fancy comes; and then resoundsA louder song of sorrow through the grove.Beside the dewy border let me sit,All in the freshness of the humid air:There on that hollow'd rock, grotesque and wild,An ample chair moss-lin'd, and overheadBy flowing umbrage shaded; where the beeStrays diligent, and with the extracted balmOf fragrant woodbine loads his little thigh.Now, while I taste the sweetness of the shade,While nature lies around deep-lull'd in noon,Now come, bold fancy, spread a daring flight,And view the wonders of the torrid zoneClimes unrelenting! with whose rage compar'd,Yon blaze is feeble, and yon skies are cool.See, how at once the bright-effulgent sun,Rising direct, swift chases from the skyThe short-liv'd twilight; and with ardent blazeLooks gayly fierce o'er all the dazzling air:He mounts his throne; but kind before him sends,Issuing from out the portals of the morn,The general breeze to mitigate his fire,And breathe refreshment on a fainting world.Great are the scenes, with dreadful beauty crown'dAnd barbarous wealth, that see, each circling year,Returning suns and double seasons pass:Rocks rich in gems, and mountains big with mines,That on the high equator ridgy rise,Whence many a bursting stream auriferous plays;Majestic woods, of every vigorous green,Stage above stage, high waving o'er the hills,Or to the far horizon wide-diffus'd,A boundless deep immensity of shade.Here lofty trees, to ancient song unknown,The noble sons of potent heat and floodsProne-rushing from the clouds, rear high to heavenTheir thorny stems, and broad around them throwMeridian gloom. Here, in eternal prime,Unnumber'd fruits, of keen, delicious tasteAnd vital spirit, drink amid the cliffs,And burning sands that bank the shrubby vales,Redoubled day; yet in their rugged coatsA friendly juice to cool its rage contain.Bear me, Pomona! to thy citron groves;To where the lemon and the piercing lime,With the deep orange, glowing through the green,Their lighter glories blend. Lay me reclin'dBeneath the spreading tamarind, that shakes,Fann'd by the breeze, its fever-cooling fruit.Deep in the night the massy locust sheds,Quench my hot limbs; or lead me through the maze,Embowering, endless, of the Indian fig;Or thrown at gayer ease, on some fair brow,Let me behold, by breezy murmurs cool'd,Broad o'er my head the verdant cedar wave,And high palmettos lift their graceful shade.Oh! stretch'd amid these orchards of the sun,Give me to drain the cocoa's milky bowl,And from the palm to draw its freshening wine;More bounteous far than all the frantic juiceWhich Bacchus pours. Nor, on its slender twigsLow-bending, be the full pomegranate scorn'd;Nor, creeping through the woods, the gelid raceOf berries. Oft in humble station dwellsUnboastful worth, above fastidious pomp.Witness, thou best ananas, thou the prideOf vegetable life, beyond whate'erThe poets imag'd in the golden age:Quick let me strip thee of thy tufty coat,Spread thy ambrosial stores, and feast with Jove!From these the prospect varies. Plains immenseLie stretch'd below, interminable meads,And vast savannas, where the wandering eye,Unfix'd, is in a verdant ocean lost.Another Flora there, of bolder huesAnd richer sweets, beyond our garden's pride,Plays o'er the fields, and showers with sudden handExuberant Spring; for oft these valleys shiftTheir green-embroidered robe to fiery brown,And swift to green again, as scorching suns,Or streaming dews and torrent rains, prevail.Along these lonely regions, where, retir'dFrom little scenes of art, great Nature dwellsIn awful solitude, and naught is seenBut the wild herds that own no master's stall,Prodigious rivers roll their fattening seas;On whose luxuriant herbage, half-conceal'd,Like a fall'n cedar, far diffus'd his train,Cas'd in green scales, the crocodile extends.The flood disparts: behold! in plaited mail,Behemoth rears his head. Glanc'd from his side,The darted steel in idle shivers flies:He fearless walks the plain, or seeks the hills;Where, as he crops his varied fare, the herds,In widening circle round, forget their food,And at the harmless stranger wondering gaze.Peaceful, beneath primeval trees that castTheir ample shade o'er Niger's yellow stream.And where the Ganges rolls his sacred wave,Or 'mid the central depth of blackening woodsHigh-rais'd in solemn theater around,Leans the huge elephant; wisest of brutes!Oh, truly wise! with gentle might endow'd,Though powerful, not destructive. Here he seesRevolving ages sweep the changeful earth,And empires rise and fall; regardless heOf what the never-resting race of menProject: thrice happy! could he 'scape their guile,Who mine, from cruel avarice, his steps,Or with his towery grandeur swell their state,The pride of kings! or else his strength pervert,And bid him rage amid the mortal fray,Astonish'd at the madness of mankind.Wide o'er the winding umbrage of the floods,Like vivid blossoms glowing from afar,Thick-swarm the brighter birds. For Nature's hand.That with a sportive vanity has deck'dThe plumy nations, there her gayest huesProfusely pours. But, if she bids them shine,Array'd in all the beauteous beams of day,Yet frugal still, she humbles them in song.Nor envy we the gaudy robes they lentProud Montezuma's realm, whose legions castA boundless radiance waving on the sun,While philomel is ours; while in our shades,Through the soft silence of the listening night,The sober-suited songstress trills her lay.But come, my muse, the desert-barrier burst,A wild expanse of lifeless sand and sky,And, swifter than the toiling caravan,Shoot o'er the vale of Sennaar, ardent climbThe Nubian mountains, and the secret boundsOf jealous Abyssinia boldly pierce.Thou art no ruffian, who beneath the maskOf social commerce com'st to rob their wealth,No holy fury thou, blaspheming Heaven.With consecrated steel to stab their peace,And through the land, yet red from civil wounds,To spread the purple tyranny of Rome.Thou, like the harmless bee, may'st freely range,From mead to mead bright with exalted flowers,From jasmine grove to grove; may'st wander gay,Through palmy shades and aromatic woods,That grace the plains, invest the peopled hills,And up the more than Alpine mountains wave.There on the breezy summit, spreading fairFor many a league; or on stupendous rocks.That from the sun-redoubling valley lift,Cool to the middle air their lawny tops;Where palaces, and fanes, and villas rise,And gardens smile around, and cultur'd fields;And fountains gush; and careless herds and flocksSecurely stray; a world within itself,Disdaining all assault: there let me drawEthereal soul, there drink reviving gales.Profusely breathing from the spicy groves,And vales of fragrance; there at distance hearThe roaring floods, and cataracts, that sweepFrom disembowel'd earth the virgin gold;And o'er the varied landscape, restless, rove,Fervent with life of every fairer kind.A land of wonders! which the sun still eyesWith ray direct, as of the lovely realmEnamor'd, and delighting there to dwell.How chang'd the scene! In blazing height of noon.The sun, oppress'd, is plung'd in thickest gloom.Still horror reigns, a dreary twilight round,Of struggling night and day malignant mix'd.For to the hot equator crowding fast,Where, highly rarefied, the yielding airAdmits their stream, incessant vapors roll,Amazing clouds on clouds continual heap'd;Or whirl'd tempestuous by the gusty wind,Or silent borne along, heavy and slow,With the big stores of steaming oceans charg'd.Meantime, amid these upper seas, condens'dAround the cold aerial mountain's brow,And by conflicting winds together dash'd,The thunder holds his black tremendous throne;From cloud to cloud the rending lightnings rage;Till, in the furious elemental warDissolv'd, the whole precipitated massUnbroken floods and solid torrents pours.The treasures these, hid from the bounded searchOf ancient knowledge; whence, with annual pomp,Rich king of floods! o'erflows the swelling Nile.From his two springs, in Gojam's sunny realm,Pure-welling out, he through the lucid lakeOf fair Dembia rolls his infant stream.There, by the naiads nurs'd, he sports awayHis playful youth, amid the fragrant islesThat with unfading verdure smile around.Ambitious, thence the manly river breaks;And gathering many a flood, and copious fedWith all the mellow'd treasures of the sky,Winds in progressive majesty along:Through splendid kingdoms now devolves his maze;Now wanders wild o'er solitary tractsOf life-deserted sand: till glad to quitThe joyless desert, down the Nubian rocks,From thundering steep to steep, he pours his urn.And Egypt joys beneath the spreading wave.His brother Niger too, and all the floodsIn which the full-form'd maids of Afric laveTheir jetty limbs; and all that from the tractOf woody mountains stretch'd through gorgeous IndFall on Cormandel's coast, or Malabar;From Menam's orient stream, that nightly shinesWith insect lamps, to where aurora shedsOn Indus' smiling banks the rosy shower;All, at this bounteous season, ope their urns,And pour untoiling harvest o'er the land.Nor less thy world, Columbus, drinks, refresh'dThe lavish moisture of the melting year.Wide e'er his isles, the branching OrinoqueRolls a brown deluge; and the native drivesTo dwell aloft on life-sufficing trees —At once his dome, his robe, his food, and arms.Swell'd by a thousand streams, impetuous hurl'dFrom all the roaring Andes, huge descendsThe mighty Orellana. Scarce the museDares stretch her wing o'er this enormous massOf rushing water; scarces she dares attemptThe sea-like Plata; to whose dread expanse,Continuous depth, and wondrous length of course,Our floods are rills. With unabated force,In silent dignity they sweep along;And traverse realms unknown, and blooming wilds,And fruitful deserts – worlds of solitude,Where the sun smiles and Seasons teem in vain,Unseen and unenjoyed. Forsaking these,O'er peopled plains they fair-diffusive flow,And many a nation feed, and circle safe,In their soft bosom, many a happy isle;The seat of blameless Pan, yet undisturbedBy Christian crimes and Europe's cruel sons.Thus pouring on they proudly seek the deep,Whose vanquish'd tide, recoiling from the shock,Yields to this liquid weight of half the globe;And ocean trembles for his green domain.But what avails this wondrous waste of wealth,This gay profusion of luxurious bliss,This pomp of Nature? what their balmy meads.Their powerful herbs, and Ceres void of pain?By vagrant birds dispers'd, and wafting winds.What their unplanted fruits? what the cool draughts,The ambrosial food, rich gums, and spicy health,Their forests yield? their toiling insects what,Their silky pride, and vegetable robes?Ah! what avail their fatal treasures, hidDeep in the bowels of the pitying earth,Golconda's gems, and sad Potosi's mines?Where dwelt the gentlest children of the sun!What all that Afric's golden rivers roll,Her odorous woods, and shining ivory stores?Ill-fated race! the softening arts of peace,Whate'er the humanizing muses teach;The godlike wisdom of the tempered breast;Progressive truth, the patient force of thought;Investigation calm, whose silent powersCommand the world; the light that leads to Heaven;Kind equal rule, the government of laws,And all-protecting freedom, which aloneSustains the name and dignity of man:These are not theirs. The parent sun himselfSeems o'er this world of slaves to tyrannize;And, with oppressive ray, the roseate bloomOf beauty blasting, gives the gloomy hue,And feature gross; or worse, to ruthless deeds,Mad jealousy, blind rage, and fell revenge,Their fervid spirit fires. Love dwells not there,The soft regards, the tenderness of life,The heart-shed tear, the ineffable delightOf sweet humanity: these court the beamOf milder climes; in selfish fierce desire,And the wild fury of voluptuous sense,There lost. The very brute creation thereThis rage partakes, and burns with horrid fire.Lo! the green serpent, from his dark abode,Which even imagination fears to tread,At noon forth-issuing, gathers up his trainIn orbs immense, then, darting out anew,Seeks the refreshing fount, by which diffus'dHe throws his folds; and while, with threatening tongueAnd dreadful jaws erect, the monster curlsHis flaming crest, all other thirst appall'd,Or shivering flies, or check'd at distance stands,Nor dares approach. But still more direful he,The small close-lurking minister of fate,Whose high concocted venom through the veinsA rapid lightning darts, arresting swiftThe vital current. Form'd to humble man,This child of vengeful Nature! There, sublim'dTo fearless lust of blood, the savage raceRoam, licens'd by the shading hour of guilt,And foul misdeed, when the pure day has shutHis sacred eye. The tiger, darting fierce,Impetuous on the prey his glance has doom'd;The lively-shining leopard, speckled o'erWith many a spot, the beauty of the waste;And, scorning all the taming arts of man,The keen hyena, fellest of the fell:These, rushing from the inhospitable woodsOf Mauritania, or the tufted islesThat verdant rise amid the Libyan wild,Innumerous glare around their shaggy king,Majestic, stalking o'er the printed sand;And, with imperious and repeated roars,Demand their fated food. The fearful flocksCrowd near the guardian swain; the nobler herds,Where round their lordly bull, in rural ease,They ruminating lie, with horror hearThe coming rage. The awaken'd village starts;And to her fluttering breast the mother strainsHer thoughtless infant. From the pirate's den,Or stern Morocco's tyrant fang, escap'd,The wretch half-wishes for his bonds again;While, uproar all, the wilderness resounds,From Atlas eastward to the frighted Nile.Unhappy he! who from the first of joys,Society, cut off, is left aloneAmid this world of death. Day after day,Sad on the jutting eminence he sits,And views the main that ever toils below;Still fondly forming in the farthest verge,Where the round ether mixes with the wave,Ships, dim-discovered, dropping from the clouds.At evening, to the setting sun he turnsA mournful eye, and down his dying heartSinks helpless; while the wonted roar is up,And hiss continual through the tedious night.Yet here, even here, into these black abodesOf monsters, unappall'd, from stooping Rome,And guilty Cæsar, Liberty retired,Her Cato following through Numidian wilds;Disdainful of Campania's gentle plainsAnd all the green delights Ausonia pours —When for them she must bend the servile knee,And fawning take the splendid robber's boon.Nor stop the terrors of these regions here.Commission'd demons oft, angels of wrath,Let loose the raging elements. Breath'd hotFrom all the boundless furnace of the sky,And the wide glittering waste of burning sand,A suffocating wind the pilgrim smitesWith instant death. Patient of thirst and toil,Son of the desert! even the camel feels,Shot through his wither'd heart, the fiery blast.Or from the black-red ether, bursting broad,Sallies the sudden whirlwind. Straight the sands,Commov'd around, in gathering eddies play;Nearer and nearer still they darkening come,Till, with the general all-involving stormSwept up, the whole continuous wilds arise;And by their noonday fount dejected thrown,Or sunk at night in sad disastrous sleep,Beneath descending hills, the caravanIs buried deep. In Cairo's crowded streetsThe impatient merchant, wondering, waits in vain,And Mecca saddens at the long delay.But chief at sea, whose every flexile waveObeys the blast, the aerial tumult swells.In the dread ocean, undulating wide,Beneath the radiant line that girts the globe,The circling Typhon, whirl'd from point to point,Exhausting all the rage of all the sky,And dire Ecnephia reign. Amid the heavens,Falsely serene, deep in a cloudy speckCompress'd, the mighty tempest brooding dwellsOf no regard save to the skillful eye,Fiery and foul, the small prognostic hangsAloft, or on the promontory's browMusters its force. A faint deceitful calm,A fluttering gale, the demon sends before,To tempt the spreading sail. Then down at once,Precipitant, descends a mingled massOf roaring winds, and flame, and rushing floods.In wild amazement fix'd the sailor stands.Art is too slow. By rapid fate oppress'd,His broad-wing'd vessel drinks the whelming tide,Hid in the bosom of the black abyss.With such mad seas the daring Gama fought,For many a day, and many a dreadful night,Incessant, laboring round the stormy cape;By bold ambition led, and bolder thirstOf gold. For then, from ancient gloom, emerg'dThe rising world of trade: the genius, then,Of navigation, that in hopeless slothHad slumber'd on the vast Atlantic deepFor idle ages, starting, heard at lastThe Lusitanian prince; who, heaven-inspired,To love of useful glory rous'd mankind,And in unbounded commerce mixed the world.Increasing still the terrors of these storms,His jaws horrific arm'd with threefold fate,Here dwells the direful shark. Lur'd by the scentOf steaming crowds, of rank disease, and death,Behold! he rushing cuts the briny flood,Swift as the gale can bear the ship along;And from the partners of that cruel tradeWhich spoils unhappy Guinea of her sons,Demands his share of prey – demands themselves.The stormy fates descend: one death involvesTyrants and slaves; when straight their mangled limbsCrashing at once, he dyes the purple seasWith gore, and riots in the vengeful meal.When o'er this world, by equinoctial rainsFlooded immense, looks out the joyless sun,And draws the copious steam; from swampy fens,Where putrefaction into life ferments,And breathes destructive myriads; or from woods,Impenetrable shades, recesses foul,In vapors rank and blue corruption wrapp'd,Whose gloomy horrors yet no desperate footHas ever dar'd to pierce – then, wasteful, forthWalks the dire power of pestilent disease.A thousand hideous fiends her course attend,Sick nature blasting, and a heartless woe,And feeble desolation, casting downThe towering hopes and all the pride of man.Such as, of late, at Carthagena quench'dThe British fire. You, gallant Vernon, sawThe miserable scene; you, pitying, sawTo infant weakness sunk the warrior's arm;Saw the deep-racking pang, the ghastly form,The lip pale-quivering, and the beamless eyeNo more with ardor bright; you heard the groansOf agonizing ships, from shore to shore;Heard, nightly plung'd amid the sullen waves,The frequent corse – while on each other fix'd,In sad presage, the blank assistants seemed,Silent, to ask, whom fate would next demand.What need I mention those inclement skiesWhere, frequent o'er the sickening city, plague,The fiercest child of Nemesis divine,Descends? From Ethiopia's poison'd woods,From stifled Cairo's filth, and fetid fieldsWith locust-armies putrefying heap'd,This great destroyer sprung. Her awful rageThe brutes escape. Man is her destin'd prey,Intemperate man! and o'er his guilty domesShe draws a close incumbent cloud of death;Uninterrupted by the living winds,Forbid to blow a wholesome breeze; and stain'dWith many a mixture by the sun, suffus'd,Of angry aspect. Princely wisdom, then,Dejects his watchful eye; and from the handOf feeble justice, ineffectual, dropThe sword and balance: mute the voice of joy,And hush'd the clamor of the busy world.Empty the streets, with uncouth verdure clad.Into the worst of deserts sudden turn'dThe cheerful haunt of men – unless escap'dFrom the doom'd house, where matchless horror reigns,Shut up by barbarous fear, the smitten wretch,With frenzy wild, breaks loose, and loud to HeavenScreaming, the dreadful policy arraigns,Inhuman and unwise. The sullen door,Yet uninfected, on its cautious hingeFearing to turn, abhors society.Dependents, friends, relations, Love himself,Savag'd by woe, forget the tender tie,The sweet engagement of the feeling heart.But vain their selfish care: the circling sky,The wide enlivening air is full of fate;And, struck by turns, in solitary pangsThey fall, unblest, untended, and unmourn'd.Thus o'er the prostrate city black despairExtends her raven wing; while, to completeThe scene of desolation, stretch'd around,The grim guards stand, denying all retreat,And give the flying wretch a better death.Much yet remains unsung: the rage intenseOf brazen-vaulted skies, of iron fields,Where drought and famine starve the blasted year;Fir'd by the torch of noon to tenfold rage,The infuriate hill that shoots the pillar'd flame;And, rous'd within the subterranean world,The expanding earthquake, that resistless shakesAspiring cities from their solid base,And buries mountains in the flaming gulf.But 'tis enough; return, my vagrant muse:A nearer scene of horror calls thee home.Behold, slow-settling o'er the lurid grove,Unusual darkness broods; and growing gainsThe full possession of the sky, surcharg'dWith wrathful vapor, from the secret beds,Where sleep the mineral generations, drawn.Thence nitre, sulphur, and the fiery spumeOf fat bitumen, steaming on the day,With various-tinctur'd trains of latent flame,Pollute the sky, and in yon baleful cloud,A reddening gloom, a magazine of fate,Ferment; till, by the touch ethereal rous'd,The dash of clouds, or irritating warOf fighting winds, while all is calm below,They furious spring. A boding silence reigns,Dread through the dun expanse; save the dull soundThat from the mountain, previous to the storm,Rolls o'er the muttering earth, disturbs the flood,And shakes the forest leaf without a breath.Prone, to the lowest vale, the aerial tribesDescend: the tempest-loving raven scarceDares wing the dubious dusk. In rueful gazeThe cattle stand, and on the scowling heavensCast a deploring eye; by man forsook,Who to the crowded cottage hies him fast,Or seeks the shelter of the downward cave.'Tis listening fear, and dumb amazement all:When to the startled eye the sudden glanceAppears far south, eruptive through the cloud;And following slower, in explosion vast,The thunder raises his tremendous voice.At first, heard solemn o'er the verge of heaven,The tempest growls; but as it nearer comes,And rolls its awful burden on the wind,The lightnings flash a larger curve, and moreThe noise astounds – till overhead a sheetOf livid flame discloses wide, then shutsAnd opens wider, shuts and opens stillExpansive, wrapping ether in a blaze.Follows the loosen'd aggravated roar,Enlarging, deepening, mingling, peal on pealCrush'd horrible, convulsing heaven and earth.Down comes a deluge of sonorous hail,Or prone-descending rain. Wide-rent, the cloudsPour a whole flood; and yet, its flame unquench'dThe unconquerable lightning struggles through,Ragged and fierce, or in red whirling balls,And fires the mountains with redoubled rage.Black from the stroke, above, the smouldering pineStands a sad shatter'd trunk; and, stretch'd below,A lifeless group the blasted cattle lie:Here the soft flocks, with that same harmless lookThey wore alive, and ruminating stillIn fancy's eye; and there the frowning bull,And ox half-rais'd. Struck on the castled cliff,The venerable tower and spiry faneResign their aged pride. The gloomy woodsStart at the flash, and from their deep recess,Wide-flaming out, their trembling inmates shadeAmid Caernarvon's mountains rages loudThe repercussive roar; with mighty crush,Into the flashing deep, from the rude rocksOf Penmaenmawr heap'd hideous to the sky,Tumble the smitten cliffs; and Snowdon's peak,Dissolving, instant yields his wintry load.Far-seen, the heights of heathy Cheviot blaze,And Thulè bellows through her utmost isles.Guilt hears appall'd, with deeply troubled thought,And yet not always on the guilty headDescends the fated flash. Young CeladonAnd his Amelia were a matchless pair;With equal virtue form'd, and equal grace,The same, distinguish'd by their sex alone:Hers the mild lustre of the blooming morn,And his the radiance of the risen day.They lov'd: but such their guileless passion was,As in the dawn of time inform'd the heartOf innocence, and undissembling truth.'Twas friendship heighten'd by the mutual wish,The enchanting hope, and sympathetic glow,Beam'd from the mutual eye. Devoting allTo love, each was to each a dearer self;Supremely happy in the awaken'd powerOf giving joy. Alone, amid the shades,Still in harmonious intercourse they liv'dThe rural day, and talk'd the flowing heart,Or sigh'd and look'd unutterable things.So pass'd their life, a clear united stream,By care unruffled; till, in evil hour,The tempest caught them on the tender walk,Heedless how far, and where its mazes stray'd,While, with each other bless'd, creative loveStill bade eternal Eden smile around.Heavy with instant fate, her bosom heav'dUnwonted sighs, and stealing oft a lookOf the big gloom, on Celadon her eyeFell tearful, wetting her disorder'd cheek.In vain assuring love, and confidenceIn Heaven, repress'd her fear; it grew, and shookHer frame near dissolution. He perceiv'dThe unequal conflict; and, as angels lookOn dying saints, his eyes compassion shed,With love illumin'd high. "Fear not," he said,"Sweet innocence! thou stranger to offense,And inward storm! He who yon skies involvesIn frowns and darkness, ever smiles on theeWith kind regard. O'er thee the secret shaftThat wastes at midnight, or the undreaded hourOf noon, flies harmless; and that very voiceWhich thunders terror through the guilty heart,With tongues of seraphs whispers peace to thine.'Tis safety to be near thee sure, and thusTo clasp perfection!" From his void embrace,Mysterious Heaven! that moment, to the ground,A blacken'd corse, was struck the beauteous maid,But who can paint the lover, as he stood,Pierc'd by severe amazement, hating life,Speechless, and fix'd in all the death of woe!So, faint resemblance, on the marble tombThe well-dissembled mourner stooping stands,Forever silent, and forever sad.As from the face of heaven the shatter'd cloudsTumultuous rove, the interminable skySublimer swells, and o'er the world expandsA purer azure. Nature, from the storm,Shines out afresh; and through the lighten'd airA higher lustre and a clearer calm,Diffusive, tremble; while, as if in signOf danger past, a glittering robe of joy,Set off abundant by the yellow ray,Invests the fields, yet dropping from distress.'Tis beauty all, and grateful song around,Join'd to the low of kine, and numerous bleatOf flocks thick-nibbling through the clover'd vale.And shall the hymn be marr'd by thankless man,Most-favor'd; who with voice articulateShould lead the chorus of this lower world?Shall he, so soon forgetful of the handThat hush'd the thunder, and serenes the sky,Extinguish'd feel that spark the tempest wak'd,That sense of powers exceeding far his own,Ere yet his feeble heart has lost its fears?Cheer'd by the milder beam, the sprightly youthSpeeds to the well-known pool, whose crystal depthA sandy bottom shows. Awhile he standsGazing the inverted landscape, half-afraidTo meditate the blue profound below;Then plunges headlong down the circling flood.His ebon tresses and his rosy cheekInstant emerge; and through the obedient wave,At each short breathing by his lip repell'd,With arms and legs according well, he makes,As humor leads, an easy-winding path;While, from his polish'd sides, a dewy lightEffuses on the pleas'd spectators round.This is the purest exercise of health,The kind refresher of the summer heats,Nor, when cold Winter keens the brightening flood,Would I weak-shivering linger on the brink.Thus life redoubles; and is oft preserved,By the bold swimmer, in the swift illapseOf accident disastrous. Hence the limbsKnit into force; and the same Roman armThat rose victorious o'er the conquer'd earth,First learned, while tender, to subdue the wave.Even, from the body's purity, the mindReceives a secret sympathetic aid.Close in the covert of an hazel copse,Where winded into pleasing solitudesRuns out the rambling dale, young Damon sat;Pensive, and pierc'd with love's delightful pangs.There to the stream that down the distant rocksHoarse-murmuring fell, and plaintive breeze that play'dAmong the bending willows, falsely heOf Musidora's cruelty complain'd.She felt his flame; but deep within her breast,In bashful coyness, or in maiden pride,The soft return conceal'd – save when it stoleIn sidelong glances from her downcast eye,Or from her swelling soul in stifled sighs.Touched by the scene, no stranger to his vows,He fram'd a melting lay, to try her heart;And, if an infant passion struggled there,To call that passion forth. Thrice-happy swain!A lucky chance, that oft decides the fateOf mighty monarchs, then decided thine.For, lo! conducted by the laughing Loves,This cool retreat his Musidora sought:Warm in her cheek the sultry season glow'd;And, rob'd in loose array, she came to batheHer fervent limbs in the refreshing stream.What shall he do? In sweet confusion lost,And dubious flutterings, he awhile remain'd.A pure ingenuous elegance of soul,A delicate refinement known to few,Perplex'd his breast, and urg'd him to retire;But love forbade. Ye prudes in virtue, say,Say, ye severest, what would you have done?Meantime, this fairer nymph than ever bless'dArcadian stream, with timid eye aroundThe banks surveying, stripp'd her beauteous limbsTo taste the lucid coolness of the flood.Ah! then, not Paris on the piny topOf Ida panted stronger, when asideThe rival goddesses the vail divineCast unconfin'd, and gave him all their charms,Than, Damon, thou; as from the snowy leg,And slender foot, the inverted silk she drew;As the soft touch dissolv'd the virgin zone;And, through the parting robe, the alternate breast,With youth wild-throbbing, on thy lawless gazeIn full luxuriance rose. But, desperate youth,How durst thou risk the soul-distracting view,As from her naked limbs, of glowing white,Harmonious swell'd by Nature's finest hand,In folds loose-floating fell the fainter lawn,And fair expos'd she stood – shrunk from herself,With fancy blushing, at the doubtful breezeAlarm'd, and starting like the fearful fawn?Then to the flood she rush'd: the parted floodIts lovely guest with closing waves received,And every beauty softening, every graceFlushing anew, a mellow lustre shed —As shines the lily through the crystal mild,Or as the rose amid the morning dew,Fresh from Aurora's hand, more sweetly glows.While thus she wanton'd now beneath the waveBut ill-concealed, and now with streaming locks,That half-embrac'd her in a humid vail,Rising again, the latent Damon drewSuch maddening draughts of beauty to the soul,As for a while o'erwhelm'd his raptur'd thoughtWith luxury too daring. Check'd, at last.By love's respectful modesty, he deem'dThe theft profane, if aught profane to loveCan e'er be deem'd, and, struggling from the shade,With headlong hurry fled; but first these lines,Trac'd by his ready pencil, on the bankWith trembling hand he threw: "Bathe on, my fair,Yet unbeheld save by the sacred eyeOf faithful love: I go to guard thy haunt;To keep from thy recess each vagrant foot,And each licentious eye." With wild surprise,As if to marble struck, devoid of sense,A stupid moment motionless she stood:So stands the statue that enchants the world:So bending tries to vail the matchless boast,The mingled beauties of exulting Greece.Recovering, swift she flew to find those robesWhich blissful Eden knew not; and, array'dIn careless haste, the alarming paper snatch'd.But when her Damon's well known hand she sawHer terrors vanish'd, and a softer trainOf mix'd emotions, hard to be describ'd,Her sudden bosom seiz'd: shame void of guilt,The charming blush of innocence, esteemAnd admiration of her lover's flame,By modesty exalted. Even a senseOf self-approving beauty stole acrossHer busy thought. At length, a tender calmHushed by degrees the tumult of her soul,And on the spreading beech, that o'er the streamIncumbent hung, she with the sylvan penOf rural lovers this confession carv'd,Which soon her Damon kiss'd with weeping joy:"Dear youth! sole judge of what these verses mean,By fortune too much favor'd, but by love,Alas! not favor'd less, be still as nowDiscreet, the time may come you need not fly."The sun has lost his rage; his downward orbShoots nothing now but animating warmth,And vital lustre; that, with various ray,Lights up the clouds, those beauteous robes of heavenIncessant roll'd into romantic shapes,The dream of waking fancy! Broad belowCover'd with ripening fruits, and swelling fastInto the perfect year, the pregnant earthAnd all her tribes rejoice. Now the soft hourOf walking comes: for him who lonely lovesTo seek the distant hills, and there converseWith Nature; there to harmonize his heart,And in pathetic song to breathe aroundThe harmony to others. Social friends,Attun'd to happy unison of soul —To whose exalting eye a fairer world,Of which the vulgar never had a glimpse,Displays its charms – whose minds are richly fraughtWith philosophic stores, superior light —And in whose breast, enthusiastic, burnsVirtue the sons of interest deem romance,Now call'd abroad enjoy the falling day:Now to the verdant portico of woods,To Nature's vast lyceum, forth they walk;By that kind school where no proud master reigns,The full free converse of the friendly heart,Improving and improv'd. Now from the world,Sacred to sweet retirement, lovers steal,And pour their souls in transport, which the SireOf love approving hears, and calls it good.Which way, Amanda, shall we bend our course?The choice perplexes. Wherefore should we choose?All is the same with thee. Say shall we windAlong the streams? or walk the smiling mead;Or court the forest glades? or wander wildAmong the waving harvests? or ascend,While radiant Summer opens all its pride,Thy hill, delightful Sheen? Here let us sweepThe boundless landscape; now the raptur'd eyeExulting swift, to huge Augusta send,Now to the sister-hills that skirt her plainTo lofty Harrow now, and now to whereMajestic Windsor lifts his princely brow.In lovely contrast to this glorious view,Calmly magnificent, then will we turnTo where the silver Thames first rural grows.There let the feasted eye unwearied stray;Luxurious, there, rove through the pendent woodsThat nodding hang o'er Harrington's retreat,And stooping thence to Ham's embowering walks,Beneath whose shades, in spotless peace retir'd,With her the pleasing partner of his heart,The worthy Queensbury yet laments his Gay,And polish'd Cornbury woos the willing muse,Slow let us trace the matchless vale of Thames —Fair-winding up to where the muses hauntIn Twit'nam's bowers, and for their Pope imploreThe healing god, to royal Hampton's pile,To Clermont's terrac'd height, and Esher's groves,Where in the sweetest solitude, embrac'dBy the soft windings of the silent Mole,From courts and senates Pelham finds repose.Enchanting vale! beyond whate'er the museHas of Achaia or Hesperia sung!O vale of bliss! O softly swelling hills!On which the power of cultivation lies,And joys to see the wonders of his toil.Heavens! what a goodly prospect spreads around,Of hills, and dales, and woods, and lawns, and spires,And glittering towns, and gilded streams, till allThe stretching landscape into smoke decays!Happy Britannia! where the queen of arts,Inspiring vigor, liberty abroadWalks, unconfin'd, even to thy farthest cots,And scatters plenty, with unsparing hand.Rich is thy soil, and merciful thy clime:Thy streams unfailing in the Summer's droughtUnmatch'd thy guardian oaks; thy valleys floatWith golden waves; and on thy mountains flocksBleat numberless – while, roving round their sides,Bellow the blackening herds in lusty droves.Beneath, thy meadows glow, and rise unquell'dAgainst the mower's scythe. On every handThy villas shine. Thy country teems with wealthAnd property assures it to the swain,Pleas'd and unwearied in his guarded toil.Full are thy cities with the sons of art;And trade and joy, in every busy street,Mingling are heard: even drudgery himself.As at the car he sweats, or dusty hewsThe palace-stone, looks gay. Thy crowded ports,Where rising masts an endless prospect yield,With labor burn, and echo to the shoutsOf hurried sailor, as he hearty wavesHis last adieu, and, loosening every sheet,Resigns the spreading vessel to the wind.Bold, firm, and graceful, are thy generous youthBy hardship sinew'd, and by danger fir'd,Scattering the nations where they go; and first,Or in the listed plain, or stormy seas.Mild are thy glories too, as o'er the plansOf thriving peace thy thoughtful sires preside;In genius, and substantial learning, high;For every virtue, every worth, renown'd;Sincere, plain-hearted, hospitable, kind;Yet like the mustering thunder when provok'd,The dread of tyrants, and the sole resourceOf those that under grim oppression groan.Thy sons of glory many! Alfred thine,In whom the splendor of heroic warAnd more heroic peace, when govern'd well,Combine; whose hallow'd name the virtues saint,And his own muses love – the best of kings.With him thy Edwards and thy Henrys shine,Names dear to fame, the first who deep impress'dOn haughty Gaul the terror of thy arms,That awes her genius still. In statesmen thou,And patriots, fertile. Thine a steady More,Who, with a generous though mistaken zeal,Withstood a brutal tyrant's useful rage,Like Cato firm, like Aristides just,Like rigid Cincinnatus nobly poor —A dauntless soul erect, who smil'd on death.Frugal and wise, a Walsingham is thine;A Drake, who made thee mistress of the deep,And bore thy name in thunder round the world.Then flam'd thy spirit high; but who can speakThe numerous worthies of the maiden-reign?In Raleigh mark their every glory mix'd;Raleigh, the scourge of Spain; whose breast with allThe sage, the patriot, and the hero burn'd.Nor sunk his vigor when a coward reignThe warrior fetter'd, and at last resign'd,To glut the vengeance of a vanquish'd foe.Then, active still and unrestrain'd, his mindExplor'd the vast extent of ages past,And with his prison-hours enrich'd the world;Yet found no times, in all the long research,So glorious, or so base, as those he prov'd,In which he conquer'd, and in which he bled.Nor can the muse the gallant Sidney pass,The plume of war! with early laurels crown'd,The lover's myrtle, and the poet's bay.A Hampden too is thine, illustrious land,Wise, strenuous, firm, of unsubmitting soul,Who stemm'd the torrent of a downward ageTo slavery prone, and bade thee rise again,In all thy native pomp of freedom bold.Bright, at his call, thy age of men effulg'd;Of men on whom late time a kindling eyeShall turn, and tyrants tremble while they read.Bring every sweetest flower, and let me strewThe grave where Russell lies; whose temper'd blood,With calmest cheerfulness for thee resign'd,Stain'd the sad annals of a giddy reign —Aiming at lawless power, though meanly sunkIn loose inglorious luxury. With himHis friend, the British Cassius, fearless bled;Of high determin'd spirit, roughly brave,By ancient learning to the enlighten'd loveOf ancient freedom warm'd. Fair thy renownIn awful sages and in noble bardsSoon as the light of dawning science spreadHer orient ray, and wak'd the muses' song.Thine is a Bacon, hapless in his choice;Unfit to stand the civil storm of state,And through the smooth barbarity of courts,With firm but pliant virtue, forward stillTo urge his course. Him for the studious shadeKind Nature form'd, deep, comprehensive, clear,Exact, and elegant; in one rich soul,Plato, the Stagyrite, and Tully join'd.The great deliverer he! who from the gloomOf cloister'd monks, and jargon-teaching schools,Led forth the true philosophy, there longHeld in the magic chain of words and forms,And definitions void: he led her forth,Daughter of heaven! that slow-ascending still,Investigating sure the chain of things,With radiant finger points to heaven again.The generous Ashley thine, the friend of man;Who scann'd his nature with a brother's eye,His weakness prompt to shade, to raise his aim,To touch the finer movements of the mind,And with the moral beauty charm the heartWhy need I name thy Boyle, whose pious search,Amid the dark recesses of his works,The great Creator sought? And why thy Locke,Who made the whole internal world his own?Let Newton, pure intelligence, whom GodTo mortals lent, to trace his boundless worksFrom laws sublimely simple, speak thy fameIn all philosophy. For lofty sense,Creative fancy, and inspection keenThrough the deep windings of the human heart,Is not wild Shakspeare thine and Nature's boast?Is not each great, each amiable museOf classic ages, in thy Milton met?A genius universal as his theme,Astonishing as chaos, as the bloomOf blowing Eden fair, as heaven sublime.Nor shall my verse that elder bard forget,The gentle Spenser, fancy's pleasing son,Who, like a copious river, pour'd his songO'er all the mazes of enchanted ground;Nor thee, his ancient master, laughing sage,Chaucer, whose native manners painting verse,Well moraliz'd, shines through the Gothic cloudOf time and language o'er thy genius thrown.May my song soften, as thy daughters I,Britannia, hail! for beauty is their own,The feeling heart, simplicity of life,And elegance, and taste; the faultless form,Shap'd by the hand of harmony; the cheek,Where the live crimson, through the native whiteSoft-shooting, o'er the face diffuses bloom,And every nameless grace; the parted lip,Like the red rose-bud moist with morning dew,Breathing delight; and, under flowing jet,Or sunny ringlets, or of circling brown,The neck slight-shaded, and the swelling breast,The look resistless, piercing to the soul,And by the soul informed, when dress'd in loveShe sits high-smiling in the conscious eye.Island of bliss! amid the subject seasThat thunder round thy rocky coasts, set up,At once the wonder, terror, and delightOf distant nations; whose remotest shoreCan soon be shaken by thy naval arm;Not to be shook thyself, but all assaultsBaffling, like thy hoar cliffs the loud sea-wave.O Thou by whose almighty nod the scaleOf empire rises, or alternate falls,Send forth the saving virtues round the land,In bright patrol: white peace, and social love;The tender-looking charity, intentOn gentle deeds, and shedding tears through smilesUndaunted truth, and dignity of mind;Courage compos'd, and keen; sound temperance,Healthful in heart and look; clear chastity,With blushes reddening as she moves along,Disorder'd at the deep regard she draws;Rough industry; activity untir'd,With copious life inform'd, and all awake;While in the radiant front, superior shinesThat first paternal virtue, public zeal —Who throws o'er all an equal wide survey,And, ever musing on the common weal,Still labors glorious with some great design.Low walks the sun, and broadens by degrees,Just o'er the verge of day. The shifting cloudsAssembled gay, a richly gorgeous train,In all their pomp attend his setting throne.Air, earth, and ocean smile immense. And nowAs if his weary chariot sought the bowersOf Amphitritè and her tending nymphs,(So Grecian fable sung) he dips his orb;Now half immers'd; and now a golden curve;Gives one bright glance, then total disappearsForever running an enchanted round,Passes the day, deceitful, vain, and void;As fleets the vision o'er the formful brain,This moment hurrying wild the impassion'd soul,The next in nothing lost. 'Tis so to him,The dreamer of this earth, an idle blank:A sight of horror to the cruel wretchWho, all day long in sordid pleasure roll'd,Himself an useless load, has squander'd vile,Upon his scoundrel train, what might have cheer'dA drooping family of modest worth.But to the generous still-improving mind,That gives the hopeless heart to sing for joy,Diffusing kind beneficence around,Boastless, as now descends the silent dew —To him the long review of order'd lifeIs inward rapture, only to be felt.Confess'd from yonder slow-extinguish'd clouds,All ether softening, sober evening takesHer wonted station in the middle air;A thousand shadows at her beck. First thisShe sends on earth; then that of deeper dyeSteals soft behind, and then a deeper still,In circle following circle, gathers round,To close the face of things. A fresher galeBegins to wave the wood, and stir the stream,Sweeping with shadowy gust the fields of corn;While the quail clamors for his running mate,Wide o'er the thistly lawn, as swells the breeze,A whitening shower of vegetable downAmusive floats. The kind impartial careOf Nature naught disdains: thoughtful to feedHer lowest sons, and clothe the coming year,From field to field the feather'd seeds she wings.His folded flock secure, the shepherd homeHies, merry-hearted; and by turns relievesThe ruddy milkmaid of her brimming pail;The beauty whom perhaps his witless heart,Unknowing what the joy-mix'd anguish meansSincerely loves, by that best language shownOf cordial glances and obliging deeds.Onward they pass, o'er many a panting height,And valley sunk, and unfrequented; whereAt fall of eve the fairy people throng,In various game and revelry to passThe summer night, as village stories tell.But far about they wander from the graveOf him, whom his ungentle fortune urg'dAgainst his own sad breast to lift the handOf impious violence. The lonely towerIs also shunn'd; whose mournful chambers hold,So night-struck fancy dreams, the yelling ghost.Among the crooked lanes, on every hedge,The glow-worm lights his gem; and, through the dark,A moving radiance twinkles. Evening yieldsThe world to night; not in her winter robeOf massy Stygian woof, but loose array'dIn mantle dun. A faint erroneous ray,Glanc'd from the imperfect surfaces of things,Flings half an image on the straining eye;While wavering woods, and villages, and streams,And rocks, and mountain tops, that long retain'dThe ascending gleam, are all one swimming scene,Uncertain if beheld. Sudden to heavenThence weary vision turns; where, leading softThe silent hours of love, with purest raySweet Venus shines; and from her genial riseWhen daylight sickens, till it springs afresh,Unrival'd reigns, the fairest lamp of night.As thus the effulgence tremulous I drinkWith cherish'd gaze, the lambent lightnings shootAcross the sky; or horizontal dart,In wondrous shapes – by fearful murmuring crowdsPortentous deem'd. Amid the radiant orbsThat more than deck, that animate the sky,The life-infusing suns of other worlds,Lo! from the dread immensity of spaceReturning, with accelerated course,The rushing cornet to the sun descends;And as he sinks below the shading earth,With awful train projected o'er the heavens,The guilty nations tremble. But, aboveThose superstitious horrors that enslaveThe fond sequacious herd, to mystic faithAnd blind amazement prone, the enliven'd few,Whose god-like minds philosophy exalts,The glorious stranger hail. They feel a joyDivinely great: they in their powers exult,That wondrous force of thought which mounting spurnsThis dusky spot and measures all the sky,While from his far excursion through the wildsOf barren ether, faithful to his time,They see the blazing wonder rise anew,In seeming terror clad, but kindly bentTo work the will of all sustaining Love;From his huge vapory train perhaps to shakeReviving moisture on the numerous orbsThrough which his long ellipsis winds – perhapsTo lend new fuel to declining suns,To light up worlds, and feed eternal fire.With thee, serene philosophy, with thee,And thy bright garland, let me crown my song!Effusive source of evidence, and truth!A lustre shedding o'er the ennobled mind,Stronger than summer noon; and pure as thatWhose mild vibrations soothe the parted soul,New to the dawning of celestial day.Hence through her nourish'd powers, enlarg'd by thee,She springs aloft, with elevated pride,Above the tangling mass of low desiresThat bind the fluttering crowd; and, angel-wing'd.The heights of science and of virtue gains,Where all is calm and clear; with nature round,Or in the starry regions, or the abyss,To reason's and to fancy's eye display'd:The first up-tracing, from the dreary void,The chain of causes and effects to him,The world-producing Essence, who alonePossesses being; while the last receivesThe whole magnificence of heaven and earth,And every beauty, delicate or bold,Obvious or more remote, with livelier sense,Diffusive painted on the rapid mind.Tutor'd by thee, hence poetry exaltsHer voice to ages; and informs the pageWith music, image, sentiment, and thought,Never to die! the treasure of mankind,Their highest honor, and their truest joy!Without thee, what were unenlighten'd man?A savage roaming through the woods and wilds,In quest of prey; and with the unfashion'd furRough-clad; devoid of every finer art,And elegance of life. Nor happinessDomestic, mix'd of tenderness and care,Nor moral excellence, nor social bliss,Nor guardian law, were his; nor various skillTo turn the furrow, or to guide the toolMechanic; nor the heaven-conducted prowOf navigation bold, that fearless bravesThe burning line or dares the wintry pole,Mother severe of infinite delights!Nothing, save rapine, indolence, and guile,And woes on woes, a still revolving train!Whose horrid circle had made human lifeThan non-existence worse; but, taught by thee,Ours are the plans of policy and peace:To live like brothers, and conjunctive allEmbellish life. While thus laborious crowdsPly the tough oar, philosophy directsThe ruling helm; or, like the liberal breathOf potent heaven, invisible, the sailSwells out, and bears the inferior world along.Nor to this evanescent speck of earthPoorly confin'd – the radiant tracts on highAre her exalted range; intent to gazeCreation through; and, from that full complexOf never-ending wonders, to conceiveOf the Sole Being right, who spoke the word,And nature mov'd complete. With inward viewThence on the ideal kingdom swift she turnsHer eye; and instant, at her powerful glance,The obedient phantoms vanish or appear;Compound, divide, and into order shift,Each to his rank, from plain perception upTo the fair forms of fancy's fleeting train;To reason then, deducing truth from truth,And notion quite abstract; where first beginsThe world of spirits, action all, and lifeUnfetter'd, and unmix'd. But here the cloud,So wills Eternal Providence, sits deep.Enough for us to know that this dark state,In wayward passions lost, and vain pursuits,This infancy of being, can not proveThe final issue of the works of God,By boundless Love and perfect Wisdom form'd,And ever rising with the rising mind.