Chapter XIV: Introduction (12)

Who lie on the heath beside me? Are they my love, and my brother? Speak to me, O my friends! To Colma they give no reply. Speak to me; I am alone! My soul is tormented with fears! Ah! they are dead! Their swords are red from the fight. O my brother! my brother! why hast thou slain my Salgar? Why, O Salgar, hast thou slain my brother? Dear were ye both to me! What shall I say in your praise? Thou wert fair on the hill among thousands! He was terrible in the fight! Speak to me; hear my voice; hear me, sons of my love! They are silent; silent forever! Cold, cold are their breasts of clay! Oh! from the rock on the hill—from the top of the windy steep, speak, ye ghosts of the dead! speak, I will not be afraid! Whither are ye gone to rest? In what cave of the hill shall I find the departed? No feeble voice is on the gale; no answer half-drowned in the storm!

I sit in my grief; I wait for morning in my tears! Rear the tomb,

ye friends of the dead. Close it not till Colma come. My life flies away like a dream; why should I stay behind? Here shall I rest with my friends, by the stream of the sounding rock. When night comes on the hill; when the loud winds arise, my ghost shall stand in the blast, and mourn the death of my friends. The hunter shall hear from his booth. He shall fear but love my voice! For sweet shall my voice be for my friends: pleasant were her friends to Colma!

JAMES MACPHERSON, 1738–1796.

SONG.

FROM “CYNTHIA’S REVELS.”

Slow, slow, fresh fount, keep time with my salt tears;
Yet slower, yet, O faintly, gentle springs!
List to the heavy part the music bears;
Woe weeps out her division when she sings.
Droop herbs and flowers,
Fall grief in showers—
Our beauties are not ours.
O I could still,
Like melting snow upon some craggy hill,
Drop, drop, drop, drop,
Since summer’s pride is now a withered daffodil.
BEN JONSON, 1574–1637.

LINES.

“O Mary, go and call the cattle home,
And call the cattle home,
And call the cattle home,
Across the sands o’ Dee;”
The western wind was wild and dark wi’ foam,
And all alone went she.

The creeping tide came up along the sand,
And o’er, and o’er the sand,
And 'round, and 'round the sand,
As far as eye could see;
The blinding mist came down and hid the land,
And never home came she.

“O is it weed, or fish, or floating hair—
A tress o’ golden hair—
O’ drowned maiden’s hair,
Above the nets at sea?
Was never salmon yet that shone so fair,
Among the stakes on Dee!”

They rowed her in across the rolling foam,
The cruel, crawling foam,
The cruel, hungry foam,
To her grave beside the sea.
But still the boatmen hear her call the cattle home,
Across the sands o’ Dee.
C. KINGSLEY.

LETTER OF ST. BASIL, DESCRIBING HIS HERMITAGE.

TO ST. GREGORY NAZIANZEN.

I believe I may at last flatter myself with having found the end of my wanderings. The hopes of being united with thee—or, I should rather say, my dreams, for hopes have been justly termed the waking dreams of men—have remained unfulfilled. God has suffered me to find a place, such as has often flitted before our imaginations; for that which fancy has shown us from afar is now made manifest to me. A high mountain, clothed with thick woods, is watered to the north by fresh and everflowing streams. At its foot lies an extended plain, rendered fruitful by the vapors with which it is moistened. The surrounding forest crowded with trees of different kinds, incloses one as in a strong fortress. This wilderness is bounded by two deep ravines; on the one side the river, rushing in foam down the mountain, forms an almost impassable barrier, while on the other all access is impeded by a broad mountain-ridge. My hut is so situated on the summit of the mountain, that I can overlook the whole plain, and follow throughout its course the Iris, which is more beautiful, and has a more abundant body of water than the Strymon, near Amphipolis. The river of my wilderness, which is more impetuous than any other that I know of, breaks against the jutting rock, and throws itself foaming into the abyss below—an object of admiration to the mountain wanderer, and a source of profit to the natives from the numerous fishes that are found in its waters. Shall I describe to thee the fructifying vapors that rise from the moist earth, or the cool breezes wafted over the rippled face of the waters? Shall I speak of the sweet song of the birds, or of the rich luxuriance of the flowering plants? What charms me beyond all else is the calm repose of the spot. It is only visited occasionally by huntsmen; for my wilderness nourishes herds of deer and wild goats, but not bears and wolves.

What other spot could I exchange for this? Alcmæon, when he had found the Echinades, would not wander farther.

_Letters of_ ST. BASIL, 329–379.

When I see every ledge of rock, every valley and plain, covered with new-born verdure, the varied beauty of the trees, and the lilies at my feet decked by Nature with the double charms of perfume and of color, when in the distance I see the ocean, toward which the clouds are borne onward, my spirit is overpowered by a sadness not wholly devoid of enjoyment. When in autumn the fruits have passed away, the leaves have fallen, and the branches of the trees, dried and shriveled, are robbed of their leafy adornments, we are instinctively led, amid the everlasting and regular change in Nature, to feel the harmony of the wondrous powers pervading all things. He who contemplates them with the eye of the soul, feels the littleness of man amid the greatness of the universe.

ST. GREGORY _of Nyssa_, 396.

A VISION.

FROM ITALIAN OF PETRARCH.

I.

Being one day at my window all alone,
So many strange things happened me to see,
As much it grieveth me to think thereon.
At my right hand a hynde appeared to mee,
So faire as mote the greatest god delite;
Two eager dogs did her pursue in chase,
Of which the one was blacke, the other white;
With deadly force, so in their cruell race
They pincht the haunches of that gentle beast,
That at the last, and in short time I spide,
Under a rocke, where she, alas, opprest,
Fell to the ground, and there untimely dide.
Cruell death vanquishing so noble beautie
Oft makes me wrile so harde a destanie.

II.

After, at sea, a tall ship did appeare,
Made all of heben and white yvorie;
The sailes of golde, of silk the tackle were;
Milde was the winde, calme seemed the sea to bee,
The skie eachwhere did show full bright and faire.
With rich treasures this gay ship fraighted was;

But sudden storme did so turmoyle the aire,
And tumbled up the sea, that she (alas!)
Strake on a rock that under water lay,
And perished past all recoverie.
O! how great ruth and sorrowful assay
Doth vex my spirite with perplexitie,
Thus in a moment to see lost and drown’d
So great riches, as like cannot be found.

III.

The heavenly branches did I see arise
Out of the fresh and lustie lawrell tree,
Amidst the yong greene wood of Paradise;
Some noble plant I thought my selfe to see,
Such store of birds therein yshrowded were,
Chaunting in shade their sundrie melodie,
That with their sweetness I was ravisht nere.
While on this lawrell fixed was mine eie,
The skie gan everie where to overcast,
And darkened was the welkin all about,
When sudden flash of heaven’s fire out brast,
And rent this royall tree quite by the roote;
Which makes me much, and ever, to complaine,
For no such shadowe shal be had againe.

IV.

Within this woode, out of a rocke, did rise
A spring of water, mildly rumbling downe,
Wherto approched not in anie wise
The homely shepherd nor the ruder clowne,
But manie muses, and the nymphes withall,
That sweetly in accord did tune their voyce
To the soft sounding of the water’s fall,
That my glad heart thereat did much reioyce.
But, while herein I tooke my chiefe delight,
I saw (alas!) the gaping earth devoure
The spring, the place, and all cleane out of sight;
Which yet aggrieves my hart even to this houre,
And wounds my soul with ruefull memorie,
To see such pleasures gon so suddenly.

V.

I saw a phœnix in the wood alone,
With purple wings and crest of golden hewe;
Strange bird he was, whereby I thought anone,
That of some heavenly wight I had the viewe;

Untill he came unto the broken tree,
And to the spring, that late devoured was.
What say I more? Each thing at last we see
Doth passe away; the phœnix there, alas!
Spying the tree destroid, the water dride,
Himself smote with his beake, as in disdaine,
And so forthwithe in greate despight he dide;
That yet my heart burns in exceeding paine,
For ruth and pitie of so haples plight;
O! let mine eyes no more see such a sight.

VI.

At last so faire a ladie did I spie,
That thinking yet on her I burn and quake;
On hearts and flowres she walked pensively
Milde, but yet love she proudly did forsake;
White seem’d her robes, yet woven so they were
As snow and golde together had beene wrought;
Above the waste a darke cloude shrouded her,
A stinging serpent by the heele her caught;
Wherewith she languish’d as the gathered flowre;
And, well assured, she mounted up to ioy.
Alas, on earth no nothing doth endure
But bitter griefe and sorrowful annoy;
Which make this life wretched and miserable,
Tossed with stormes of fortune variable.

VII.

When I beheld this tickle trustles state
Of vaine worlde’s glorie, flitting to and fro,
And mortall men tossed by troublous fate
In restless seas of wretchednesse and woe,
I wish I might this wearie life foregoe,
And shortly turn into my happie rest,
Where my free spirit might not anie moe
Be vext with sights that doo her peace molest.
And ye, faire ladie, in whose bounteous brest
All heavenly grace and vertue shrined is,
When ye these rymes doe read, and vow the rest,
Loath this base world, and thinke of heaven’s bliss;
And though ye be the fairest of God’s creatures,
Yet thinke that Death shall spoyle your goodly features.
_Translation of_ EDMUND SPENSER. FRANCESCO PETRARCA, 1304–1374.

THE CAMPAGNA OF ROME.

Perhaps there is no more impressive scene on earth than the solitary extent of the Campagna of Rome under evening light. Let the reader imagine himself for a moment withdrawn from the sounds and motion of the living world, and sent forth alone into this wild and wasted plain. The earth yields and crumbles beneath his foot, tread he never so lightly, for its substance is white, hollow, and carious, like the dusty wreck of the bones of men. The long, knotted grass waves and tosses feebly in the evening wind, and the shadows of its motion shake feverishly along the banks of rivers that lift themselves to the sunlight. Hillocks of moldering earth heave around him, as if the dead beneath were struggling in their sleep; scattered blocks of black stone, four square, remnants of mighty edifices, not one left upon another, lie upon them to keep them down. A dull purple, poisonous haze stretches level along the desert, vailing its spectral wrecks of massy ruins, on whose rents the red light rests like dying fire on defiled altars. The blue ridge of the Alban mount lifts itself against a solemn space of green, clear, quiet sky. Watch-towers of dark clouds stand steadfastly along the promontories of the Apennines. From the plain to the mountains, the shattered aqueducts, pier beyond pier, melt into the darkness, like shadowy and countless troops of funeral mourners passing from a nation’s grave.

JOHN RUSKIN.

THE WAVE OF LIFE.

FROM THE GERMAN.

“Whither, thou turbid wave?
Whither, with so much haste,
As if a thief wert thou?”

“I am the Wave of Life
Stained with my margin’s dust;
From the struggle and the strife
Of the narrow stream I fly
To the sea’s immensity,
To wash me from the slime
Of the muddy banks of Time.”
_Translation of_ H. W. LONGFELLOW. CHRISTOPH TIEDGE, 1752–1840.

MUTABILITY.

From low to high doth dissolution climb, And sinks from high to low, along a scale Of awful notes, whose concord shall not fail; A musical but melancholy chime, Which they can hear who meddle not with crime, Nor avarice, nor over-anxious care. Truth fails not; but her outward forms that bear The longest date do melt like frosty rime, That in the morning whitened hill and plain And is no more; drop like the tower sublime Of yesterday, that royally did wear Its crown of weeds, but could not even sustain Some casual shout that broke the silent air, Or the unimaginable touch of Time. WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

]

XXVII.
=Winter.=

An interesting passage from Hesiod is given below. The extract is taken from the “Works and Days,” a poem giving instructions regarding agriculture, trade, and labor, blended with precepts of a moral character; and, in addition to the extremely remote date of its origin, the passage is also remarkable as one of the few instances in which a poet of the old heathen world has entered into detail of description on natural subjects. Its authenticity is, I believe, admitted. “The picturesque description given by Hesiod of Winter bears all the evidences of great antiquity,” says a learned German critic.

WINTER.

FROM HESIOD.

Beware the January month, beware
Those hurtful days, that keenly piercing air,
Which flays the herds; when icicles are cast
O’er frozen earth, and sheathe the nipping blast.

From courser-breeding Thrace comes rushing forth
O’er the broad sea the whirlwind of the North,
And moves it with his breath; the ocean floods
Heave, and earth bellows through her wild of woods.
Full many an oak of lofty leaf he fells
And strews with thick-branched pines the mountain dells
He stoops to earth; the crash is heard around;
The depth of forests rolls the roar of sound.
The beasts their cowering tails with trembling fold,
And shrink and shudder at the gusty cold;
Thick is the hairy coat, the shaggy skin,
But that all-chilling breath shall pierce within.
Not his rough hide can then the ox avail;
The long-haired goat, defenseless, feels the gale;
Yet vain the northwind’s rushing strength to wound
The flock with sheltering fleeces fenced around.
_Translation of_ SIR C. A. ELTON.

A WINTER SCENE.

FROM “THE SEASONS.”

The keener tempests rise; and fuming dun, From all the livid east, or piercing north, Thick clouds ascend; in whose capacious womb A vapory deluge lies, to snow congeal’d. Heavy they roll their fleecy world along; And the sky saddens with the gathered storm. Through the hush’d air the whitening shower descends, At first thin wavering; till at last the flakes Fall broad, and wide, and fast, dimming the sky, With a continual flow. The cherish’d fields Put on their winter robe of purest white. ’Tis brightness all; save where the new snow melts Along the mazy current. Low, the woods Bow their hoar head; and, ere the languid sun, Faint from the west, emits his evening ray, Earth’s universal face, deep hid and still, Is one wild dazzling waste, that buries wide The works of man. Drooping, the laborer-ox Stands cover’d o’er with snow, and then demands The fruit of all his toil. The fowls of heaven, Tam’d by the cruel season, crowd around The winnowing store, and claim the little boon Which Providence assigns them. One alone,

The redbreast, sacred to the household gods, Wisely regardful of th’ embroiling sky, In joyless fields and thorny thickets leaves His shivering mates, and pays to trusted man His annual visit. Half afraid, he first Against the window beats; then, brisk, alights On the warm hearth; then, hopping o’er the floor Eyes all the smiling family askance, And pecks, and starts, and wonders where he is: Till, more familiar grown, the table crumbs Attract his slender feet. The foodless wilds Pour forth their brown inhabitants. The hare, Though timorous of heart, and hard beset By death in various forms, dark snares and dogs, And more unpitying men, the garden seeks, Urg’d on by fearless want. The bleating kind Eye the bleak heaven, and next the glistening earth, With looks of dumb despair; then, sad dispers’d, Dig for the withered herb through heaps of snow. JAMES THOMSON, 1700–1748.

WINTER SONG.

FROM THE GERMAN.

Summer joys are o’er;
Flow’rets bloom no more
Wintry winds are sweeping,
Through the snow-drifts peeping,
Cheerful evergreen
Rarely now is seen.

Now no plumed throng
Charms the wood with song;
Ice-bound trees are glittering;
Merry snow-birds, twittering,
Fondly strive to cheer
Scenes so cold and drear.

Winter, still I see
Many charms in thee;
Love thy chilly greeting,
Snow-storms fiercely beating,
And the dear delights
Of the long, long nights.
_Translation of_ T. BROOKS. LUDWIG HOLTY, 1748–1776.

HOLLY SONG.

Blow, blow, thou winter wind,
Thou art not so unkind
As man’s ingratitude;
Thy tooth is not so keen,
Because thou art not seen,
Although thy breath be rude.
Heigh ho! sing heigh ho! unto the green holly;
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly;
Then, heigh ho! the holly;
This life is most jolly!

Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky,
Thou dost not bite so nigh
As benefits forgot;
Though thou the waters warp,
Thy sting is not so sharp
As friend remembered not.
Heigh ho! sing heigh ho! unto the green holly;
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly;
Then, heigh ho! the holly!
This life is most jolly!
SHAKSPEARE.

AN OLD-FASHIONED HOLLY HEDGE.

Is there under heaven a more glorious and refreshing object of the kind than an impassable hedge of about four hundred feet in length, nine feet high, and five feet in diameter, which I can show in my gardens at Say’s Court, at any time of the year, glittering with its armed and varnished leaves, the taller standards at orderly distances blushing with their natural coral—shorn and fashioned into columns and pilasters, architecturally shaped, at due distance?

EVELYN’S “_Silva_.”

CHRISTMAS CAROL.

HOLLY AND IVY.

I.

Holly and Ivy made a great party,
Who should have the mastery
In lands where they go.

Then spake Holly, “I am fierce and jolly,
I will have the mastery
In lands where we go!”
Then spake Ivy, “I am loud and proud,
And I will have the mastery
In lands where we go!”
Then spake Holly, and bent down on his knee,
“I pray thee, gentle Ivy, essay me no villainy,
In lands where we go!”

II.

Nay, Ivy, nay, it shall not be, I wis, Let Holly have the mastery, as the manner is. Holly standeth in the hall fair to behold; Ivy stands without the door, she is full sore a cold. Nay, Ivy, nay, etc., etc. Holly and his merry men, they dance now and they sing; Ivy and her maidens they weep and their hands wring. Nay, Ivy, nay, etc., etc. Ivy hath a lyke,[15] she caught it with the cold, So may they all have that do with Ivy hold. Nay, Ivy, nay, etc., etc. Holly he hath berries as red as any rose, The foresters, the hunters, keep them for the does. Nay, Ivy, nay, etc., etc. Ivy she hath berries as black as any sloe, There come the owls and eat them as they goe. Nay, Ivy, nay, etc., etc. Holly he hath birds, a full, fair flock, The nightingale, the popinjay, the gentle laverock. Nay, Ivy, nay, etc., etc. Good Ivy say to us what bird hath thou; None but the owlet that cries How! How! _Dating in the 14th century._

THE SEASONS.

A blue-eyed child that sits amid the noon,
O’erhung with a laburnum’s drooping sprays,
Singing her little songs, while softly, 'round
Along the grass the checkered sunshine plays.

All beauty that is throned in womanhood,
Pacing a summer-garden’s fountain-walks,

That stoops to smooth a glossy spaniel down,
To hide her flushing cheek from one who talks.

A happy mother with her fair-faced girls,
In whose sweet Spring again her youth she sees,
With shout and dance, and laugh and bound and song,
Stripping an Autumn orchard’s laden trees.

An aged woman in a wintry room—
Frost on the pane, without the whirling snow—
Reading old letters of her far-off youth,
Of sorrows past and joys of long ago.
N. C. BENNET.

A WINTER SONG.

When icicles hang by the wall, And Dick the shepherd blows his nail, And Tom bears logs into the hall, And milk comes frozen home in pail; When blood is nipp’d, and ways be foul, Then nightly sings the staring owl, To-whoo; Tu-whit, to-whoo, a merry note, While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.

When all aloud the wind doth blow, And coughing drowns the parson’s saw, And birds sit brooding in the snow, And Marian’s nose looks red and raw; When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl, Then nightly sings the staring owl, To-whoo; Tu-whit, to-whoo, a merry note, While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. SHAKSPEARE.

THE THRUSH.

Sing on, sweet thrush, upon the leafless bough;
Sing on, sweet bird, I listen to thy strain;
See aged Winter, 'mid his surly reign,
At thy blithe carol cheers his furrowed brow.

So in lone Poverty’s dominion drear
Sits meek Content with light, unanxious heart,
Welcomes the rapid movements, bids them part,
Nor asks if they bring aught to hope or fear.

I thank thee, Author of this opening day!
Thou whose bright sun now gilds the Orient skies!
Riches denied, thy boon was purer joys,
What wealth could never give nor take away!

Yet come, thou child of poverty and care; The mite high Heaven bestow’d, that mite with thee I’ll share. ROBERT BURNS, 1750–1796.

SONNET.

Sheath’d is the river as it glideth by, Frost-pearl’d are all the boughs in forests old, The sheep are huddling close upon the wold, And over them the stars tremble on high. Pure joys, these winter nights, around me lie; ’Tis fine to loiter through the lighted streets At Christmas time, and guess from brow and pace The doom and history of each one we meet; What kind of heart beats in each dusky case; Whiles startled by the beauty of a face In a shop-light a moment; or, instead, To dream of silent fields, where calm and deep The sunshine lieth like a golden sleep— Recalling sweetest looks of summers dead. ALEXANDER SMITH.

SPRING AND WINTER.

FROM THE FRENCH.

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 cover over the embers low; And, snugly housed from the wind and weather, 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 naught, both late and early, Is banished afar by the new-born year, When thy merry step draws near! _Translation by_ H. W. LONGFELLOW. CHARLES, DUKE OF ORLEANS, 1391–1467.

WOODS IN WINTER.

When winter winds are piercing chill,
And through the hawthorn blows the gale,
With solemn feet I tread the hill
That overbrows the lonely vale.

O’er the bare upland, and away
Through the long reach of desert woods,
The embracing sunbeams chastely play,
And gladden those deep solitudes

Where, twisted round the barren oak,
The summer vine in beauty clung,
And summer winds the silence broke,
The crystal icicle is hung.

Where from their frozen urns, mute springs
Pour out the river’s gradual tide,
Shrilly the skater’s iron rings,
And voices fill the woodland side.

Alas! how changed from the fair scene,
When birds sang out their mellow lay,
And winds were soft, and woods were green,
And the song ceased not with the day.

But still wild music is abroad,
Pale, desert woods! within your crowd;
And gathering winds in hoarse accord
Amid the vocal reeds pipe loud.

Chill airs, and wintry winds! my ear
Has grown familiar with your song;
I hear it in the opening year—
I listen, and it cheers me long.
H. W. LONGFELLOW.

WINTER.

Sad soul—dear heart, O why repine?
The melancholy tale is plain;
The leaves of spring, the summer flowers
Have bloomed and died again.

The sweet and silver-sandaled Dew,
Which, like a maiden, fed the flowers,
Hath waned into the beldame Frost,
And walked amid our bowers.

Some buds there were—sad hearts, be still!
Which looked awhile unto the sky,
Then breathed but once or lived, to tell
How sweetest things may die!

And some must blight where many bloom;
But, blight or bloom, the fruit must fall!
Why sigh for spring or summer flowers,
Since winter gathers all?

He gathers all—but chide him not;
He wraps them in his mantle cold,
And folds them close, as best he can,
For he is blind and old.

Sad soul—dear heart, no more repine—
The tale is beautiful and plain:
Surely as winter taketh all,
The spring shall bring again.
T. B. READ.

XXVIII.
=Medley.=

FRAGMENT FROM THE GREEK OF ARISTOTLE.

If there were beings who lived in the depths of the earth, in dwellings adorned with statues and paintings, and every thing which is possessed in rich abundance by those whom we esteem fortunate; and if these beings could receive tidings of the power and might of the gods, and could then emerge from their hidden dwellings through the open fissures of the earth, to the places which we inhabit; if they could suddenly behold the earth, and the sea, and the vault of heaven; could recognize the expanse of the cloudy firmament, and the might of the winds of heaven, and admire the sun in its majesty, beauty, and radiant effulgence; and, lastly, when night vailed the earth in darkness, they could behold the starry heavens, the changing moon, and the stars rising and setting in the unvarying course ordained from eternity, they would surely exclaim, “There are gods, and such great things must be the work of their hands.”

_Translation from_ HUMBOLDT’S “_Cosmos_.”

THE CREATION OF THE EARTH.

God said, Be gather’d now, ye waters under heav’n, Into one place, and let dry land appear. Immediately the mountains huge appear Emergent, and their broad backs upheave Into the clouds, their tops ascend the sky. So high as heav’d the tumid hills, so low Down sunk a hollow bottom, broad and deep, Capacious bed of waters: thither they Hasted with glad precipitance, uproll’d As drops on dust conglobing from the dry: Part rise in crystal wall, or ridge direct, For haste; such flight the great command imprest On the swift floods; as armies at the call Of trumpet (for of armies thou hast heard) Troop to their standard, so the wat’ry throng, Wave rolling after wave, where way they found; If steep, with torrent rapture, if through plain, Soft-ebbing; nor withstood them rock or hill, But they, or under ground, or circuit wide With serpent error wand’ring, found their way, And on the washy ooze deep channels wore, Easy, ere God had bid the ground be dry, All but within those banks, where rivers now Stream, and perpetual draw their humid train. The dry land Earth, and the great receptacle Of congregated waters he call’d Seas; And saw that it was good, and said, Let th’ earth Put forth the verdant grass, herb yielding seed, And fruit-tree yielding fruit after her kind; Whose seed is in herself upon the earth. He scarce had said, when the bare earth, till then Desert and bare, unsightly, unadorn’d, Brought forth the tender grass, whose verdure clad Her universal face with pleasant green; Then herbs of every leaf, that sudden flower’d, Op’ning their various colors, and made gay Her bosom smelling sweet; and these scarce blown, Forth flourish’d thick the clust’ring vine, forth crept The swelling gourd, up stood the corny reed Embattl’d in her field; and th’ humble shrub,

And bush with frizzled hair implicit: last Rose, as in dance, the stately trees, and spread Their branches hung with copious fruit, or gemm’d Their blossoms: with high wood the hills were crown’d; With tufts the valleys and each fountain side, With borders 'long the rivers: that earth now Seem’d like to heav’n, a seat where Gods might dwell Or wander with delight, and love to haunt Her sacred shades. * * * * JOHN MILTON, 1608–1674.

EARTH.

Harp! lift thy voice on high, And run in rapid numbers o’er the face Of Nature’s scenery; and there were day And night, and rising suns, and setting suns; And clouds that seemed like chariots of saints, By fiery coursers drawn—as brightly head As if the glorious, lusty, golden locks Of thousand cherubims had been shorn off, And on the temples hung of morn and even; And there were moons, and stars, and darkness streaked With light; and voice of tempest heard secure. And there were seasons coming evermore, And going still—all fair and always new, With bloom, and fruit, and fields of hoary grain. And there were hills of flocks, and groves of song; And flowery streams, and garden walks embowered, Where side by side the rose and lily bloomed. And sacred founts, wild hills, and moonlight glens; And forests vast, fair lawns, and lovely oaks, And little willows sipping at the brook; Old wizard haunts, and dancing seats of mirth; Gay, festive bowers, and palaces in dust; Dark owlet nooks, and caves, and belted rocks; And winding valleys, roofed with pendent shade; And tall and perilous cliffs, that overlooked The breath of Ocean, sleeping on his waves. Sounds, sights, smells, tastes; the heaven and earth, profuse In endless sweets, above all praise of song: For not to use alone did Providence Abound, but large example gave to man

Of grace, and ornament, and splendor rich; Suited abundantly to every taste In bird, beast, fish, winged and creeping thing; In herb and flower; and in the restless change Which on the many-colored seasons made The annual circuit of the fruitful earth. ROBERT POLLOCK, 1799–1827.

THE SHIELD OF ACHILLES.

FROM THE “ILIAD.”

* * * * *

He also graved on it a fallow field,
Rich, spacious, and well tilled. Plowers not few,
There driving to and fro their sturdy teams,
Labor’d the land; and oft as in their course
They came to the field’s bourn, so oft a man
Met them, who in their hands a goblet placed,
Charged with delicious wine. They, turning, wrought
Each his own furrow, and impatient seem’d
To reach the border of the tilth, which black
Appear’d behind them as a glebe new-turn’d,
Though golden, sight to be admired by all!
There, too, he form’d the likeness of a field,
Crowded with corn, in which the reapers toil’d
Each with a sharp-tooth’d sickle in his hand.
Along the furrow here the harvest fell
In frequent handfuls, there they bound the sheaves.
Three binders of the sheaves their sultry task
All plied industrious, and behind them boys
Attended, filling with the corn their arms,
And offering still their bundles to be bound.
Amid them, staff in hand, the master stood
Silent exulting, while beneath an oak
Apart, his heralds busily prepared
The banquet, dressing a well-thriven ox,
New slain, and the attendant maidens mix’d
Large supper for the hinds of whitest flour.
There, also, laden with its fruit, he form’d
A vineyard all of gold; purple he made
The clusters, and the vines supported, stood
By poles of silver set in even rows.
The trench he color’d sable, and around
Fenced it with tin. One only path it show’d

By which the gatherers, when they stripp’d the vines,
Pass’d and repass’d. There, youths and maidens blithe,
In pails of wicker bore the luscious fruit,
While in the midst a boy, on his shrill harp,
Harmonious play’d; still as he struck the chord,
Carolling to it with a slender voice,
They smote the ground together, and with song
And sprightly reed came dancing on behind.
There, too, a herd he fashion’d of tall beeves,
Part gold, part tin; they, lowing, from the stalls
Rush’d forth to pasture by a river-side,
Rapid, sonorous, fringed with whispering reeds.
Four golden herdsmen drove the kine a-field,
By nine swift dogs attended. Dreadful sprang
Two lions forth, and of the foremost herd,
Seized fast a bull. Him, bellowing, they dragg’d,
While dogs and peasants all flew to his aid.
The lions tore the hide of the huge prey,
And lapp’d his entrails and his blood. Meantime
The herdsmen, troubling them in vain, their hounds
Encouraged; but no tooth for lion’s flesh
Found they, and therefore stood aside and bark’d.
There, also, the illustrious smith divine
Amidst a pleasant grove a pasture found
Spacious, and sprinkled o’er with silver sheep
Numerous, and stalls, and huts, and shepherds’ tents.
_Translation of_ WILLIAM COWPER. HOMER.

LINES.

FROM “CHILDE HAROLD.”

Clear, placid Leman! thy contrasted lake,
With the wild world I dwell in, is a thing
Which warns me, with its stillness, to forsake
Earth’s troubled waters for a purer spring.
His quiet sail is as a noiseless wing
To waft me from distraction; once I loved
Torn Ocean’s roar, but thy soft murmuring
Sounds sweet as if a sister’s voice reproved,
That I with stern delights should e’er have been so moved.

It is the hush of night, and all between
Thy margin and the mountains, dusk, yet clear,

Mellow’d and mingling, yet distinctly seen,
Save darken’d Jura, whose capt heights appear
Precipitously steep; and, drawing near,
There breathes a living fragrance from the shore,
Of flowers yet fresh with childhood; on the ear
Drops the light drip of the suspended oar,
Or chirps the grasshopper one good-night carol more:

He is an evening reveler, who makes
His life an infancy, and sings his fill;
At intervals, some bird from out the brakes
Starts into voice a moment, then is still.
There seems a floating whisper on the hill;
But that is fancy, for the starlight dews
All silently their tears of love instill,
Weeping themselves away, till they infuse
Deep into Nature’s breast the spirit of her hues.

Ye stars! which are the poetry of heaven,
If in your bright leaves we would read the fate
Of men and empires—’tis to be forgiven,
That in our aspirations to be great,
Our destinies o’erleap their mortal state,
And claim a kindred with you; for ye are
A beauty and a mystery, and create
In us such love and reverence from afar,
That fortune, fame, power, life, have named themselves a star.

All heaven and earth are still—though not in sleep,
But breathless, as we grow when feeling most;
And silent, as we stand in thoughts too deep:
All heaven and earth are still: from the high host
Of stars, and to the lull’d lake and mountain coast,
All is concenter’d in a life intense,
Where not a beam, nor air, nor leaf is lost,
But hath a part of being, and a sense
Of that which is of all Creator, and defense.

Then stirs the feeling infinite, so felt
In solitude, where we are least alone:
A truth which through our being then doth melt,
And purifies from self; it is a tone
The soul and source of music, which makes known
Eternal harmony, and sheds a charm
Like to the fabled Cytherea’s zone,

Binding all things with beauty; ’twould disarm
The specter Death, had he substantial power to harm.

Not vainly did the early Persian make
His altar the high places and the peak
Of earth o’ergazing mountains, and thus take
A fit and unwall’d temple, there to seek
The spirit, in whose honor shrines are weak,
Unrear’d of human hands. Come and compare
Columns, and idol-dwellings, Goth or Greek,
With Nature’s realms of worship, earth and air,
Nor fix on fond abodes to circumscribe thy prayer.

The sky is changed! and such a change! Oh night,
And storm, and darkness, ye are wondrous strong,
Yet lovely in your strength, as is the light
Of a dark eye in woman! Far along,
From peak to peak, the rattling crags among,
Leaps the live thunder! Not from one lone cloud,
But every mountain now hath found a tongue,
And Jura answers through her misty shroud,
Back to the joyous Alps, who call to her aloud!

And this is in the night: most glorious night!
Thou wert not sent for slumber! let me be
A sharer in thy fierce and far delight—
A portion of the tempest, and of thee!
How the lit lake shines, a phosphoric sea,
And the big rain comes dancing to the earth!
And now again ’tis black—and now the glee
Of the loud hills shakes with its mountain-mirth,
As if they did rejoice o’er a young earthquake’s birth.

Now, where the swift Rhone cleaves his way between
Heights which appear as lovers who have parted
In hate, whose mining depths so intervene,
That they can meet no more, though broken-hearted;
Though in their souls, which thus each other thwarted,
Love was the very root of the fond rage,
Which blighted their life’s bloom, and then departed;
Itself expired, but leaving them an age
Of years all winters—war within themselves to rage.

Now, where the quick Rhone thus has cleft his way,
The mightiest of the storms hath ta’en his stand,
For here not one, but many, make their play,
And fling their thunderbolts from hand to hand,

The brightest through these parted hills hath fork’d
His lightnings—as if he did understand
That in such gaps as desolation work’d,
There the hot shaft should blast whatever therein lurk’d.

Sky, mountains, river, winds, lake, lightnings! ye!
With night, and clouds, and thunder, and a soul
To make these felt, and feeling, well may be,
Things that have made me watchful; the far roll
Of your departing voices is the knoll
Of what in me is sleepless—if I rest.
But where, of ye, O tempests! is the goal?
Are ye like those within the human breast?
Or do ye find, at length, like eagles, some high nest?
LORD BYRON, 1788–1824.

AN ITALIAN NOON.

LINES WRITTEN AMONG THE EUGANEAN HILLS, OCTOBER, 1818.

* * * * *

Noon descends around me now; ’Tis the noon of autumn’s glow, When a soft and purple mist, Lake a vaporous amethyst, Or an air-dissolved star, Mingling light and fragrance, far From the curved horizon’s bound, To the point of heaven’s profound, Fills the overflowing sky, And the plains that silent lie Underneath, the leaves unsodden Where the infant frost has trodden With his morning-winged feet, Whose bright print is gleaming yet; And the red and golden vines, Piercing with their trellis’d lines The rough, dark-skirted wilderness; The dim and bladed grass no less Pointing from this hoary tower In the windless air; the flower Glimmering at my feet; the line Of the olive-sandaled Apennine,

In the south dimly islanded; And the Alps, whose snows are spread High between the clouds and sun; And of living things each one; And my spirit, which so long Darken’d this swift stream of song, Interpenetrated lie By the glory of the sky; Be it love, light, harmony, Odor, or the soul of all Which from Heaven like dew doth fall, Or the mind which feeds this verse, Peopling the lone universe. P. B. SHELLEY.

ITALIAN SONG.

Dear is my little native vale; The ring-dove builds and warbles there; Close by my cot she tells her tale To every passing villager. The squirrel leaps from tree to tree, And shells his nuts at liberty.

In orange grove and myrtle bowers, That breathe a gale of fragrance round, I charm the fairy-footed hours With my lov’d lute’s romantic sound; Or crowns of living laurel weave For those that win the race at eve.

The shepherd’s horn, at break of day, The ballet danc’d in twilight glade, The canzonet and roundelay, Sung in the silent greenwood shade; These simple joys, that never fail, Shall bind me to my native vale. SAMUEL ROGERS.

A FARM SCENE IN PORTUGAL.

FROM A LETTER OF W. BECKFORD, ESQ.

_October 19, 1797._

* * * * *

The valley of Collares affords me a source of perpetual amusement. I have discovered a variety of paths which lead through chestnut copses and orchards to irregular green spots, where self-sown bays and citronbushes

hang wild over the rocky margin of a little river, and drop their fruit and blossoms into the stream. You may ride for miles along the banks of this delightful water, catching endless perspectives of flowery thickets, between the stems of poplar and walnut. The scenery is truly Elysian, and exactly such as poets assign for the resort of happy spirits. The mossy fragments of rocks, grotesque pollards, and rustic bridges you meet with at every step, recall Savoy and Switzerland to the imagination; but the exotic cast of the vegetation, the vivid green of the citron, the golden fruitage of the orange, the blossoming myrtle, and the rich fragrance of a turf embroidered with the brightest-colored and most aromatic flowers, allow me, without a stretch of fancy, to believe myself in the garden of the Hesperides, and to expect the dragon under every tree. I by no means like the thought of abandoning these smiling regions, and have been twenty times on the point, this very day, of revoking the orders I have given for my journey. Whatever objections I may have had to Portugal seem to vanish since I have determined to leave it; for such is the perversity of human nature, that objects appear the most estimable precisely at the moment when we are going to leave them.

There was this morning a mild radiance in the sunbeams, and a balsamic serenity in the air, which infused that voluptuous listlessness—that desire of remaining imparadised in one delightful spot, which, in classical fictions, was supposed to render those who had tasted of the lotus, forgetful of friends and of every tie. My feelings were not dissimilar; I loathed the idea of moving away.

Though I had entered these beautiful orchards soon after sunrise, the clocks of some distant conventual churches had chimed hour after hour, before I could prevail upon myself to quit the spreading odoriferous baytrees under which I had been lying. If shades so cool and fragrant invited to repose, I must observe, that never were paths better calculated to tempt the laziest of beings to a walk, than those that opened on all sides, and are formed of a smooth, dry sand, bound firmly together, composing a surface as hard as gravel. These level paths wind about among a labyrinth of light, elegant fruit-trees: almond, plum, and cherry, something like the groves of Tongo-Taboo, as represented in Cook’s voyages; and to increase the resemblance, neat, clean fences and low, open sheds, thatched with reeds, appear at intervals, breaking the horizontal line of the perspective. I had now lingered and loitered away pretty nearly the whole morning, and though, as far as scenery could authorize and climate inspire, I might fancy myself an inhabitant of Polynesia, I could not pretend to be sufficiently ethereal to exist without nourishment. In plain English, I was extremely hungry. The pears, quinces, and oranges, which dangled above my head, although fair to the eye, were neither so juicy nor so gratifying to the palate, as might have been expected from their promising appearance.

Being considerably

“More than a mile within the wood,”

and not recollecting by which clue of a path I could get out of it, I remained at least half an hour deliberating which way to turn myself. The sheds and inclosures I have mentioned were put together with care, and even nicety, it is true, but seemed to have no other inhabitants than flocks of bantams, strutting about and destroying the eggs and hopes of many an insect family. These glistening fowls, like their brethren described in Anson’s voyages, as ruminating the profound solitudes of the island of Tinian, appeared to have no master. At length, just as I was beginning to wish myself very heartily in a less romantic region, I heard the loud, though not unmusical tones of a powerful female voice, echoing through the arched green avenues; presently a stout, ruddy young peasant, very picturesquely attired in brown and scarlet, came hoydening along, driving a mule before her laden with two enormous panniers of grapes. To ask for a share of this luxurious load, and to compliment the fair driver, was instantaneous on my part—but to no purpose. I was answered by a sly wink: “We all belong to Senhor José Dias, whose coreal (farm-yard) is half a league distant. There, Senhor, if you follow that road and don’t puzzle yourself by a straying to the right or left, you will soon reach it, and the bailiff, I dare say, will be proud to give you as many grapes as you please. Good-morning; happy days to you! I must mind my business.”

Seating herself between the tantalizing panniers, she was gone in an instant, and I had the good luck to arrive at the wicket of a rude, dry well, winding up several bushy slopes in a wild, irregular manner. If the outside of this inclosure was rough and unpromising, the interior presented a most cheerful scene of rural opulence: droves of cows and goats milking; ovens, out of which huge savory cakes of bread had just been taken; ranges of bee-hives and long pillared sheds, entirely tapestried with purple and yellow muscadine grapes half candied, which were hung up to dry. A very good-natured, classical-looking _magister pecorum_, followed by two well-disciplined, though savage-eyed dogs, whom the least glance of their master prevented from barking, gave me a hearty welcome, and with genuine hospitality not only allowed me the free range of his domain, but set whatever it produced in the greatest perfection before me. A contest took place between two or three curly-haired, chubby-faced children, who should be first to bring me walnuts fresh from the shell, bowls of milk, and cream cheeses, made after the best of fashions, that of the province of Alemtejo.

* * * * *

WILLIAM BECKFORD.

]

FROM “THE LUSIAD.”

With graceful pride three hills of softest green
Rear their fair bosoms o’er the sylvan scene;
Their sides embroider’d boast the rich array
Of flowery shrubs in all the pride of May;
The purple lotus and the snowy thorn,
And yellow pod-flowers every slope adorn.
From the green summits of the leafy hills
Descend with murmuring lapse three limpid rills;
Beneath the rose-trees loitering slow they glide,
Now tumbles o’er some rock their crystal pride;
Sonorous now they roll adown the glade,
Now plaintive tinkle in the secret shade;
Now from the darkling grove, beneath the beam
Of ruddy morn, like melted silver stream,
Edging the painted margins of the bowers,
And breathing liquid freshness on the flowers.
Here bright reflected in the pool below
The vermil apples tremble on the bough;
Where o’er the yellow sands the waters sleep,
The primrosed banks inverted, dew-drops weep;
Where murmuring o’er the pebbles purls the stream,
The silver trouts in playful curvings gleam.
Long thus and various every riv’let strays,
Till closing now their long meand’ring maze,
Where in a sinking vale the mountains end,
Form’d in a crystal lake the waters blend;
Fring’d was the border with a woodland shade,
In every leaf of various green array’d,
Each yellow-ting’d, each mingling tint between
The dark ash verdure and the silvery green.
The trees now bending forward, slowly shake
Their lofty honors o’er the crystal lake;
Now from the flood the graceful boughs retire,
With coy reserve, and now again admire
Their various liveries by the summer dress’d,
Smooth-gloss’d and soften’d in the mirror’s breast.
So by her glass the wishful virgin strays,
And oft retiring steals the lingering gaze.

* * * * *

Wild forest-trees the mountain sides array’d:
With curling foliage and romantic shade;

Here spreads the poplar, to Alcides dear;
And dear to Phœbus, ever verdant here,
The laurel joins the bowers for ever green,
The myrtle bowers belov’d of beauty’s queen.
To Jove the oak his wide-spread branches rears;
And high to heaven the fragrant cedar bears;
Where through the glades appear the cavern’d rocks,
The lofty pine-tree waves her sable locks;
Sacred to Cybele, the whispering pine
Loves the wild grottoes where the white cliffs shine;
Here towers the cypress, preacher to the wise,
Less’ning, from earth, her spiral honors rise,
Till, as a spear-point rear’d, the topmost spray
Points to the Eden of eternal day.
_Translation of_ W. J. MICKLE. LUIS DE CAMOENS, 1517–1579.

PARADISE.

FROM THE ITALIAN OF DANTE.

Longing already to search in and round
The heavenly forest, dense and living-green,
Which to the eyes tempered the new-born day,
Withouten more delay I left the bank,
Crossing the level country slowly, slowly,
Over the soil, that everywhere breathed fragrance.
A gently breathing air, that no mutation
Had in itself, smote me upon the forehead—
No heavier blow than of a pleasant breeze;
Whereat the tremulous branches readily
Did all of them bow downward toward that side
Where its first shadow casts the Holy Mountain;
Yet not from their upright direction bent,
So that the little birds upon their tops
Should cease the practice of their tuneful art;
But, with full-throated joy, the hours of prime
Singing received they in the midst of foliage,
That made monotonous burden to their rhymes;
Even as from branch to branch it gathering swells
Through the pine forests on the shore of Chiassi
When Æolus unlooses the sirocco.
Already my slow steps had led me on
Into the ancient wood so far, that I
Could see no more the place where I had entered;

And, lo! my farther course cut off a river,
Which, toward the left hand, with its little waves,
Bent down the grass that on its margin sprang.
All waters that on earth most limpid are,
Would seem to have within themselves some mixture,
Compared with that, which nothing doth conceal,
Although it moves with a brown, brown current,
Under the shade perpetual, that never
Ray of sun let in, nor of the moon.
_Translation of_ H. W. LONGFELLOW. DANTE ALIGHIERI, 1265–1321.

NATURE TEACHING IMMORTALITY.

Nature, thy daughter, ever-changing birth Of thee, the great Immutable, to man Speaks wisdom; is his oracle supreme; And he who most consults her is most wise. Look nature through, ’tis revolution all. All change, no death. Day follows night, and night The dying day; stars rise, and set, and rise; Earth takes th’ example. See the summer gay, With her green chaplet, and ambrosial flow’rs, Droops into pallid autumn; winter gray, Horrid with frost, and turbulent with storm, Blows autumn and his golden fruits away, Then melts into the spring; soft spring, with breath Favonian, from warm chambers of the south, Recalls the first. All to re-flourish fades, As in a wheel all sinks to reascend; Emblems of man, who passes, not expires. With this minute distinction, emblems just, Nature revolves, but man advances; both Eternal, that a circle, this a line; That gravitates, this soars. Th’ aspiring soul, Ardent and tremulous, like flame ascends, Zeal and humility her wings, to heaven. The world of matter, with its various forms, All dies into new life. Life, born from death, Rolls the vast mass, and shall for ever roll. No single atom, once in being lost, With change of counsel charges the Most High. Matter immortal, and shall spirit die? Above the nobler shall less noble rise? Shall man alone, for whom all else revives,

Now resurrection know! shall man alone, Imperial man! be sown in barren ground, Less privileg’d than grain on which he feeds? Is man, in whom alone is power to prize The bliss of being, or with previous pain Deplore its period, by the spleen of fate, Severely doom’d, death’s single unredeem’d? EDWARD YOUNG, 1681–1765.

XXIX.
=Evening and Night.=

THE MOON.

FROM THE GREEK OF SAPPHO.

The stars that 'round the beauteous moon
Attendant wait, cast into shade
Their ineffectual luster soon
As she in full-orb’d majesty array’d
Her silver radiance showers
Upon this world of ours.
_Translation of_ J. H. MERIVALE.

LINES

FROM THE “MEMORABLE MASK.”

_Silvan._ Tell me, gentle Hour of Night,
Wherein dost thou most delight?

_Hour._ Not in sleep!

_Silvan._ Wherein, then?

_Hour._ In the frolic view of men.

_Silvan._ Lov’st thou music?

_Hour._ Oh, ’tis sweet!

_Silvan._ What’s dancing.

_Hour._ E’en the mirth of feet.

_Silvan._ Joy you in fairies, or in elves.