He took it on the Page's saye,
Hunthill had driven these steeds away;
Then Howard, Home, and Douglas rose,
The kindling discord to compose;
Stern Rutherford right little said,
But bit his glove and shook his head.-
A fortnight thence, in Inglewood,
Stout Conrad, cold, and drench'd in blood,
His bosom gored with many a wound,
Was by a woodman's lyme-dog found:
Unknown the manner of his death,
Gone was his brand, both sword and sheath;
But ever from that time, 'twas said,
That Dickon wore a Cologne blade.
Lay of the Last Minstrel.
As down Ohio's ever ebbing tide,
Oarless and sailless silently they glide,
How still the scene, how lifeless, yet how fair,
Was the lone land that met the strangers there!
No smiling villages, or curling smoke,
The busy haunts of busy men bespoke,
No solitary hut, the banks along,
Sent forth blithe Labour's homely rustic song,
No urchin gambol'd on the smooth white sand,
Or hurl'd the skipping-stone with playful hand,
While playmate dog plunged in the clear blue wave,
And swam in vain the sinking prize to save.
Where now are seen along the river side,
Young busy towns, in buxom painted pride,
And fleets of gliding boats with riches crown'd,
To distant Orleans or St. Louis bound,
Nothing appear'd, but Nature unsubdued,
One endless, noiseless, woodland solitude,
Or boundless prairie, that aye seem'd to be
As level and as lifeless as the sea!
They seem'd to breathe in this wide world alone,
Heirs of the earth-the land was all their own!
'Twas evening now-the hour of toil was o'er, Yet still they durst not seek the fearful shore,
Lest watchful Indian crew should silent creep,
And spring upon, and murder them in sleep;
So through the livelong night they held their way,
And 'twas a night might shame the fairest day,
So still, so bright, so tranquil was its reign,
They cared not though the day ne'er came again.
The moon high wheel'd the distant hills above,
Silver'd the fleecy foliage of the grove,
That as the wooing zephyrs on it fell,
Whisper'd it loved the gentle visit well.
That fair-faced orb alone to move appear'd,
That zephyr was the only sound they heard.
No deep-mouth'd hound the hunter's haunt betray'd,
No lights upon the shore or waters play'd;
No loud laugh broke upon the silent air,
To tell the wanderers man was nestling there,
While even the froward babe in mother's arms
Lull'd by the scene suppress'd its loud alarms,
And yielding to that moment's tranquil sway,
Sunk on the breast, and slept its rage away、
All, all, was still, on gliding barque and shore,
As if the earth now slept to wake no more;
Life seem'd extinct, as when the world first smiled,
Ere Adam was a dupe, or Eve beguiled.
In such a scene the soul oft walks abroad,
For silence is the energy of God!
Not in the blackest tempest's midnight scowl,
The earthquake's rocking or the whirlwind's howl,
Not from the crashing thunder-rifted cloud,
Does his immortal mandate speak so loud,
As when the silent night around her throws
Her star-bespangled mantle of repose;
Thunder and whirlwind, and the earth's dread shake,
The selfish thoughts of man alone awake;
His lips may prate of heaven, but all his fears
Are for himself, though pious he appears.
But when all Nature sleeps in tranquil smiles, -
What sweet yet lofty thought the soul beguiles!
There's not an object 'neath the moon's bright beam,
There's not a shadow darkening on the stream,
There's not a star that jewels yonder skies,
Whose bright reflection on the water lies,
That does not in the lifted mind awake
Thoughts that of love and heaven alike partake;
While all its newly waken'd feelings prove,
That love is heaven, and God the soul of love.
In such sweet times the spirit rambles forth
Beyond the precincts of this grovelling earth,
Expatiates in a brighter world than this,
And plunging in the future's dread abyss,
Proves an existence separate, and refined,
By leaving its frail tenement behind.
So felt our Basil, as he sat the while,
Guiding his boat beneath the noonbeam's smile,
For there are thoughts, which God alike has given,
To high and low-and these are thoughts of heaven.
"Tis said she once was beautiful;—and still
(For 'tis not years that can have wrought her ill)
Deep rays of loveliness around her form
Beam, as the rainbow that succeeds the storm
Brightens a glorious ruin. In her face,
Though something touch'd by sorrow, you may trace
The all she was, when first in life's young spring,
Like the gay bee-bird on delighted wing,
She stoop'd to cull the honey from each flower
That bares its breast in joy's luxuriant bower!
O'er her pure forehead, pale as moonlit snow,
Her ebon locks are parted,-and her brow
Stands forth like morning from the shades of night,
Serene, though clouds hang over it. The bright
And searching glance of her Ithuriel eye,
Might even the sternest hypocrite defy
To meet it unappall'd; 'twould almost seem
As though, epitomized in one deep beam,
Her full collected soul upon the heart,
Whate'er its mask, she strove at once to dart;
And few may brave the talisman that's hid
'Neath the dark fringes of her drooping lid、
Patient in suffering, she has learnt the art To bleed in silence and conceal the smart ;
And thence, though quick of feeling, has been deem'd Almost as cold and loveless as she seem'd ;
Because to fools she never would reveal
Wounds they would probe, without the power to heal.
No,-whatsoe'er the visions that disturb
The fountain of her thoughts, she knows to curb
Each outward sign of sorrow, and suppress
Even to a sigh-all tokens of distress.
Yet some, perhaps, with keener vision than
The crowd, that pass her by unnoted, can,
Through well dissembled smiles, at times discern
A settled anguish that would seem to burn
The very brain it feeds upon; and when
This mood of pain is on her, then, oh! then,
A more than wonted paleness of the cheek,
And, it may be, a flitting hectic streak,-
A tremulous motion of the lip or eye,
Are all that anxious friendship may descry.
Reserve and womanly pride are in her look,
Though temper'd into meekness: she can brook
Unkindness and neglect from those she loves,
Because she feels it undeserved; which proves,
That firm and conscious rectitude hath power
To blunt Fate's darts, in sorrow's darkest hour.
Ay, unprovoked injustice she can bear
Without a sigh-almost without a tear,
Save such as hearts internally will weep;
And they ne'er rise the burning lids to steep;
But to those petty wrongs which half defy
Human forbearance, she can make reply,
With a proud lip and a contemptuous eye.
|