What though the Spirits of the North, that swept Rome from the earth when in her pomp she slept, Smote thee with fury, and thy headless trunk Deep in the dust mid tower and temple sunk; Soon to subdue mankind 't was thine to rise, Still, still unquelled thy glorious energies! Aspiring minds, with thee conversing, caught Bright revelations of the Good they sought;25 By thee that long-lost spell in secret given, To draw down gods, and lift the soul to Heaven!26
AH! little thought she, when, with wild delight, By many a torrent's shining track she flew, When mountain-glens and caverns full of night O'er her young mind divine enchantment threw,
That in her veins a secret horror slept,
That her light footsteps should be heard no more, That she should die-nor watched, alas! nor wept By thee, unconscious of the pangs she bore.
Yet round her couch indulgent Fancy drew The kindred forms her closing eye required.
There didst thou stand there, with the smile she knew; She moved her lips to bless thee, and expired.
And now to thee she comes; still, still the same As in the hours gone unregarded by!
To thee, how changed, comes as she ever came;
Health on her cheek, and pleasure in her eye!
Nor less, less oft, as on that day, appears, When lingering, as prophetic of the truth, By the way-side she shed her parting tears Forever lovely in the light of Youth!
THE BOY OF EGREMOND.
"SAY, what remains when Hope is fled?" She answered, "Endless weeping!" For in the herdsman's eye she read Who in his shroud lay sleeping.
At Embsay rung the matin-bell,
The stag was roused on Barden-fell; The mingled sounds were swelling, dying, And down the Wharfe a hern was flying; When near the cabin in the wood, In tartan-clad and forest-green, With hound in leash and hawk in hood,
The Boy of Egremond was seen. Blithe was his song, a song of yore; But where the rock is rent in two, And the river rushes through,
His voice was heard no more!
'T was but a step! the gulf he passed; But that step it was his last!
As through the mist he winged his way (A cloud that hovers night and day), The hound hung back, and back he drew The master and his merlin too.
WRITTEN IN THE HIGHLANDS OF SCOTLAND. 241
That narrow place of noise and strife Received their little all of life!
There now the matin-bell is rung; The "Miserere!" duly sung ; And holy men in cowl and hood Are wandering up and down the wood. But what avail they? Ruthless Lord, Thou didst not shudder when the sword
Here on the young its fury spent, The helpless and the innocent. Sit now and answer, groan for The child before thee is thy own. And she who wildly wanders there, The mother in her long despair,
Shall oft remind thee, waking, sleeping, Of those who by the Wharfe were weeping; Of those who would not be consoled
When red with blood the river rolled.
WRITTEN IN THE HIGHLANDS OF SCOTLAND,
BLUE was the loch, the clouds were gone,
Ben-Lomond in his glory shone,
When, Luss, I left thee; when the breeze
Bore me from thy silver sands, Thy kirk-yard wall among the trees, Where, gray with age, the dial stands; That dial so well known to me! -Though many a shadow it had shed,
Beloved sister, since with thee The legend on the stone was read. The fairy-isles fled far away; That with its woods and uplands green, Where shepherd-huts are dimly seen, And songs are heard at close of day; That too, the deer's wild covert, fled, And that, the asylum of the dead : While, as the boat went merrily, Much of ROB Roy the boatman told; His arm that fell below his knee, His cattle-ford and mountain-hold.
Tarbat, thy shore I climbed at last; And, thy shady region passed, Upon another shore I stood,
And looked upon another flood; s Great Ocean's self! (T is He who fills That vast and awful depth of hills); Where many an elf was playing round, Who treads unshod his classic ground; And speaks, his native rocks among, As FINGAL spoke, and OSSIAN sung. Night fell; and dark and darker grew That narrow sea, that narrow sky, As o'er the glimmering waves we flew ; The sea-bird rustling, wailing by. And now the grampus, half-descried, Black and huge above the tide ; The cliffs and promontories there, Front to front, and broad and bare; Each beyond each, with giant-feet Advancing as in haste to meet ;
The shattered fortress, whence the Dane Blew his shrill blast, nor rushed in vain, Tyrant of the drear domain;
All into midnight-shadow sweep
When day springs upward from the deep!31 Kindling the waters in its flight,
The prow wakes splendor; and the oar, That rose and fell unseen before, Flashes in a sea of light!
Glad sign, and sure! for now we hail Thy flowers, Glenfinnart, in the gale; And bright indeed the path should be, That leads to Friendship and to thee!
O blest retreat, and sacred too! Sacred as when the bell of prayer Tolled duly on the desert air, And crosses decked thy summits blue. Oft, like some loved romantic tale, Oft shall my weary mind recall, Amid the hum and stir of men, Thy beechen-grove and waterfall, Thy ferry with its gliding sail, And her the Lady of the Glen !
SLEEP on, and dream of Heaven a while. Though shut so close thy laughing eyes, Thy rosy lips still wear a smile,
And move, and breathe delicious sighs!
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