Of wealth and power, renouncing willingly
His freedom, and the hours that fly so fast,
A burden or a curse when misemploy'd,
But to the wise how precious!-every day
A little life, a blank to be inscribed
With gentle deeds, such as in after-time
Console, rejoice, whene'er we turn the leaf
To read them? All, wherever in the scale,
Have, be they high or low, or rich or poor,
Inherit they a sheep-hook or a sceptre,
Much to be grateful for; but most has he,
Born in that middle sphere, that temperate zone,
Where Knowledge lights his lamp, there most secure,
And Wisdom comes, if ever, she who dwells
Above the clouds, above the firmament,

That Seraph sitting in the heaven of heavens.

A heaving bark, an anchor on the strand,
May tell him what it is; but what it was,
Cannot be told so soon.

The time has been,
When on the quays along the Syrian coast,
"T was ask'd and eagerly, at break of dawn,
What ships are from Amalfi?" when her coins,
Silver and gold, circled from clime to clime;
From Alexandria southward to Sennaar,
And eastward, through Damascus and Cabul
And Samarcand, to thy great wall, Cathay.

Then were the nations by her wisdom sway'd;
And every crime on every sea was judged
According to her judgments. In her port
Prows, strange, uncouth, from Nile and Niger met,
People of various feature, various speech;

What men most covet, wealth, distinction, power, And in their countries many a house of prayer,

Are baubles nothing worth, that only serve
To rouse us up, as children in the schools
Are roused up to exertion. The reward
Is in the race we run, not in the prize;

And they, the few, that have it ere they earn it,
Having by favor or inheritance,

These dangerous gifts placed in their idle hands,
And all that should await on worth well-tried,
All in the glorious days of old reserved
For manhood most mature or reverend age,
Know not, nor ever can, the generous pride
That glows in him who on himself relies,
Entering the lists of life.

XVIII.

SORRENTO.

He who sets sail from Naples, when the wind
Blows fragrance from Posilipo, may soon,
Crossing from side to side that beautiful lake,
Land underneath the cliff, where once among
The children gathering shells along the shore,
One laugh'd and play'd, unconscious of his fate;1
His to drink deep of sorrow, and, through life,
To be the scorn of them that knew him not,
Trampling alike the giver and his gift,
The gift a pearl precious, inestimable,
A lay divine, a lay of love and war,
To charm, ennoble, and, from age to age,
Sweeten the labor, when the oar was plied
Or on the Adrian or the Tuscan sea.

There would I linger-then go forth again,
And hover round that region unexplored,
Where to Salvator (when, as some relate,
By chance or choice he led a bandit's life,
Yet oft withdrew, alone and unobserved,
To wander through those awful solitudes)
Nature reveal'd herself. Unveil'd she stood,
In all her wildness, all her majesty,
As in that elder time, ere Man was made.

There would I linger-then go forth again;
And he who steers due east, doubling the cape,
Discovers, in a crevice of the rock,
The fishing-town, Amalfi. (165) Haply there

1 Tasso.

And many a shelter, where no shelter was,
And many a well, like Jacob's in the wild,
Rose at her bidding. Then in Palestine,
By the way-side, in sober grandeur stood
An Hospital, that, night and day, received
The pilgrims of the west; (166) and, when 't was
ask'd,

"Who are the noble founders?" every tongue
At once replied, "The merchants of Amalfi."
That Hospital, when Godfrey scaled the walls,
Sent forth its holy mer in complete steel;
And hence, the cowl relinquish'd for the helm,
That chosen band, valiant, invincible,
So long renown'd as champions of the Cross,
In Rhodes, in Malta.

For three hundred years,
There, unapproach'd but from the deep, they dwelt,
Assail'd for ever, yet from age to age
Acknowledging no master. From the deep
They gather'd in their harvests; bringing home,
In the same ship, relies of ancient Greece, (167)
That land of glory where their fathers lay,
Grain from the golden vales of Sicily, (168)
And Indian spices. When at length they fell,
Losing their liberty, they left mankind
A legacy, compared with which the wealth
Of Eastern kings-what is it in the scale?-
The mariner's compass.

They are now forgot,
And with them all they did, all they endured,
Struggling with fortune. When Sicardi stood,
And, with a shout like thunder, cried, "Come forth,
And serve me in Salerno!" forth they came,
Covering the sea, a mournful spectacle;
The women wailing, and the heavy oar
Falling unheard. Not thus did they return,
The tyrant slain; (169) though then the grass of years
Grew in their streets.

There now to him who sails
Under the shore, a few white villages,
Scatter'd above, below, some in the clouds,
Some on the margin of the dark-blue sea,
And glittering through their lemon-groves, announce
The region of Amalfi. Then, half-fallen,

A lonely watch-tower on the precipice,

Their ancient land-mark, comes. Long may it last;
And to the seaman in a distant age,

Though now he little thinks how large his debt,
Serve for their monument! (170)

XIX.

PÆSTUM

THEY stand between the mountains and the sea;

Awful memorials, but of whom we know not!1
The seaman, passing, gazes from the deck.
The buffalo-driver, in his shaggy cloak,
Points to the work of magic and moves on.

Time was they stood along the crowded street,
Temples of Gods! and on their ample steps
What various habits, various tongues beset
The brazen gates for prayer and sacrifice!

Save the shrill-voiced cicala flitting round
On the rough pediment to sit and sing;
And up the fluted shaft with short quick motion,
Or the green lizard rustling through the grass,

To vanish in the chinks that Time has made.

In such an hour as this, the sun's broad disk
Seen at his setting, and a flood of light
Filling the courts of these old sanctuaries,
| (Gigantic shadows, broken and confused,
Across the innumerable columns flung)
In such an hour he came, who saw and told,

Time was perhaps the third was sought for Justice; Led by the mighty Genius of the Place,'

And here the accuser stood, and there the accused;

And here the judges sate, and heard, and judged.
All silent now!-as in the ages past,

Trodden under foot and mingled, dust with dust.

How many centuries did the sun go round
From Mount Alburnus to the Tyrrhene sea,
While, by some spell render'd invisible,
Or, if approach'd, approach'd by him alone
Who saw as though he saw not, they remain'd
As in the darkness of a sepulchre,

Waiting the appointed time! All, all within
Proclaims that Nature had resumed her right,
And taken to herself what man renounced;
No cornice, triglyph, or worn abacus,
But with thick ivy hung or branching fern;
Their iron-brown o'erspread with brightest verdure!

From my youth upward have I longed to tread
This classic ground-And am I here at last?
Wandering at will through the long porticoes,
And catching, as through some majestic grove,
Now the blue ocean, and now, chaos-like,
Mountains and mountain gulfs, and, half-way up,
Towns like the living rock from which they grew?
A cloudy region, black and desolate,

Where once a slave withstood a world in arms.2

The air is sweet with violets, running wild (171)
'Mid broken friezes and fallen capitals;
Sweet as when Tully, writing down his thoughts,
Those thoughts so precious and so lately lost, (172)
(Turning to thee, divine Philosophy,
Ever at hand to calm his troubled soul)
Sail'd slowly by, two thousand years ago,
For Athens; when a ship, if north-east winds
Blew from the Pæstan gardens, slack'd her course.

On as he moved along the level shore,
These temples, in their splendor eminent
Mid arcs and obelisks, and domes and towers,
Reflecting back the radiance of the west,
Well might He dream of Glory!-Now, coil'd up,
The serpent sleeps within them; the she-wolf
Suckles her young: and, as alone I stand
In this, the nobler pile, the elements
Of earth and air its only floor and covering,
How solemn is the stillness! Nothing stirs

1 The temples of Paestum are three in number; and have survived, nearly nine centuries, the total destruction of the city. Tradition is silent concerning them; but they must have existed now between two and three thousand years. 2 Spartacus. See Plutarch in the life of Crassus.

Walls of some capital city first appear'd,

Half razed, half sunk, or scatter'd as in scorn;
-And what within them? what but in the midst
These Three in more than their original grandeur
And, round about, no stone upon another?
As if the spoiler had fallen back in fear,
And, turning, left them to the elements.

'Tis said a stranger in the days of old
(Some say a Dorian, some a Sybarite;
But distant things are ever lost in clouds),
"T is said a stranger came, and, with his plow,
Traced out the site; and Posidonia rose, (173)
Severely great, Neptune the tutelar God;
A Homer's language murmuriug in her streets,
And in her haven many a mast from Tyre.
Then came another, an unbidden guest.
He knock'd and enter'd with a train in arms;
And all was changed, her very name and language
The Tyrian merchant, shipping at his door
Ivory and gold, and silk, and frankincense,
Sail'd as before, but sailing, cried "For Pæstum !"
Pastum's twice-blowing roses; while, within,
And now a Virgil, now an Ovid sung
Parents and children mourn'd-and, every year,
("T was on the day of some old festival)
Talk'd in the ancient tongue of things gone by.2
Met to give way to tears, and once again,
At length an Arab climb'd the battlements,

Slaying the sleepers in the dead of night;
And from all eyes the glorious vision fled!
Leaving a place lonely and dangerous,
Where whom the robber spares, a deadlier foe3
Strikes at unseen-and at a time when joy
Opens the heart, when summer-skies are blue,
And the clear air is soft and delicate;
For then the demon works-then with that air
The thoughtless wretch drinks in a subtle poison
Lulling to sleep; and, when he sleeps, he dies.

It was a Harper, wandering with his harp,

"WHAT hangs behind that curtain?" (174)- His only treasure; a majestic man,

THIS house was Andrea Doria's. Here he lived; (181)

Parent and child! How oft where now we rode (180) And here at eve relaxing, when ashore,
Over the billow, has a wretched son,

Or yet more wretched sire, grown grey in chains,
Labor'd, his hands upon the oar, his eyes
Upon the land-the land, that gave him birth;
And, as he gazed, his homestall through his tears
Fondly imagined; when a Christian ship
Of war appearing in her Bravery,

A voice in anger cried, "Use all your strength!"

But when, ah when, do they that can, forbear To crush the unresisting? Strange, that men, Creatures so frail, so soon, alas' to die,

"Tis still the noblest dwelling-even in Genoa!
And hadst thou, Andrea, lived there to the last,
Thou hadst done well; for there is that without,
That in the wall, which monarchs could not give,
Nor thou take with thee, that which says aloud,
It was thy Country's gift to her Deliverer.

"Tis in the heart of Genoa (he who comes,
Must come on foot) and in a place of stir;
Men on their daily business, early and late,
Thronging thy very threshold. But when there,
Thou wert among thy fellow-citizens,

Thy children, for they hail'd thee as their sire;
And on a spot thou must have loved, for there,
Calling them round, thou gavest them more than life,
Giving what, lost, makes life not worth the keeping.
There thou didst do indeed an act divine;
Nor couldst thou leave thy door or enter in,
Without a blessing on thee.

Thou art now
Again among them. Thy brave mariners,
They who had fought so often by thy side,
Staining the mountain-billows, bore thee back;
And thou art sleeping in thy funeral-chamber.

Where, when the south-wind blows, and clouds on
clouds

Gather and fall, the peasant freights his bark,
Mindful to migrate when the king of floods
Visits his humble dwelling, and the keel,
Slowly uplifted over field and fence,
Floats on a world of waters-from that low,
That level region, where no Echo dwells,
Or, if she comes, comes in her saddest plight,
Hoarse, inarticulate-on to where the path
Is lost in rank luxuriance, and to breathe
Is to inhale distemper, if not death;
Where the wild-boar retreats, when hunters chafe
And, when the day-star flames, the buffalo-herd,
Afflicted, plunge into the stagnant pool,
Nothing discern'd amid the water-leaves,
Save here and there the likeness of a head,
Savage, uncouth; where none in human shape
Come, save the herdsman, levelling his length
Of lance with many a cry, or, Tartar-like,
Urging his steed along the distant hill
As from a danger. There, but not to rest,
I travell'd many a dreary league, nor turn'd
(Ah then least willing, as who had not been?)
When in the South, against the azure sky,

Thine was a glorious course; but couldst thou Three temples rose in soberest majesty,

there,

Clad in thy cere-cloth-in that silent vault,
Where thou art gather'd to thy ancestors-
Open thy secret heart and tell us all,
Then should we hear thee with a sigh confess,
A sigh how heavy, that thy happiest hours
Were pass'd before these sacred walls were left,
Before the ocean-wave thy wealth reflected, (184)
And pomp and power drew envy, stirring up
The ambitious man,' that in a perilous hour
Fell from the plank. (185)

A FAREWELL.?

AND now farewell to Italy-perhaps
For ever! Yet, methinks, I could not go,
I could not leave it, were it mine to say,
"Farewell for ever!"

Many a courtesy,
That sought no recompense, and met with none
But in the swell of heart with which it came,
Have I experienced; not a cabin-door,
Go where I would, but open'd with a smile;
From the first hour, when, in my long descent,
Strange perfumes rose, as if to welcome me,
From flowers that minister'd like unseen spirits;
From the first hour, when vintage-songs broke forth,
A grateful earnest, and the Southern lakes,
Dazzlingly bright, unfolded at my feet;
They that receive the cataracts, and ere-long
Dismiss them, but how changed-onward to roll
From age to age in silent majesty,

Blessing the nations, and reflecting round
The gladness they inspire.

Gentle or rude,
No scene of life but has contributed
Much to remember-from the Polesine,

The wondrous work of some heroic race.2

But now a long farewell! Oft, while I live,
If once again in England, once again
In my own chimney-nook, as Night steals on,
With half-shut eyes reclining, oft, methinks,
While the wind blusters and the pelting rain
Clatters without, shall I recall to mind
The scenes, occurrences, I met with here,
And wander in Elysium; many a note
Of wildest melody, magician-like,
Awakening, such as the Calabrian horn,
Along the mountain-side, when all is still,
Pours forth at folding-time; and many a chant,
Solemn, sublime, such as at midnight flows
From the full choir, when richest harmonies
Break the deep silence of thy glens, La Cava;
To him who lingers there with listening ear,
Now lost and now descending as from Heaven!

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.

Note 1, page 40, col. 2.

As on that Sabbath-eve when he arrived.

"J'arrive essoufflé, tout en nage; le cœur me bat, je vois de lom les soldats à leur poste; j'accours, je crie d'une voix étouffee. Il étoit trop tard."-See Les Confessions, L. 1. The street, in which he was born, is called Rue Rousseau.

Note 2, page 40, col. 2.

He sate him down and wept-wept till the morning. "Lines of eleven syllables occur almost in every page of Milton; but though they are not unpleasing, they ought not to be admitted into heroic poetry; since the