Thus Harold inly said, and pass'd along,
Yet not insensibly to all which here
Awoke the jocund birds to early song
In glens which might have made even exile dear;
Though on his brow were graven lines austere,
And tranquil sternness which had ta'en the place
Of feelings fierier far but less severe,
Joy was not always absent from his face,
But o'er it in such scenes would steal with transient trace.
Nor was all love shut from him, though his days
Of passion had consumed themselves to dust.
It is in vain that we should coldly gaze
On such as smile upon us; the heart must
Leap kindly back to kindness, though disgust
Hath wean'd it from all wordlings; thus he felt,
For there was soft remembrance, and sweet trust
In one fond breast, to which his own would melt,
And in its tenderer hour on that his bosom dwelt.
And he had learn'd to love,-I know not why,
For this in such as him seems strange of mood,
The helpless looks of blooming infancy,
Even in its earliest nurture; what subdued,
To change like this, a mind so far imbued
With scorn of man, it little boots to know;
But thus it was; and though in solitude
Small power the nipp'd affections have to grow
In him this glowed when all beside had ceased to glow.
And there was one soft breast, as hath been said,
Which unto his was bound with stronger ties
Than the church links withal; and, though unwed,
That love was pure and far above disguise,
Had stood the test of mortal enmities
Still undivided, and cemented more
By peril dreaded most in female eyes;
But this was firm, and from a foreign shore
Well to that heart might his these absent greetings pour.
The castle crag of Drachenfels (11)
Frowns o'er the wide and winding Rhine,
Whose breast of waters broadly swells
Between the banks which bear the vine,
And hills all rich with blossomed trees,
And fields which promise corn and wine,
And scattered cities crowning these,
Whose far white walls along them shine,
Have strewed a scene, which I should see
With double joy wert thou with me!
And peasant girls, with deep blue eyes,
And hands which offer early flowers,
Walk smiling o'er this paradise :
Above, the frequent feudal towers
Through green leaves lift their walls of grey,
And many a rock which steeply lours,
And noble arch in proud decay,
Look o'er this vale of vintage bowers;
But one thing want these banks of Rhine,Thy gentle hand to clasp in mine!
I send the lillies given to me;
Though long before thy hand they touch,
I know that they must withered be,
But yet reject them not as such;
For I have cherish'd them as dear,
Because they yet may meet thine eye,
And guide thy soul to mine even here,
When thou beholdst them drooping nigh,
And knowst them gathered by the Rhine,
And offered from my heart to thine.
The river nobly foams and flows,
The charm of this enchanted ground,
And all its thousand turns disclose
Some fresher beauty varying round;
The haughtiest breast its wish might bound
Through life to dwell delighted here;
Nor could on earth a spot be found
To nature and to me so dear,
Could thy dear eyes in following mine
Still sweeten more these banks of Rhine!
By Coblentz, on a rise of gentle ground,
There is a small and simple pyramid,
Crowning the summit of the verdant mound;
Beneath its base are heroes ashes hid,
Our enemy's, but let not that forbid
Honour to Marceau! o'er whose early tomb
Tears, big tears, gush'd from the rough soldier's lid,
Lamenting and yet envying such a doom,
Falling for France, whose rights he battled to resume.
Brief, brave and glorious was his young career,— His mourners were two hosts, his friends and foes, And fitly may the stranger lingering here Pray for his gallant spirit's bright repose: For he was Freedom's champion one of those, The few in number, who had not o'erstept The charter to chastise which she bestows On such as wield her weapons; he had kept The whiteness of his soul, and thus men o'er him wept.
Here Ehrenbreitstein, (13) with her shattered wall
Black with the miner's blast, upon her height
Yet shows of what she was, when shell and ball
Rebounding idly on her strength did light;
A tower of victory! from whence the flight
Of baffled foes was watch'd along the plain;
But Peace destroy'd what War could never blight,
And laid those proud roofs bare to Summer's rain-
On which the iron shower for years had pour'd in vain.
LIX.
Adieu to thee, fair Rhine! How long delighted
The stranger fain would linger on his way!
Thine is a scene alike where souls united
Or lonely Contemplation thus might stray;
And could the ceaseless vultures cease to prey
On self-condemning bosoms, it were here,
Where Nature, nor too sombre, nor too gay,
Wild but not rude, awful yet not austere,
Is to the mellow earth as Autumn to the year,
Adieu to thee again! a vain adieu !
There can be no farewell to scene like thine;
The mind is coloured by thy every hue;
And if reluctantly the eyes resign
Their cherish'd gaze upon thee, lovely Rhine!
"Tis with the thankful glance of parting praise;
More mighty spots may rise-more glaring shine,
But none unite in one attaching maze
The brilliant fair,and soft,-the glories of old days.
LXI.
The negligently grand, the fruitful bloom
Of coming ripeness, the white city's sheen,
The rolling stream, the precipice's gloom,
The forest's growth, and Gothic walls between,
The wild rocks shaped as they had turrets been
In mockery of man's art; and these withal
A race of faces happy as the scene,
Whose fertile bounties here extend to all
Still springing o'er thy banks, though Empires near them
But these recede. Above me are the Alps, The palaces of Nature, whose vast walls Have pinnacled in clouds their snowy scalps, And throned Eternity in icy halls Of cold sublimity, where forms and falls The avalanche-the thunderbolt of snow! All that expands the spirit, yet appals, Gather around these summits, as to show How Earth may pierce to Heaven, yet leave vain man
But ere these matchless heights I dare to scau,
There is a spot should not be pass'd in vain,-
Morat! the proud, the patriot field! where man
May gaze on ghastly trophies of the slain,
Nor blush for those who conquer'd on that plain ;
Here Burgundy bequeath'd his tombless host,
A bony heap, through ages to remain,
Themselves their monument ;-the Stygian coast Unsepulchred they roam'd, and shriek'd each wandering [ghost. (14)
While Waterloo with Canna's carnage vies,
Morat and Marathon twin names shall stand;
They were true Glory's stainless victories,
Won by the unambitious heart and hand
Of a proud, brotherly, and civic band,
All unbought champions in no princely cause
Of vice-entail'd Corruption; they no land
Doom'd to bewail the blasphemy of laws
Making king's right divine, by some Draconic clause,
LXV.
By a lone wall a lonelier column rears
A gray and grief-worn aspect of old days,
'Tis the last remnant of the wreck of years,
And looks as with the wild bewildered gaze
Of one to stone converted by amaze,
Yet still with consciousness; and there it stands
Making a marvel that it not decays,
When the coeval pride of human hands,
Levell❜d (15) Aventicum, hath strewed her subject lands.
And there-oh! sweet and sacred be the name!-
Julia-the daughter, the devoted-gave
Her youth to Heaven; her heart beneath a claim
Nearest to Heaven's, broke o'er a father's grave.
Justice is sworn 'gainst tears, and her's would crave
The life she lived in ; but the judge was just,
Their tomb was simple, and without a bust,
And held within their urn one mind, one heart, one dust.
But these are deeds which should not pass away,
And names that must not wither, though the earth
Forgets her empires with a just decay,
The enslavers and the enslaved, their death and birth; The high, the mountain-majesty of worth
Should be, and shall, survivor of its woe,
And from its immortality look forth
In the sun's face, like yonder Alpine snow, (17) Imperishably pure beyond all things below.
|