But all elated, on its verdant stem,

Confiding solely in its regal height,

It soared presumptuous, as for empire born;
And God for this removed its diadem,
And cast it from its regions of delight,
Forth to the spoiler, as a prey and scorn,
By the deep roots uptorn!

And lo! encumbering the lone hills it lay,
Shorn of its leaves, dismantled of its state,
While, pale with fear, men hurried far

away,

Who in its ample shade had found so late

Their bower of rest; and nature's savage race 'Midst the great ruin sought their dwelling-place.

But thou, base Libya, thou whose arid sand
Hath been a kingdom's death-bed, where one fate
Closed her bright life, and her majestic fame,
Though to thy feeble and barbarian hand

Hath fallen the victory, be not thou elate!

Boast not thyself, though thine that day of shame,

Unworthy of a name!

Know, if the Spaniard in his wrath advance,
Aroused to vengeance by a nation's cry,

Pierced by his searching lance,

Soon shalt thou expiate crime with agony,
And thine affrighted streams to ocean's flood
An ample tribute bear of Afric's Paynim blood.

FRAGMENTS

FROM THE

IPHIGENIA OF GOETHE.

I.

JOY OF PYLADES ON HEARING HIS NATIVE

LANGUAGE.

Oн sweetest voice! Oh blest familiar sound

Of mother-words heard in the stranger's land!
I see the blue hills of my native shore,
The far blue hills again! those cordial tones
Before the captive bid them freshly rise
For ever welcome! Oh by this deep joy,

Know the true son of Greece !

II.

EXCLAMATION OF IPHIGENIA ON SEEING HER

BROTHER.

Oh hear me, look upon me, how my heart

After long desolation now unfolds

Unto this new delight, to kiss thy head,

Thou dearest, dearest one of all on Earth!

To clasp thee with my arms which were but thrown
On the void winds before! Oh give me way,
Give my soul's rapture way, the eternal fount,

Leaps not more brightly forth from cliff to cliff
Of high Parnassus, down the golden vale,

Than the strong joy bursts gushing from my heart,
And swells around me to a flood of bliss,

Orestes! Oh my Brother!

M

III.

LOT OF MAN AND WOMAN COMPARED BY
IPHIGENIA.

Man by the battle's hour immortalized

May fall, yet leave his name to living song;
But of forsaken woman's countless tears,
What recks the after-world? the poet's voice
Tells naught of all the slow, sad, weary days

And long, long nights, through which the lonely soul
Poured itself forth, consumed itself away,

In passionate adjurings, vain desires,

And ceaseless weepings for the early lost,

The loved and vanished!