Page images
PDF
EPUB

them has given to me, the more the repetition of them will give to you. Indeed I can never write without restraint, and so I never write at all, but to the very few of whom I am certain that this will be true. How apt one is, and how natural it is that one should be apt to indulge in little egotisms, that are not only forgiven but welcomed by a friend (properly so called), for the very same reason, and in the very same proportion, that they are (to say the least) insipid to every one else. In thinking of these places, you will have patience to let me share your thoughts with Rousseau and Byron, and even with Nature herself-but who else shall I find that would? Perhaps, indeed-or why should I say 66 perhaps?"-I'm sure, that you will now anticipate the pleasure of visiting these scenes even with more earnestness than you used to do; just as I, though I cannot imagine a greater delight than it has been to see them as I have done, should, I am certain, have felt it doubled if you had been with me.

"You know one of my objects in taking the opportunity I had of coming here now, was to determine on which part of this neighbourhood I should hereafter choose for the purpose of"

"I have at once

fixed on Lausanne :-not the town itself, but its immediate vicinity. Nothing can be finer than the site of Lausanne. It is built on an eminence, and from different parts commands a view of all the scenery that is in any way connected with the lake of Geneva, which includes every possible variety of sublimity and beauty. Behind rises the lofty and regular chain of the Jura mountains-to the right and left lie the lovely hills of the Pays de Vaud, beautified in a thousand ways by towns, villages, countryhouses, vineyards, meadows, chesnutgroves, and forests-in front the lake stretches itself from Geneva on the one hand, to Villeneure on the other, with the beautiful opening at the eastern extremity, giving an exquisite view into the valley of the Rhone and the mountains of the Valais-and on the opposite side of the lake, almost perpendicularly from the water's edge, rise the majestic Alps of Savoy; not forming a regular chain, as the Jura mountains do behind, but broken into every conceivable form, and opening

here and there, so as to give a most sublime but indescribable view into the white and glittering distance as far as the eye can reach.

"I saw the house where Gibbon lived, and the terrace and little summer-house where he used to write, and like him better than I did before for having the taste to choose such a retirement, and the power to be happy in it; which he undoubtedly was, more than during any of the other more busy and brilliant periods of his life. The terrace has a fine view of the lake and the opposite mountains, but its situation is not to be compared with many others in the town and neighbourhood.

"On leaving Lausanne we descend to Vevai, which is followed by Cla rens, Chillon, and Villeneure. And here I must have done with descriptions-for even while I was among these scenes I could not bring myself to look at them with a view-hunter's eye, beautiful as they are:-and now that I have left them, my recollections are so blended with the fancies and imaginations that I had previously clustered round them, and that were multiplied and rendered tenfold more vivid when I did see them, that I can give you very little real information about them. Indeed if I could I think you would be better without it. It is much better that you should make them just what you wish them to be, till you do sec them; and when you do, I'll answer for them, that the fairy-work they will destroy, will be replaced by a still more lovely reality. It was here, on the borders of this lake, between Vevai and Villeneure, that the genius of Rousseu luxuriated in all its beauty and in all its power. In his earliest youth he learned to appreciate these scenes; and for ever afterwards, wherever his perverse fortune might cast him, here and here only could his spirit find a resting place and a home. All his plans of future and possible good-for he lived in the future and the possible-were centered in this spot; and yet, sincere and simple as they were, they could never be realized. The very ideal of his hopes and wishes was confined to a cottage and an orchard on the borders of this lake, with a kind companion to talk to, and a little boat to row himself about in. That part of his life over which he

for his sake-for without it we should have been without them and I, for one, should find it very difficult to point out any one foreign writer that I would not rather part with than him

can be said to have had any real control, has proved, that this was what his natural taste and his habits of thought and feeling would have led him to. But how did he, in fact, pass his life-he whose love for na--and as for the literature of his own ture and virtue was as ardent and language, I believe I should not be sincere as his conceptions of them long in deciding to sacrifice it all to were just and exalted? In the midst Rousseau. ef a mob of unprincipled and heartless men and women of the world, whose loftiest notions of goodness made it a theory, and that theory an affair of convention;-with whom truth was under the control of fashion, nature was a thing constructed by art, and love an invention of Racine: and who could talk glibly of all these things, exactly in proportion as they knew and felt nothing about them and, indeed, for that very reason. In the eyes of such people as these, Rousseau, when first he came among them, must have seemed a living libel on themselves-a standing satire on all their habits and institutions; and it must not be wondered at, if, when his weakness and vanity had once tied him to the stake, they should keep him there to "be baited by the rabble's curse," that thus bound and hampered he should be delivered over to the contempt and hatred of those very persons who had stood awe-struck before him in the light of his natural simplicity. Still, however, it is some praise to him, that he never learned to wear his shackles gracefully; and that the glitter and noise of them could never destroy the sights and sounds that came to his imagination from the mountains of his native land-that wherever his weak and diseased body might be detained by his still more weak and diseased will-there was his spirit and his heart. There is not a page of his writings but what proves this. Even the existence of those writings prove it for if this had not been true, they would never have been written. So that it would be very idle in us to lament such a state of things-except

"From Lausanne you descend to Vevai, Rousseau's favourite town; and a sweet little town it is.-Clarens is a short distance farther. The Chateau and chesnut groves, which are the supposed scene of part of the Hélouise, are situated on a slight eminence about a mile from the lake.-A few miles farther, and near to the extremity of the lake, is the castle of Chillon. It is built in the lake-the entrance next the road being so near, however, as to be reached by a small draw-bridge. Within a short distance of this castle there is a very small island, with two or three trees on it. It is the only one on the lake. Byron has here stepped in and disturbed the associations which previously belonged entirely to Rousseau and history. We descended into the dungeon which is the scene of his poem. It is not near so gloomy as his darkening imagination has made it. You can see to read the names that are cut on the stone columns and walls. His own is among the restcut very small, on the column to which Bonnivard is supposed to have been chained; and that of another poet, Percy Byshe Shelley, is cut on the neighbouring wall, and occupies the space of any fifty others. this characteristic?-Whereabout do you think I cut mine?-On the column near Byron's, or on the wall near Shelley's?-Or among those of the unknown multitude? Or on the floor or the ceiling, where there was none before?-No where at all!-I hope that this was characteristic, and that the other was not."

GHOST STORY.

*

*

(To be continued.)

(From WILLIAM of MALMESBURY.)

Is

THE following Ghost Story must be known in some shape or another to most of our readers. But not many, perhaps, are aware how long it has been upon record. The following are the words, a little abridged, of William of Malmesbury, written in the 12th century, of the reign of William the Conqueror. "THERE were in that city (Nantes) two ecclesiastics, ordained, ere their

years allowed, to be priests, the bishop yielding the same rather to favour

than to desert of a fair life; at last, the woful ending of the one instructed the survivor how their road went sheer to hell. But so far as the science of letters they were excellently taught, and from very tender infancy so join ed in pleasant friendship, that they would have adventured peril of life for one another. Wherefore one day, in more than wonted overflowing of mind, they thus secretly spake :-That for many years they, now in study of letters, now in worldly cares, had exercised their minds, and had found no satisfaction, intent rather amiss than aright. Meanwhile the day draweth on which shall sever their loves; wherefore they should prevent this, and provide that the same faith which had joined them living, go with the first dying unto the kingdom of the dead. They compact therefore, that whichsoever shall first depart, shall certainly, within thirty days, appear to the survivor, waking or sleeping, and declare to him if it be as the Platonists hold, that death extinguisheth not the mind, but restores it as released out of prison, unto its origin, God; if not, then must faith be given to the sect of the Epicureans, who believe that the soul, loosed from the body, vanisheth into air. To this was their faith plighted, and in their daily discourses the same oath oftententimes renewed; nor was it long before death suddenly taketh one of them away. The other remained, and thought with much seriousness of the promise, expecting momently that his friend shall come during the thirty days; which being spent, giving up his hope, he turneth himself to other business, when suddenly the other stood beside him, being awake, and going about some work, pale, and with countenance such as is of the dying while the spirit passeth away. Then the dead first accosts the living, who spake not Knowest thou me?' he said. I know thee,' he made answer; ' and I am not troubled at thy unwonted presence so much, as I am in wonder of thy long absence.' But he having excused his delay-At last,' said he, 'I come; and my coming, if thou wilt, dear friend, shall be

ers,

profitable to thee; but to me utterly fruitless, whose sentence is pronounced into eternal punishment.' And when the living man, for redemption of the dead, would promise to bestow all his substance on monasteries and on the poor, and himself to spend nights and days in fastings and pray"It is fixed,' quoth he, that I have said; for the judgments of God are without repenting, by which I am plunged into the sulphureous gulph of hell. My doom is everlasting-my pains eternal and innumerable, though all the whole world should seek remedy. And that thou mayest understand something of my infinite sufferings,' stretching out his hand, distilling with an ulcerous sore; lo!' he said, 'one of the least. Doth it seem to thee light?' And the other replying that it seemed to him light, he, bending his fingers, cast three drops upon him of that trickling gore; whereof two touching the temples, and one the forehead, entered skin and flesh as with fiery cautery, making wounds that might hold a nut. He by a cry testifying the greatness of the anguish - This,' said the dead, shall be to thee, as long as thou shalt live, an admonishment of my great punishment; and, if thou slight it not, of thy own deliverance.' He then enjoined him (as the historian goes on to relate) to proceed forthwith to Rennes, and there to take the habit of a monk under the holy Melanius. And the other ap

pearing still to hesitate, the dead, cum oculi vigore perstringens, bade him, if he doubted, to read these letters; and opening his hand, showed him written on it thanks, addressed by Satan and his whole crew, to every ecclesiastical society (catui); because they neglected nothing of their own pleas ures, and suffered such numbers of souls to go down to hell, through the decay of preaching, as former ages had never beheld. The sinner was overcome distributed all his property to churches and the poor-took the habit under St Melanius-and became an eminent example to all, not only of a wonderful conversion, but of a holy conversation to the end of life."

TRANSLATION OF AN ARABIC POEM.

In the Appendix to the second volume of the "History of the Crusades," of Professor Wilken of Heidelberg, is given a literal translation of an Arabic poem, written in reproach of the indifference with which the Moslems prosecuted those wars.

Of the poet, Modaffar of Abiward (a town of Khorassan), nothing farther is known, than his song of upbraiding on the slackness of the Mussulinen in the contest for Islam against the Crusades, specimens of which are given in differ◄ ent historical works of the Arabians. Abulfeda, in his Annals, has adduced, as a specimen, some distichs, to which Reiske, from a MS. of Ebn-Shohnah, has added three more (9, 11, 12). In the History of Jerusalem and Hebron, of which Professor Wilken had access to two MSS. in the Imperial Library at Paris, varying but little from one another in regard to this poem, and that chiefly in errors of the copyist, nor differing much from the text as given by Abulfeda, a few additional distichs are cited. Abulfeda has given only the better and more intelligible distichs (1, 2, 4-7, 16, 17), which does credit to his judgment.

It would appear, from the reference made to the poem in the body of the work, that it was written soon after the taking of Jerusalem by the Crusaders, which assigns its date about the year A. D. 1100.

1. WE have mingled our blood with streaming tears,

Therefore is there nothing of us now left for the stroke of the foe.

2. Oh! ill weapons of the man are tears, which he sheds

In the time when the fire of war is kindled by the glittering swords.

3. Hear, sons of Islam! Yet are there appointed to you Battles, in which heads must come under hoofs.

4. But how can it be that your eye sleeps, the lashes full (sc. of sleep) Amidst sorrows, which would awaken every sleeper?

5. And your brothers in Syria-their place of rest is

On the back of young horses, or in the maw of old vultures.

6. Them the Roman loads, burdens with dishonour, and ye Draw after you the train of luxury, as if ye lived in peace.

7. And how much of blood is already poured out, and of the beautiful

ཐ ་

How many a one guards the blushes of her beauty with her fingers spread over them.

$. During the time that stroke and thrust are but once exchanged, Are both her sons grown gray.

9. And he that draws back in fear, from the whirlpool of this strife To deliver his life, shall one day gnash his teeth for repentance.

10. This strife puts into the hands of the idolaters sharp-edged swords, Which will one day wound neck and head of the faithful.

11. Soon will the prophet, the buried in Taijeba,* cry out, With loud voice," O race of Hashem!

12. I see my people not pointing on the foe

Their lances, and the pillars of the Faith totter."

13. They shun the fire, fearing to set their foot in it,

And consider not that shame follows without tarrying.

16. Can they endure such shame, the leaders in fight of the Arabs?
Can they keep silence in such dishonour, the heroes of the Persians?

17. Ah! if they will not out of zeal defend their Faith,

Yet out of jealousy should they guard what is to them precious and holy.+

18. And if they dread, on naked fields without shelter, the raging of the fight, Should they not yet engage in the fight for very lust of spoil ?"

An appellation of Medina.

Namely, the persons of their families.

HORE CANTABRIGIENSES. No III.

When Britain first, at Heav'n's command,
Arose from out the azure main ;
This was the charter, the charter of the land,
And guardian angels sung the strain:

Rule, Britannia! Britannia, rule the waves!
Britons never shall be slaves.

The nations, not so blest as thee,

Must in their turns to tyrants fall; While thou shalt flourish great and free, The dread and envy of them all. Rule, Britannia! &c.

Still more majestic shalt thou rise,

More dreadful from each foreign stroke; As the loud blast that rends the skies, Serves but to root thy native oak.

Rule, Britannia! &c.

Thee haughty tyrants ne'er shall tame: All their attempts to bend thee down Will but arouse thy generous flameAnd work their woe, and thy renown. Rule, Britannia! &c.

To thee belongs the rural reign:

Thy cities shall with commerce shine; All thine shall be the subject main, And ev'ry shore it circles thine.

Rule, Britannia! &c.

The muses, still with freedom found,
Shall to thy happy coasts repair,

Blest isle! with matchless beauty crown'd,
And manly hearts to guard the fair.

Rule, Britannia! Britannia rule the waves!
Britons never shall be slaves.

1.

Jubente cum primum Deo Britannia Pelagi cavis recessibus caput extulit,

Ei in manus hæc charta magna tradita est,
Cælestiumque omnis melos cæcinit chorus:
Fluctus regas, domina regas Britannia;
Nunquam Britannus imperanti serviet.

Sua quamque gentium minus felicium
Manet vicissim sors, jugum hostile: interina;
Tu, Nostra, pulcra, tu vigebis libera,
Gens invidenda, gens timendaque omnibus.
Fluctus, &c.

Per damna tu cædesque surges celsior,
Ferrumque opes dabit peregrinum tibi:
Procella ceu, quæ miscet thera et salum,
Novas tuis vires ministrat quercubus.
Fluctus &c.

Non te tyrannus perdomabit insolens,
Ut sæviat thronoque te dejectum eat:
Virtus tua, acriore calcare incita,
Illi ruinam, gloriam tibi pariet.
Fluctus, &c.

Ruris colonos imperia beant tua;
Cives beant in urbibus commercia:
Tibi æquor omne obtemperabit subditum,
Et omne, cujus alluit fitus, solum.
Fluctus, &c.

Camana, Libertatis usque hæc est comes,
Viset tuam, visamquè amabit insulam :
Felix nimis! nam filias armat Venus,
Et filias qui protegant, Mars filios.

Fluctus regas, domina regas Brittania g
Nunquam Brittanus imperanti serviet.

Says Plato, why should man be vain,

Since bounteous Heaven has made him great? Why look, with insolent disdain,

On those undeck'd with wealth or state?
Can costly robes, or beds of down,
Or all the gems that deck the fair,

Can all the glories of a crown

Give health, or ease the brow of care?

The sceptred king, the burthened slave,
The humble and the haughty die;
The rich, the poor, the base, the brave,
In dust, without distinction, lie.

Go, search the tombs where monarchs rest,
Who once the greatest titles wore;
Of wealth and pomp they're dispossest,
And all their honours are no more.

So flies the meteor through the skies,
And spreads along a gilded train;
When shot-'tis gone-its beauty dies,
Dissolved to common air again.
So 'tis with us, my social souls:

Let friendship reign while here we stay;
Let's crown our joys with flowing bowls-
When Jove commands, we must obey.

The sun sets in night, and the stars shun the day; But glory remains, when their light fades away." Begin, ye tormentors; your threats are in vain ; For the son of Alnomoc shall never complain.

Remember the arrows he shot from his bow;
Remember your chiefs by his hatchet laid low:
Why so slow? Do you wait till I shrink from iny pain?
No! the son of Alnomoc will never complain."

Remember the wood where in ambush we lay,
And the scalps which we bore from your nation away.
Now the flame rises fast! you exult in my pain;
But the son of Alnomoc shall never complain.
I go to the land where my father is gone;
His ghost shall rejoice in the fame of his son:
Death comes like a friend; he relieves me from pain,
And the son of Alnomoc has scorn'd to complain.

3.

Cur vana mens homini, rogat Plato, ciet,
Beårit illum larga quòd Jovis manus?
Superbior cur ille felices minus,
Opes quibus non adfluant, despexerit ?
Num vestis aurea, num levi plumâ tumens
Torus, puellæ gemma num pulcræ decus,
Diadema num regale sollicitam potest
Frontem explicare? num salutem reddere?

Rex sceptrigerque obit, obit et servus miser,
Obit humilis vir sorte et arrogans pari;
Fortes, fugaces, divites, pauperculos
Pulvis-nec est discrimen-idem contegit.
Regum sepulchra quære, queis vivis caput
Corona cinxit splendidissimùm micans:
Priscæ nec ultrà opes, nec ultrà gloria
Comitatur; aufugit throno excussis honos.

Sic quæ citato pervolant axe æthera
Meteora, dispergunt inauratum jubar:

En jam micant-volant-cadunt! extinguitur
Omnis venustas; nil nisi aer est levis.
Nostrum hac, sodales, usque lege res fluunt;
Ergo et sodalitium colamus arctius:
Cratera, dum licet, coronemus-Jove
Jubente, cunctis (ut negent) abeundum erit.

Sol nocte conditur, astra Lucifer fugat:
Condantur astra solque, gloria superest.
Uras secesve, tortor; incassum furis.
Satus Alnomoco, utut fremas, nescit queri..

Cornu memento quot sagittas torserit,
Quot straverit vestrum bipennifer duces-
Moratur ecquid?-An dolorem ut deprecer?
Perge-Alnomoci filius nescit queri.

Memento vastis quàm latuerim in saltibus,
Ovans quot et victor tropea evexerim !
Ardescit ignis-jam triumphus vester est :
At Alnomoci filius nescit queri.

Eo ipse terram, quò prior venit pater;
Gaudebit umbra filii famâ sui:
Cunctos amica mors dolores eximit,
Satus Alnomoco nec semel voluit queri.

« PreviousContinue »