Whither is fled that Power whose frown severe Awed sober Reason till she crouched in fear? That Silence, once in deathlike fetters bound, Chains that were loosened only by the sound Of holy rites chanted in measured round? -The voice of blasphemy the fane alarms, The cloister startles at the gleam of arms. The thundering tube the aged angler hears, Bent o'er the groaning flood that sweeps away his tears. Cloud-piercing pine-trees nod their troubled heads, Or, from the bending rocks, obtrusive cling, And o'er the whitened wave their shadows fling The pathway leads, as round the steeps it twines; And Silence loves its purple roof of vines. The loitering traveller hence, at evening, sees From rock-hewn steps the sail between the trees; Or marks, 'mid opening cliffs, fair darkeyed maids Tend the small harvest of their garden glades; Or stops the solemn mountain-shades to view Spires, rocks, and lawns a browner night Stretch o'er the pictured mirror broad and Strong terror checks the female peasant's And track the yellow lights from steep to steep, As up the opposing hills they slowly creep. Restlessly flashing, seems to mount like fire: And amorous music on the water dies. How blest, delicious scene! the eye that greets Thy open beauties, or thy lone retreats; Beholds the unwearied sweep of wood that scales Thy cliffs; the endless waters of thy vales; Thy lowly cots that sprinkle all the shore, Each with its household boat beside the door; Thy torrents shooting from the clear-blue sky; Thy towns, that cleave, like swallows' nests, on high; That glimmer hoar in eve's last light, descried Dim from the twilight water's shaggy side, Whence lutes and voices down the en chanted woods Steal, and compose the oar-forgotten floods; Thy lake, that, streaked or dappled, blue or grey, 'Mid smoking woods gleams hid from morning's ray Slow-travelling down the western hills, to enfold Its green-tinged margin in a blaze of gold; Thy glittering steeples, whence the matin bell Calls forth the woodman from his desert cell, Along the steaming lake, to early mass. Lip-dewing song, and ringlet - tossing Where sparkling eyes and breaking smiles illume The sylvan cabin's lute-enlivened gloom. While Slavery, forcing the sunk mind to From the bright wave, in solemn gloom, retire The dull-red steeps, and, darkening still, aspire To where afar rich orange lustres glow Or, led where Via Mala's chasms confine His burning eyes with fearful light illume. to go O'er life's long deserts with its charge of woe, With sad congratulation joins the train Where beasts and men together o'er the plain Move on a mighty caravan of pain: Hope, strength, and courage, social suffering brings, Freshening the wilderness with shades and springs. -There be whose lot far otherwise is cast: On joys that might disgrace the captive's Sole human tenant of the piny waste, cell, Her shameless timbrel shakes on Como's marge, And lures from bay to bay the vocal barge. By silent cottage-doors, the peasant's home His children's children listened to the -A Hermit with his family around! But let us hence; for fair Locarno smiles Embowered in walnut slopes and citron isles : Or seek at eve the banks of Tusa's stream, waters gleam. 1 The river along whose banks you descend in crossing the Alps by the Simplon Pass. By choice or doom a gipsy wanders here, A cowering shape half hid in curling When lightning among clouds and mountain-snows Predominates, and darkness comes and And the fierce torrent, at the flashes broad road She seeks a covert from the battering shower In the roofed bridge;2 the bridge, in that dread hour, Itself all trembling at the torrent's power. Nor is she more at ease on some still night, When not a star supplies the comfort of its Only the waning moon hangs dull and red 2 Most of the bridges among the Alps are of wood, and covered: these bridges have a heavy appearance, and rather injure the effect of the scenery in some places. While pastoral pipes and streams the landscape lull, And bells of passing mules that tinkle dull, In solemn shapes before the admiring eye Dilated hang the misty pines on high, Huge convent domes with pinnacles and towers, And antique castles seen through gleamy showers. From such romantic dreams, my soul, awake! To sterner pleasure, where, by Uri's lake In Nature's pristine majesty outspread, Winds neither road nor path for foot to tread: The rocks rise naked as a wall, or stretch Far o'er the water, hung with groves of beech; Aerial pines from loftier steeps ascend, -Before those thresholds (never can they know The face of traveller passing to and fro,) Their watch-dog ne'er his angry bark foregoes, Touched by the beggar's moan of human woes; The shady porch ne'er offered a cool seat To pilgrims overcome by summer's heat. Yet thither the world's business finds its way At times, and tales unsought beguile the day, And there are those fond thoughts which Solitude, However stern, is powerless to exclude. There doth the maiden watch her lover's sail Approaching, and upbraid the tardy gale ; cry Amid tempestuous vapours driving by, ear; Where the green apple shrivels on the spray, And pines the unripened pear in summer's kindliest ray; Contentment shares the desolate domain With Independence, child of high Disdain. Exulting 'mid the winter of the skies, Shy as the jealous chamois, Freedom flies, And grasps by fits her sword, and often eyes; And sometimes, as from rock to rock she bounds The Patriot nymph starts at imagined sounds, And, wildly pausing, oft she hangs aghast, Whether some old Swiss air hath checked her haste Or thrill of Spartan fife is caught between the blast. Swoln with incessant rains from hour to hour, All day the floods a deepening murmur pour : The sky is veiled, and every cheerful sight: Dark is the region as with coming night; But what a sudden burst of overpowering light! Triumphant on the bosom of the storm, Glances the wheeling eagle's glorious form! Eastward, in long perspective glittering, shine The wood-crowned cliffs that o'er the lake recline; Those lofty cliffs a hundred streams unfold, At once to pillars turned that flame with gold: Behind his sail the peasant shrinks, to shun But, lo! the boatman, overawed, before The pictured fane of Tell suspends his oar; Confused the Marathonian tale appears, While his eyes sparkle with heroic tears. And who, that walks where men of ancient days Have wrought with godlike arm the deeds of praise, Feels not the spirit of the place control, Or rouse and agitate his labouring soul? Say, who, by thinking on Canadian hills, Or wild Aosta lulled by Alpine rills, Of ether, shining with diminished round, Shorn of its beams, insufferably white, And cold and hunger are his least of woes; 1 For most of the images in the next sixteen verses, I am indebted to M. Raymond's interesting observations annexed to his translation of Coxe's Tour in Switzerland. The Demon of the snow, with angry roar Descending, shuts for aye his prison door. Soon with despair's whole weight his spirits sink; Bread has he none, the snow must be his drink; And, ere his eyes can close upon the day, The eagle of the Alps o'ershades her prey. Now couch thyself where, heard with fear afar, Thunders through echoing pines the headlong Aar; Or rather stay to taste the mild delights Of pensive Underwalden's 1 pastoral heights. -Is there who 'mid these awful wilds has seen The native Genii walk the mountain green? Or heard, while other worlds their charms reveal, Soft music o'er the aërial summit steal? While o'er the desert, answering every close, Rich steam of sweetest perfume comes and goes. -And sure there is a secret Power that reigns Here, where no trace of man the spot profanes, Nought but the chalets, flat and bare, on high Suspended 'mid the quiet of the sky; Or distant herds that pasturing upward creep, And, not untended, climb the dangerous steep. How still! no irreligious sound or sight Of drowsy bells, for ever tinkling round; 1 The people of this Canton are supposed to be of a more melancholy disposition than the other inhabitants of the Alps; this, if true, may proceed from their living more secluded. 2 This picture is from the middle region of the Alps. Chalets are summer huts for the Swiss herdsmen. 3 Sugh, a Scotch word expressive of the sound of the wind through the trees. The solitary heifer's deepened low; Blend in a music of tranquillity; Save when, a stranger seen below, the boy Shouts from the echoing hills with savage joy. When, from the sunny breast of open seas, And bays with myrtle fringed, the southern breeze Comes on to gladden April with the sight Of green isles widening on each snow-clad height; When shouts and lowing herds the valley fill, And louder torrents stun the noon-tide hill, High and more high in summer's heat they go, And hear the rattling thunder far below; Or steal beneath the mountains, half-deterred, Where huge rocks tremble to the bellowing herd. One I behold who, 'cross the foaming flood, Leaps with a bound of graceful hardihood; Another, high on that green ledge;-he gained The tempting spot with every sinew strained; And downward thence a knot of grass he throws, Food for his beasts in time of winter snows. -Far different life from what Tradition hoar Transmits of happier lot in times of yore! Then Summer lingered long; and honey flowed From out the rocks, the wild bees' safe abode : Continual waters welling cheered the waste, And plants were wholesome, now of deadly taste: Nor Winter yet his frozen stores had piled, Usurping where the fairest herbage smiled: Nor Hunger driven the herds from pastures bare, To climb the treacherous cliffs for scanty fare. |