And lips half-opening with the dread of sound,
Unsleeping Silence guards, worn out with fear,
Lest, haply escaping on some treacherous blast,
The fateful word let slip the Elements,
And frenzy Nature. Yet the wizard her,
Was moulded to such features as declared That Pity there had oft and strongly work'd, And sometimes Indignation. Bold her mien And like a haughty Huntress of the woods She mov'd: yet sure she was a gentle maid!
Arm'd with Torngarsuck's* power, the Spirit of And in each motion her most innocent soul
Good,
Forces to unchain the foodful progeny
Beam'd forth so brightly, that who saw would say
Guilt was a thing impossible in her!
Of the Ocean's stream.—Wild phantasies! yet wise, Nor idly would have said-for she had lived
On the victorious goodness of High God
Teaching Reliance, and Medicinal Hope,
Till from Bethabra northward, heavenly Truth, With gradual steps winning her difficult way, Transfer their rude Faith perfected and pure.
If there be Beings of higher class than Man,
I deem no nobler province they possess,
Than by disposal of apt circumstance
To rear up Kingdoms: and the deeds they prompt,
Distinguishing from mortal agency,
They choose their human ministers from such states
As still the Epic song half fears to name,
Repell'd from all the Minstrelsies that strike
The Palace-roof and soothe the Monarch's pride.
And such, perhaps, the Spirit, who (if words Witness'd by answering deeds may claim our Faith)
Held commune with that warrior-maid of France
Who scourged the Invader. From her infant days,
With Wisdom, Mother of retired Thoughts,
Her soul had dwelt; and she was quick to mark
The good and evil thing, in human lore
Undisciplined. For lowly was her Birth,
And Heaven had doom'd her early years to Toil,
That pure from Tyranny's least deed, herself
Unfear'd by Fellow-natures, she might wait
On the poor Laboring man with kindly looks,
And minister refreshment to the tired
Way-wanderer, when along the rough-hewn Bench
The sweltry man had stretch'd him, and aloft
Vacantly watch'd the rudely pictured board
Which on the Mulberry-bough with welcome creak
Swung to the pleasant breeze. Here, too, the Maid
Learnt more than Schools could teach: Man's shift-
ing mind,
His Vices and his Sorrows! And full oft
At Tales of cruel Wrong and strange Distress
Had wept and shiver'd. To the tottering Eld
Still as a Daughter would she run: she placed
His cold Limbs at the sunny Door, and loved
To hear him story, in his garrulous sort,
Of his eventful years, all come and gone.
So twenty seasons past. The Virgin's Form,
Active and tall, nor Sloth nor Luxury
Had shrunk or paled. Her front sublime and broad,
Her flexile eye-brows wildly hair'd and low,
And her full eye, now bright, now unillum'd,
In this bad World as in a place of Tombs, And touch'd not the pollutions of the Dead.
"Twas the cold season, when the Rustic's eye
From the drear desolate whiteness of his fields
Rolls for relief to watch the skiey tints
And clouds slow varying their huge imagery;
When now, as she was wont, the healthful Maid
Had left her pallet ere one beam of day
Slanted the fog-smoke. She went forth alone,
Urged by the indwelling angel-guide, that oft,
With dim inexplicable sympathies
Disquieting the Heart, shapes out Man's course
To the predoom'd adventure. Now the ascent
She climbs of that steep upland, on whose top
The Pilgrim-Man, who long since eve had watch d
Shouts to himself, there first the Abbey-lights
The alien shine of unconcerning Stars,
The winding sheep-track vale-ward: when, behold
Seen in Neufchatel's vale; now slopes adown
In the first entrance of the level road
An unattended Team! The foremost horse
Lay with stretch'd limbs; the others, yet alive,
But stiff and cold, stood motionless, their manes
Hoar with the frozen night-dews. Dismally
The dark-red down now glimmer'd; but its gleams
Disclosed no face of man. The Maiden paused,
Then hail'd who might be near No voice replied.
From the thwart wain at length there reach'd het
A sound so feeble that it almost seem'd
Distant: and feebly, with slow effort push'd,
A miserable man crept forth his limbs
Faint on the shafts he rested. She, meantime,
The silent frost had eat, scathing like fire.
Saw crowded close beneath the coverture
A mother and her children-lifeless all,
Yet lovely! not a lineament was marr'd-
Death had put on so slumber-like a form!
It was a piteous sight; and one, a babe,
The crisp milk frozen on its innocent lips,
Lay on the woman's arm, its little hand
Stretch'd on her bosom.
Mutely questioning, The Maid gazed wildly at the living wretch. He, his head feebly turning, on the group Look'd with a vacant stare, and his eye spoke
Spake more than Woman's Thought; and all her The drowsy pang that steals on worn-out anguish. face
They call the Good Spirit Torngarsuck. The other great but malignant spirit is a nameless Female; she dwells under the sea in a great house, where she can detain in captivity all the animals of the ocean by her magic power. When a dearth befalls the Greenlanders, an Angekok or magician must undertake a journey thither. He passes through the kingdom of ouls, over an horrible abyss into the Palace of this phantom, and by his enchantments causes the captive creatures to ascend directly to the surface of the ocean.-See Crantz' Hist. of
She shudder'd: but, each vainer pang subdued,
Quick disentangling from the foremost horse
The rustic bands, with difficulty and toil
The stiff cramp'd team forced homeward. There
arrived,
Anxiously tends him she with healing herbs,
And weeps and prays-but the numb power of Death
Spreads o'er his limbs; and ere the noontide hour
The hovering spirits of his Wife and Babes
Hail him immortal! Yet amid his pangs,
With interruptions long from ghastly throes,
His voice had falter'd out this simple tale.
The Village, where he dwelt an Husbandman,
By sudden inroad had been seized and fired
Late on the yester-evening. With his wife
And little ones he hurried his escape.
Sent forth, when she the Protoplast beheld
Stand beauteous on Confusion's charmed wave.
Moaning she fled, and entered the Profound
That leads with downward windings to the Cave
Of darkness palpable, Desert of Death
Sunk deep beneath Gehenna's massy roots.
There many a dateless age the Beldame lurk'd
They saw the neighboring Hamlets flame, they And trembled; till engender'd by fierce Hate,
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Ah! suffering to the height of what was suffer'd,
Stung with too keen a sympathy, the Maid
Brooded with moving lips, mute, startful, dark!
And now her flush'd tumultuous features shot
Such strange vivacity, as fires the eye
Of misery Fancy-crazed! and now once more
Naked, and void, and fix'd, and all within
The unquiet silence of confused thought
And shapeless feelings. For a mighty hand
Was strong upon her, till in the heat of soul
To the high hill-top tracing back her steps,
Aside the beacon, up whose smoulder'd stones
The tender ivy-trails crept thinly, there,
Unconscious of the driving element,
Yea, swallow'd up in the ominous dream, she sate
Ghastly as broad-eyed Slumber! a dim anguish
Breathed from her look! and still, with pant and sob,
Inly she toil'd to flee, and still subdued,
Felt an inevitable Presence near.
Thus as she toil'd in troublous ecstasy,'
An horror of great darkness wrapt her round,
And a voice uttered forth unearthly tones,
Calming her soul,-" O Thou of the Most High
Chosen, whom all the perfected in Heaven
Behold expectant—
Fierce Hate and gloomy Hope, a Dream arose,
Shaped like a black cloud mark'd with streaks of
It roused the Hell-Hag: she the dew damp wiped
From off her brow, and through the uncouth maze
Retraced her steps; but ere she reach'd the mouth
Of that drear labyrinth, shuddering she paused,
Nor dared re-enter the diminish'd Gulf.
As through the dark vaults of some moulder'd
Tower
(Which, fearful to approach, the evening Hind
Circles at distance in his homeward way)
The winds breathe hollow, deem'd the plaining groan
Of prison'd spirits; with such fearful voice
Night murmur'd, and the sound through Chaos went
Leap'd at her call her hideous-fronted brood!
A dark behest they heard, and rush'd on earth;
Since that sad hour, in Camps and Courts adored,
Rebels from God, and Monarchs o'er Mankind!"
From his obscure haunt
Shriek'd Fear, of Cruelty the ghastly Dam,
Feverish yet freezing, eager-paced yet slow,
As she that creeps from forth her swampy reeds,
Ague, the biform Hag! when early Spring
Beams on the marsh-bred vapors.
"Even so" (the exulting Maiden said;
"The sainted Heralds of Good Tidings fell,
And thus they witness'd God! But now the clouds
Treading, and storms beneath their feet, they soar
Higher, and higher soar, and soaring sing
Loud songs of Triumph! O ye spirits of God,
Hover around my mortal agonies!"
She spake, and instantly faint melody
Melts on her ear, soothing and sad, and slow,-
Such Measures, as at calmest midnight heard
By aged Hermit in his holy dream,
Foretell and solace death; and now they rise
Louder, as when with harp and mingled voice
The white-robed* multitude of slaughter'd saints
At Heaven's wide-open'd portals gratulant
Receive some martyr'd Patriot. The harmony
Entranced the Maid, till each suspended sense
[The following fragments were intended to form part of the Brief slumber seized, and confused ecstasy.
Poem when finished.]
"Maid beloved of Heaven!"
To her the tutelary Power exclaim'd)
"Of Chaos the adventurous progeny
Thou seest; foul missionaries of foul sire,
Fierce to regain the losses of that hour
When Love rose glittering, and his gorgeous wings
Over the abyss flutter'd with such glad noise,
As what time after long and pestful calms,
With slimy shapes and miscreated life
Poisoning the vast Pacific, the fresh breeze
Wakens the merchant-sail uprising. Night
A heavy unimaginable moan
At length awakening slow, she gazed around:
And through a Mist, the relic of that trance
Still thinning as she gazed, an Isle appear'd,
Its high, o'er-hanging, white, broad-breasted cliffs,
Glass'd on the subject ocean. A vast plain
Stretch'd opposite, where ever and anon
Revel. vi. 9, 11. And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held. And white robes were given unto every one of them, and it was said unto them that they should rest yet for a little season, until their fellow servants also and their brethren, that should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled.
The Plow-man, following sad his meagre team,
Turn'd
up fresh sculls unstartled, and the bones
Of fierce hate-breathing combatants, who there
All mingled lay beneath the common earth,
Death's gloomy reconcilement! O'er the Fields
Stept a fair form, repairing all she might,
Her temples olive-wreathed; and where she trod
Fresh flowerets rose, and many a foodful herb.
But wan her cheek, her footsteps insecure,
And anxious pleasure beam'd in her faint eye,
As she had newly left a couch of pain,
Pale Convalescent! (yet some time to rule
With power exclusive o'er the willing world,
That bless'd prophetic mandate then fulfill'd,
Peace be on Earth!) A happy while, but brief,
She seem'd to wander with assiduous feet,
And heal'd the recent harm of chill and blight,
And nursed each plant that fair and virtuous grew.
(Victims at once and Executioners),
The congregated Husbandmen lay waste
The Vineyard and the Harvest. As long
The Bothnic coast, or southward of the Line,
Though hush'd the Winds and cloudless the high
Noon,
Yet if Leviathan, weary of ease,
In sports unwieldy toss his Island-bulk,
Ocean behind him billows, and before
A storm of waves breaks foamy on the strand.
And hence, for times and seasons bloody and dark,
Short Peace shall skin the wounds of causeless War
And War, his strained sinews knit anew,
Still violate the unfinish'd works of Peace.
But yonder look! for more demands thy view!"
He said: and straightway from the opposite Isle
A Vapor sailed, as when a cloud, exhaled
From Egypt's fields that steam hot pestilence,
Travels the sky for many a trackless league,
Till o'er some Death-doom'd land, distant in vain,
It broods incumbent. Forthwith from the Plain,
But soon a deep precursive sound moan'd hollow:
Black rose the clouds, and now (as in a dream)
Their reddening shapes, transformed to Warrior-Facing the Isle, a brighter cloud arose,
The power of Justice, like a name all Light,
Shone from thy brow; but all they, who unblamed
Dwelt in thy dwellings, call thee Happiness.
Ah! why, uninjured and unprofited,
Should multitudes against their brethren rush?
Why sow they guilt, still reaping Misery?
Lenient of care, thy songs, O Peace! are sweet,
As after showers the perfumed gale of eve,
That flings the cool drops on a feverous cheek:
And gay the grassy altar piled with fruits.
But boasts the shrine of Dæmon War one charm,
Save that with many an orgie strange and foul,
Dancing around with interwoven arms,
The Maniac Suicide and Giant Murder
Exult in their fierce union? I am sad,
And know not why the simple Peasants crowd
Beneath the Chieftains' standard!" Thus the Maid.
To her the tutelary Spirit replied:
"When Luxury and Lust's exhausted stores
No more can rouse the appetites of Kings;
When the low flattery of their reptile Lords
Falls flat and heavy on the accustom'd ear;
When Eunuchs sing, and Fools buffoonery make,
And Dancers writhe their harlot-limbs in vain;
Then War and all its dread vicissitudes
Pleasingly agitate their stagnant Hearts;
Its hopes, its fears, its victories, its defeats,
Insipid Royalty's keen condiment !
Therefore uninjured and unprofited
And steer'd its course which way the Vapor went.
The Maiden paused, musing what this might mean.
But long time pass'd not, ere that brighter cloud
Return'd more bright; along the plain it swept;
And soon from forth its bursting sides emerged
A dazzling form, broad-bosom'd, bold of eye,
And wild her hair, save where with laurels bound.
Not more majestic stood the healing God,
When from his bow the arrow sped that slew
Huge Python. Shriek'd Ambition's giant throng,
And with them hiss'd the Locust-fiends that crawl'd
And glitter'd in Corruption's slimy track.
Great was their wrath, for short they knew their
The infuriate spirits of the Murder'd make
Fierce merriment, and vengeance ask of Heaven.'
Warm'd with new influence, the unwholesome plain
Sent up its foulest fogs to meet the Morn :
The Sun that rose on Freedom, rose in blood!
"Maiden beloved, and Delegate of Heaven!" "To her the tutelary Spirit said)
Soon shall the Morning struggle into Day,
The stormy Morning into cloudless Noon.
Much hast thou seen, nor all canst understand—
But this be thy best Omen-Save thy Country!"
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In Will, in Deed, Impulse of All to All! Whether thy love with unrefracted ray Beam on the Prophet's purged eye, or if Diseasing realms the enthusiast, wild of thought, Scatter new frenzies on the infected throng, Thou both inspiring and predooming both, Fit instruments and best, of perfect end: Glory to Thee, Father of Earth and Heaven!" And first a landscape rose, yet thou dwellest with Liberty, stern Genius! Borne on thy More wild and waste and desolate than where dark pinions over the swelling of ocean, they return to their native country. There, by the side of Fountains beneath The white bear, drifting on a field of ice, Citron-groves, the lovers tell to their beloved what horrors, Howls to her sunder'd cubs with piteous rage being Men, they had endured from Men. And savage agony.
lacerations of cheeks, nor with funeral ululation-but with circling dances and the joy of songs. Thou art terrible indeed,
I POEMS OCCASIONED BY POLITICAL may appear to mortals. The second Strophe calls EVENTS OR FEELINGS CONNECTED on men to suspend their private joys and sorrows, WITH THEM.
When I have borne in memory what has tamed
Great nations, how ennobling thoughts depart
When men change swords for legers, and desert
The student's bower for gold, some fears unnamed
I had, my country! Am I to be blamed?
But, when I think of Thee, and what Thou art,
Verily, in the bottom of my heart,
Of those unfilial fears I am ashamed.
But dearly must we prize thee; we who find
In thee a bulwark of the cause of men;
And I by my affection was beguiled.
What wonder if a poet, now and then,
Among the many movements of his mind,
Felt for thee as a Lover or a Child.
and devote them for a while to the cause of human nature in general. The first Epode speaks of the Empress of Russia, who died of an apoplexy on the 17th of November, 1796; having just concluded a subsidiary treaty with the Kings combined against France. The first and second Antistrophe describe the Image of the Departing Year, etc. as in a vision. The second Epode prophesies, in anguish of spirit, the downfall of this country.
SPIRIT who sweepest the wild Harp of Time!
It is most hard, with an untroubled ear
Thy dark inwoven harmonies to hear!
Yet, mine eye fix'd on Heaven's unchanging clime,
Long when I listen'd, free from mortal fear,
With inward stillness, and submitted mind;
When lo! its folds far waving on the wind,
I saw the train of the DEPARTING YEAR!
Starting from my silent sadness,
Then with no unholy madness,
Ere yet the enter'd cloud foreclosed my sight,
I raised the impetuous song, and solemnized his
By Time's wild harp, and by the hand
Whose indefatigable sweep
Raises its fateful strings from sleep,
I bid you haste, a mix'd tumultuous band!
From every private bower,
And each domestic hearth,
Haste for one solemn hour;
And with a loud and yet a louder voice,
O'er Nature struggling in portentous birth
Weep and rejoice!
Still echoes the dread Name that o'er the earth
Let slip the storm, and woke the brood of Hell:
And now advance in saintly Jubilee
Justice and Truth! They too have heard thy spell,
They too obey thy name, Divinest Liberty!
I mark'd Ambition in his war-array!
I heard the mailed Monarch's troublous cry-
"Ah! wherefore does the Northern Conqueress stay!
Groans not her chariot on its onward way?"
Fly, mailed Monarch, fly!
Stunn'd by Death's twice mortal mace,
No more on Murder's lurid face
The insatiate hag shall gloat with drunken eye!
Manes of the unnumber'd slain!
Ye that gasp'd on Warsaw's plain!
Ye that erst at Ismail's tower,
When human ruin choked the streams,
Fell in conquest's glutted hour,
'Mid women's shrieks and infants' screams! Spirits of the uncoffin'd slain,
Sudden blasts of triumph swelling, Oft, at night, in misty train,
Rush around her narrow dwelling! The exterminating fiend is fled
(Foul her life, and dark her doom) Mighty armies of the dead
Dance like death-fires round her tomb!
Then with prophetic song relate,
Each some tyrant-murderer's fate!
Departing Year! 't was on no earthly shore
My soul beheld thy vision! Where alone,
Voiceless and stern, before the cloudy throne,
Aye Memory sits: thy robe inscribed with gore,
With many an unimaginable groan
Thou storied'st thy sad hours! Silence ensued, Deep silence o'er the ethereal multitude, Whose locks with wreaths, whose wreaths with glories shone.
Then, his eye wild ardors glancing,
From the choired Gods advancing,
The Spirit of the Earth made reverence meet,
And stood up, beautiful, before the cloudy seat.
Throughout the blissful throng,
Hush'd were harp and song:
Till wheeling round the throne the Lampads seven (The mystic Words of Heaven),
"Thou in stormy blackness throning
Love and uncreated Light,
By the Earth's unsolaced groaning,
Seize thy terrors, Arm of might!
By Peace with proffer'd insult sacred,
Masked Hate and envying Scorn!
By Years of Havoc yet unborn!
And Hunger's bosom to the frost-winds bare.!!
But chief by Afric's wrongs,
Strange, horrible, and foul!
By what deep guilt belongs
To the deaf Synod, full of gifts and lies" By Wealth's insensate laugh! by Torture's howl! Avenger, rise!
For ever shall the thankless Island scowl,
Her quiver full, and with unbroken bow?
Speak! from thy storm-black Heaven, O speak aloud
And on the darkling foe
Open thine eye of fire from some uncertain cloud!
O dart the flash! O rise and deal the blow!
The past to thee, to thee the future cries!
Hark! how wide Nature joins her groans how!
Rise, God of Nature! rise."
The voice had ceased, the vision fled;
Yet still I gasp'd and reel'd with dread.
And ever, when the dream of night
Renews the phantom to my sight,
Cold sweat-drops gather on my limbs ;
My ears throb hot; my eye-balls start;
My brain with horrid tumult swims;
Wild is the tempest of my heart;
And
my thick and struggling breath Imitates the toil of Death!
No stronger agony confounds
The Soldier on the war-field spread, When all foredone with toil and wounds, Death-like he dozes among heaps of dead (The strife is o'er, the day-light fled, And the night-wind clamors hoarse! See the starting wretch's head Lies pillow'd on a brother's corse!)
Not yet enslaved, not wholly vile,
O Albion! O my mother Isle !
Thy valleys, fair as Eden's bowers,
Glitter green with sunny showers;
Thy grassy uplands' gentle swells
Echo to the bleat of flocks
(Those grassy hills, those glittering dells
Proudly ramparted with rocks);
And Ocean, 'mid his uproar wild
Speaks safety to his ISLAND-CHILD!
Hence, for many a fearless age
Has social Quiet loved thy shore!
Nor ever proud Invader's rage
Or sack'd thy towers, or stain'd thy fields with gore
The fervent Spirit bow'd, then spread his wings and Abandon'd of Heaven' mad Avarice thy guide, At cowardly distance yet kindling with pride
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