My spirit moved upon the sea like wind

Which round some thymy cape will lag and hover,
Though it can wake the still cloud, and unbind
The strength of tempest: day was almost over,
When through the fading light I could discover
A ship approaching-its white sails were fed
With the north wind-its moving shade did cover
The twilight deep; -the mariners in dread

<< What dream ye? Your own hands have built a home,
Even for yourselves on a beloved shore:
For some, fond eyes are pining till they come,
How they will greet him when his toils are o'er,
And laughing babes rush from the well-known door!
Is this your care? ye toil for your own good-
Ye feel and think-has some immortal power
Such purposes? or in a human mood,

XII.

«To feel the peace of self-contentment's lot, To own all sympathies, and outrage none, And in the inmost bowers of sense and thought, Until life's sunny day is quite gone down, To sit and smile with Joy, or, not alone, To kiss salt tears from the worn cheek of Woe; To live, as if to love and live were one,This is not faith or law, nor those who bow. To thrones on Heaven or Earth, such destiny may know. XIII.

But children near their parents tremble now, Because they must obey-one rules another, And as one Power rules both high and low, So man is made the captive of his brother, And Hate is throned on high with Fear her mother, Above the Highest-and those fountain-cells, Whence love yet flow'd when faith had choked all other,

Are darkened-Woman, as the bond-slave, dwells Of man, a slave; and life is poisoned in its wells.

XIV.

« Man seeks for gold in mines, that he may weave
A lasting chain for his own slavery;-
In fear and restless care that he may live
He toils for others, who must ever be
The joyless thralls of like captivity;

He murders, for his chiefs delight in ruin;
He builds the altar, that its idol's fee

May be his very blood; he is pursuing

O, blind and willing wretch! his own obscure undoing.

XV.

Woman!-she is his slave, she has become

A thing I weep to speak-the child of scorn,
The outcast of a desolated home,

Falsehood, and fear, and toil, like waves have worn
Channels upon her cheek, which smiles adorn,
As calm decks the false Ocean:-well ye know
What Woman is, for none of Woman born
Can chuse but drain the bitter dregs of woe,
Which ever from the oppress'd to the oppressors flow.

XVI.

This need not be; ye might arise, and will That gold should lose its power, and thrones their glory; That love, which none may bind, be free to fill The world, like light; and evil faith, grown hoary With crime, be quench'd and die.--Yon promontory Even now eclipses the descending moon!Dungeons and palaces are transitoryHigh temples fade like vapour-Man alone Remains, whose will has power when all beside is gone.

XVII.

«Let all be free and equal!-from your hearts
I feel an echo; through my inmost frame
Like sweetest sound, secking its mate, it darts-
Whence come ye, friends? alas, I cannot name
All that I read of sorrow, toil, and shame,
On your worn faces; as in legends old

Which make immortal the disastrous fame
Of conquerors and impostors false and bold,
The discord of your hearts, I in your looks behold.

"For she must perish in the tyrant's hallAlas, alas!'-He ceased, and by the sail

Sate cowering-but his sobs were heard by all,
And still before the ocean and the gale

The ship fled fast till the stars 'gan to fail,

And round me gathered with mute countenance,
The Seamen gazed, the Pilot, worn and pale

With toil, the Captain with grey locks, whose glance

XXI.

<«< Yes, it is Hate, that shapeless fiendly thing Of many names, all evil, some divine, Whom self-contempt arms with a mortal sting; Which, when the heart its snaky folds entwine Is wasted quite, and when it doth repine To gorge such bitter prey, on all beside It turns with ninefold rage, as with its twine When Amphisbæna some fair bird has tied, Soon o'er the putrid mass he threats on every side.

XXII.

Reproach not thine own soul, but know thyself, Nor hate another's crime, nor loathe thine own. It is the dark idolatry of self,

Which, when our thoughts and actions once are gone, Demands that man should weep, and bleed, and groan; O vacant expiation! be at rest.—

The past is Death's, the future is thine own;

And love and joy can make the foulest breast

XXVII.

« Recede not! pause not now! thou art grown old,
But Hope will make thee young, for Hope and Youth
Are children of one mother, even Love-behold!
The eternal stars gaze on us!-is the truth
Within your soul? care for your own, or ruth
For other's sufferings? do ye thirst to bear
A heart which not the serpent custom's tooth
May violate?-be free! and even here,

Swear to be firm till death! they cried, 'We swear! we

swear!"

XXVIII.

<< The very darkness shook, as with a blast
Of subterranean thunder at the cry;
The hollow shore its thousand echoes cast
Into the night, as if the sea, and sky,
And earth, rejoiced with new-born liberty,
For in that name they swore! Bolts were undrawn,
And on the deck, with unaccustom'd eye
The captives gazing stood, and every one

ΧΧΧ.

<< But one was mute, her cheeks and lips most fair, Changing their hue like lilies newly blown, Beneath a bright acacia's shadowy hair, Waved by the wind amid the sunny noon, Show'd that her soul was quivering; and full soon That Youth arose, and breathlessly did look On her and me, as for some speechless boon: I smiled, and both their hands in mine I took, And felt a soft delight from what their spirits shook.

CANTO IX.

I.

«THAT night we anchor'd in a woody bay,
And sleep no more around us dared to hover
Than, when all doubt and fear has past away,
It shades the couch of some unresting lover,
Whose heart is now at rest: thus night past over
In mutual joy:-around, a forest grew

Of poplars and dark oaks, whose shade did cover
The waning stars prankt in the waters blue,

V.

<<We reach'd the port-alas! from many spirits The wisdom which had waked that cry, was fled, Like the brief glory which dark Heaven inherits From the false dawn, which fades ere it is spread, Upon the night's devouring darkness shed: Yet soon bright day will burst-even like a chasm Of fire, to burn the shrouds outworn and dead, Which wrap the world; a wide enthusiasm, To cleanse the fever'd world as with an earthquake's spasm!

VI.

« I walked through the great City then, but free From shame or fear; those toil-worn Mariners And happy Maidens did encompass me; And like a subterranean wind that stirs Some forest among caves, the hopes and fears From every human soul, a murmur strange Made as I past; and many wept, with tears Of joy and awe, and winged thoughts did range, And half-extinguish'd words, which prophesied of change.

VII.

« For, with strong speech I tore the veil that hid
Nature, and Truth, and Liberty, and Love,—
As one who from some mountain's pyramid,
Points to the unrisen sun!-the shades approve
His truth, and flee from every stream and grove.
Thus, gentle thoughts did many a bosom fill,-
Wisdom, the mail of tried affections wove
For many a heart, and tameless scorn of ill,

II.

«The joyous mariners, and each free maiden,
Now brought from the deep forest many a bough,
With woodland spoil most innocently laden;
Soon wreaths of budding foliage seemed to flow
Over the mast and sails, the stern and prow
Were canopied with blooming boughs,-the while
On the slant sun's path o'er the waves we go
Rejoicing, like the dwellers of an isle

Doom'd to pursue those waves that cannot cease to smile.

III.

«The many ships spotting the dark blue deep With snowy sails, fled fast as ours came nigh, In fear and wonder; and on every steep Thousands did gaze, they heard the startling cry, Like earth's own voice lifted unconquerably To all her children, the unbounded mirth, The glorious joy of thy name-Liberty! They heard!-As o'er the mountains of the earth From peak to peak leap on the beams of morning's birth:

IV.

So from that cry over the boundless hills,
Sudden was caught one universal sound,
Like a volcano's voice, whose thunder fills
Remotest skies,—such glorious madness found

A path through human hearts with stream which drown'd

Its struggling fears and cares, dark custom's brood, They knew not whence it came, but felt around A wide contagion pour'd-they call'd aloud On Liberty-that name lived on the sunny flood.

VIII.

« Some said I was a maniac wild and lost; Some, that I scarce had risen from the grave The Prophet's virgin bride, a heavenly ghost :Some said, I was a fiend from my weird cave, Who had stolen human shape, and o'er the wave, The forest, and the mountain came;--some said I was the child of God, sent down to save Women from bonds and death, and on my head The burthen of their sins would frightfully be laid. IX.

« But soon my human words found sympathy In human hearts: the purest and the best, As friend with friend made common cause with me, And they were few, but resolute;—the rest, Ere yet success the enterprise had blest, Leagued with me in their hearts;-their meals, their slumber,

Their hourly occupations were possest

By hopes which I had arm'd to overnumber, Those hosts of meaner cares, which life's strong wings

encumber.

X.

But chiefly women, whom my voice did waken From their cold, careless, willing slavery, Sought me : one truth their dreary prison has shaken,They look'd around, and lo! they became free! Their many tyrants sitting desolately

In slave-deserted halls, could none restrain; For wrath's red fire had wither'd in the eye, Whose lightning once was death,-nor fear, nor gain Could tempt one captive now to lock another's chain.