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And rent the nets of passion from her path.

By that victorious hand despair was slain :
With love she vanquished hate, and overcame
Evil with good in her great Master's name.
5. Her glory is not of this shadowy state,

Glory that with the fleeting season dies;
But when she entered at the sapphire gate,
What joy was radiant in celestial eyes!

How heaven's bright depths with sounding welcomes rung,
And flowers of heaven by shining hands were flung!
And He who, long before,

Pain, scorn, and sorrow bōre,

The mighty Sufferer, with aspect sweet,

Smiled on the timid stranger from His seat

He who, returning glorious from the grave, Dragged death, disarmed, in chains, a crouching slave. 6. See, as I linger here, the sun grows low;

Cool airs are murmuring that the night is near.
O gentle sleeper, from thy grave I go

Consoled, though sad, in hope, and yet in fear.
Brief is the time, I know,

The warfare scarce begun;

Yet all may win the triumphs thou hast won;
Still flows the fount whose waters strengthened thee.
The victors' names are yet too few to fill
Heaven's mighty roll; the glorious armory
That ministered to thee is open still.

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT.

T

SECTION VII.

I.

36. DESTINY OF AMERICA.

HE Muse, disgusted at an age and clime
Barren of every glorious theme,

In distant lands now waits a better time

Producing subjects worthy fame :

2. In happy climes, where, from the genial sun
And virgin earth, such scenes ensue ;
The force of art by nature seems outdone,
And fancied beauties by the true :

3. In happy climes, the seat of innocence,
Where nature guides, and virtue rules;
Where men shall not impose for truth and sense
The pedantry of courts and schools :

4. There shall be sung another golden age,
The rise of empire and of arts;
The good and great inspiring epic rage,
The wisest heads and noblest hearts.

5. Not such as Europe breeds in her decay:
Such as she bred when fresh and

young,

When heavenly flame did animate her clay,
By future poets shall be sung.

6. Westward the course of empire takes its way:
The four first acts already past,

A fifth shall close the drama with the day

Time's noblest offspring is the last.

BERKELEY.

GEORGE BERKELEY, Bishop of Cloyne, was born at Thomastown, County of Kilkenny, Ireland, in 1684, and died at Oxford, England, in 1753. He was the author of several works, principally on metaphysical science. He visited America in 1728 for the purpose of founding a college for the conversion of the Indians; but failing to obtain the promised funds from the government, after remaining seven years in Rhode Island, he returned to Europe. While inspired with his transatlantic mission, he penned the above fine moral verses, so truly prophetic of the progress of the United States.

HR

II.

37. CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.

E was decidedly a visionary,' but a visionary of an uncommon and successful kind. The manner in which his ardènt imagination and mercurial nature were controlled by a powerful judgment, and directed by an acute sagacity, is the most extraordinary' feature' in his character. Thus governed,

1 Visionary, (viz' un a rf), one who is confident of success in a project which others perceive or think to be idle and fanciful; a dreamer.

' Extraordinary, (èks trár di narf), beyond or out of the common method or order; remarkable.

3

' Feature, (fèt yår).

`his imagination, instead of wasting itself in idle soarings, lent wings to his judgment, and bōre it away to conclusions at which common minds could never have arrived; nay, which they could not perceive when pointed out.

2. To his intellectual vision it was given to read, in the signs of the times and the reveries of past ages, the indications of an unknown world, as soothsayers were said to read predictions in the stars, and to foretell events from the visions of the night "His soul," observes a Spanish writer, " was superior to the age in which he lived. For him was reserved the great enterprise to plow the sea which had given rise to so many fables, and to decipher the mystery of his time.”

3. With all the visionary fervor of his imagination, its fondèst dreams fell short of the reality. He died in ignorance of the real grandeur of his discovery. Until his last breath, he entertained the idea that he had merely opened a new way to the old resorts of opulent commerce, and had discovered some of the wild regions of the East. He supposed Hispaniola to be the ancient Ophir which had been visited by the ships of Solomon, and that Cuba and Terra Firma were but remote parts of Asiä. 4. What visions of glory would have broke upon his mind, could he have known that he had indeed discovered a new continent, equal to the whole of the old world in magnitude, and separated, by two vast oceans, from all the earth hitherto known by civilized man! And how would his magnanimous spirit have been consoled, amid the chills of age and cares of penury, the neglect of a fickle public and the injustice of an ungrateful king, could he have anticipated the splendid empires which were to spread over the beautiful world he had discovered, and the nations and tongues and languages which were to fill its lands with his renown, and to revere and bless his name to the latest posterity! WASHINGTON IRVING

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III.

88. RETURN OF COLUMBUS.

N the spring of 1493, while the court was still at Barcelona, letters were received from Christopher Columbus, announcing his return to Spain, and the successful achievement of his great enterprise, by the discovery of land beyond the western

ocean. The delight and astonishment, raised by this intelligence, were proportioned to the skepticism with which his project had been originally viewed. The sovereigns (suv' er inz) were now filled with a natural impatience to ascertain the extent and other particulars of the important discovery: and they transmitted instant instructions to the admiral to repair to Barcelona, as soon as he should have made the preliminary arrangements for the further prosecution of his enterprise.

2. The great navigator had succeeded, as is well known, after a voyage, the natural difficulties of which had been much augmented by the distrust and mutinous spirit of his followers, in descrying land on Friday, the 12th of October, 1492. After some months spent in exploring the delightful regions, now for the first time thrown open to the eyes of a Europë'an, he embarked in the month of January, 1493, for Spain. One of his vessels had previously foundered, and another had deserted him, so that he was left alone to retrace his course across the Atlantic. 3. After a most tempestuous voyage, he was compelled to take shelter in the Tagus, sorely against his inclination. He experienced, however, the most honorable reception from the Portuguese monarch, John the Second, who did ample justice to the great qualities of Columbus, although he had failed to profit by them. After a brief delay, the admiral resumed his voyage, and crossing the bar of Saltes, entered the harbor of Palos about noon, on the 15th of March, 1493, being exactly seven months and eleven days since his departure from that port.

4. Great was the agitation in the little community at Pālos, as they beheld the well-known vessel of the admiral reëntering their harbor. Their desponding imaginations had long since consigned him to a watery grave; for, in addition to the preternatural horrors which hung over the voyage, they had experienced the most stormy and disastrous winter within the recollection of the oldest mariners. Most of them had relatives or friends on board. They thronged immediately to the shore, to assure themselves with their own eyes of the truth of their return.

5. When they beheld their faces once more, and saw them accompanied by the numerous evidences which they brought back of the success of the expedition, they burst forth in acclamations of joy and gratulation. They awaited the landing of Columbus, when the whole population of the place accompanied

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him and his crew to the principal church, where solemn thanksgivings were offered up for their return; while every bell in the village sent forth a joyous peal in honor of the glorious event.

6. The admiral was too desirous of presenting himself before the sovereigns, to protract his stay long at Palos. He took with him on his journey specimens of the multifarious products of the newly-discovered regions. He was accompanied by several of the native islanders, arrayed in their simple barbaric costume', and decorated, as he passed through the principal cities, with collars, bracelets, and other ornaments of gold, rudely fashioned : he exhibited, also, considerable quantities of the same metal in dust, or in crude masses, numerous vegetable exotics,' possessed of aromatic or medicinal virtue, and several kinds of quadrupeds unknown in Europe, and birds, whose varieties of gaudy plumage gave a brilliant effect to the pageant.

7. The admiral's progress through the country was everywhere impeded by the multitudes thronging forth to gaze at the extraordinary spectacle, and the more extraordinary man, who, in the emphatic language of that time, which has now lost its fōrce from its familiarity, first revealed the existence of a "New World." As he passed through the busy, populous city of Sěv'ille, every window, băl'cony, and housetop, which could afford a glimpse of him, is described to have been crowded with spectators.

8. It was the middle of April before Columbus reached Barcelona. The nobility and cavaliers in attendance on the court, together with the authorities of the city, came to the gates to receive him, and escorted him to the royal presence. Ferdinand and Isabella were seated, with their son, Prince John, under a superb canopy of state, awaiting his arrival. On his approach, they rose from their seats, and extending their hands to him to salute, caused him to be seated before them.

9. These were unprecedented marks of condescension to a person of Columbus's rank, in the haughty and ceremonious court of Castile (kas tēl'). It was, indeed, the proudèst moment in the life of Columbus. He had fully established the truth of his long-contested theory, in the face of argument, sophistry, sneer, skepticism, and contempt. He had achieved this, not by chance, but by calculation, supported through the most adverse circum

Exotic, (egzotik) a foreign plant or production.

"Ar`o mǎt' ic, spicy; fragrant; odoriferous; strong-scented.

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