Εικόνες σελίδας
PDF
Ηλεκτρ. έκδοση

Of endless glory and perennial bays.
He idly reasons of eternity,

As of the train of ages-when, alas!
Ten thousand thousand of his centuries
Are, in comparison, a little point

Too trivial for account. O, it is strange,
'Tis passing strange, to mark his fallacies;
Behold him proudly view some pompous pile,
Whose high dome swells to emulate the skies,
And smile, and say, my name shall live with this
Till time shall be no more; while at his feet,
Yea, at his very feet, the crumbling dust
Of the fallen fabric of the other day

Preaches the solemn lesson. He should know
That Time must conquer; that the loudest blast
That ever filled Renown's obstreperous trump
Fades in the lapse of ages, and expires.
Who lies inhumed in the terrific gloom

Of the gigantic pyramid? or who

Reared its huge walls? Oblivion laughs and says The prey is mine. They sleep, and never more Their names shall strike upon the ear of man, Their memory burst its fetters.

KIRKE WHITE.

THE STORMY PETREL.

A THOUSAND miles from land are we,
Tossing about on the roaring sea;
From billow to bounding billow cast,
Like fleecy snow on the stormy blast:
The sails are scattered about like weeds,
The strong masts shake like quivering reeds;

H

The mighty cables and iron chains,

The hull which all earthly strength disdains,

They strain and they crack; and hearts of stone,
Their natural hard proud strength disown.

Up and down! up and down!

From the base of the wave to the billows crown,

Amidst the flashing and feathery foam,
The stormy petrel finds a home;

A home-if such a place can be

For her who lives on the wide wide sea,
On the craggy ice, in the frozen air,

And only seeking her rocky lair

To warn her young, and teach them to spring,

At once o'er the waves on their stormy wing!

O'er the deep! o'er the deep!

Where the whale, and the shark, and the swordfish sleep! Outflying the blast, and the driving rain,

The petrel telleth her tale in vain :

For the mariner curseth the warning bird,
Who bringeth him news of the storm unheard:

Ah! thus does the prophet of good or ill
Meet hate from the creatures he serveth still;
Yet, he never falters;-so, petrel! spring

Once more o'er the waves on thy stormy wing.

BARRY CORNWALL.

THE LINDEN TREE.

HERE'S a song for thee-of the linden tree!

A song of the silken lime!

There is no other tree so pleaseth me,

No other so fit for rhyme.

When I was a boy, it was all my joy

To rest in its scented shade,

When the sun was high, and the river nigh
A musical murmur made:

When, floating along, like a winged song,
The traveller-bee would stop,

And choose for his bower the lime-tree flower,
And drink-to the last sweet drop.

When the evening star stole forth, afar,
And the gnats flew round and round,
I sought for a rhyme, beneath the lime,
Or dreamed on the grassy ground.

Ah! years have fled; and the linden, dead,
Is a brand on the cottier's floor;

And the river creeps through its slimy deeps,
And youth-is a thought of yore!

Yet they live again, in the dreamer's brain:
As deeds of love and wrong,

Which pass with a sigh, and seem to die,

Survive in the poet's song.

BARRY CORNWALL.

ADDRESS TO THE OCEAN.

O THOU vast ocean! ever-sounding sea!
Thou symbol of a drear immensity!

Thou thing that windest round the solid world

Like a huge animal, which, downward hurled

From the black clouds, lies weltering and alone,
Lashing and writhing till its strength be gone.
Thy voice is like the thunder, and thy sleep
Is like a giant's slumber, loud and deep.
Thou speakest in the east and in the west
At once, and on thy heavily-laden breast

Fleets come and go, and shapes that have no life
Or motion, yet are moved and meet in strife.

The earth hath nought of this; nor chance nor change
Ruffles its surface, and no spirits dare

Give answer to the tempest-waken air;

But o'er its wastes the weakly tenants range
At will, and wound his bosom as they go.
Ever the same, it hath no ebb, no flow;
But in their stated round the seasons come,
And pass like visions to their viewless home,
And come again and vanish: the young spring
Looks ever bright with leaves and blossoming,
And winter always winds his sullen horn,
And the wild autumn with a look forlorn

Dies in his stormy manhood; and the skies

Ween, and flowers sicken when the summer flies.
Oh! wonderful thou art, great element;

And fearful in thy spleeny humours bent,

And lovely in repose: thy summer form

Is beautiful, and when thy silver waves
Make music in earth's dark and winding caves,
I love to wander on thy pebbled beach,

Marking the sunlight at the evening hour,

And hearken to the thoughts thy waters teach"Eternity, eternity, and power."

BARRY CORNWALL.

THE LAKE OF GENEVA.

CLEAR, placid Leman! thy contrasted lake,
With the wide world I dwelt in, is a thing
Which warns me, with its stillness, to forsake
Earth's troubled waters for a purer spring.
This quiet sail is as a noiseless wing

To waft me from distraction; once I loved
Torn ocean's roar, but thy soft murmuring
Sounds sweet as if a sister's voice reproved,

That I with stern delights should e'er have been so moved.

It is the hush of night, and all between

Thy margin and the mountains, dusk, yet clear,
Mellowed and mingling, yet distinctly seen,
Save darkened Jura, whose capt heights appear
Precipitously steep; and drawing near,

There breathes a living fragrance from the shore,
Of flowers yet fresh with childhood; on the ear
Drops the light drip of the suspended oar,
Or chirps the grasshopper one good-night carol more;

He is an evening reveller, who makes
His life an infancy, and sings his fill:
At intervals, some bird from out the brakes
Starts into voice a moment, then is still.
There seems a floating whisper on the hill,
But that is fancy-for the starlight dews
All silently their tears of love instil,
Weeping themselves away, till they infuse
Deep into nature's breast the spirit of her hues.

« ΠροηγούμενηΣυνέχεια »