Like leviathans afloat,
Lay their bulwarks on the brine;
While the sign of battle flew
On the lofty British line:
It was ten of April morn by the chime:
As they drifted on their path,
There was silence deep as death;
And the boldest-held his breath
For a time!
our captains cried, when each gun
From its adamantine lips
Spread a death-shade round the ships,
Like the hurricane eclipse
Again! again! again!
And the havoc did not slack,
Till a feeble cheer the Dane
To our cheering sent us back;
Their shots along the deep slowly boom;
Then ceased-and all is wail,
As they strike the shatter'd sail;
Or, in conflagration pale,
Light the gloom!
Out spoke the victor then,
As he hail'd them o'er the wave,
Ye are brothers! ye are men!
And we conquer but to save!—
So peace, instead of death, let us bring:
But yield, proud foe, thy fleet,
With the crews, at England's feet,
And make submission meet
Then Denmark bless'd our chief,
That he gave her wounds repose;
And the sounds of joy and grief
From her people wildly rose;
As Death withdrew his shades from the day;
While the sun look'd smiling-bright
O'er a wide and woful sight,
Where the fires of funeral light
Now joy, old England, raise
For the tidings of thy might,
By the festal cities' blaze,
While the wine-cup shines in light!-
And yet, amidst that joy and uproar,
Let us think of them that sleep,
Full many a fathom deep,
By thy wild and stormy steep,
Elsinore!
Brave hearts! to Britain's pride
Once so faithful and so true,
On the deck of fame that died,
With the gallant-good Riou!
Soft sigh the winds of heaven o'er their grave!
While the billow mournful rolls,
And the mermaid's song condoles,
Singing glory to the souls
Of the brave!
THERE is a pleasure in the pathless woods;
There is a rapture on the lonely shore;
There is society, when none intrudes,
By the deep Sea, and music in its roar:
I love not Man the less, but Nature more,
From these our interviews; in which I steal
From all I may be, or have been before,
To mingle with the Universe, and feel
What I can ne'er express, yet can not all conceal.
Roll on, thou deep and dark-blue ocean-roll!
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain;
Man marks the earth with ruin-his control
Stops with thy shore;-upon the watery plain.
The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain
A shadow of man's ravage, save his own;
When, for a moment, like a drop of rain,
He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan,
Without a grave, unknell'd, uncoffin'd, and unknown!
His steps are not upon thy paths-thy fields.
Are not a spoil for him,-thou dost arise,
And shake him from thee; the vile strength he wields For earth's destruction thou dost all despise, Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies, And send'st him, shivering in thy playful spray And howling, to his gods, where haply lies His petty hope in some near port or bay, And dashest him again to earth:-there let him lay. The armaments which thunderstrike the walls Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake, And monarchs tremble in their capitals— The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make Their clay creator the vain title take Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war
These are thy toys; and, as the snowy flake,
They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar
Alike the Armada's pride, or spoils of Trafalgar.
Thy shores are empires, changed in all save thee—
Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what are they?
Thy waters wasted them while they were free,
And many a tyrant since; their shores obey
The stranger, slave, or savage! their decay
Has dried up realms to deserts:-not so thou,
Unchangeable save to thy wild waves' play-
Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow-
Such as Creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now!
Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty's form
Glasses itself in tempests!-in all time—
Calm or convulsed, in breeze or gale or storm,
Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime
Dark-heaving-boundless, endless, and sublime!
The image of Eternity!-the throne
Of the invisible!-Even from out thy slime
The monsters of the deep are made! Each zone
Obeys thee! Thou goest forth, dread! fathomless! alone!"
The Present Aspect of Greece.
HE who hath bent him o'er the dead,
Ere the first day of death is fled—
The first dark day of nothingness,
The last of danger and distress-
Before Decay's effacing fingers
Have swept the lines where beauty lingers,
And mark'd the mild angelic air,
The rapture of repose that's there—
The fix'd, yet tender traits, that streak
The languor of the placid cheek—
And-but for that sad shrouded eye,
That fires not-wins not-weeps not-now-
And but for that chill changeless brow,
Whose touch thrills with mortality;
And curdles to the gazer's heart,
As if to him it could impart
The doom he dreads, yet dwells upon-
Yes-but for these-and these alone-
Some moments-ay-one treacherous hour,
He still might doubt the tyrant's power,
So fair-so calm-so softly seal'd
The first-last look-by death reveal'd!
Such is the aspect of this shore.
'Tis Greece-but living Greece no more!
So coldly sweet, so deadly fair,
We start-for soul is wanting there.
Hers is the loveliness in death,
That parts not quite with parting breath:
But beauty with that fearful bloom,
That hue which haunts it to the tomb-
Expression's last receding ray,
A gilded halo hovering round decay,
The farewell beam of Feeling past away!
Spark of that flame-perchance of heavenly birth
Which gleams-but warms no more its cherish'd earth!
THE Curfew tolls-the knell of parting day!
The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea;
The ploughman homeward plods his weary way;
And leaves the world to darkness, and to me.-
Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight,
And all the air a solemn stillness holds;
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds:
Save that, from yonder ivy-mantled tower,
The moping owl does to the moon complain
Of such as, wandering near her secret bower,
Molest her ancient solitary reign.
Beneath these rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap,
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.—
The breezy call of incense-breathing morn,
The swallow twittering from the straw-built shed, The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed! For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,` Or busy housewife ply her evening care;
No children run to lisp their sire's return,
Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share!
Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield;
Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke: How jocund did they drive their team a-field!
How bow'd the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!
Let not ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor grandeur hear, with a disdainful smile,
The short and simple annals of the poor.-
The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,
Await, alike, the inevitable hour-
The paths of glory lead-but to the grave!
Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault,
If memory o'er their tombs no trophies raise, Where, through the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault, The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.
Can storied urn, or animated bust,
Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?
Can honour's voice provoke the silent dust?
Or flattery soothe the dull cold ear of death?
|