Again and yet again; until the Deep
Recalls his brood of waves;

And, with a sullen moan, abashed, they creep
Back to his inner caves.

Brief respite! they shall rush from that recess
With noise and tumult soon,

And fling themselves, with unavailing stress,
Up toward the placid moon.

O restless Sea, that, in thy prison here,
Dost struggle and complain;

Through the slow centuries yearning to be near
To that fair orb in vain;

The glorious source of light and heat must warm Thy billows from on high,

And change them to the cloudy trains that form The curtains of the sky.

Then only may they leave the waste of brine
In which they welter here,

And rise above the hills of earth, and shine
In a serener sphere.

ITALY.

VOICES from the mountains speak,

Apennines to Alps reply;

Vale to vale and peak to peak

Toss an old-remembered cry:

"Italy

Shall be free!"

Such the mighty shout that fills
All the passes of her hills.

All the old Italian lakes

Quiver at that quickening word;
Como with a thrill awakes;

Garda to her depths is stirred;
Mid the steeps

Where he sleeps,

Dreaming of the elder years,

Startled Thrasymenus hears.

Sweeping Arno, swelling Po,

Murmur freedom to their meads.

Tiber swift and Liris slow

Send strange whispers from their reeds. "Italy

Shall be free!"

Sing the glittering brooks that slide,
Toward the sea, from Etna's side.

Long ago was Gracchus slain;

Brutus perished long ago;

Yet the living roots remain

Whence the shoots of greatness grow,

Yet again,

Godlike men,

Sprung from that heroic stem,

Call the land to rise with them.

They who haunt the swarming street,

They who chase the mountain-boar,

Or, where cliff and billow meet,
Prune the vine or pull the oar,
With a stroke

Break their yoke;

Slaves but yestereve were they-
Freemen with the dawning day.

Looking in his children's eyes,

While his own with gladness flash, "These," the Umbrian father cries, "Ne'er shall crouch beneath the lash! These shall ne'er

Brook to wear

Chains whose cruel links are twined

Round the crushed and withering mind."

Monarchs! ye whose armies stand

Harnessed for the battle-field!

Pause, and from the lifted hand

Drop the bolts of war ye wield.
Stand aloof

While the proof

Of the people's might is given;

Leave their kings to them and Heaven!

Stand aloof, and see the oppressed

Chase the oppressor, pale with fear,

As the fresh winds of the west
Blow the misty valleys clear.
Stand and see

Italy

Cast the gyves she wears no more

To the gulfs that steep her shore.

A DAY-DREAM.

A DAY-DREAM by the dark-blue deep;
Was it a dream, or something more?
I sat where Posilippo's steep,

With its gray shelves, o'erhung the shore.

On ruined Roman walls around

The poppy flaunted, for 'twas May; And at my feet, with gentle sound, Broke the light billows of the bay.

I sat and watched the eternal flow

Of those smooth billows toward the shore,
While quivering lines of light below
Ran with them on the ocean-floor.

Till, from the deep, there seemed to rise

White arms upon the waves outspread,

Young faces, lit with soft blue eyes,

And smooth, round cheeks, just touched with red.

Their long, fair tresses, tinged with gold,

Lay floating on the ocean-streams,
And such their brows as bards behold-
Love-stricken bards-in morning dreams.

Then moved their coral lips; a strain
Low, sweet, and sorrowful, I heard,

As if the murmurs of the main

Were shaped to syllable and word.

"The sight thou dimly dost behold, Oh, stranger from a distant sky! Was often, in the days of old,

Seen by the clear, believing eye.

"Then danced we on the wrinkled sand,
Sat in cool caverns by the sea,
Or wandered up the bloomy land,
To talk with shepherds on the lea.

"To us, in storms, the seaman prayed, And where our rustic altars stood,

His little children came and laid

The fairest flowers of field and wood.

"Oh woe, a long, unending woe!
For who shall knit the ties again
That linked the sea-nymphs, long ago,
In kindly fellowship with men ?

"Earth rears her flowers for us no more; A half-remembered dream are we;

Unseen we haunt the sunny shore,
And swim, unmarked, the glassy sea.

"And we have none to love or aid,
But wander, heedless of mankind,
With shadows by the cloud-rack made,
With moaning wave and sighing wind.

"Yet sometimes, as in elder days,
We come before the painter's eye,
Or fix the sculptor's eager gaze,
With no profaner witness nigh.