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The good and evil thing, in human lore Undisciplin'd. For lowly was her birth, And Heaven had doom'd her early years to toil

She climbs of that steep upland, on whose top The pilgrim-man, who long since eve had watch'd The alien shine of unconcerning stars, Shouts to himself, there first the Abbeylights

That pure from tyranny's least deed, herself
Unfear'd by fellow-natures, she might wait
On the poor lab'ring man with kindly looks, | Seen in Neufchatel's vale; now slopes adown
And minister refreshment to the tir'd
The winding sheep-track valeward: when,
Way-wanderer, when along the rough-hewn
behold

bench

The sweltry man had stretch'd him, and aloft Vacantly watch'd the rudely pictured board Which on the mulberry-bough with welcome

creek

Swung to the pleasant breeze. Here, too, the Maid

Learnt more than schools could teach: Man's shifting mind,

His vices and his sorrows! And full oft At tales of cruel wrong and strange distress Had wept and shiver'd. To the tottering Eld Still as a Daughter would she run: she plac'd

His cold limbs at the sunny door, and lov'd To hear him story, in his garrulous sort, Of his eventful years, all come and gone.

So twenty seasons past. The Virgin's Form,

Active and tall, nor Sloth nor Luxury Had shrunk or paled. Her front sublime and broad,

Her flexile eye-brows wildly hair'd and low, And her full eye, now bright, now unillum'd, Spake more than woman's thought: and all her face

Was moulded to such features, as declared,
That Pity there had oft and strongly work'd,
And sometimes Indignation. Bold her mien,
And like an haughty Huntress of the woods
She mov'd: yet sure she was a gentle maid!
And in each motion her most innocent soul
Beam'd forth so brightly, that who saw
would say,

Guilt was a thing impossible in her!
Nor idly would have said, for she had liv'd
In this bad world, as in a place of tombs,
And touch'd not the pollutions of the Dead.

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In the first entrance of the level road
An unattended team! The foremost horse
Lay with stretch'd limbs; the others, yet
alive

But stiff and cold, stood motionless, their

manes

Hoar with the frozen night-dews. Dismally The dark-red dawn now glimmer'd; but its gleams

Disclosed no face of man. The maiden paused, Then hail'd who might be near. No voice replied.

From the thwart wain at length there reach'd her ear

A sound so feeble that it almost seem'd
Distant-and feebly, with slow effort push'd,
A miserable man crept forth: his limbs
The silent frost had eat, scathing like fire.
Faint on the shafts he rested. She, mean
time,

Saw crowded close beneath the coverture
A mother and her children-lifeless all,
Yet lovely! not a lineament was marr'd—
Death had put on so slumber-like a form!
It was a piteous sight; and one, a babe,
The crisp milk frozen on its innocent lips,
Lay on the woman's arm, its little hand
Stretch'd on her bosom. Mutely questioning,
The Maid gazed wildly at the living wretch.
He, his head feebly turning, on the group
Look'd with a vacant stare, and his eye spoke
The drowsy calm that steals on worn-out
anguish.

She shudder'd: but, each vainer pang subdued,

Quick disentangling from the foremost horse The rustic bands, with difficulty and toil The stiff, crampt team forced homeward. There arrived

Anxiously tends him she with healing herbs, And weeps and prays-but the numb power of Death Spreads o'er his limbs; and ere the noontide-hour

The hov'ring spirits of his wife and babes Hail him immortal! Yet amid his pangs, With interruptions long from ghastly throes, His voice had falter'd out this simple tale.

The Village, where he dwelt an Husband

man,

By sudden inroad had been seiz'd and fired
Late on the yester-evening. With his wife
And little ones he hurried his escape.
They saw the neighbouring hamlets flame.
they heard

Uproar and shrieks! and terror-struck drove | Of CHAOS the adventurous progeny

on

Through unfrequented roads, a weary way! But saw nor house nor cottage. All had quench'd

Their evening-hearth-fire: for the alarm had spread.

The air clipt keen, the night was fang'd with frost,

And they provisionless! The weeping wife Ill-hush'd her children's moans; and still they moan'd,

Till Fright and Cold and Hunger drank their life.

They closed their eyes in sleep, nor knew 'twas Death.

He only, lashing his o'er-wearied team,
Gained a sad respite, till beside the base
Of the high hill his foremost horse dropt
dead.

Then hopeless, strengthless, sick for lack of food,

He crept beneath the coverture, entranced, Till waken'd by the maiden.-Such his tale.

Ah! suffering to the height of what was suffered,

Stung with too keen a sympathy, the Maid Brooded with moving lips, mute, startful,

dark!

And now her flush'd tumultuous features shot

Such strange vivacity, as fires the eye
Of misery fancy-craz'd! and now once more
Naked, and void, and fix'd, and all, within,
The unquiet silence of confused thought
And shapeless feelings. For a mighty hand
Was strong upon her, till in the heat of soul
To the high hill-top tracing back her steps,
Aside the beacon, up whose smoulder'd stones
The tender ivy-trails crept thinly, there,
Unconscious of the driving element,
Yea, swallow'd up in the ominous dream,

she sate,

Ghastly as broad-eyed Slumber! a dim anguish Breath'd from her look! and still with pant

and sob

Inly she toil'd to flee, and still subdued Felt an inevitable Presence near.

Thus as she toil'd in troublous extacy, An horror of great darkness wrapt her round, And a voice uttered forth unearthly tones, Calming her soul:--Oh Thou of the Most High

Chosen, whom all the perfected in Heaven Behold expectant

(The following fragments were intended to form part of the Poem when finished.]

Maid belov'd of Heaven! (To her the tutelary Power exclaimed)

Thou seest; foul missionaries of foul sire,
Fierce to regain the losses of that hour
When LOVE rose glittering, and his gor-
geous wings

Over the abyss flutter'd with such glad noise,
As what time after long and pestful calms,
With slimy shapes and miscreated life
Poisoning the vast Pacific, the fresh breeze
Wakens the merchant-sail uprising. Night
An'heavy unimaginable moan
Sent forth, when she the PROTOPLAST beheld
Stand beauteous on Confusion's charmed

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And thus they witness'd God! But now the | Nor did not the large blood-drops fall from Heaven

clouds

they soar

Treading, and storms beneath their feet, Portentous! while aloft were seen to float, Like hideous features looming on the mist, Wan stains of ominous light! Resign'd, yet sad, The fair Form bow'd her olive-crowned brow: Then o'er the Plain with oft reverted eye Fled till a place of tombs she reach'd, and there Within a ruin'd sepulchre obscure Found hiding-place. The delegated Maid Gaz'd thro' her tears, then in sad tones exclaim'd:

Higher, and higher soar, and soaring sing
Loud songs of Triumph! O ye spirits of God,
Hover around my mortal agonies!-
She spake, and instantly faint melody
Melts on her ear, soothing and sad, and slow,
Such measures, as at calmest midnight heard
By aged Hermit in his holy dream,
Foretell and solace death; and now they rise
Louder, as when with harp and mingled
voice

The white-robed multitude of slaughter'd
saints

Thou mild-ey'd FORM! wherefore, ah! wherefore fled?

At Heaven's wide-open'd portals gratulant
Receive some martyr'd Patriot. The har-The power of JUSTICE, like a name all

mony

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Stept a fair form, repairing all she might,
Her temples olive-wreath'd; and where she
trod,

Fresh flowrets rose and many a foodful herb.
But wan her cheek, her footsteps insecure,
And anxious pleasure beam'd in her faint eye,
As she had newly left a couch of pain,
Pale Convalescent! (Yet some time to rule
With power exclusive o'er the willing world,
That blest prophetic mandate then fulfill'd,
PEACE be on Earth!) An happy while, but
brief,
She seem'd to wander with assiduous feet,
And heal'd the recent harm of chill and
blight,

And nurs'd each plant that fair and virtuous

grew.

But soon a deep precursive sound moan'd
hollow:

Black rose the clouds, and now (as in a
dream)/
Their reddening shapes, transform'd to War-
rior-hosts,
Cours'd o'er the Sky, and battled in mid-air.

Light,

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Then WAR and all its dread vicissitudes

Pleasingly agitate their stagnant hearts;
Its hopes, its fears, its victories, its defeats,
Insipid Royalty's keen condiment!
Therefore, uninjur'd and unprofited,
(Victims at once and Executioners)
The congregated husbandmen lay waste
The Vineyard and the Harvest. As along
The Bothnic coast, or southward of the Line,
Though hush'd the Winds and cloudless the
high Noon,

Yet if LEVIATHAN, weary of case,

In sports unwieldy toss his Island-bulk, Ocean behind him billows, and before A storm of waves breaks foamy on the strand. And hence, for times and seasons bloody and dark, Short Peace shall skin the wounds of causeless War,

And War, his strained sinews knit anew, Still violate th' unfinish'd works of Peace. But yonder look! for more demands thy view!

He said: and straightway from the opposite Isle

A Vapor sail'd, as when a cloud, exhaled From Egypt's fields that steam hot pestilence,

Travels the sky for many a trackless league, Till o'er some death-doom'd land, distant in vain,

It broods incumbent. Forthwith from the
Plain,

Facing the Isle, a brighter cloud arose,
And steer'd its course which way the Vapor

went.

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ALAS! they had been friends in youth;
But whispering tongues can poison truth;
And constancy lives in realms above;
And life is thorny; and youth is vain;
And to be wroth with one we love,
Doth work like madness in the brain.
And thus it chanc'd, as I divine,

With Roland and Sir Leoline.
Each spake words of high disdain
And insult to his heart's best brother:
They parted-ne'er to meet again!
But never either found another
To free the hollow heart from paining—
They stood aloof, the scars remaining,

Like cliffs which had been rent asunder;
A dreary sea now flows between,
But neither heat, nor frost, nor thunder,
Shall wholly do away, I ween,

The marks of that which once hath been.

BRACY'S DREAM.

THY words, thou sire of Christabel, Are sweeter than my harp can tell; Yet might I gain a boon of thee, This day my journey should not be; So strange a dream hath come to me, That I had vow'd with music loud To clear yon wood from thing unblest, Warn'd by a vision in my rest! For in my sleep I saw that dove, That gentle bird, whom thou dost love, And callst by thy own daughter's nameSir Leoline! I saw the same, Fluttering, and uttering fearful moan, Among the green herbs in the forest alone. Which when I saw and when I heard, I wonder❜d what might ail the bird:

For nothing near it could I see, Save the grass and green herbs underneath the old tree.

And in my dream, methought, I went To search out what might there be found; And what the sweet bird's trouble meant, That thus lay fluttering on the ground. I went and peer'd, and could descry No cause for her distressful cry; But yet for her dear lady's sake, I stoop'd, methought the dove to take, When lo! I saw a bright green snake Coil'd around its wings and neck. Green as the herbs on which it couch'd, Close by the dove's its head it crouch'd; And with the dove it heaves and stirs, Swelling its neck as she swell'd hers! I woke; it was the midnight-hour, The clock was echoing in the tower; But tho' my slumber was gone by, This dream it would not pass awayIt seems to live upon my eye! And thence I vow'd this self-same day, With music strong and saintly song To wander thro' the forest bare, Lest aught unholy loiter there.

NOTE S.

America to Great Britain.

[p. 305. This poem, written in the year 1810, by an American Gentleman, a valued and dear friend, I communicate to the reader for its moral, no less than its poetic spirit.

We are One.

[p. 306. This alludes merely to the moral union of the two Countries. The Author would not have it supposed that the tribute of respect, offered in these Stanzas to the Land of his Ancestors, would be paid by him, if at the expense of the independence of that which gave him birth.

Or Balda-Zhiok, or the mossy stone Of Solfar-Kapper, while the snowy blast Drifts arrowy by, or eddies round his sledge, Making the poor babe at its mother's back Scream in its scanty cradle. [p. 307. Balda-Zhiok: i. e. mons altitudinis, the highest mountain in Lapland. Solfar Kapper: capitium Solfar, hic locus omnium, quotquot veterum Lap ponum superstitio sacrificiis religiosoque cultui dedicavit, celebratissimus erat, in parte sinus australis situs, semimilliaris spatio a mari distans. Ipse locus, quem curiositatis gratia aliquando me invisisse memini, duabus præaltis lapidibus, sibi invicem oppositis, quorum alter musco circumdatus erat, constabat. LEEMIUs, de Lapponibus. The Lapland women carry their infants at their back in a piece of excavated wood, which serves them for a cradle Opposite to the infant's mouth there is a hole for it to breathe through.-Mirandum prorsus est et vix credibile nisi cui vidisse contigit. Lappones hyeme iter facientes per vastos montes, perque horrida et invia tesqua, eo presertim tempore quo omnia perpetuis nivibus obtecta sunt et nives ventis agitantur et in gyros aguntur, viam ad destinata loca absque errore in

a great

venire posse, lactantem autem infantem, si quem habeat, ipsa mater in dorso bajulat, in excavate ligno quod pro cunis utuntur in hoc infans pannis et pellibus convolutus colligatus jacet. LEEMIUS, Armed with Torngarsuck's power (p. 307 They call the Good Spirit, Torngarsuck. The other great but malignant spirit is a nameless Female; she dwells under the sea in house, where she can detain in captivity all the animals of the ocean by her magic power. When a dearth befalls the Greenlanders, an Angekok or magician must undertake a journey thither: he passes through the kingdom of souls, over an horrible abyss into the palace of this phantom, and by his enchantments causes the captive creatures to ascend directly to the surface of the ocean. Eboe, or Koromantyn's plain of Palms, What time departing from their native shores, The infuriate spirits of the Murdered make Fierce merriment, and vengeance ask of Hearen p.311.

The Slaves in the West-Indies consider death timent is thus expressed in the introduction to a as a passport to their native country. This senGreek Prize-Ode on the Slave-Trade:

LITERAL TRANSLATION.

Leaving the Gates of Darkness, oh Death! hasten thou to a Race yoked with Misery! Thon wilt not be received with lacerations of cheeks, nor with funereal ululation-but with eireling dances, and the joy of songs. Thou art terrible indred, yet thou dwelleth with LIBERTY, stern GENITs' Borne on thy dark pinions over the swelling of Ocean, they return to their native country. There, by the side of Fountains beneath Citron-groves, the lovers tell to their beloved what horrors, being Men, they had endured from Men.

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