Plashes the rain in heavy gouts,
The crinkled lightning
Seems ever brightening,
And loud and long
Again the thunder shouts
His battle song,
One quivering flash,
One wildering crash,
Follow'd by silence dead and dull,
As if the cloud, let go,
Leapt bodily below
To whelm the earth in one mad overthrow,
And then a total lull.
No more my half-crazed fancy there
Can shape a giant in the air,
No more I see his streaming hair,
The writhing portent of his form :-
The pale and quiet moon
Makes her calm forehead bare,
And the last fragments of the storm,
Like shatter'd rigging from a fight at sea,
Silent and few, are drifting over me.
Another beautiful passage from BYRON.
An infant when it gazes on a light,
A child the moment when it drains the breast,
A devotee when soars the host in sight,
An Arab with a stranger for a guest,
A sailor when the prize has struck in fight,
A miser filling his most hoarded chest,
Feel rapture; but not such true joy are reaping
As they who watch o'er what they love while sleeping.
For there it lies so tranquil, so beloved,
All that it hath of life with us is living;
So gentle, stirless, helpless, and unmoved,
And all unconscious of the joy 'tis giving;
All it hath felt, inflicted, pass'd, and proved,
Hush'd into depths beyond the watcher's diving ;
There lies the thing we love with all its errors
And all its charms, like death without its terrors.
The lady watch'd her lover-and that hour
Of love's, and night's, and ocean's solitude, O'erflow'd her soul with their united power;
Amidst the barren sand and rocks so rude
She and her wave-worn love had made their bower,
Where nought upon their passion could intrude,
And all the stars that crowded the blue space
Saw nothing happier than her glowing face.
Alas! the love of women! it is known
To be a lovely and a fearful thing;
For all of theirs upon that die is thrown,
And if 'tis lost, life hath no more to bring
To them but mockeries of the past alone,
And their revenge is as the tiger's spring,
Deadly, and quick, and crushing; yet as real
Torture is theirs—what they inflict they feel.
Translated from HEINRICH HEINE.
CALM is the night, and the city is sleeping,-
Once in this house dwelt a lady fair;
Long, long, ago, she left it, weeping;
But still the old house is standing there.
Yonder a man at the heavens is staring,
Wringing his hands as in sorrowful case:
He turns to the moonlight, his countenance baring-
Oh, heaven! he shows me my own sad face!
Shadowy form, with my own agreeing,
Why mockest thou thus, in the moonlight cold,
The sorrows which here once vex'd my being,
Many a night in the days of old ?
By Miss E. L. MONTAGUE, now Mrs. T. K. HERVEY.
THERE is a land of glory and of song,
Whereon the Sun-god sheddeth gorgeous light;
Therein all radiant forms-a wondrous throng—
Together walk in beauty and in might,
There wind afar sweet valleys of delight,
And in mid-heaven the waneless moon doth glow
Mid starry beams that beautify the night;
And plumy boughs wave ever too and fro,
And waves o'er pearly sands make music as they flow.
All lovely plants of joyless bloom are there,
And some dew-fill'd, that droop the weary head
In listless sorrow, desolately fair;
On every gale the rose-leaf, blushing red,
Sighs to the morn; and pale-brow'd lilies shed
Their faint, sweet breath through all the inspired night; And ever-blooming amaranth doth o'erspread
Fair bowers whose bosoms know no cankering blight, And heath-flowers, clustering wild, glow with empurpled light.
Each glorious day the crimson sun doth set
Along the azure decks in power and pride;
As with a glance, half joy and half regret,
He sinks behind some fine wood's sombre side,
And through the dark leaves pours the blushing tide,
Rich, eloquent, and warm,-like that which glows
Through the dark cheek of an Egyptian bride;
Then o'er some clime less fair his radiance throws,
Or lights some far-off land of mountains and of snows.
In every hall high harps stand ever strung-
Strung to rich music, and with golden strings-
And silver lutes on storied walls are hung,
All changeful hours the tuneful time-bell rings:
From tower, to distant tower, wild murmuring clings
Each varied chord of soft Æolian lyre,
O'er which the south waves oft his dusky wings,
And high immortal hands that never tire,
With light awakening touch, o'ers weep the sounding wire.
No mortal ever from that bourne departs,
Yet many oft unto that land repair;
Some with crush'd hopes, and some with riven hearts,
And most in anguish deep and fill'd with care;
And some who on their lofty brows do bear
Great scorn of that false world they did forsake,―
Who hither come to battle with despair,
And with the gods their nectareous draughts partake,
And breathe the breath of fame, and die for glory's sake.
There came a sweet-voiced exile to that shore,
With whom the world did wage ungentle war;
Yet in whose eye all forms a beauty wore,
Which suffering, falsehood, time, nor death could 'mar.
His shrinking soul was like an unknown star,
That, growing dim before some fiercer light,
With fitful ray shines beautiful and far,
And mid the fix'd planets, scarce less bright,
High in its heavenly sphere, trembles the live-long night.
And night was round him; yet there came a dawn,
Before whose light the stars of heaven grow pale,—
A light of promise;-night and gloom were gone,
And the broad sun its glory did unveil,
He felt his hope was great-his trust on high-
His love no longer weak, no longer frail,
And look'd on all things with a chasten'd eye,
And breathed his farewell words without a tear or sigh.
"Mourn not for me, dear friend, when I shall sleep-
My heart no more to earthly hope is clinging;
Even now I feel soft dews my slumber steep,
And meadow flowers above my grave are springing.
I hear the sound of angel voices singing,
In a far land where grief hath never trod;
And other hands than mine wild harps are ringing.
'Tis but this clay which moulders 'neath the sod,
My memory rests with thee-my spirit with my God!"
It died away-the music and the voice,
(For in that clime each voice was music's flow,)
And through the land his brethren did rejoice
O'er one who now could feel nor joy nor woe,
Nor hear their sighs, nor mark their tears o'erflow,
And only long'd like him to sleep-to die,
And over-head to feel the grave-flowers grow;
Like him, beneath the earthy sod to lie,
With a death-tranquil brow, and spirit-closed eye.
Such are the hearts that fondly beat for ever,
With a true pulse, unheeded and unheard;
Such is the voice that fills wood, rock, and river,
With the meek anguish of its farewell word!
Oh! they are lonelier than the desert bird,
Though in a world of gorgeous beauty placed;
Ere yet joy's phantom stream their breath has stirr'd,
Time's drifting sands have fill'd the gulf, and chased
Afar the unreal wave they vainly long'd to taste!
My thoughts, and bid you look upon the night:
As water does a sponge, so the moonlight
Fills the void, hollow, universal air.
What see you?-Unpavilion'd heaven is fair,
Whether the moon, into her chamber gone,
Leaves midnight to the golden stars, or wan
Climbs with diminish'd beams the azure steep;
Or whether clouds sail o'er the inverse deep,
Piloted by the many-wandering blast,
And the rare stars rush through them, dim and fast.
All this is beautiful in every land.
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