rell-one day, when king Phœbus in the East | Am in the Doctors' language stupid yet,
d lifted his round head from off his pillow, d frighten'd from their slumbers man and beast,
d turn'd to clear quicksilver every billow, e Don Diego, from Love's toil released, th ducats prim'd and head ycrown'd with willow,
pp'd in his heavy coach with heavier sigh, I'd up the blinds and bade the drivers fly.
ey travell❜d (our sad hero and his mother)
om great Madrid, thro' old and new Castile,
pp'd at one town and rattled thro' another,
fish and fowl and flesh, (excepting veal:)
anwhile he took it in his head he'd smother
pid; he tried, and soon began to feel
at as the boy grew quiet, he grew merry.
e smother'd him with Port and sometimes
Sherry!)
And often blunder in my phraseology;
No matter, he was sick he did declare,
And wanted change of scene and country-air.
And then he rambled thro' his native land,
And by her rivers wide and silver rills
Running thro' cork and beechen forests, and
Breath'd the brave air of those immortal
hills,
Which like an altar or memorial stand
Of patriot spirits, whose achievement fills
Story and song: for, once, the Spanish name
Was noble and identified with fame.
Now-but I'm quite a shallow politician,
And we've enough of politics in prose,
And so to men of talent and condition
I leave the task to plead the Spanish woes;
What I should say would be mere repetition,
en 'round his mother he would twine his And bring the theme no nearer to its close,
at filial duty was a noble thing:
at he must live tho' 'gainst his inclination,
r tho' he once resolv'd, he said, to fling
mself into the sea as an oblation
· Cupid, yet, as love had lost its sting,
I'd take a dip merely for recreation:
d then he added he should go to Cadiz,
see the place, and how he lik'd the ladies.
e letter ended with-I quite forget
e actual words, but with some short
apology
out his lungs, he said he ow'd a debt
nature, and-pshaw! tho' I've been to
college I
So I'll e'en leave the wrongs of Spain to time;
Besides, the thing's too serious for this rhyme.
Diego pass'd Cordova, gay Sevilla,
|(Seville) and saw some mighty pleasant
sights,
Saw the Fandango and the Sequidilla
And new Bolero danc'd on summer-nights,
And got at last to Cadiz, which is still a
Right noble city, as Lord Byron writes.
N.B. The dances I have named are national,
And like all others tolerably irrational,
Yet, I remember some half pleasant days
When I did love a common country-dance,
Ere peace and fashion had conspir'd to raise
Quadrilles to note in England as in France:
I came in then for some small share of praise,
But now, I dread (I own't) a woman's
glance,
These vile Quadrilles do so perplex one's feet
With windings,-like the labyrinth of Crete.
Four girls stand up, and beside each a beau
Of figure, stiffen'd upwards from the hip,
(Loose as his morals downwards) points his
Prepar'd thro' many a puzzling maze to slip, "Poule- Moulinet-Balancez-Dos à dos”(Wherein the pretty damsels seem to dip And rise and fall just like the unquiet ocean) And other moods of which I have no notion.
He stayed some time at Cadiz; tho' he hated,
He vow'd, the shocking gallantries which
there
Some-any men may have till they are sated;
Yet look'd he sometimes at the sweeping hair
For there when the August-sun had w high,
(Until in truth his choler had abated)
That bound the foreheads of the Spanish fair,
And sunn'd him often 'neath a warm full eye, And all was silent but the stock-dovede
And wish'd—but this was seldom, by the bye-The whispering zephyr sometima *
He wish'd at times to meet Aurelia's look
Divine, and her right royal figure, graced
With beauty intellectual, (like a book
Well bound and written in the finest taste
Whose noble meaning no one e'er mistook)
Her white arm, and her undulating waist,
Her foot like Atalanta's, when she ran
And lost the race (a woman should) to man.
Whate'er it was -presentiment (which is
A sort of silent prophecy, some say,
In lottery-luck,and love, and death, and bliss!)
Or not, he could not drive the thought away;
Then-'twas a passing fancy--were she his,
How gently would he soothe her dying day-
He swore she should not die-(when folks
And kiss'd the leaves and boughs of vu
Back a perfuming sigh, and rustling ri And every shrub that fond wind flatteris Its virgin branches 'till they mov'd at Did homage to the zephyr as he past: The neighbour tree, and the great fores And gently to and fro' the fruits of ge The beeches shook their dark nuts to a Swayed in the air, and scarcely with a se ground.
Before the entrance of that grotto flow? Wherein the many-colour'd pebbles glov And sparkled thro' its waters beautiful, A quiet streamlet, cool and never dull. And on its grassy margin yon might cul And thereon the shy wild-fowl often Flowers and healing plants: a hermit-sp And, once seen, never to be quite forgot
Our lover, Don Diego de Montilla,
In moody humour pass'd his time at Cadi
Drove out to Arcos, or perhaps Sevilla.
Saint Lucar-Trafalgar (which I'm afraid »
Not now in fashion)-danced the Sequidla
Sometimes with castanets to please the lad
Ate, drank, and sail'd upon the dark bulan
Where mothers begg'd he'd take (for health
waters,
their daughters
They used to say: "my poor Theresa's grov: Lately quite pale and grave, poor dear; and she
They're frequently absurd as well as cla- And wipe their eyes, where tears were sure Has lost all appetite"-and then they'd mor
And leave their daughters with the Don,alone.
to be,
The Don was satisfied and never gazed
To be cur'd by sea-air-and gallantry.
Or talk'd of love: the girls were quite amar'd
They look'd and sigh'd, as girls can look
When they want husbands, or when gossips
and sigh
tell
That they shall have a husband six feet
high,
(Tho' five feet nine or ten might do as well
With curly hair, Greck nose, and
'Twas useless: he was puzzling o'er sous:
And other things on which I cannot dwel}
black eye,
rhyme,
Or thinking of Aurora all the time.
Wesh, poor Aurora !—she is gone where never | Oft would she sit and look upon the sky, ate, passion, envy, grief can touch her When rich clouds in the golden sun-set lay Basking, and loved to hear the soft winds
He saw her where she lay in silent state,
Cold and as white as marble: and her eye,
Whereon such bright and beaming beauty
sate,
Was after the fashion of mortality,
Closed up for ever; e'en the smiles which
late
None could withstand, were gone; and there
did lie
And thou, poor Spanish maid, ah! what hadst thou (For he had drawn aside the shrouding veil) Done to the archer blind, that he should dart | By her a helpless hand, waxen and pale. His cruel shafts 'till thou wast forced to bow In bitter anguish, aye, endure the smart The more because thou wor'st a smiling brow
While the dark arrow canker'd at thy heart?
Yet jeer her not: if 'twere a folly, she
Hath paid (how firmly paid!) Love's penalty.
Diego stood beside the coffin-lid
And gazed awhile upon her: then he bent
And kiss'd her, and did-'twas grief's folly,
bid
Her wait awhile for him, for that he meant
To follow quickly: then his face he hid,
And 'gainst the margin of the coffin leant
In mute and idle anguish: not a breath
Or sound was heard. He was alone, with
Death.
He grew familiar with the bird; the bre
Knew well its benefactor, and he'd feed
And make acquaintance with the fishes wat
And, like the Thracian Shepherd as we rea
Drew, with the music of his stringed in
Behind him winged things, and many a treat
And tramp of animal: and in his hall
He was a Lord indeed, belov'd by all.
At last they drew him, like a child, away;
And spoke in soothing sorrow of the dead,
Placing her sweet acts out in kind array,
And mourn'd that one so gracious should In a high solitary turret where
None were admitted would he muse,
LISTEN, my love, and I will tell you now
A tale Sicilian: 'tis of fabulous times
When the vast giants liv'd and spirits dwelt
In haunted woods and caves beneath the
And some (these were the harmless Naiades)
By running waters. You have heard me
The sea-nymph Galatea, Nereus' child,
Who lov'd the shepherd Acis? 'tis a sweet
And mournful history, and to think how
Love
Could bend a rugged Cyclops to his power
Is pleasant hearken then. There is a
time,
Just the first blush of Summer, when the
Spring
One delicate hand was press'd against her
cheek
That flush'd with pleasure, and her dark
hair stream'd
Shadowing the brightness of her fixed eye,
Which on the young Sicilian shepherd's face
Shone like a star: the other hand hung down,
White as that Parian stone the sculptor
hew'd
To fashion for the temples of his gods.
Peerless on earth, and like those forms of old,
Pallas, or dark-eyed Juno, or the queen
Who won the fruit on Ida,sate the sea-nymph,
Proud Galatea; 'till at last she rais'd
Her arm and twined it round her lover's neck,
And in the gentlest music asked him then
Why and how much he lov'd, and if he
thought
'Twas strange that she, a high sea-nymph,
should leave
And his soft rains are passing off, and flowers
Unclasp their bosoms to the winds and spread
Perfume and living beauty thro' the world.
It is the year's gay manhood: Nature then,
Grateful and wantoning in idolatry,
Does homage to the sun. -Long years ago,
At this gay season, in a cave o'errun
By vines and boundless clematis,-between
Whose wilderness of leaves white roses And thro' the disturbed air came words like
peep'd,
And honeysuckle which, with trailing boughs,
Droop'd o'er a sward grateful as ever sprung
By sprinkling fountains, when Apollo drove
The nymphs to haunt the thickets,-Acis
knelt
At Galatea's feet. She gaz'd awhile.
Her watery palaces and coral-caves,
Her home, and all immortal company,
To dwell with him, a simple shepherd-boy :
-But hark! a sudden sound burst on their
ears,
"Hear me, ye rocks, and all ye hollow caves
Where the wild ocean raves!
And thou, eternal Etna! on whose brow
The white and silent and perennial snow
|