Page images
PDF
EPUB

The nimble mercury, ere we are aware,
Descends the elastic ladder of the air;
The telltale blood in artery and vein
Sinks from its higher levels in the brain;
Whatever poet, orator, or sage

May say of it, old age is still old age.
It is the waning, not the crescent moon,
The dusk of evening, not the blaze of noon :
It is not strength, but weakness; not desire,
But its surcease; not the fierce heat of fire,
The burning and consuming element,
But that of ashes and of embers spent,
In which some living sparks we still discern,
Enough to warm, but not enough to burn.

What then? Shall we sit idly down and say
The night hath come; it is no longer day?
The night hath not yet come; we are not quite
Cut off from labor by the failing light;
Something remains for us to do or dare;
Even the oldest tree some fruit may bear;
Not (Edipus Coloneus, or Greek Ode,
Or tales of pilgrims that one morning rode
Out of the gateway of the Tabard Inn,
But other something, would we but begin;
For age is opportunity no less

Than youth itself, though in another dress,
And as the evening twilight fades away
The sky is filled with stars, invisible by day.

BIRDS OF PASSAGE.

FLIGHT THE FOURTH.

CHARLES SUMNER. GARLANDS upon his grave, And flowers upon his hearse, And to the tender heart and brave The tribute of this verse.

His was the troubled life, The conflict and the pain, The grief, the bitterness of strife, The honor without stain.

Like Winkelried, he took
Into his manly breast

The sheaf of hostile spears, and broke
A path for the oppressed.

Then from the fatal field
Upon a nation's heart

Borne like a warrior on his shield!-
So should the brave depart.

Death takes us by surprise, And stays our hurrying feet; The great design unfinished lies, Our lives are incomplete.

But in the dark unknown Perfect their circles seem, Even as a bridge's arch of stone Is rounded in the stream.

Alike are life and death,
When life in death survives,
And the uninterrupted breath
Inspires a thousand lives

Were a star quenched on high,
For ages would its light,

Still travelling downward from the sky,
Shine on our mortal sight.

So when a great man dies,
For years beyond our ken,
The light he leaves behind him lies
Upon the paths of men.

TRAVELS BY THE FIRESIDE.
THE ceaseless rain is falling fast,
And yonder gilded vane,
Immovable for three days past,
Points to the misty main.

It drives me in upon myself
And to the fireside gleams,

To pleasant books that crowd my shelf, And still more pleasant dreams.

I read whatever bards have sung
Of lands beyond the sea,

And the bright days when I was young
Come thronging back to me.

In fancy I can hear again

The Alpine torrent's roar,

The mule-bells on the hills of Spain,
The sea at Elsinore.

I see the convent's gleaming wall Rise from its groves of pine, And towers of old cathedrals tall, And castles by the Rhine.

I journey on by park and spire,
Beneath centennial trees,
Through fields with poppies all on fire,
And gleams of distant seas.

I fear no more the dust and heat,
No more I feel fatigue,
While journeying with another's feet
O'er many a lengthening league.

Let others traverse sea and land,
And toil through various climes,
I turn the world round with my hand
Reading these poets' rhymes.

From them I learn whatever lies
Beneath each changing zone,
And see, when looking with their eyes,
Better than with mine own.

CADENABBIA.

LAKE OF COMO.

No sound of wheels or hoof-beat breaks
The silence of the summer day,

As by the loveliest of all lakes
I while the idle hours away.

I pace the leafy colonnade
Where level branches of the plane
Above me weave a roof of shade
Impervious to the sun and rain.

At times a sudden rush of air
Flutters the lazy leaves o'erhead,
And gleams of sunshine toss and flare
Like torches down the path I tread.

By Somariva's garden gate

I make the marble stairs my seat, And hear the water, as I wait,

Lapping the steps beneath my feet.

The undulation sinks and swells
Along the stony parapets,
And far away the floating bells
Tinkle upon the fisher's nets.

Silent and slow, by tower and town
The freighted barges come and go,
Their pendent shadows gliding down
By town and tower submerged below.
The hills sweep upward from the shore,
With villas scattered one by one
Upon their wooded spurs, and lower
Bellaggio blazing in the sun.

And dimly seen, a tangled mass

Of walls and woods, of light and shade, Stands beckoning up the Stelvio Pass Varenna with its white cascade.

I ask myself, Is this a dream?
Will it all vanish into air?
Is there a land of such supreme

And perfect beauty anywhere?

Sweet vision! Do not fade away; Linger until my heart shall take Into itself the summer day,

And all the beauty of the lake.

Linger until upon my brain

Is stamped an image of the scene, Then fade into the air again,

And be as if thou hadst not been.

MONTE CASSINO.

TERRA DI LAVORO.

BEAUTIFUL valley! through whose verdant meads
Unheard the Garigliano glides along;-
The Liris, nurse of rushes and of reeds,
The river taciturn of classic song.

The Land of Labor and the Land of Rest,
Where medieval towns are white on all
The hillsides, and where every mountain's crest
Is an Etrurian or a Roman wall.

There is Alagna, where Pope Boniface

Was dragged with contumely from his throne; Sciara Colonna, was that day's disgrace

The Pontiff's only, or in part thine own?

There is Ceprano, where a renegade

Was each Apulian, as great Dante saith,
When Manfred by his men-at-arms betrayed
Spurred on to Benevento and to death.

There is Aquinum, the old Volscian town,
Where Juvenal was born, whose lurid light
Still hovers o'er his birthplace like the crown
Of splendor seen o'er cities in the night.

Doubled the splendor is, that in its streets

The Angelic Doctor as a school-boy played, And dreamed perhaps the dreams, that he repeats In ponderous folios for scholastics made.

And there, uplifted, like a passing cloud

That pauses on a mountain summit high, Monte Cassino's convent rears its proud

And venerable walls against the sky.

Well I remember how on foot I climbed
The stony pathway leading to its gate;

Above, the convent bells for vespers chimed,
Below, the darkening town grew desolate.
Well I remember the low arch and dark,

The courtyard with its well, the terrace wide, From which far down the valley, like a park Veiled in the evening mists, was dim descried.

The day was dying, and with feeble hands Caressed the mountain tops; the vales between Darkened; the river in the meadow-lands Sheathed itself as a sword, and was not seen.

The silence of the place was like a sleep,
So full of rest it seemed; each passing tread
Was a reverberation from the deep

Recesses of the ages that are dead.

For, more than thirteen centuries ago,
Benedict fleeing from the gates of Rome,
A youth disgusted with its vice and woe,
Sought in these mountain solitudes a home.

He founded here his Convent and his Rule
Of prayer and work, and counted work as
prayer;
The pen became a clarion, and his school
Flamed like a beacon in the midnight air.

What though Boccaccio, in his reckless way,
Mocking the lazy brotherhood, deplores
The illuminated manuscripts, that lay
Torn and neglected on the dusty floors?

Boccaccio was a novelist, a child

Of fancy and of fiction at the best!
This the urbane librarian said, and smiled
Incredulous, as at some idle jest.

Upon such themes as these, with one young friar
I sat conversing late into the night,
Till in its cavernous chimney the wood-fire
Had burnt its heart out like an anchorite.

And then translated, in my convent cell,
Myself yet not myself, in dreams I lay;
And, as a monk who hears the matin bell,
Started from sleep; already it was day.
From the high window I beheld the scene

On which Saint Benedict so oft had gazed,The mountains and the valley in the sheen

Of the bright sun,-and stood as one amazed.

Gray mists were rolling, rising, vanishing;
The woodlands glistened with their jewelled

crowns;

Far off the mellow bells began to ring

For matins in the half-awakened towns.

The conflict of the Present and the Past,
The ideal and the actual in our life,
As on a field of battle held me fast,

While this world and the next world were at strife.

For, as the valley from its sleep awoke,
I saw the iron horses of the steam
Toss to the morning air their plumes of smoke,
And woke, as one awaketh from a dream.

AMALFI.

SWEET the memory is to me

Of a land beyond the sea,

Where the waves and mountains meet,
Where, amid her mulberry-trees
Sits Amalfi in the heat,
Bathing ever her white feet
In the tideless summer seas.

THE SERMON OF ST. FRANCIS.-BELISARIUS.

In the middle of the town,

From its fountains in the hills,

Tumbling through the narrow gorge,
The Canneto rushes down,
Turns the great wheels of the mills,
Lifts the hammers of the forge.

"T is a stairway, not a street,
That ascends the deep ravine,
Where the torrent leaps between
Rocky walls that almost meet.
Toiling up
from stair to stair
Peasant girls their burdens bear;
Sunburnt daughters of the soil,
Stately figures tall and straight,
What inexorable fate

Dooms them to this life of toil?

Lord of vineyards and of lands,
Far above the convent stands.
On its terraced walk aloof
Leans a monk with folded hands,
Placid, satisfied, serene,
Looking down upon the scene
Over wall and red-tiled roof;
Wondering unto what good end
All this toil and traffic tend,
And why all men cannot be
Free from care and free from pain,
And the sordid love of gain
And as indolent as he.

Where are now the freighted barks
From the marts of east and west?
Where the knights in iron sarks
Journeying to the Holy Land,
Glove of steel upon the hand,
Cross of crimson on the breast?
Where the pomp of camp and court?
Where the pilgrims with their prayers?
Where the merchants with their wares,
And their gallant brigantines
Sailing safely into port
Chased by corsair Algerines?

Vanished like a fleet of cloud,
Like a passing trumpet-blast,
Are those splendors of the past,
And the commerce and the crowd!
Fathoms deep beneath the seas
Lie the ancient wharves and quays,
Swallowed by the engulfing waves;
Silent streets and vacant halls,
Ruined roofs and towers and walls;
Hidden from all mortal eyes
Deep the sunken city lies:
Even cities have their graves!

This is an enchanted land!
Round the headlands far away
Sweeps the blue Salernian bay
With its sickle of white sand:
Further still and furthermost
On the dim discovered coast
Pæstum with its ruins lies,
And its roses all in bloom
Seem to tinge the fatal skies
Of that lonely land of doom.
On his terrace, high in air,
Nothing doth the good monk care
For such worldly themes as these.
From the garden just below
Little puffs of perfume blow,
And a sound is in his ears
Of the murmur of the bees
In the shining chestnut-trees;
Nothing else he heeds or hears.
All the landscape seems to swoon
In the happy afternoon;
Slowly o'er his senses creep

[merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small]

263

Not mine, though they be spoken through me.

"O, doubly are ye bound to praise
The great Creator in your lays;
He giveth you your plumes of down,

Your crimson hoods, your cloaks of brown.

"He giveth you your wings to fly
And breathe a purer air on high,
And careth for you everywhere,
Who for yourselves so little care!"

With flutter of swift wings and songs
Together rose the feathered throngs,
And singing scattered far apart;
Deep peace was in St. Francis' heart.

He knew not if the brotherhood
His homily had understood;
He only knew that to one ear
The meaning of his words was clear.

BELISARIUS.

I AM poor and old and blind;
The sun burns me, and the wind
Blows through the city gate
And covers me with dust
From the wheels of the august
Justinian the Great.

It was for him I chased

The Persians o'er wild and waste,

As General of the East;
Night after night I lay
In their camps of yesterday;
Their forage was my feast.

For him, with sails of red,
And torches at mast-head,

Piloting the great fleet,

I swept the Afric coasts
And scattered the Vandal hosts,
Like dust in a windy street.

For him I won again
The Ausonian realm and reign,
Rome and Parthenope;
And all the land was mine
From the summits of Apennine
To the shores of either sea.

For him, in my feeble age,
I dared the battle's rage,

To save Byzantium's state,
When the tents of Zabergan,
Like snow-drifts overran

The road to the Golden Gate.

And for this, for this, behold!
Infirm and blind and old,

With gray, uncovered head,
Beneath the very arch
Of my triumphal march,

I stand and beg my bread!

Methinks I still can hear,
Sounding distinct and near,

The Vandal monarch's cry,
As, captive and disgraced,
With majestic step he paced, -
"All, all is Vanity!"

Ah! vainest of all things
Is the gratitude of kings;

The plaudits of the crowd
Are but the clatter of feet
At midnight in the street,

Hollow and restless and loud.

But the bitterest disgrace
Is to see forever the face

Of the Monk of Ephesus!

The unconquerable will
This, too, can bear; -I still
Am Belisarius!

SONGO RIVER.

NOWHERE such a devious stream,
Save in fancy or in dream,

Winding slow through bush and brake
Links together lake and lake.

Walled with woods or sandy shelf,
Ever doubling or itself

Flows the stream, so still and slow
That it hardly seems to flow.

Never errant knight of old,
Lost in woodland or on wold,
Such a winding path pursued
Through the sylvan solitude.

Never school-boy in his quest
After hazel-nut or nest,
Through the forest in and out
Wandered loitering thus about.

In the mirror of its tide
Tangled thickets on each side
Hang inverted, and between
Floating cloud or sky serene.

Swift or swallow on the wing
Seems the only living thing,
Or the loon, that laughs and flies
Down to those reflected skies.

Silent stream! thy Indian name
Unfamiliar is to fame;

For thou hidest here alone,
Well content to be unknown.

But thy tranquil waters teach
Wisdom deep as human speech,
Moving without haste or noise
In unbroken equipoise.

Though thou turnest no busy mill,
And art ever calm and still,
Even thy silence seems to say
To the traveller on his way :-
"Traveller, hurrying from the heat
Of the city, stay thy feet!
Rest awhile, nor longer waste
Life with inconsiderate haste!

"Be not like a stream that brawls Loud with shallow waterfalls,

But in quiet self-control

Link together soul and soul."

A BOOK OF SONNETS.

THREE FRIENDS OF MINE.

I.

WHEN I remember them, those friends of mine,
Who are no longer here, the noble three,
Who half my life were more than friends to me,
And whose discourse was like a generous wine,
I most of all remember the divine

Something, that shone in them, and made us see
The archetypal man, and what might be
The amplitude of Nature's first design.
In vain I stretch my hands to clasp their hands;
I cannot find them. Nothing now is left
But a majestic memory. They meanwhile
Wander together in Elysian lands,

Perchance remembering me, who am bereft
Of their dear presence, and, remembering, smile."

[blocks in formation]

CHAUCER.-SHAKESPEARE.-MILTON.-KEATS.-THE GALAXY.

III.

I STAND again on the familiar shore,

And hear the waves of the distracted sea Piteously calling and lamenting thee, And waiting restless at thy cottage door. The rocks, the sea-weed on the ocean floor, The willows in the meadow, and the free Wild winds of the Atlantic welcome me; Then why shouldst thou be dead, and come no more?

Ah, why shouldst thou be dead, when common

men

Are busy with their trivial affairs,

Having and holding? Why, when thou hadst

read

Nature's mysterious manuscript, and then
Wast ready to reveal the truth it bears,
Why art thou silent? Why shouldst thou be
dead?

SHAKESPEARE.

265

A VISION as of crowded city streets,
With human life in endless overflow;
Thunder of thoroughfares; trumpets that blow
To battle; clamor, in obscure retreats,
Of sailors landed from their anchored fleets;
Tolling of bells in turrets, and below

Voices of children, and bright flowers that throw

O'er garden-walls their intermingled sweets! This vision comes to me when I unfold

The volume of the Poet paramount,
Whom all the Muses loved, not one alone ;-
Into his hands they put the lyre of gold,

And, crowned with sacred laurel at their fount,

Placed him as Musagetes on their throne.

IV.

RIVER, that stealest with such silent pace
Around the City of the Dead, where lies

A friend who bore thy name, and whom these

eyes

Shall see no more in his accustomed place, Linger and fold him in thy soft embrace

And say good night, for now the western skies Are red with sunset, and gray mists arise Like damps that gather on a dead man's face. Good night! good night! as we so oft have said Beneath this roof at midnight, in the days That are no more, and shall no more return. Thou hast but taken thy lamp and gone to bed; I stay a little longer, as one stays To cover up the embers that still burn.

V.

THE doors are all wide open; at the gate
The blossomed lilacs counterfeit a blaze,
And seem to warm the air; a dreamy haze
Hangs o'er the Brighton meadows like a fate,
And on their margin, with sea-tides elate,

The flooded Charles, as in the happier days,
Writes the last letter of his name, and stays
His restless steps, as if compelled to wait.
I also wait! but they will come no more,

Those friends of mine, whose presence satisfied The thirst and hunger of my heart. Ah me! They have forgotten the pathway to my door!. Something is gone from nature since they died, And summer is not summer, nor can be.

MILTON.

I PACE the sounding sea beach and behold
How the voluminous billows roll and run,
Upheaving and subsiding, while the sun
Shines through their sheeted emerald far un-
rolled,

And the ninth wave, slow gathering fold by fold
All its loose-flowing garments into one,
Plunges upon the shore, and floods the dur
Pale reach of sands, and changes them to gold.
So in majestic cadence rise and fall

The mighty undulations of thy song,
O sightless bard, England's Mæonides
And ever and anon, high over all

Uplifted, a ninth wave superb and strong,
Floods all the soul with its melodious seas.

KEATS.

THE young Endymion sleeps Endymion's sleep;
The shepherd-boy whose tale was left half told!
The solemn grove uplifts its shield of gold
To the red rising moon, and loud and deep
The nightingale is singing from the steep;
It is midsummer, but the air is cold;

Can it be death? Alas, beside the fold
A shepherd's pipe lies shattered near his sheep.
Lo! in the moonlight gleams a marble white,
On which I read: " Here lieth one whose name
Was writ in water." And was this the meed
Of his sweet singing? Rather let me write :
"The smoking flax before it burst to flame
Was quenched by death, and broken the
bruised reed."

[blocks in formation]

And the hurt deer. He listeneth to the lark, Whose song comes with the sunshine through the dark

Of painted glass in leaden lattice bound; He listeneth and he laugheth at the sound, Then writeth in a book like any clerk. He is the poet of the dawn, who wrote The Canterbury Tales, and his old age Made beautiful with song; and as I read I hear the crowing cock, I hear the note Of lark and linnet, and from every page Rise odors of ploughed field or flowery mead.

THE GALAXY.

TORRENT of light and river of the air,

Along whose bed the glimmering stars are seen
Like gold and silver sands in some ravine
Where mountain streams have left their chan-
nels bare!

The Spaniard sees in thee the pathway, where
His patron saint descended in the sheen

Of his celestial armor, on serene

And quiet nights, when all the heavens were fair.

Not this I see, nor yet the ancient fable

Of Phaeton's wild course, that scorchea the skies

« PreviousContinue »