Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

Thus is all nature perfect. Harmony
Pervades the whole, by His all-wise decree,
With whom are those, to vast infinity,
We misname dead.

ANON.

LXI. SAID I TO MYSELF, SAID I.

"I'm poor, and quite unknown; I have neither fame nor rank; My labor is all I own; I have no gold at the bank;

I'm one of the common crowd, despised of the passers-by,
Contemned by the rich and proud,"— said I to myself, said I.
"I want, and I can not obtain, the luxuries of the earth;
My raiment is scant and plain, and I live in the fear of dearth;
While others can laugh or sing, I have ever some cause to sigh ;
I'm a weary wanderling," said I to myself, said I.

"But is this grieving just? Is it wise to fret and wail?
Is it right, thou speck of dust, thine envy should prevail ?*
Is it fitting thou shouldst close thy sight to the sunny sky,
And an utter dark suppose?" said I to myself, said I.
"If poor, thou hast thy health; if humble, thou art strong;
And the lark, that knows not wealth, ever sings a happy song.
The flowers rejoice in the air, and give thy needs the lie;
Thou 'rt a fool to foster care," said I to myself, said I.

"If the wants of thy pride be great, the needs of thy health are

small;

And the world is the man's estate who can wisely enjoy it all.
For him is the landscape spread, for him do the breezes ply,
For him is the day-beam shed," said I to myself, said I.
"For him are the oceans rolled, for him do the rivers run,
For him doth the year unfold her bounties to the sun;
For him, if his heart be pure, shall common things supply
All pleasures that endure," said I to myself, said I.

"For him each blade of grass waves pleasure as it grows,
For him, as the light clouds pass, a spirit of beauty flows;
For him, as the streamlets leap, or the winds on the tree-tops sigh,
Comes a music sweet and deep," — said I to myself, said I

"Nor of earth are his joys alone, how mean soever his state-
On him from the starry zone his ministering angels wait;
With him in voiceless thought they hold communion high;
By them are his fancies fraught," said I to myself, said I.

WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR.

"I will mould my life afresh, I will circumscribe desire;
Farewell to ye, griefs of flesh! and let my soul aspire.
I will make my wishes few, that my joys may multiply;
Adieu, false wants, adieu!"— said I to myself, said I.

365

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

GREAT King William spread before him
All his stores of wealth untold, –
Diamonds, emeralds, and rubies,
Heaps on heaps of minted gold.
Mournfully he gazed upon it
As it glittered in the sun,
Sighing to himself, "O ! treasure,
Held in care, by sorrow won!
Millions think me rich and happy;
But, alas! before me piled,
I would give thee ten times over
For the slumbers of a child!"

Great King William from his turret
Heard the martial trumpets blow,
Saw the crimson banners floating
Of a countless host below;
Saw their weapons flash in sunlight,
As the squadrons trod the sward;
And he sighed, "O, mighty army,
Hear thy miserable lord:
At my word thy legions gather-
At my nod thy captains bend;
But, with all thy power and splendor,
I would give thee for a friend!"
Great King William stood on Windsor,
Looking, from its castled height,
O'er his wide-spread realm of England
Glittering in the morning light ;
Looking on the tranquil river

And the forest waving free,
And he sighed, "O! land of beauty,
Fondled by the circling sea,

Mine thou art, but I would yield thee
And be happy, could I gain,

In exchange, a peasant's garden,

And a conscience free from stain!'

IB.

[blocks in formation]

I SEE before me the Gladiator lie :

He leans upon his hand; his manly brow
Consents to death, but conquers agony;

And his drooped head sinks gradually low;
And through his side the last drops, ebbing slow
From the red gash, fall heavy, one by one,

Like the first of a thunder-shower; and now
The arena swims around him
he is gone,

Ere ceased the inhuman shout which hailed the wretch who won.

[merged small][ocr errors]

his eyes

Were with his heart, and that was far away;
He recked not of the life he lost, nor prize,
But where his rude hut by the Danube lay,
There were his young barbarians all at play,
There was their Dacian mother - he, their sire,
Butchered to make a Roman holiday!

[ocr errors]

All this rushed with his blood. — Shall he expire, And unavenged? Arise! ye Goths, and glut your ire!

BYRON.

LXIV. — LAMENTATION FOR THE DEATH OF CELIN.*

Ar the gate of old Grana'da, when all its bolts are barred,
At twilight, at the Vega-gate, there is a trampling heard;
There is a trampling heard, as of horses treading slow,
And a weeping voice of women, and a heavy sound of woe.
"What tower is fallen? what star is set? what chief come these

[blocks in formation]

"A tower is fallen! A star is set! - Alas! alas for Celin!"

Three times they knock, three times they cry, and wide the doors they throw;

Dejectedly they enter, and mournfully they go!

In gloomy lines they mustering stand beneath the hollow porch,
Each horseman grasping in his hand a black and flaming torch.
Wet is each eye as they go by, and all around is wailing,
For all have heard the misery, "Alas! alas for Celin!

Him yesterday a Moor did slay, of Bencerraje's blood:
'Twas at the solemn jousting; around the nobles stood;

* Pronounce Salin.

THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC.

367

The nobles of the land were by, and ladies bright and fair Looked from their latticed windows, the haughty sight to share; But now the nobles all lament, the ladies are bewailing,

For he was Granada's darling knight, "Alas! alas for Celin!"
Before him ride his vassals, in order two by two,

With ashes on their turbans spread, most pitiful to view;
Behind him his four sisters, each wrapped in sable veil,

Between the tambour's dismal strokes take up their doleful tale; When stops the muffled drum, ye hear their brotherless bewailing,

And all the people, far and near, cry, "Alas! alas for Celin!"
O lovely lies he on his bier above the purple pall,

The flower of all Granada's youth, the loveliest of them all;
His dark, dark eye is closed, his rosy lip is pale,

The crust of blood lies black and dim upon his burnished mail;
And evermore the hoarse tambour breaks in upon their wailing;
Its sound is like no earthly sound, -"Alas! alas for Celin!"
The Moorish maid at her lattice stands, the Moor stands at his
door;

One maid is wringing of her hands, and one is weeping sore. Down to the dust men bow their heads, and ashes black they

strew

Upon their broidered garments, of crimson, green, and blue; Before each gate the bier stands still, then bursts the loud bewailing,

From door and lattice, high and low, - Alas! alas for Celin!"

An old, old woman cometh forth, when she hears the people cry; Her hair is white as silver, like horn her glazed eye;

'Twas she who nursed him at her breast, who nursed him long

ago;

She knows not whom they all lament, but, ah! she soon shall

know!

With one loud shriek, she through doth break, when her ears receive their wailing, —

[ocr errors]

"Let me kiss my Celin ere I die! - Alas! alas for Celin!

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

THE name of Commonwealth is past and gone
O'er the three fractions of the groaning globe;
Venice is crushed, and Holland deigns to own
A scepter, and endures the purple robe :

If the free Switzer yet bestrides alone
His chainless mountains, 't is but for a time,
For Tyranny of late is cunning grown,
And in its own good season tramples down
The sparkles of our ashes. One great clime,
Whose vigorous offspring by dividing ocean
Are kept apart and nursed in the devotion
Of Freedom, which their fathers fought for, and
Bequeathed—a heritage of heart and hand,
And proud distinction from each other land,
Whose sons must bow them at a monarch's motion,
As if his senseless scepter were a wand

Full of the magic of exploded science
Still one great clime, in full and free defiance,
Yet rears her crest, unconquered and sublime,
Above the far Atlantic! She has taught
Her Esau-brethren that the haughty flag,
The floating fence of Albion's feebler crag,

May strike to those whose red right hands have bought
Rights cheaply earned with blood. Still, still for ever
Better, though each man's life-blood were a river,
That it should flow, and overflow, than creep
Through thousand lazy channels in our veins,
Dammed like the dull canal with locks and chains,
And moving, as a sick man in his sleep,
Three paces, and then faltering : — - better be
Where the extinguished Spartans still are free,
In their proud charnel of Thermopylæ,
Than stagnate in our marsh, or o'er the deep
Fly, and one current to the ocean add,
One spirit to the souls our fathers had,
One freeman more, America, to thee!

BYRON.

[blocks in formation]

The following will be found suitable for delivery by three speakers. Let the First Speaker be on the right, the Second on the left, and the Third in the middle. The First and Second Speakers will distinguish between those parts of their stanzas addressed to the audience, and those parts addressed to the Third Speaker.

FIRST SPEAKER.

"O, ARM thee, youthful warrior,

And gird me to thy side!
Come forth to breast, undaunted,
The battle's crimson tide;

« AnteriorContinuar »