That host, -as huge and strong as e'er defied
Their God, and placed their trust in human pride!
As fathers persecute rebellious sons,

He smote the blossoms of the warlike youth;

He called on Frost's inexorable tooth

Life to consume in manhood's firmest hold;

Nor spared the reverend blood that feebly runs;
For why-unless for liberty enrolled,

And sacred home-ah, why should hoary age be bold?

Fleet the Tartar's reinless steed,

But fleeter far the pinions of the wind,

Which from Siberia's caves the monarch freed,
And sent him forth, with squadrons of his kind,
And bade the snow their ample backs bestride,
And to the battle ride,-

No pitying voice commands a halt,—
No courage can repel the dire assault,-
Distracted, spiritless, benumbed, and blind,
Whole legions sink, and, in an instant, find
Burial and death: look for them-and descry,
When morn returns, beneath the clear blue sky,
A soundless waste, a trackless vacancy!

VIII.

SONNET ON THE SAME OCCASION.

FEBRUARY 1816.

YE storms, resound the praises of your king!
And ye mild seasons-in a sunny clime,
Midway on some high hill, while Father Time
Looks on delighted-meet in festal ring,

And loud and long of Winter's triumph sing!

Sing ye, with blossoms crowned, and fruits and flowers,
Of Winter's breath surcharged with sleety showers,

And the dire flapping of his hoary wing!

Knit the blithe dance upon the soft green grass,

With feet, hands, eyes, looks, lips, report your gain;
Whisper it to the billows of the main,

And to the aërial zephyrs as they pass,

That old decrepit Winter-he hath slain

That host which rendered all your beauties vain!

IX.

ON THE DISINTERMENT OF THE REMAINS OF THE DUKE D'ENGHIEN

DEAR reliques! from a pit of vilest mould
Uprisen to lodge among ancestral kings;
And to inflict shame's salutary stings
On the remorseless hearts of men grown old

In a blind worship-men perversely bold
Even to this hour; yet at this hour they quake;
And some their monstrous idol shall forsake.
If to the living truth was ever told

By aught surrendered from the hollow grave:
O murdered Prince! meek, loyal, pious, brave!
The power of retribution once was given;
But 'tis a rueful thought that willow bands
So often tie the thunder-wielding hands
Of Justice, sent to earth from higher heaven!

X.

ODE.

WHO rises on the banks of Seine,

And binds her temples with the civic wreath?
What joy to read the promise of her mien !
How sweet to rest her wide-spread wings beneath!
But they are ever playing,

And twinkling in the light,
And if a breeze be straying,
That breeze will she invite;

And stands on tiptoe, conscious she is fair,
And calls a look of love into her face-
And spreads her arms-as if the genial air
Alone could satisfy her wide embrace.
-Melt, Principalities, before her, melt!
Her love ye hailed-her wrath have felt.

But she through many a change of form hath gone,
And stands amidst ye now, an armèd creature,

Whose panoply is not a thing put on,

But the live scales of a portentous nature,

That, having wrought its way from birth to birth,

Stalks round-abhorred by Heaven, a terror to the earth.

I marked the breathings of her dragon crest;
My soul in many a midnight vision bowed
Before the meanings which our spear expressed;
Whether the mighty beam, in scorn upheld,
Threatened her foes-or, pompously at rest,
Seemed to bisect the orbit of her shield,
Like to a long blue bar of solid cloud
At evening stretched across the fiery west.

So did she daunt the earth, and God defy!
And wheresoe'er she spread her sovereignty,
Pollution tainted all that was most pure.
-Have we not known-and have we not to tell
That Justice seemed to hear her final knell ?
Faith buried deeper in her own deep breast
Her stores and sighed to find them insecure!
And hope was maddened by the drops that fell

254

From shades-her chosen place of short-lived rest,
Which, when they first received her, she had blessed:
Shame followed shame-and woe supplanted woe.

Is this the only change that Time can show?

How long shall vengeance sleep? Ye patient heavens,
Infirm ejaculation from the tongue
how long?

Of nations wanting virtue to be strong
Up to the measure of recorded might,-

And daring not to feel the majesty of right!

Weak spirits are there who would ask,
Upon the pressure of a painful thing,
The lion's sinews or the eagle's wing;
Or let their wishes loose, in forest glade,
Among the lurking powers

Of herbs and lovely flowers,

That man may be accomplished for a task
Which his own nature hath enjoined-and why?
If when that interference hath relieved him
He must sink down to languish

In worse than former helplessness, and lie
Till the caves roar,—and imbecility,
Again engendering anguish,

[him.

The same weak wish returns-that had before deceived

But Thou, supreme Disposer! mightst not speed

The course of things, and change the creed

Which hath been held aloft before man's sight,

Since the first forming of societies!

Whether, as bards have told in ancient song,

Built up by soft seducing harmonies,-
Or pressed together by the appetite,
And by the power of wrong.

XI.

ELEGIAC VERSES.

FEBRUARY 1816.

"REST, rest, perturbed Earth!

O rest, thou doleful mother of mankind!"

A spirit sang in tones more plaintive than the wind; "From regions where no evil thing has birth

I come thy stains to wash away,

Thy cherished fetters to unbind,

To open thy sad eyes upon a milder day!

-The heavens are thronged with martyrs that have risen
From out thy noisome prison;

The penal caverns groan

With tens of thousands rent from off the tree
Of hopeful life,-by battle's whirlwind blown
Into the deserts of Eternity.

Unpitied havoc-victims unlamented!

But not on high, where madness is resented,
And murder causes some sad tears to flow,
Though, from the widely-sweeping blow,

The choirs of angels spread triumphantly augmented.

"False parent of mankind!
Obdurate, proud, and blind,

I sprinkle thee with soft celestial dews,
Thy lost maternal heart to re-infuse!

Scattering this far-fetched moisture from my wings,
Upon the act a blessing I implore,

Of which the rivers in their secret springs,
The rivers stained so oft with human gore,
Are conscious;-may the like return no more!
May Discord-for a seraph's care

Shall be attended with a bolder prayer-
May she, who once disturbed the seats of bliss,
These mortal spheres above,

Be chained for ever to the black abyss !
And thou, O rescued Earth, by peace and love,
And merciful desires, thy sanctity approve!"

The spirit ended his mysterious rite,
And the pure vision closed in darkness infinite.

Poems on the Naming of Places.

ADVERTISEMENT.

By persons resident in the country and attached to rural objects, many places will be found unnamed or of unknown names, where little incidents will have occurred, or feelings been experienced, which will have given to such places a private and peculiar interest. From a wish to give some sort of record to such incidents, or renew the gratification of such feelings, names have been given to places by the author and some of his friends, and the following poems written in consequence.

I.

Ir was an April morning: fresh and clear
The rivulet, delighting in its strength,

Ran with a young man's speed; and yet the voice

Of waters which the winter had supplied

Was softened down into a vernal tone.

The spirit of enjoyment and desire,

And hopes and wishes, from all living things
Went circling, like a multitude of sounds.
The budding groves appeared as if in haste
To spur the steps of June; as if their shades

Of various green were hind'rances that stood
Between them and their object: yet, meanwhile,
There was such deep contentment in the air
That every naked ash, and tardy tree

Yet leafless, seemed as though the countenance
With which it looked on this delightful day
Were native to the summer. Up the brook
I roamed in the confusion of my heart,
Alive to all things and-forgetting all.
At length I to a sudden turning came
In this continuous glen, where down a rock
The stream, so ardent in its course before,
Sent forth such sallies of glad sound, that all
Which I till then had heard, appeared the voice
Of common pleasure: beast and bird, the lamb,
The shepherd's dog, the linnet and the thrush,
Vied with this waterfall, and made a song
Which, while I listened, seemed like the wild growth
Or like some natural produce of the air,

That could not cease to be. Green leaves were here;
But 'twas the foliage of the rocks, the birch,
The yew, the holly, and the bright green thorn,
With hanging islands of resplendent furze :
And on a summit, distant a short space,
By any who should look beyond the dell,
A single mountain cottage might be seen.
I gazed and gazed, and to myself I said,

"Our thoughts at least are ours; and this wild nook, My Emma, I will dedicate to thee."

-Soon did the spot become my other home,

My dwelling, and my out-of-doors abode.

And, of the shepherds who have seen me there,
To whom I sometimes in our idle talk

Have told this fancy, two or three, perhaps,
Years after we are gone and in our graves,
When they have cause to speak of this wild place,
May call it by the name of " Emma's Dell.'

II.

TO JOANNA.

AMID the smoke of cities did you pass

Your time of early youth; and there you learned,
From years of quiet industry, to love

The living beings by your own fire-side

With such a strong devotion, that your heart

Is slow towards the sympathies of them

Who look upon the hills with tenderness,

And make dear friendships with the streams and groves

Yet we, who are transgressors in this kind,

Dwelling, retired in our simplicity,

Among the woods and fields, we love you well,