The pall of a past world; and then again shriek'd, And, terrified, did flutter on the ground, Of famine fed upon all entrails-men Died, and their bones were tombless as their flesh; And they were enemies: they met beside Where had been heap'd a mass of holy things For an unholy usage; they raked up, And shivering scraped with their cold skeleton hands Blew for a little life, and made a flame Each other's aspects- saw, and shriek'd, and died- And their masts fell down piecemeal; as they dropp'd ["Darkness" is a grand and gloomy sketch of the supposed consequences of the final extinction of the Sun and the heavenly bodies: executed, undoubtedly, with great and fearful force, but with something of German exaggeration, and a fantastical solution of incidents. The very conception is terrible above all conception of known calamity, and is too oppressive to the imagination to be contemplated with pleasure, even in the faint reflection of poetry. JEFFREY.] 2 [On the sheet containing the original draught of these lines, Lord Byron has written:-"The following poem (as most that I have endeavoured to write) is founded on a fact; and this detail is an attempt at a serious imitation of the style of a great poet-its beauties and its defects: I say the style; for the thoughts I claim as my own. In this, if there be any thing ridiculous, let it be attributed to me, at least as much as to Mr. Wordsworth; of whom there can exist few greater admirers than myself. I have blended what I would deem to be the beauties as well as defects of his style; and it ought to be remembered, that, in such things, whether there be praise or dispraise, there is always what is called a compliment, ⚫ver unintentional."] CHURCHILL'S GRAVE.? I STOOD beside the grave of him who blazed The Gardener of that ground, why it might be That for this plant strangers his memory task'd Through the thick deaths of half a century? And thus he answer'd" Well, I do not know Why frequent travellers turn to pilgrims so; He died before my day of Sextonship, And I had not the digging of this grave." I know not what of honour and of light Your honour pleases," then most pleased I shook Diodati, 1815. 3 [ The Grave of Churchill might have called from Lord Byron a deeper commemoration; for, though they generally differed in character and genius, there was a resemblance tween their history and character. The satire of Churcht flowed with a more profuse, though not a more embittered, stream; while, on the other hand, he cannot be compared to Lord Byron in point of tenderness or imagination. But both these poets held themselves above the opinion of the world, and both were followed by the fame and popularity which they seemed to despise. The writings of both exhib an inborn, though sometimes ill-regulated, generosity of mind, and a spirit of proud independence, frequently pushed to extremes. Both carried their hatred of hypocrisy beyond the verge of prudence, and indulged their vein of satire to the borders of licentiousness. Both died in the flower of their age in a foreign land."- SIR WALTER SCOTT. - Churchil died at Boulogne, November 4. 1764, in the thirty-third year of his age." Though his associates obtained Christian burial for him, by bringing the body to Dover, where it was interred in the old cemetery which once belonged to the collegiate church of St. Martin, they inscribed upon his tombstone, 15 A FRAGMENT. PROMETHEUS. TITAN! to whose immortal eyes Were not as things that gods despise ; The rock, the vulture, and the chain, Which speaks but in its loneliness, And then is jealous lest the sky Should have a listener, nor will sigh Until its voice is echoless. Titan! to thee the strife was given Between the suffering and the will, And the inexorable Heaven, And the deaf tyranny of Fate, The ruling principle of Hate, Which for its pleasure doth create The things it may annihilate, Was thine-and thou hast borne it well. That in his hand the lightnings trembled. Thy Godlike crime was to be kind, To render with thy precepts less In the endurance, and repulse Of thine impenetrable Spirit, Which Earth and Heaven could not convulse, A mighty lesson we inherit : Thou art a symbol and a sign To Mortals of their fate and force; A troubled stream from a pure source; And a firm will, and a deep sense, Its own concenter'd recompense, Triumphant where it dares defy, And making Death a Victory. Diodati, July, 1816. stead of any consolatory or monitory text, this Epicurean line from one of his own poems "Life to the last enjoy'd, here Churchill lies." Southey's Cowper, vol. ii. p. 159.] COULD I remount the river of my years To the first fountain of our smiles and tears, What is this Death?-a quiet of the heart? or if yet The absent are the dead for they are cold, And ne'er can be what once we did behold; And they are changed, and cheerless, The unforgotten do not all forget, Since thus divided-equal must it be If the deep barrier be of earth, or sea; It may be both - but one day end it must In the dark union of insensate dust. The under-earth inhabitants are they Or have they their own language? and a sense Diodati, July, 1816. " SONNET TO LAKE LEMAN. But they have made them lovelier, for the lore Of human hearts the ruin of a wall Where dwelt the wise and wondrous; but by thee, How much more, Lake of Beauty! do we feel, In sweetly gliding o'er thy crystal sea, The wild glow of that not ungentle zeal, Which of the heirs of immortality Is proud, and makes the breath of glory real! Diodati, July, 1816. ROMANCE MUY DOLOROSO DEL SITIO Y TOMA DE ALHAMA. El qual dezia en Aravigo assi. PASSEAVASE el Rey Moro Ay de mi, Alhama ! Cartas le fueron venidas Que Alhama era ganada. Las cartas echò en el fuego, Descavalga de una mula, Y en un cavallo cavalga. Ay de mi, Alhama ! Como en el Alhambra estuvo, Al mismo punto mandava Que se toquen las trompetas Ay de mi, Alhama! Y que atambores de guerra Los Moros que el son oyeron, Un gran esquadron formavan. Alli hablò un Moro viejo; Aveys de saber, amigos, Que Christianos, con braveza, Alli hablò un viejo Alfaqui, De barba crecida y cana: Bien se te emplea, buen Rey, Buen Rey; bien se te empleava. Ay de mi, Alhama! Mataste los Bencerrages, Que era la flor de Granada: Cogiste los tornadizos De Cordova la nombrada. Ay de mi, Alhama ! Por esso mereces, Rey, Una pene bien doblada; Que te pierdas tu y el reyno, Y que se pierda Granada. Ay de mi, Alhama ! 1 The effect of the original ballad-which existed both in Spanish and Arabic-was such that it was forbidden Out then spake an aged Moor "Friends! ye have, alas! to know That the Christians, stern and bold, Out then spake old Alfaqui, "By thee were slain, in evil hour, Woe is me, Alhama! "And for this, oh King! is sent Woe is me, Alhama! And to fix thy head upon High Alhambra's loftiest stone; "Cavalier, and man of worth! Woe is me, Alhama! "Sires have lost their children, wives "I lost a damsel in that hour, And as these things the old Moor said, And men and infants therein weep And from the windows o'er the walls SONETTO DI VITTORELLI. PER MONACA. Sonetto composto in nome di un genitore, a cui era morta poco innanzi una figlia appena maritata; e diretto al genitore della sacra sposa. Di due vaghe donzelle, oneste, accorte Il ciel, che degne di più nobil sorte A le fumanti tede d' imeneo : La tua, Francesco, in sugellate porte Irremeabil soglia, ove s' asconde, Corro a quel marmo, in cui la figlia or posa, TRANSLATION FROM VITTORELLL ON A NUN. Sonnet composed in the name of a father, whose daughter But thou at least from out the jealous door, Which shuts between your never-meeting eyes, May'st hear her sweet and pious voice once more: I to the marble, where my daughter lies, STANZAS FOR MUSIC. BRIGHT be the place of thy soul ! No lovelier spirit than thine E'er burst from its mortal control, In the orbs of the blessed to shine. On earth thou wert all but divine, As thy soul shall immortally be; And our sorrow may cease to repine When we know that thy God is with thee. Light be the turf of thy tomb! May its verdure like emeralds be! There should not be the shadow of gloom, In aught that reminds us of thee. Young flowers and an evergreen tree May spring from the spot of thy rest: But nor cypress nor yew let us see; For why should we mourn for the blest? TO THOMAS MOORE. My boat is on the shore, And my bark is on the sea; But, before I go, Tom Moore, Here's a double health to thee: Here's a sigh to those who love me, And a smile to those who hate; And, whatever sky's above me, Here's a heart for every fate. Though the ocean roar around me, Yet it still shall bear me on; Though a desert should surround me, It hath springs that may be won Were't the last drop in the well, As I gasp'd upon the brink, Ere my fainting spirit fell, "Tis to thee that I would drink. With that water, as this wine, STANZAS FOR MUSIC. THEY say that Hope is happiness; But genuine Love must prize the past, And Memory wakes the thoughts that bless: They rose the first-they set the last; And all that Memory loves the most Was once our only Hope to be, And all that Hope adored and lost Hath melted into Memory. Alas! it is delusion all: The future cheats us from afar, Nor can we be what we recall, Nor dare we think on what we are. 1["This should have been written fifteen moons ago: the first stanza was. I am just come out from an hour's swim in the Adriatic." - Lord Byron to Mr. Moore, July 10. 1817.] 2 ["The Helen of Canova (a bust which is in the house July, 1817. ON THE BUST OF HELEN BY CANOVA. Above the works and thoughts of man, Beyond imagination's power, of Madame the Countess d'Albrizzi) is," says Lord Byrol, "without exception, to my mind, the most perfectly beauti of human conceptions, and far beyond my ideas of hum execution." -Lord Byron to Mr. Murray, Nov. 23, 1816] |