Few words they speak, nor dare to slack Their pace from mile to mile, Till they have crossed the quaking marsh, And reached the lonely Isle. The sun above the pine-trees showed A bright and cheerful face; And Ina looked for her abode, The promised hiding-place; She sought in vain, the Woodman smiled; No threshold could be seen, Nor roof, nor window ;-all seemed wild As it had ever been. Advancing, you might guess an hour, As shaggy as were wall and roof So smooth was all within, air-proof, And hearth was there, and maple dish, And cups in seemly rows, And couch-all ready to a wish For nurture or repose; And Heaven doth to her virtue grant That here she may abide In solitude, with every want By cautious love supplied. No queen, before a shouting crowd, E'er struggled with a heart so proud, "Father of all, upon thy care And mercy am I thrown; Be thou my safeguard!"-such her prayer When she was left alone, Kneeling amid the wilderness. When joy had passed away, And smiles, fond efforts of distress To hide what they betray! The prayer is heard, the Saints have seen, Diffused through form and face, Resolves devotedly serene; That monumental grace Of Faith, which doth all passions tame And shows in the untrembling frame PART III. 'Tis sung in ancient minstrelsy Till Daphne, desperate with pursuit At her own prayer transformed, took root, Then did the Penitent adorn His brow with laurel green; And 'mid his bright locks never shorn No meaner leaf was seen; And poets sage, through every age, About their temples wound The bay; and conquerors thanked the Gods, With laurel chaplets crowned. Into the mists of fabling Time That scorns temptation; power defies Where mutual love is not; And to the tomb for rescue flies When life would be a blot. To this fair Votaress, a fate More mild doth Heaven ordain Upon her Island desolate; And words, not breathed in vain, Might tell what intercourse she found, Her silence to endear; What birds she tamed, what flowers the ground Sent forth her peace to cheer. To one mute Presence, above all, A picture on the cabin wall By Russian usage hung The Mother-maid, whose countenance bright With love abridged the day; And, communed with by taper light, Chased spectral fears away. And oft, as either Guardian came, Might any common friendship shame, So high their hearts would beat; But, when she of her Parents thought, Before her flight she had not dared Too much the heroic Daughter feared Dark is the past to them, and dark Till pitying Saints conduct her bark Or gentle Nature close her eyes, Yet, when above the forest-glooms The white swans southward passed, High as the pitch of their swift pluies And bore her toward the fields of France To mingle in the rustic dance, Of those beloved fields she oft She saw the hereditary bowers, She heard the ancestral stream; VOL. IV. B B |