But now the clear bright Moon her zenith gains, A peace enlivened, not disturbed, by wreaths The song of mountain-streams, unheard by day, Now hardly heard, beguiles my homeward way. Air listens, like the sleeping water, still, To catch the spiritual music of the hill, Broke only by the slow clock tolling deep, Or shout that wakes the ferry-man from.sleep, The echoed hoof nearing the distant shore, The boat's first motion-made with dashing oar; Sound of closed gate, across the water borne, Hurrying the timid hare through rustling corn; The sportive outcry of the mocking owl ; And at long intervals the mill-dog's howl; The distant forge's swinging thump profound; Or yell, in the deep woods, of lonely hound. IV. 1787, 8, & 9. LINES WRITTEN WHILE SAILING IN A BOAT AT EVENING. How richly glows the water's breast While, facing thus the crimson west, Such views the youthful Bard allure; 1789. VI. DESCRIPTIVE SKETCHES TAKEN DURING A PEDESTRIAN TOUR AMONG THE ALPS. TO THE REV. ROBERT JONES, FELLOW OF ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. DEAR SIR, HOWEVER desirous I might have been of giving you proofs of the high place you hold in my esteem, I should have been cautious of wounding your delicacy by thus publicly addressing you, had not the circumstance of our having been companions among the Alps, seemed to give this dedication a propriety sufficient to do away any scruples which your modesty might otherwise have suggested. *Collins's Ode on the death of Thomson, the last written, I believe, of the poems which were published during his life-time. This Ode is also alluded to in the next stanza. In inscribing this little work to you, I consult my heart. You know well how great is the difference between two companions lolling in a post-chaise, and two travellers plodding slowly along the road, side by side, each with his little knapsack of necessaries upon his shoulders. How much more of heart between the two latter! I am happy in being conscious that I shall have one reader who will approach the conclusion of these few pages with regret. You they must certainly interest, in reminding you of moments to which you can hardly look back without a pleasure not the less dear from a shade of melancholy. You will meet with few images without recollecting the spot where we observed them together; consequently, Whatever is feeble in my design, or spiritless in my colouring, will be amply supplied by your own memory. With still greater propriety I might have inscribed to you a description of some of the features of your native mountains, through which we have wandered together, in the same manner, with so much pleasure. But the seasunsets, which give such splendour to the vale of Clwyd, Snowdon, the chair of Idris, the quiet village of Bethgelert, Menai and her Druids, the Alpine steeps of the Conway, and the still more interesting windings of the wizard stream of the Dee, remain yet untouched. Apprehensive that my pencil may never be exercised on these subjects, I cannot let slip this opportunity of thus publicly assuring you with how much affection and esteem Happiness (if she had been to be found on earth) among the charms of Nature-Pleasures of the pedestrian Traveller-Author crosses France to the Alps-Present state of the Grande Chartreuse-Lake of Como-Time, Sunset Same Scene, Twilight-Same Scene, Morning; its voluptuous Character; Old man and forest-cottage music-River Tusa-Via Mala and Grison GipsySckellenen-thal-Lake of Uri-Stormy sunset-Chapel of William Tell-Force of local emotion-Chamoischaser-View of the higher Alps-manner of life of a Swiss mountaineer, interspersed with views of the higher Alps-Golden age of the Alps-Life and views continued -Ranz des Vaches, famous Swiss Air-Abbey of Einsiedlen and its pilgrims-Valley of Chamouny-Mont Blanc -Slavery of Savoy-Influence of liberty on cottage-happiness-France-Wish for the Extirpation of slavery— Conclusion. WERE there, below, a spot of holy ground Yet not unrecompensed the man shall roam, Who at the call of summer quits his home, And plods through some wide realm o'er vale and height, Though seeking only holiday delight; A hope, that prudence could not then approve, That clung to Nature with a truant's love, O'er Gallia's wastes of corn my footsteps led; Her files of road-elms, high above my head In long-drawn vista, rustling in the breeze; Or where her pathways straggle as they please By lonely farms and secret villages. But lo! the Alps ascending white in air, Toy with the sun and glitter from afar. And now, emerging from the forest's gloom, I greet thee, Chartreuse, while I mourn thy doom. Whither is fled that Power whose frown severe Awed sober Reason till she crouched in fear? That Silence, once in deathlike fetters bound, Chains that were loosened only by the sound Of holy rites chanted in measured round? The lyre of Memnon is reported to have emitted melancholy or cheerful tones, as it was touched by the sun's evening or morning rays. -The voice of blasphemy the fane alarms, The cloister startles at the gleam of arms. The thundering tube the aged angler hears, Slow glides the sail along the illumined shore, Bent o'er the groaning flood that sweeps away his And amorous music on the water dies. tears. Cloud-piercing pine-trees nod their troubled heads, Spires, rocks, and lawns a browner night o'erspreads; Strong terror checks the female peasant's sighs, Vallombre +, 'mid her falling fanes, deplores, More pleased, my foot the hidden margin roves From ringing team apart and grating wain— * Alluding to crosses seen on the tops of the spiry rocks of Chartreuse, which have every appearance of being inaccessible. Names of rivers at the Chartreuse. ‡ Name of one of the valleys of the Chartreuse. How blest, delicious scene! the eye that greets Thy open beauties, or thy lone retreats; Beholds the unwearied sweep of wood that scales Thy cliffs; the endless waters of thy vales; Thy lowly cots that sprinkle all the shore, Each with its household boat beside the door; Thy torrents shooting from the clear-blue sky; Thy towns, that cleave, like swallows' nests, on high; That glimmer hoar in eve's last light, descried Dim from the twilight water's shaggy side, Whence lutes and voices down the enchanted woods Steal, and compose the oar-forgotten floods; -Thy lake, that, streaked or dappled, blue or grey, 'Mid smoking woods gleams hid from morning's ray Yet are thy softer arts with power indued To soothe and cheer the poor man's solitude. By silent cottage-doors, the peasant's home Left vacant for the day, I loved to roam. But once I pierced the mazes of a wood In which a cabin undeserted stood; There an old man an olden measure scanned On a rude viol touched with withered hand. As lambs or fawns in April clustering lie Under a hoary oak's thin canopy, Stretched at his feet, with stedfast upward eye, His children's children listened to the sound; --A Hermit with his family around! But let us hence; for fair Locarno smiles Embowered in walnut slopes and citron isles : Or seek at eve the banks of Tusa's stream, Where, 'mid dim towers and woods, her water's gleam. From the bright wave, in solemn gloom, retire The dull-red steeps, and, darkening still, aspire Or on her fingers counts the distant clock, From the green vale of Urseren smooth and wide Descend we now, the maddened Reuss our guide; By rocks that, shutting out the blessed day, Cling tremblingly to rocks as loose as they ; By cells upon whose image, while he prays, The kneeling peasant scarcely dares to gaze; * Round undistinguished clouds, and rocks, and By many a votive death-cross + planted near, snow: 1 Or, led where Via Mala's chasms confine The indignant waters of the infant Rhine, Hang o'er the abyss, whose else impervious gloom His burning eyes with fearful light illume. The mind condemned, without reprieve, to go O'er life's long deserts with its charge of woe, With sad congratulation joins the train Where beasts and men together o'er the plain Move on a mighty caravan of pain: Hope, strength, and courage, social suffering brings, Freshening the wilderness with shades and springs. -There be whose lot far otherwise is cast: When lightning among clouds and mountain snows Predominates, and darkness comes and goes, Itself all trembling at the torrent's power. Nor is she more at ease on some still night, When not a star supplies the comfort of its light; Only the waning moon hangs dull and red Above a melancholy mountain's head, Then sets. In total gloom the Vagrant sighs, Stoops her sick head, and shuts her weary eyes; * The river along whose banks you descend in crossing the Alps by the Simplon Pass. Most of the bridges among the Alps are of wood, and covered: these bridges have a heavy appearance, and rather injure the effect of the scenery in some places. And watered duly with the pious tear, But soon a peopled region on the sight Opens a little world of calm delight; Where mists, suspended on the expiring gale, Spread rooflike o'er the deep secluded vale, And beams of evening slipping in between, Gently illuminate a sober scene :— Here, on the brown wood-cottages they sleep, There, over rock or sloping pasture creep. On as we journey, in clear view displayed, The still vale lengthens underneath its shade Of low-hung vapour : on the freshened mead The green light sparkles;-the dim bowers recede. While pastoral pipes and streams the landscape lull, And bells of passing mules that tinkle dull, In solemn shapes before the admiring eye Dilated hang the misty pines on high, Huge convent domes with pinnacles and towers, And antique castles seen through gleamy showers. From such romantic dreams, my soul, awake! To sterner pleasure, where, by Uri's lake In Nature's pristine majesty outspread, Winds neither road nor path for foot to tread : The rocks rise naked as a wall, or stretch, Far o'er the water, hung with groves of beech; Aerial pines from loftier steeps ascend, Nor stop but where creation seems to end. Yet here and there, if mid the savage scene Appears a scanty plot of smiling green, The Catholic religion prevails here: these cells are, as is well known, very common in the Catholic countries, planted, like the Roman tombs, along the road side. † Crosses, commemorative of the deaths of travellers by the fall of snow, and other accidents, are very common along this dreadful road. The houses in the more retired Swiss valleys are all built of wood. Up from the lake a zigzag path will creep For whom at morning tolled the funeral bell; And what if ospreys, cormorants, herons cry, ray; Contentment shares the desolate domain Swoln with incessant rains from hour to hour, But, lo! the boatman, overawed, before The pictured fane of Teli suspends his oar; Confused the Marathonian tale appears, Or rouse and agitate his labouring soul? On Zutphen's plain; or on that highland dell, And the last sunbeam fell on Bayard's eye; But now with other mind I stand alone Where silent Hours their death-like sway extend, 'Tis his, while wandering on from height to height, To see a planet's pomp and steady light To him the day-star glitters small and bright, *For most of the images in the next sixteen verses, I am indebted to M. Raymond's interesting observations annexed to his translation of Coxe's Tour in Switzerland. |