And glistening antlers are descried, And gilded flocks appear. Thine is the tranquil hour, purpureal Eve! From worlds not quickened by the sun An intermingling of Heaven's pomp is spread On ground which British shepherds tread! III. And if there be whom broken ties Afflict, or injuries assail, Yon hazy ridges to their eyes Present a glorious scale, Climbing, suffused with sunny air, To stop no record hath told where ! And tempting Fancy to ascend, And with immortal Spirits blend! Wings at my shoulders seem to play; On those bright steps that heavenward raise Come forth, ye drooping old men, look abroad, And wake him with such gentle heed As may attune his soul to meet the dower IV. Such hues from their celestial Urn Were wont to stream before mine eye, This glimpse of glory, why renewed? Dread Power! whom peace and calmness serve O, let thy grace remind me of the light -'Tis past, the visionary splendor fades ; 1818. Note. The multiplication of mountain ridges, described at the commencement of the third Stanza of this Ode as a kind of Jacob's Ladder leading to Heaven, is produced either by watery vapors or sunny haze;-in the present instance, by the latter cause. Allusions to the Ode entitled "Intimations of Immortality" pervade the last Stanza of the foregoing Poem. X. COMPOSED BY THE SEA-SHORE. WHAT mischief cleaves to unsubdued regret, Daily to think on old familiar doors, Hearths loved in childhood, and ancestral floors; Which with the dear Betrothed was to come, Or in a dream recalled, whose smoothest range A less imperious sympathy is due, Such as my verse now yields, while moonbeams play Such as will promptly flow from every breast, XI. THE Crescent-moon, the Star of Love, Speak one of you, my doubts remove, Which is the attendant Page and which the Queen? XII. TO THE MOON. (Composed by the Sea-side, -on the Coast of Cumberland.) WANDERER! that stoop'st so low, and com'st so near To human life's unsettled atmosphere; Who lov'st with Night and Silence to partake, So might it seem, the cares of them that wake; I slight them all; and, on this sea-beat shore That bid me hail thee as the SAILOR'S FRIEND; So call thee for Heaven's grace through thee made known, By confidence supplied and mercy shown, And for less obvious benefits, that find Their way, with thy pure help, to heart and mind; Both for the adventurer starting in life's prime, And veteran ranging round from clime to clime, Long-baffled hope's slow fever in his veins, And wounds and weakness oft his labor's sole remains. The aspiring Mountains and the winding Streams, Empress of Night! are gladdened by thy beams; A look of thine the wilderness pervades, And penetrates the forest's inmost shades; |