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PR
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1846
uhini;ton, Pa.
LIBRARY
UNIVERSITY or
CALIFORNIA
SAN OiEGO
J
v.^X',
LIBRARY
UNIVERSITY OF
CALIFORNIA
SAN DIEGO
I>rawn "by RWestall^aA.
E";;Q;"awed'b7Z.G.Perldns.
THE
POETICAL WORKS
OF
THOMAS CAMPBELL:
INCLVDIITG
THEODRIC,
AND
MANY OTHER PIECES NOT CONTAINED IN ANY
FORMER EDITION.
PHILADELPHIA:
CRISSY & MARKLEY, No. 4 MINOR STREET.
184 6.
CONTENTS.
Page.
Pleasures of Hope, Pari 1 7
Part II 29
Gertrude of Wyoming, Part 1 47
• . Part II. . . ... 57
Part III 65
O'Connor's Child, or the Flower of Love lies bleeding 78
Lochiel's Warning . 87
Specimens of Translation from Medea .... 90
Speech of the Chorus in the same Tragedy . . 91
Love and Madness, an Elegy 95
The Wounded Hussar 97
Gilderoy 98
The Harper 100
Song — " My mind is my kingdom," &c. . . . 101
The Beech Tree's Petition ib.
Hohenlinden 102
Ye Mariner's of England, a Naval Ode . . .103
Glenara 105
Battle of the Baltic 106
Lord Ullin's Daughter . lOS
Lines on the Grave of a Suicide Ill
Ode to Winter 112
The Soldier's Dream 114
The Turkish Lady 115
Exile of Erin 116
Lines written at the request of the Highland So-
ciety in London, when met to commemorate
the 21st of March, the day of victory in
Egypt ............. 117
Lines written on visiting a scene in Argyleshire . 119
Patriotic Stanzas composed and recited at a meet-
ing of North Britons, in London, on Monday
the 8th of August, 1803 120
IV CONTENTS.
Page.
Caroline, Part 1 121
. . . Part II 123
Ode to the Memory of Burns 124
Theodric, a Domestic Tale 128
To the Rainbow 145
The Brave Roland 147
The Spectre Boat 148
Song — To the Evening Star 150
Valedictory Stanzas to J. P. Kemble, Esq. . .157
Lines, spoken by Mr. * * *, at Drury Lane Theatre,
on the first opening of the house after the death
of the Princess Charlotte, 1817 153
Lines on receiving a Seal, with the Campbell crest,
from K. M , before her marriage . . .155
Stanzas to the memory of the Spanish patriots
latest killed in resisting the Regency and the
Duke of Angouleme 157
Lmes mscnbed on the monument of Sir G. Campbell 158
Song of the Greeks 159
The Lover to his Mistress, on her birthday . . 161
Song—" Men of England," 162
Adelgitha 163
Song — " Drink ye to her," &c ib.
" When Napoleon was flying," &c. . .164
" Oh how hard it is to find," &,c. . . . ib.
. . "Earl March looked on his dying child," &c. 165
Absence 166
Song — " Withdraw not yet those lips," &c. . . ib
The Last Man 16^
The Ritter Bann 169
A Dream 175
HeuUura 177
NOTES.
Pleasures of Hope, Part 1 1
Part II 5
Gertrude of Wyoming, Part 1 6
Part III 21
O'Connor's Child, or the Flower of Love lies bleed-
ing 24
Lxfchiel's Warning 30
Theodric 36
PLEASURES OF HOPE.
PART 1.
ANALYSIS OF PART I.
The poem opens with a comparison between the beauty of
remote objects in a landscape, and those ideal scenes of felicity
which the imagination delights to contemplate — the influence
of anticipation upon the other passions is next delineated — an
allusion is made to the well knoivn fiction in pagan tradition,
that, when all the guardian deities of mankind abandoned the
world, Hope alone was left behind — the consolations of this
passion in situations of danger and distress — the seaman on his
midnight watch — the soldier marching into battle — allusion to
the interesting adventures of Byron.
The inspiration of Hope, as it actuates the efforts of genius,
whether in the department of science or of taste — domestic
felicity, how intimely connected with views of future hap-
piness — picture of a mother watching her infant when asleep —
pictures of the prisoner, the maniac, and the ivanderer.
From the consolations of individual misery, a transition is
made to prospects of political improvenicnt in the future state
of society — the wide field that is yet open for the progress of
humanizing arts among uncivilized rations — from these views
of amelioration of society, and the extension of liberty and truth
over despotic and barbarous countries, by melancholy contrast
of ideas we are led to reflect upon the hard fate of a brava
people, recently conspicuous in their struggles for indepen-
dence — description of the capture of Warsaw, of the last con-
test of the oppressors and the oppressed, and the massacre of
the Polish patriots at the bridge of Prague — apostrophe to tlie
self-interested enemies of human improvement — the wrongs
of Africa — the barbarous policy of Europeans in India — pro-
phecy in the Hindoo mythology of the expected descent of tlie
Deity, to redress the miseries of their race, and to take ven-
geance on the violators of justice and mercy
THE
PLEASURES OF HOPE.
PART I.
At summer eve, when Heav'n's aerial bow
Spans with bright arch the glittering hills below,
Why to yon mountain turns the musing eye,
Whose sun-bright summit mingles with the sky?
Why do those cliffs of shadowy tint appear
More sweet than all the landscape smiling near ? —
'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view,
And robes the mountain in its azure hue.
Thus, with delight, we linger to survey
The promised joys of life's unmeasured way;
Thus, from afar, each dim-discovered scene
More pleasing seems than all the past hath been ;
And every form, that fancy can repair
From dark oblivion, glows divinely there.
W'hat potent spirit guides the raptured eye
To pierce the shades of dim futurity?
Can Wisdom lend, with all her heav'nly power,
The pledge of Joy's anticipated hour ?
Ah, no ! she darkly sees the fate of man —
Her dim horizon bounded to a span ;
Or, if she hold an image to the view,
'"Tis Nature pictured too severely true.
With thee, sweet Hope ! resides the heavenly light
That pours remotest rapture on the sight :
Thine is the charm of life's bewilder'd way.
That calls each slumb'ring passion into play ;
8 Campbell's poems.
Wak'd by thy touch, I see the sister band,
On tiptoe watching, start at thy command.
And fly where'er thy mandate bids them steer,
To Pleasure's path, or Glory's bright career.
Primeval Hope, the Aonian Muses say,
When Man and Nature mourned their first decay;
When every form of death, and every wo.
Shot from malignant stars to earth below ;
When Murder bared his arm, and rampant War
Yoked the red dragons of her iron car ;
When Peace and Mercy, banished from the plain,
Sprung on the viewless winds to Heav'n again ;
All, all forsook the friendless guilty mind,
But Hope, the charmer, lingered still behind.
Thus, while Elijah's burning wl'.°els prepare
From Carmel's height to sweep the fields of air.
The Prophet's mantle, ere his flight began.
Dropped on the world — a sacred gift to man.
Auspicious Hope ! in thy sweet garden grow
Wreaths for each toil, a charm for every wo :
Won by their sweets, in nature's languid hour
The way-worn pilgrim seeks thy summer bower ;
There, as the wild-bee murmurs on the wing,
What peaceful dreams thy handmaid spirits bring !
What viewless forms th' ^olian organ play,
And sweep the furrow'd lines of anxious thought away
Angel of life ! thy glittering wings explore
Earth's loneliest bounds, and ocean's wildest shore.
Lo ! to the wint'ry winds the pilot yields
His bark careering o'er unfathomed fields ^
Now on Atlantic waves he rides afar,
Where Andes, giant of the western star,
Campbell's poems. 9
With meteor standard to the winds unfurled.
Looks from his throne of clouds o'er half the world.
Now far he sweeps, where scarce a summer smiles,
On Behring's rocks, or Greenland's naked isles :
Cold on his midnight watch the breezes blow,
From wastes that slumber in eternal snow ;
And waft, across the waves' tumultuous roar,
The wolf's long howl from Oonalaska's shore.
■o
Poor child of danger, nursling of the storm.
Sad are the woes that wreck thy manly form !
Rocks, waves, and winds, the shatter'd bark delay '
Thy heart is sad, thy home is far away.
But Hope can here her moonlight vigils keep.
And sing to charm the spirit of the deep.
Swift as yon streamer lights the stam-y pole.
Her visions warm the watchman's pensive soul :
His native hills that rise in happier climes,
The grot that heard his song of other times.
His cottage-home, his bark of slender sail,
His glassy lake, and broomwood-blossomed vale,
Rush on his thought ; he sweeps before the wind,
Treads the loved shore he sighed to leave behind ;
Meets at each step a friend's familiar face.
And flies at last to Helen's long embrace ;
Wipes from her cheek the rapture-speaking tear,
And clasps, with many a sigh, his children dear !
While, long neglected, but at length caressed.
His faithful dog salutes the smiling guest,
Points to the master's eyes (where'er they roam)
His wistful face, and whines a welcome home.
Friend of the brave ! in peril's darkest hour,
Intrepid Virtue looks to thee for power ;
10 CAMPBELL S POEMS.
To thee the heart its trembling homage yields,
On stormy floods, and carnage-covered fields.
When front to front the bannered hosts combine,
Halt ere they close, and form the dreadful line ;
When all is still on Death's devoted soil,
The march-worn soldier mingles for the toil ;
As rings his glittering tube, he lifts on high
The dauntless brow, and spirit-speaking eye,
Hails in his heart the triumph yet to come.
And hears thy stormy music in th.e drum.
And such thy strength-inspiring aid that bore
The hardy Byron to his native shore. — (a)
In horrid climes, where Chiloe's tempests sweep
Tumultuous murmurs o'er the troubled deep,
'Twas his to mourn misfortune's rudest shock,
Scourged by the winds, and cradled on the rock,
To wake each joyless morn, and search again
The famished naunts of solitary men.
Whose race, un^ ielding as their native storm,
Knows not a trace of Nature but the form ;
Yet^ at thy call, the hardy tar pursued,
Pale, but intrepid, sad, but unsubdued.
Pierced the deep woods, and, hailing from afar
The moon's pale planet and the northern star ;
Paused at each dreary cry, unheard before.
Hyaenas in the wild, and mermaids on the shore <
Till, led by thee o'er many a cliff sublime,
He found a warmer world, a milder clime,
A home to rest, a shelter to defend,
Peace and repose, a Briton and a friend ! (V)
Congenial Hope ! thy passion-kindling power,
How bright, how strong, in youth's untroubled hour
On yon proud height, with Genius hand in hand,
I see thee light, and wave thy golden wand.
Campbell's poetms, 1 1
" Go, Child of heaven, (thy winged words proclaim)
'Tis thine to search the boundless fields of fame !
Lo ! Newton, priest of Nature, shines afar.
Scans the wide world, and numbers every star !
Wilt thou, with him, mysterious rites apply,
And watch the shrine with wonder-beaming eye ?
Yes, thou shalt mark, with magic art profound,
The speed of light, the circling march of sound ;
With Franklin, grasp the lightning's fiery wing.
Or yield the lyre of Heaven another string, (c)
" The Swedish sage admires, in yonder bowers, (c?)
Plis winged insects, and his rosy flowers ;
Calls from their woodland haunts the savage train
With sounding horn, and counts them on the plain —
So once, at Heaven's command, the wand'rers came
To Eden's shade, and heard their various name.
" Far from the world, in yon sequestered clime,
Slow pass the sons of Wisdom, more sublime ;
Calm as the fields of Heav'n his sapient eye
The loved Athenian lifts to realms on high ;
Admiring Plato, on his spotless page,
Stamps the bright dictates of the father sage ;
' Shall Nature bound to earth's diurnal span
The fire of God, tli' immortal soul of man ?'
" Turn, Child of Heaven, thy rapture-lightened eye
To Wisdom's walk, — the sacred Nine are nigh :
Hark '. from bright spires that gild the Delphian height,
From streams that wander in eternal light,
Ranged on their hill, Harmonia's daughters swell
The mingling tones of horn, and harp, and shell ;
Deep from his vaults the Loxian murmurs flow, (e)
And Pythia's awful organ peals below.
Campbell's poems.
" Beloved of Heaven ! the smiling Muse shall shed
Her moonlight halo on thy beauteous head ;
Shall swell thy heart to rapture unconfined,
And breathe a holy madness o'er thy mind.
! see thee roam her guardian power beneath,
And talk with spirits on the midnight heath ;
Inquire of guilty wanderers whence they came,
And ask each blood-stained form his earthly name ;
Then weave in rapid verse the deeds they tell,
And read the trembling world the tales of hell.
" When Venus, throned in clouds of rosy hue.
Flings from her golden urn the vesper dew,
And bids fond man her glimmering noon employ,
Sacred to love and walks of tender joy;
A milder mood the goddess shall recall,
And soft as dew thy tones of music fall ;
While Beauty's deeply-pictured smiles impart
A pang more dear than pleasure to the heart —
Warm as thy sighs shall flow the Lesbian strain,
And plead in Beauty's ear, nor plead in vain.
" Or wilt thou Orphean hymns more sacred deem,
And steep thy song in Mercy's mellow stream ;
To pensive drops the radiant ey=» beguile —
For Beauty's tears are lovelier tuan her smile ;
On Nature's throbbing anguish pour relief.
And teach impassioned souls the joy of grief?
" Yes ; to thy tongue shall seraph words be given.
And power on earth to plead the cause of heaven :
The proud, the cold, untroubled heart of stone,
That never mused on sorrow but its own,
Unlocks a generous store at thy command.
Like Horeb's rocks beneath the prophet's hand. (/)
Campbell's poems. 13
The living lumber of his kindred earth,
Charmed into soul, receives a second birth ;
Feels thy dread power another heart atYord,
Whose passion-touched harmonious strings accord
True as the circling spheres to Nature's plan ;
And man, the brother, lives the friend of man '.
" Bright as the pillar rose at Heaven's command,
When Israel marched along the desert land.
Blazed through the night on lonely wilds afar,
And told the path— a never-setting star:
So, heavenly Genius, in thy course divine,
Hope is thy star, her light is ever thine."
Propitious Power ! when rankling cares annoy
The sacred home of Hymenean joy ;
When doomed to Poverty's sequestered dell,
The wedded pair of love and virtue dwell,
Unpitied by the world, unknown to fame,
Their woes, their wishes, and their hearts the same —
Oh there, prophetic hope ! thy smile bestow,
And chase the pangs that worth should never know —
There, as the parent deals his scanty store
To friendless babes, and weeps to give no more,
Tell, that his manly race shall yet assuage
Their father's wrongs, and shield his later age.
What though for him no Hybla sweets distil.
Nor bloomy vines wave purple on the hill ;
Tell, that when silent years have passed away.
That when his eyes grow dim, his tresses grey.
These busy hands a lovelier cot shall build.
And deck with fairer flowers his little field,
And call from Heaven propitious dews to breathe
Arcadian beauty on the barren heath ;
Tell, that while Love's spontaneous smile endeari
The days of peace, the sabbath of his years,
14 Campbell's poems.
Health shall prolong to many a festive hour
The social pleasures of his humble power.
Lo ! at the couch where infant beauty sleeps,
Her silent watch the mournful mother keeps ;
She, while the lovely babe unconscious lies,
Smiles on her slumb'ring child with pensive eyes,
And weaves a song of melancholy joy —
" Sleep, image of thy father, sleep, my boy:
No lingering hour of sorrow shall be thine ;
No sigh that rends thy father's heart and mine ;
Bright as his manly sire, the son shall be
In form and soul ; but, ah ! more blest than he !
Thy fame, thy worth, thy filial love, at last.
Shall soothe this aching heart for all the past —
With many a smile my solitude repay,
And chase the world's ungenerous scorn away.
" A.nd say, when summoned from the world and thee
I lay my head beneath the willow tree,
Wilt thou, sweet mourner ! at my stone appear,
And soothe my parted spirit ling'ring near ?
Oh, wilt thou come, at evening hour, to shed
The tears of Memory o'er my narrow bed ;
With aching temples on thy hand reclined,
Muse on the last farewell I leave behind,
Breathe a deep sigh to winds that murmur low,
And think on all my love, and all my wo ?"
So speaks affection, ere the infant eye
Can look regard, or brighten in reply ;
But when the cherub lip hath learnt to claim
A mother's ear by that endearing name ;
Soon as the playful innocent can prove
A tear of pity, or a smile of love.
Campbell's poems. 15
Or cons his murmuring taslc beneath her care,
Or lisps with holy look Ids ev'ning prayer,
Or gazing, mutely pensive, sits to hear
The mournful ballad warbled in his ear ;
How fondly looks admiring Hope the while,
At every artless tear, and every smile !
How glows the joyous parent to descry
A guileless bosom, true to sympathy !
Where is the troubled heart, consigned to share
Tumultuous toils, or solitary care,
Unbiest by visionary thoughts that stray
To count the joys of Fortune's better day !
Lo, nature, life, and liberty relume
The dim-eyed tenant of the dungeon gloom,
A long-lost friend, or hapless child restored,
Smiles at his blazing hearth and social board ;
Warm from his heart the tears of rapture flow.
And virtue triumphs o'er remembered wo.
Chide not his peace, proud Reason ! nor destroy
The shadowy forms of uncreated joy,
That urge the lingering tide of life, and pour
Spontaneous slumber on his midnight hour.
Hark ! the wild maniac sings, to chide the gale
That wafts so slow her lover's distant sail ;
She, sad spectatress, on the wintry shore
Watched the rude surge his shroudless corse that bore,
Knew the pale form, and, shrieking in amaze.
Clasped her cold hands, and fixed her maddening gaze :
Poor widowed wretch ! 'twas there she wept in vain.
Till memory fled her agonizing brain : —
But Mercy gave, to charm the sense of wo.
Ideal peace, that truth could ne'er bestow ;
16 Campbell's poems.
Warm on her heart the joys of Fancy beam,
And aimless Hope delights her darkest dream.
Oft when yon moon has climbed the midnight SKy,
And the lone seabird wakes its wildest cry,
Piled on the steep, her blazing faggots burn
To hail the bark that never can return ;
And still she waits, but scarce forbears to weep,
That constant love can linger on the deep.
And, mark the wretch, whose wanderings never knew
iTie world's regard, that soothes, though half untrue,
Whose erring heart the lash of sorrow bore,
But found not pity when it erred no more.
Yon friendless man, at whose dejected eye
Th' unfeeling proud one looks — and passes by ;
Condemned on Penury's barren path to roam,
Scorned by the world, and left without a home —
Ev'n he, at evening, should he chance to stray
Down by the hamlet's hawthorn-scented way,
Where, round the cot's romantic glade are seen
The blossomed bean-field, and the sloping green,
Leans o'er its humble gate, and thinks the while —
Oh ! that for me some home like this would smile,
Some hamlet shade, to yield my sickly form,
HeaUh in the breeze, and shelter in the storm !
There should my hand no stinted boon assign
To wretched hearts with sorrow such as mine !
That generous wish can soothe unpitied care.
And Hope half mingles with the poor man's prayer.
Hope ! when I mourn, with sympathizing mind,
The wrongs of fate, the woes of human kind,
Thy blissful omens bid my spirit see
The boundless fields of rapture yet to be
Campbell's poems. 17
I wntcli the wlicels of Nature's mazy plan
And learn the future by the past of man.
Come, bright Improvement ! on the car of Time,
And rule the spacious world from clime to clime ;
Thy handmaid arts shall every wild explore,
Trace every wave, and culture every shore.
On Erie's banks, where tygers steal along.
And the dread Indian chants a dismal song.
Where human fiends on midnight errands walk,
And bathe in brains the murderous tomahawk',
There shall the flocks on thymy pasture stray.
And shepherds dance at Summer's opening day;
Each wand'ring genius of the lonely glen
Shall start to view the glittering haunts of men ;
And silent watch, on woodland heights around,
The village curfew, as it tolls profound.
Tn Libyan groves, where damned rites are done,
That bathe the rocks in blood, and veil the sun.
Truth shall arrest the murderous arm profane.
Wild Obi flies (i) — the veil is rent in twain.
Where barb'rous hoards on Scythian mountains roam,
Truth, Mercy, Freedom, yet shall find a home ;
Where'er degraded Nature bleeds and pines,
From Guinea's coast to Sibir's dreary mines, (,»•)
Truth shall pervade th' unfathomed darkness there,
And light the dreadful features of despair. —
Hark ! the stern captive spurns his heavy load.
And asks the image back that Heaven bestowed :
Fierce in his eyes the fire of valour burns.
And, as the slave departs, the man returns !
Oh ! sacred Truth ! thy triumph ceased awhile.
And Hope, thy sister, ceased with thee to smile,
B 2
18 Campbell's poems.
When leagued Oppression poured to northern wars
Her whiskered pandoors and her fierce hussars,
Waved her dread standard to the breeze of morn,
Pealed her loud drum, and twanged her trumpet horn ;
Tumultuous horror brooded o'er her van,
Presaging ^vrath to Poland — and to man ! (/i)
Warsaw's last champion, from her height surveyed,
Wide o'er the fields, a waste of ruin laid, —
Oh ! Heaven ! he cried, my bleeding country save ;
Is there no hand on high to shield the brave.
Yet, though destruction sweep these lovely plains,
Rise, fellow-men ! our country yet remains !
By that dread name, we wave the sword on high,
And sweai- for her to live ! — with her to die !
He said, and on the rampart-heights arrayed
His trusty warriors, few, but undismaj^ed !
Firm-paced and slow, a horrid front they form.
Still as the breeze, but dreadful as the storm ;
Low, murmuring sounds along their banners fly,
Revenge, or death, — the watchword and reply ;
Then pealed the notes, omnipotent to charm,
\nd the loud tocsin tolled their last alarm ! —
In vain, alas ! in vain, ye gallant few !
From rank to rank your volleyed thunder flew :
Oh ! bloodiest picture in the book of Time,
Sarmatia fell, unwept, without a crime ;
Found not a generous friend, a pitying foe,
Strength in her arms, nor mercy in her wo !
Dropt from her nerveless grasp the shattered spear,
Closed her bright eye, and curbed her high career! —
Hope, for a season, bade the world farewell.
And Freedom shrieked — as Kosciusko fell I
CAMPBELL'S POEMS
The sun went down, nor ceased the carnage there,
Tumultuous murder shook the midnight air —
On Prague's proud arch the fires of ruin glow,
His blood-dyed waters murm'ring far below ;
The storm prevails, the ramparts yield away,
Bursts the wild cry of horror and dismay;
Hark ! as the smouldering piles with thunder fall,
A thousand shrieks for hopeless mercy call !
Earth shook — red meteors flashed along the sky,
And conscious Nature shuddered at the cry !
Oh ! Righteous Heaven ! ere Freedom found a grave,
Why slept thy sword, omnipotent to save ?
Where was thine arm, O Vengeance ! where thy rod,
That smote the foes of Zion and of God,
That crushed proud Amnion, when his iron car
Was yoked in wrath, and thundered from afar?
Where was the storm that slumbered till the host
Of blood-stained Pharaoh left their trembling coast!
Then bade the deep in wild commotion flow.
And heaved an ocean on their march below ?
Departed spirits of the mighty dead !
Ye that at Marathon and Leuctra bled !
Friends of the world 1 restore your swords to man,
Fight in his sacred cause, and lead the van !
Yet for Sarmatia's tears of blood atone.
And make her arm puissant as your own !
Oh ! once again to Freedom's cause return
The patriot Tell — the Bruce of Baiinockburn !
Yes '. thy proud lords, unpitying land ! shall see
That man hath yet a soul — and dare be free ;
A little while, along thy saddening plains,
The starless ni^ht of desolation reiirris ;
20 Campbell's poems
Truth shall restore the light by Nature given
And, like Prometheus, bring the fire of Heaven I
Prone to the dust Oppression shall be hurled, —
Her name, her nature, withered from the world !
Ye that the rising moon invidious mark,
And hate the light — because your deeds are dark ;
Ye that expanding truth invidious view.
And think, or wish the song of Hope untrue !
Perhaps your little hands presume to span
The march of Genius, and the pow'rs of Man ;
Perhaps ye watch, at Pride's unhallowed shrine.
Her victims, newly slain, and thus divine : —
" Here shall thy triumph, Genius, cease ; and here
Truth, Science, Virtue, close your short career."
Tyi'ants ! in vain ye trace the wizard ring ;
In vain ye limit Mind's unwearied spring :
What ! can ye lull the winged winds asleep,
Arrest the rolling world, or chain the deep?
No : — the wild wave contemns your sceptered hand ;
It rolled not back when Canute gave command !
Man! can thy doom no brighter soul allow?
Still must thou live a blot on Nature's brow ?
Shall War's polluted banner ne'er be furled ?
Shall crimes and tyrants cease but with the world r
What ! are thy triumphs, sacred Truth, belied ?
Why then hath Plato lived — or Sidney died ?
Ye fond adorers of departed fame.
Who warm at Scipio's worth, or Tully's name ;
Ye that, in fancied vision, can admire
The sword of Brutus, and the Theban lyre !
Wrapt in historic ardour, who adore
Each classic haunt, and well-remembered shore.
Campbell's poems. 21
Where Valour tuned, amid her chosen throng,
Tl[»e Thracian trumpet and the Spartan song;
Or, wand'ring thence, behold the later charms
Of England's glory, and Helvetia's arms !
See Roman fire in Hampden's bosom swell,
And fate and freedom in the shaft of Tell !
Say, ye fond zealots to the worth of yore.
Hath Valour left the world— to live no more ?
No m.ore shall Brutus bid a tyrant die.
And sternly smile with vengeance in his eye ?
Hampden no more, when suffering Freedom calls,
Encounter fate, and triumph as he falls ?
Nor Tell disclose, through peril and alarm,
The might that slumbers in a peasant's arm ?
Yes ! in that generous cause for ever strong,
The patriot's virtue, and the poet's song,
Still, as the tide of ages rolls away.
Shall charm the world, unconscious of decay !
Yes ! there are hearts, prophetic Hope may trust,
That slumber yet in uncreated dust,
Ordained to fire th' adoring sons of earth
With every charm of wisdom and of worth ;
Ordained to light, with intellectual day.
The mazy wheels of Nature as they play.
Or, warm with Fancy's energy, to glow.
And rival all but Shakspeare's name below !
And say, supernal Powers ! who deeply scan
Heaven's dark decrees, unfathomed yet by man,
When shall the world call down, to cleanse her shame,
That embryo spirit, yet without a name, —
That friend of Nature, whose avenging hands
.Shall burst the Libyan's adamantine bands ?
22 Campbell's poems.
Who, sternly marking on his native soil,
The blood, the tears, the anguish, and the toil,
Shall bid each righteous heart exult, to see
Peace to the slave, and vengeance on the free !
Yet, yet, degraded men ! th' expected day
That breaks your bitter cup, is far away;
Trade, wealth, and fashion, ask you still to bleed.
And holy men give scripture for the deed ;
Scourged and debased, no Briton stoops to save
A wretch, a coward ; yes, because a slave !
Eternal Nature ! when thy giant hand
Had heaved the floods, and fixed the trembling land,
When life sprung startling at thy plastic call.
Endless her forms, and Man the lord of all ;
Say, was that lordly form inspired by thee
To wear eternal chains, and bow the knee ?
Was man ordained the slave of man to toil.
Yoked with the brutes, and fettered to the soil ;
Weighed in a tyrant's balance with his gold ?
No ! — Nature stamped us in a heavenly mould;
She bade no wretch his thankless labour urge,
Nor, trembling, take the pittance and the scourge !
No homeless Libyan, on the stormy deep,
To call upon his country's name, and weep !
Lio ! once in triumph on his boundless plain,
The quivered chief of Congo loved to reign !
W^ith fires proportioned to his native sky.
Strength in his arm, and lightning in his eye !
Scoured with wild feet his sun-illumined zone,
The spear, the lion, and the v^oods his own !
Or led the combat, bold without a plan,
An artless savage, but a fearless man '.
Campbell's poems. 23
The plunderer came : — alas ! no glory smiles
For Congo's chief on yonder Indian isles 1
For ever fallen ! no son of Nature now,
With Freedom chartered on his manly brow ;
Faint, bleeding, bound, he weeps the night away.
And, when the seawind wafts the dewless day,
Starts, with a bursting heart, for ever more
To curse the sun that lights their guilty shore.
The shrill horn blew ! (k) at that alarum knell
His guardian angel took a last farewell !
That funeral dirge to darkness hath resigned
The fiery grandeur of a generous mind ! —
Poor fettered man ! I hear thee whispering low
Unhallowed vows to Guilt, the child of Wo '
Friendless thy heart ! and, canst thou harbour there
A wish but death — a passion but despair ?
The widowed Indian, when her lord expires,
Mounts the dread pile, and braves the funeral fires !
So falls the heart at Thraldom's bitter sigh !
So Virtue dies, the spouse of Liberty'
But not to Libya's barren climes alone,
To Chili, or the wild Siberian zone,
Belong the wretched heart and haggard eye,
Degraded worth, and poor misfortune's sigh !
Ye orient realms, where Ganges' waters run !
Prolific fields ! dominions of the sun !
How long your triies have trembled, and obeyed !
How long was Timour's iron sceptre swayed ! (I)
Whose marshalled hosts, the lions of the plain.
From Scythia's northern mountains to the main,
Raged o'er your plundered shrines and altars bare,
With blazing torch and gory scimitar, —
Stunned with the cries of death each gentle gale,
And bathed in blood the verdure of the vale I
24 Campbell's poems.
Yet could no pangs the immortal spirit tame,
When Brama's children perished for his name ;
The martyr smiled beneath avenging pow'r,
And braved the tyrant in his torturing hour !
When Europe sought your subject realms to gain.
And stretched her giant sceptre o'er the main,
Taught her proud barks their winding way to shape,
And braved the stormy spirit of the Cape ; (m)
Children of Brama ! then was Mercy nigh
To wash the stain of blood's eternal dye ?
Did Peace descend, to triumph and to save,
When free-born Britons crossed the Indian wave ?
Ah, no ! — to more than Rome's ambition true,
The Nurse of Freedom gave it not to you !
She the bold route of Europe's guilt began,
And in the march of nations, led the van I
Rich in the gems of India's gaudy zone,
And plunder piled from kingdoms not their own,
Degenerate Trade ! thy minions could despise
The heart-born anguish of a thousand cries ;
Could lock, with impious hands, their teeming store.
While famished nations died along the shore ; (n)
Could mock the groans of fellow-men, and bear
The curse of kingdoms peopled with despair !
Could stamp disgrace on man's polluted name,
And barter, mth their gold, eternal shame!
But hark I as bowed to earth the Bramin kneels,
From heavenly climes propitious thunder peals I
Of India's fate her guardian spirits tell.
Prophetic murmurs breathing on the shell.
And solemn sounds, that awe the list'ning mind.
Roll on the azure paths of every wind.
CAMPBELL'S POEMS. 25
" Foes of mankind ! (her guardian spirits say)
Revolving ages bring the bitter day,
When Heaven's unerring arm shall fall on you,
And blood for blood these Indian plains bedew ;
Nine times have Brama's wheels of lightning; hurled
His awful presence o'er the alarmed world ! (o)
Nine times hath Guilt, through all his giant frame,
Convulsive trembled as the Mighty came !
Nine times hath suffering Mercy spared in vain —
But Heaven shall burst her starry gates again ;
He comes ! dread Brama shakes the sunless sky
With murmuring wrath, and thunders from on high !
Heaven's fiery horse, beneath his warrior form.
Paws the light clouds, and gallops on the storm !
Wide waves his flickering sword, his bright arms glow
Like summer suns, and light the world below 1
Earth, and her trembling isles in Ocean's bed
Are shook, and Natui-e rocks beneath his tread.
" To pour redress on India's injured realm,
The oppressor to dethrone, the proud to whelm ;
To chase destruction from her plundered shore,
With arts and arms that triumphed once before.
The tenth Avater comes ! at Heaven's command
Shall Seriswattee {p) wave her hallowed wand !
And Camdeo bright ! and Genesa sublime.
Shall bless with joy their own propitious clime ! —
Come, Heavenly Powers ! primeval peace restore !
Love ! — Mercy ! — Wisdom ! rule for ever more '."
PLEASURES OF HOPE
PART II.
ANALYSIS OF PART II.
Apostrophe to the power of Love — its intimate connexion
with generous and social Sensibility — allusion to that beautiful
passage in the beginning of the book of Genesis, which repre-
sents the happiness of Paradise itself incomplete, till love was
superadded to its other blessings — the dreams of future felicity
which a lively imagination is apt to cherish, when Hope is ani-
mated by refined attachment — this disposition to combine, in
one imaginary scene of residence, all that is pleasing in our es-
timate of happiness, compared to the skill of the great artist,
ivho personified perfect beauty, in the picture of Venus, by an
assemblage of the most beautitul features he could find — a sum-
mer and winter evening described, as they may be supposed to
arise in the mind of one who wishes, with enthusiasm, for the
union of friendship and retirement.
Hope and imagination inseparable agents — even in those
rontemplative moments when our imagination wanders beyond
the boundaries of this world, our minds are not unattended
■»vith an impression that we shall some day have a wider and
distinct prospect of the universe, instead of the partial glimpse
we now enjoy.
The last and most sublime influence of Hope, is the con>
eluding topic of tlie Poem, — the predominance of a belief in a
future state over the terrors attendant on dissolution — the
baneful influence of that sceptical philosophy which bars us
from such comforts — allusion to the fate of a suicide — Episode
of Conrad and Ellenore — Conclusion.
THB
PLEASrHES OF HOPE.
PART II.
In joyous youth, what soul hath never known
Thought, feeling, taste, harmonious to its own ?
Who hath not paused while Beauty's pensive eye
Asked from his heart the homage of a sigh ?
Who hath not owned with rapture-smitten frame.
The power of grace, the magic of a name 1
There be, perhaps, who barren hearts avow,
Cold as the rocks on Torneo's hoary brow ;
There be, whose loveless wisdom never failed,
In self-adoring pride securely mailed ; —
But, triumph not, ye peace-enamoured few !
Fire, Nature, Genius, never dwelt with you !
For you no fancy consecrates the scene
Where rapture uttered vows, and wept between ;
'Tis yours, unmoved to sever and to meet ;
No pledge is sacred, and no home is sweet !
Who that would ask a heart to dulness wed,
The waveless calm, the slumber of the dead ?
No ; the wild bliss of Nature needs alloy,
And care and sorrow fan the fire of joy !
And say, without our hopes, without our fears
Without the home that plighted love endears,
Without the smiles from partial beauty won,
O ! what were man ? — a world without a sun l
Till Hymen brought his love-delighted hour,
There dwelt no joy in Eden's rosy bow'r !
C2
30 Campbell's poems.
In vain the viewless seraph ling'ring there.
At starry midnight charmed the silent air ;
In vain the wild-bird carolled on the steep,
To hail the sun, slow- wheeling from the deep ;
In vain, to soothe the solitary shade,
Aerial notes in mingling measure played ;
The summer wind that shook the spangled tree,
The whispering wave, the murmur of the bee ;— •
Still slowly passed the melancholy day.
And still the stranger wist not where to stray,—
The world was sad ! — the garden was a wild !
And Man, the hermit, sighed — till Woman smiled '.
True, the sad power to generous hearts may bring
Delirious anguish on his fiery wing !
Barred from delight by Fate's untimely hand.
By wealthless lot, or pitiless command !
Or doomed to gaze on beauties that adorn
The smile of triumph, or the frown of scorn ;
While Memory watches o'er the sad review.
Of joys that faded like the morning dew !
Peace may depart — and life and nature seero
^ barren path — a. wildness, and a dream I
But, can the noble mind for ever brood,
The willing victim of a weary mood.
On heartless cares that squander life away,
And cloud young Genius bright'ning into day ?
Shame to the coward thought that e'er betrayed
The noon of manhood to a myrtle shade ! (a)
If Hope's creative spirit cannot raise
One trophy sacred to thy future days,
Scorn the dull crowd that haunt the gloomy shrine
Of hopeless love to murmur and repine !
But, should a sigh of milder mood express
Thy heart-warm wishes, true to happiness,
CAMPBELL'S POEMS. 31
Should Heaven's fair harbinger delight to pour
Her blissful visions on thy pensive hour,
No tear to blot thy memory's pictured page,
No fears but such as fancy can assuage ;
Though thy wild heart some hapless hour may miss,
The peaceful tenor of unvaried bliss,
(For love pursues an ever devious race.
True to the winding lineaments of grace ;)
Yet still may Hope her talisman employ
To snatch from Heaven anticipated joy,
And all her kindred energies impart
That burn the brightest in the purest heart !
When first the Rhodian's mimic art arrayed
The queen of Beauty in her Cyprian shade,
The happy master mingled on his piece
Each look that charmed him in the fair of Greece !
To faultless Nature true, he stole a grace
From every finer form and sweeter face !
And, as he sojourned on the JEgean isles,
Wooed all their love, and treasured all their smiles !
Then glowed the tints, pure, precious, and refined,
And mortal charms seemed heavenly when combined
Love on the picture smiled ! Expression poured
Her mingling spirit there — and Greece adored !
So thy fair hand, enamoured Fancy ! gleans
The treasured pictures of a thousand scenes ;
Thy pencil traces on the Lover's thought
Some cottage-home, from towns and toil remote,
Where Love and Lore may claim alternate hours.
With Peace embosomed in Idalian bow'rs ;
Remote from busy life's bewildered way,
O'er all his heart shall Taste and Beauty sway ;
Free on the sunny slope, or winding shore,
With hermit steps to wandei and adore ;
S2 CAMPBELLS POEMS.
There shall he love, when genial morn appears,
Like pensive beauty smiling in her tears,
To watch the bright'ning roses of the sky,
And muse on Nature with a poet's eye '
And when the sun's last splendour lights the deep,
The woods, and waves, and murm'ring winds asleep ;
When fairy harps th' Hesperian planets hail.
And the lone cuckoo sighs along the vale,
His path shall be where streamy mountains swell
Their shadowy grandeur o'er the narrow dell.
Where mouldering piles and forests intervene.
Mingling with darker tints the living green !
No circling hills his ravished eye to bound,
Heaven, earth, and ocean, blazing all around !
The moon is up — the watch-tower dimly burns-
And down the vale his sober step returns ;
But pauses oft as winding rocks convey
The still sweet fall of Music far away !
And oft he lingers from his home awhile
To watch the dying notes !— and start, and smile
Let Winter come ! let polar spirits sweep
The darkening world, and tempest-troubled deep !
Though boundless snows the withered heath deform,
And the dim sun scarce wanders through the storm '
Yet shall the smile of social love repay.
With mental light, the melancholy day !
And, when its short and sullen noon is o'er.
The ice-chained waters slumbering on the shore,
How bright the faggots in his little hall
Blaze on the hearth, and warm the pictured wall !
How blest he names, in Love's familiar tone.
The kind fair friend, bv nature marked his own 1
CAMPBELL'S POEMS. 33
And, in the waveless mirror of his mind,
V^iews the fleet years of pleasure left behind,
Since Anna's empire o'er his heart began !
Since first he called her his before the holy man I
Trim the gay taper in his rustic dome,
And light the wint'ry paradise of home !
And let the half-uncurtained window hail
Some way-worn man benighted in the vale !
Now, while the moaning night-wind rages high.
As sweep the shot-stars down the troubled sky.
While fiery hosts in Heaven's wide circle play,
And bathe in livid light the milky-way,
Safe from the storm, the meteor, and the shower.
Some pleasing page shall charm the solemn hour--
With pathos shall command, with wit beguile,
A generous tear of anguish, or a smile —
Thy woes, Ariou ! and thy simple tale, (6)
O'er all the heart shall triumph and prevail !
Charmed as they read the verse too sadly true,
How gallant Albert, and his weary crew.
Heaved all their guns, their foundering bark to save,
And toiled — and shrieked — and perished on the wave •
Yes, at the dead of night, by Lonna's steep.
The seamen's cry was heard along the deep ;
There on his funeral waters, dark and wild,
The dying father blest his darling child !
Oh ! Mercy, shield her innocence, he cried.
Spent on the prayer his bursting heart, and died !
Or will they learn how generous worth sublimes
The robber Moor, (c) and pleads for all his crimes ?
How poor Amelia kissed with many a tear,
His hand blood-stained, but ever ever dear !
34 Campbell's poems.
Hung on the tortured bosom of her lord,
And wept, and prayed perdition from his sword !
Nor sought in vain ! at that heart-piercing cry
The strings of nature cracked with agony !
He, with delirious laugh, the dagger hurled.
And burst the ties that bound him to the world !
Turn from his dying words, that smite with steel
The shuddering thoughts, or wind them on the wheel-
Turn to the gentler melodies that suit
Thalia's harp, or Pan's Arcadian lute ;
Or, down the stream of Truth's historic page,
From clime to clime descend, from age to age !
Yet there, perhaps, may darker scenes obtrude
Than Fancy fashions in her wildest mood ;
There shall he pause, with horrent brow, to rate
What millions died — that Caesar might be great ! (d)
Or learn the fate that bleeding thousands bore, (e)
Marched by their Charles to Dneiper's swampy shore ;
Faint in his wounds, and shivering in the blast,
The Swedish soldier sunk — and groaned his last !
File after file, the stormy showers benumb.
Freeze every standard-sheet, and hush the drum !
Horsemen and horse confessed the bitter pang,
And arms and warriors fell ^vith hollow clang !
Yet, ere he sunk in Nature's last repose,
Fre life's warm torrent to the fountain froze.
The dying man to Sweden turned his eye.
Thought of his home, and closed it with a sigh !
Imperial pride looked sullen on his plight.
And Charles beheld — nor shuddered at the sight !
Above, below, in Ocean, Earth, and Sky,
Thy fairy worlds, Imagination, lie,
Campbell's poems. 35
And Hope attends, companion of the way,
Thy dream by night, thy visions of the day !
In yonder pensile orb, and every sphere
That gems the starry girdle of the year !
In those unmeasured worlds, she bids thee tell,
Pure from their God, created millions dwell.
Whose names and natures, unrevealed below,
We yet shall learn, and wonder as we know ;
For, as Zona's Saint, a giant form, (/)
Throned on her tow'rs, conversing with the storm,
(When o'er each Runic altar, weed-entwined.
The vesper clock tolls mournful to the wind,)
Counts every wave-worn isle, and mountain hoar,
From Kilda to the green lerne's shore ;
So, when thy pure and renovated mind
This perishable dust hath left behind.
Thy seraph eye shall count the starry train.
Like distant isles embosomed in the main ;
Rapt to the shrine where motion first began,
And light and life in mingling torrent ran,
From whence each bright rotundity was hurled,
The throne of God, — the centre of the world !
Oh ! vainly wise, the moral Muse hath sung
That suasive Hope hath but a Syren tongue !
True ; she may sport with life's untutored day,
Nor heed the solace of its last decay.
The guileless heart her happy mansion spurn,
And part like Ajut — never to return ! (g)
But yet, methinks, when Wisdom shall assuage
The griefs and passions of our greener age.
Though dull the close of life, and far away
Each flow'r that hailed the dawning of the day ;
Yet o'er her lovely hopes that once were dear,
The time-taught spirit, pensive, not severe,
36 Campbell's poems.
With milder griefs her aged eye shall fill,
And weep their falsehood, though she love tliem still '.
Thus, with forgiving tears, and reconciled,
The king of Judah mourned his rebel child '
Musing on days, when yet the guiltless boy
Smiled on his sire, and filled his heart with joy !
My Absalom ! (the voice of nature cried !)
Oh ! that for thee thy father could have died !
For bloody was the deed and rashly done,
That slew my Absalom ! — my son ! — my son •
Unfading Hope; when life's last embers bum,
When soul to soul, and dust to dust return !
Heaven to thy charge resigns the awful hour !
Oh ! then, thy kingdom comes ! Immortal Power '
What though each spark of earth-born rapture fly
The quivering lip, pale cheek, and closing eye
Bright to the soul thy seraph hands convey
The morning dream of life's eternal day —
Then, then, the triumph and the trance begin !
And all the Phoenix spirit burns within !
Oh ! deep enchanting prelude to repose,
The dawn of bliss, the twilight of our woes !
Yet half I hear the parting spirit sigh,
It is a dread and awful thing to die !
Mysterious worlds, untravelled by the sun !
Where Time's far-wand'ring tide has never run.
From your unfathomed shades, and viewless spheres,
A warning comes, unheard by other ears.
'Tis Heaven's commanding trumpet, long and loud,
Like Sinai's thunder, pealing from the cloud !
While Nature hears, with terror-mingled trust,
The shock that hurls her fabric to the dust ;
Campbell's poem?. 37
And, like the trembling Hebrew, when he irod
The roaring waves, and called upon his God,
With mortal terrors clouds immortal bliss.
And shrieks, and hovers o'er the dark abyss !
Daughter of Faith, awake, arise, illume
The dread unknown, the chaos of the tomb !
Melt, and dispel, ye spectre doubts, that roll
Cimmerian darkness on the parting soul !
Fly, like the moon-eyed herald of Dismay,
Chased on his night-steed by the star of day !
The strife is o'er — the pangs of Nature close,
And life's last rapture triumphs o'er her woes.
Hark ! as the spirit eyes, Avith eagle gaze,
The noon of Heaven undazzled by the blaze.
On Heavenly winds that waft her to the sky,
Float the sweet tones of star-born melody ;
Wild as that hallowed anthem sent to hail
Bethlehem's shepherds in the lonely vale,
When Jordan hushed his waves, and midnight still
Watched on the holy towers of Zion hill !
Soul of the just ! companion of the dead !
Where is thy home, and whither art thou fled?
Back to its heavenly source thy being goes,
Swift as the comet wheels to whence he rose ;
Doomed on his airy path awhile to burn,
And doomed, like thee, to travel and return. — •
Hark ! from the world's exploding centre driven,
With sounds that shook the firmament of Heaven,
Careers the fiery giant, fast and far.
On bick'ring wheels, and adamantine car ;
From planet whirled to planet more remote,
He visits reakns beyond the reach of thought ;
But, wheeling homeward, when his course is run,
Curbs the red yoke, and mingles with the sun !
D
38 CAMPBELL'S POEMS.
So hath the traveller of earth unfurled
Her trembling wings, emerging from the world ,
And o'er the path by mortal never trod,
Sprung to her source, the bosom of her God !
Oh ! lives there, Heaven ! beneath thy dread expans'
One hopeless, dark Idolater of Chance,
Content to feed, with pleasures unrefined,
The lukewarm passions of a lowly mind ;
Who, mould'ring earthward, ^reft of every trust,
In joyless union wedded to the dust.
Could all his parting energy dismiss,
And call this barren world sufficient bliss ? —
There live, alas ! of Heaven-directed mien,
Of cultured soul, and sapient eye serene.
Who hailed thee, Man ! the pilgrim of a day,
Spouse of the worm, and brother of the clay !
Frail as the leaf in Autumn's yellow bovver,
Dust in the wind, or dew upon the flower !
A friendless slave, a child without a sire,
Whose mortal life, and momentary fire.
Lights to the grave his chance-created form.
As ocean-wrecks illuminate the storm ;
And when the gun's tremendous flash is o'er,
To Night and Silence sink for ever more ! —
Are these the pompous tidings ye proclaim.
Lights of the world, and demi-gods of Fame ?
Is this your triumph — this your proud applause,
Children of Truth, and champions of her cause.'
For this hath Science searched, on weary wing.
By shore and sea — each mute and living thing ?
Launched with Iberia's pilot from the steep,
To worlds unknown, and isles beyond the deep ?
Or round the cope her living chariot driven.
And wheeled in triumph through the signs of Heaven ?
CAMPBELL'S POEMS. 30
Oh ! star-eyed Science, hast thou wandered there,
To waft us home the message of despair ?
Then bind the palm, thy sage's brow to suit.
Of blasted leaf, and death-distilling fruit !
Ah me ! the laurelled wreath that murder rears.
Blood-nursed, and watered by the widow's tears,
Seems not so foul, so tainted, and so dread.
As waves the night-shade round the skeptic head.
What is the bigot's torch, the tyrant's chain ?
I smile on death, if Heav'n-ward Hope remain !
But, if the warring winds of Nature's strife
Be all the faithless charter of my life.
If Chance awaked, inexorable power !
This frail and feverish being of an hour,
Doomed o'er the world's precarious scene to sweep,
Swift as the tempest travels on the deep.
To know Delight but by her parting smile,
And toil, and wish, and weep, a little while ;
Then melt, ye elements, that formed in vain
This troubled pulse, and visionary brain !
Fade, ye wild flowers, memorials of my doom !
And sink, ye stars, that light me to the tomb !
Truth, ever lovely, since the world began.
The foe of tyrants, and the friend of man,—
How can thy words from balmy slumber start
Reposing Virtue, pillowed on the heart !
Yet. if thy voice the note of thunder rolled,
And that were true which Nature never told.
Let wisdom smile not on her conquered field ;
No rapture dawns, no treasure is revealed !
Oh ! let her read, nor loudly, nor elate,
The doom that bars us from a better fate ;
But, sad as angels for the good man's sin.
Weep to record, and blash to give it in !
40 Campbell's poems.
And well may Doubt, the mother of Dismay,
Pause at her martyr's tomb, and read the lay.
Down by the wilds of yon deserted vale,
It darkly hints a melancholy tale !
There, as the homeless madman sits alone.
In hollow winds he hears a spirit moan !
And there, they say, a wizard orgie crowds.
When the moon lights her watch-tower in the clouds,
Poor, lost Alonzo ! Fate's neglected child !
Mild be the doom of Heaven — as thou wert mild !
For oh ! thy heart in holy mould was cast.
And all thy deeds were blameless, but the last.
Poor, lost Alonzo ! still I seem to hear
The clod that struck thy hollow-sounding bier !
When Friendship paid, in speechless sorrow drowned
Thy midnight rites, but not on hallowed ground !
Cease every joy to glimmer on my mind,
But leave — oh ! leave the light of Hope behind !
What though my winged hours of bliss have been.
Like angel-visits, few, and far between !
Her musing mood shall every pang appease.
And charm — when pleasures lose the power to please
Yes ! let each rapture, dear to Nature, flee ;
Close not the light of Fortune's stormy sea —
Mirth, Music, Friendship, Love's propitious smile
Chase every care, and charm a little while,
Extatic throbs the fluttering heart employ,
And all her strings are harmonized to joy ! —
But why so short is Love's delighted hour ?
Why fades the dew on Beauty's sweetest flower ?
Why can no hymned charm of Music heal
The sleepless woes impassioned spirits feel ?
Can Fancy's fairy hands no veil create,
To hide the sad realities of fate ? —
Campbell's, poems. 41
No ! not the quaint icniaik, the sapient rule,
Nor all the pride of Wisdom's worldly school,
Have power to soothe, unaided and alone,
The heart that vibrates to a feeling tone !
When stepdame Nature every bliss recalls,
Fleet as the meteor o'er the desert falls ;
When, 'reft of all, yon widowed sire appears
A lonely hermit in the vale of years ;
Say, can the world one joyous thought bestow
To Friendship, weeping at the couch of Wo ?
No ! but a brighter soothes the last adieu, —
Souls of impassioned mould, she speaks to you
Weep not, she says, at Nature's transient pain,
Congenial spirits part to meet again ! —
What plaintive sobs thy filial spirit drew.
What sorrow choked thy long and last adieu,
Daughter of Conrad ! when he heard his knell.
And bade his country and his child farewell !
Doomed the long isles of Sydney Cove to see,
The martyr of his crimes, but true to thee ?
Thrice the sad father tore thee from his heart.
And thrice returned, to bless thee and to part ;
Thrice from his trembling lips he murmured low
The plaint that owned unutterable wo ;
Till Faith, prevailing o'er his sullen doom,
As burst the morning on nig-ht's unfathomed gloom,
Lured his dim eye to deathless hopes sublime,
Beyond the realms of Nature and of time !
" And weep not thus, (he cried) young EUenore,
My bosom bleeds, but soon shall bleed no more !
Short shall this half-extinguished spirit burn.
And soon these limbs to kindred dust return !
But not, my child, with life's precarious fire,
The immortal ties of Nature shall expire ;
42 Campbell's poems.
These shall resist the triumph of decay
When time is o'er, and worlds have passed away !
Cold in the dust this perished heart may lie,
But that which warmed it once shall never die !
That spark unburied in its mortal frame,
With living light, eternal, and the same.
Shall beam on Joy's interminable years,
Unveiled by darkness — ^unassuaged by tears !
" Yet on the barren shore and stormy deep,
One tedious watch is Conrad doomed to weep ;
But when I gain the home without a friend
And press th' uneasy couch where none attend,
This last embrace, still cherished in my heart.
Shall calm the struggling spirit ere it part !
Thy darling form shall seem to hover nigh,
And hush the groan of life's last agony !
" Farewell ! when strangers lift thy father's bier,
And place my nameless stone without a tear ;
When each returning pledge hath told my child
That Conrad's tomb is on the desert piled ;
And when the dream of troubled fancy sees
Its lonely rank grass waving in the breeze ;
Who then will soothe thy grief when mine is o'er?
Who will protect thee, helpless Ellenore '
Shall secret scenes thy filial sorrows hide,
Scorned by the world, to factious guilt allied '
Ah ! no ; methinks the generous and the good
Will woo thee from the shades of solitude !
O'er friendless grief compassion shall awake,
And smile on Innocence, for Mercy's sake !"
Inspiring thought of rapture yet to be,
The tears of love were hopeless, but for thee !
Campbell's poems. 43
[f in that frame no deathless spirit dwell,
If that faint murmur be the last farewell !
if fate unite the faithful but to part,
Why is their memory sacred to the heart ?
Why does the brother of my childhood seem
Restored awhile in every pleasing dream ?
Why do I joy the lonely spot to view,
By artless friendship blessed when life was new ?
Eternal Hope ! when yonder spheres sublime
Pealed their first notes to sound the march of Time,
Thy joyous youth began — but not to fade. —
When all the sister planets have decayed ;
When wrapt in fire the realms of ether glow,
And Heaven's last thunder shakes the world below ;
Thou, undismayed shalt o'er the ruins smile,
And light thy torch at Nature's funeral pile !
GERTRUDE OF WYOMING;
OR THE
PENNSYLVANIAN COTTAGE
PART I.
ADVERTISEMENT.
Most of the popular histories of England, as well as of
the American war, give an authentic account of the des-
olation of Wyoming, in Pennsylvania, which took place
in 1778, by an incursion of the Indians. The Scenery
and Incidents of the following Poem are connected with
that event. The testimonies of historians and travellers
concur in describing the infant colony as one of the hap-
piest spots of human existence, for the hospitable and
innocent manners of the inhabitants, the beauty of the
country, and the luxuriant fertility of the soil and
climate. In an evil hour, the junction of European with
Indian arms, converted this terrestrial paradise into a
frightful waste. Mr Isaac Weld informs us, that the
ruins of many of the villages, perforated with balls, and
bearing marks of conflagration were still preserved by
the recent inhabitants, when he travelled through Amer-
ica in 1796.
GERTRUDE OF WYOMING.
PART I.
I.
On Susquehanna's side, fair Wyoming !
Although the wild-flower on thy ruined wall
And roofless homes a sad remembrance bring
Of what thy gentle people did befall,
Yet thou wert once the lovliest land of all
That see the Atlantic wave their morn restore.
Sweet land ! may I thy lost delights recall,
And paint thy Gertrude in her bowers of yore.
Whose beauty was the love of Pennsylvania's shore,
II.
Delightful Wyoming ! beneath thy skies,
The happy shepherd swains had nought to do.
But feed their flocks on green declivities,
Or skim perchance thy lake with light canoe.
From morn, till evening's sweeter pastime grew,
With timbrel, when beneath the forests brown,
The lovely maidens would the dance renew :
And aye those sunny mountains half-way down
Would echo flagelet from some romantic town.
III.
Then, where ^on Indian hills the daylight takes
His leave, how might you the flami-ngo see
Disporting like a meteor on the lakes
And playful squirrel on his nut-grown tree :
And every sound of life was full of glee,
From mercy mock-bird's song, or hum of men,
While heark'ning, fearing nought their revelry.
48 Campbell's poems.
The wild deer arched his neck from glades, and then
Unhunted, sought his woods and wilderness again.
IV.
And scarce had Wyoming of war or crime
Heard but in transatlantic story rung,
For here the exile met from every clime,
And spoke in friendship ev'ry distant tongue :
Men from the blood of warring Europe sprung,
Were but divided by the running brook ;
And happy where no Rhenish trumpet sung.
On plains no sieging mine's volcano shook, [hook.
The blue-eyed German changed his sword to pruning
V.
Nor far some Andalusian saraband
Would sound to many a native roundelay.
But who is he that yet a dearer land
Remembers over hills and far away ?
Green Albyn !* what though he no more survey
Thy ships at anchor on the quiet shore,
Thy pellochs rolling from the mountain bay ;
Thy lone sepulchral cairn upon the moor.
And distant isles that hear the loud Corbrechtan roar '1
VI.
Alas poor Caledonia's mountaineer.
That want's stern edict e'er, and feudal grief.
Had forced him from a home he loved so dear !
Yet found he here a home, and glad relief.
And plied the beverage from his own fair sheaf.
That fired his Highland blood with mickle glee ;
And England sent her men, of men the chief,
* Scotland.
t The great whirlpool of the Weslern Htbrides.
'^
CAMPBELL'S POEMS ' 49
Who taught those sires of Empire yet to be,
To plant the tree of life,— to plant fair freedom's tree !
Here was not mingled in the city's pomp
Of life's exti-emes the grandeur and the gloom ;
Judgment awoke not here her dismal tromp,
Nor sealed in blood a fellow-creature's doom,
Nor mourned the captive in a living tomb.
One venerable man, beloved of all,
Sufficed where innocence was yet in bloom,
To sway the strife, that seldom might befall.
And Albert was their judge in patriarchal hall.
VIII.
How reverend was the look, serenely aged.
He bore, this gentle Pennsylvanian sire.
Where, all but kindly fervours were assuaged,
Undimmed by w-eakness' shade, or turbid ire ;
And though amidst the calm of thought entire,
Some high and haughty features might betray
A soul impetuous once, 'twas earthly fire
That fled composure's intellectual ray.
As Etna's fires grow dim before the rising day.
IX.
I boast no song in magic wonders rife.
But yet, oh Nature ! is there nought to prize,
Familiar in thy bosom-scenes of life ?
And dwells in daylight truth's salubrious skies
No form with which the soul may sympathize ?
Young, innocent, on whose sweet forehead mild
The parted ringlet shone in simplest guise,
An inmate in the home of Albert smiled,
Or blest his noonday walk — she was his only child.
E
50 Campbell's poems
X.
The rose of England bloomed on Gertrude's cheek
What though these shades had seen her birth, her sire
A Briton's independence taught to seek
Far western worlds ; and there his household fire
The light of social love did long inspire,
And many a halcyon day he lived to see
Unbroken, but by one misfortune dire,
When fate had 'reft his mutual heart — but she [knee.
Was gone — and Gertrude climbed a widowed father's
XI.
A loved bequest, — and I may half impart
To them that feel the strong paternal tie,
How like a new existence to his heart
Uprose that living flower beneath his eye,
Dear as she was, from cherub infancy,
From hours when she would round his garden play,
To time when as the rip'ning years went by.
Her lovely mind could culture well repay.
And more engaging grew, from pleasing day to day.
XK.
I may not paint those thousand Infant charms ;
Unconscious fascination, undesigned !)
The orison repeated in his arms.
For God to bless her sire and all mankind ;
The book, the bosom on his knee reclined.
Or how sweet fairy-lore he heard her con,
(The playmate ere the teacher of her mind :)
All uncompanioned else her years had gone [shone.
Till now in Gertrude's eyes their ninth blue summer
XIII.
And summer was the tide, and sweet the hour,
When sire and daughter saw, with fleet descent.
Campbell's poems. 51
An Indian from his bark aiiproach their bower,
Of buskin'd limb, and swarthy lineament ;
The red wild feathers on his brow were blent,
And bracelets bound the arm that helped to light
A boy, who seemed, as he beside him went.
Of Christian vesture, and complexion bright.
Led by his dusky guide like morning brought by night
XIV.
Vet pensive seemed the boy for one so young,
The dimple from his polished cheek had fled ;
When, leaning on his forest-bow unstrung,
Th' Oneyda warrior to the planter said.
And laid his hand upon the stripling's head,
" Peace be to thee ! my words this belt approve ;
The paths of peace my steps have hither led :
This little nursling, take him to thy love, [dove.
And shield the bird unfledged, since gone the parent
XV.
*' Christian ! I am the foeman of thy foe ;
Our wampum league thy brethren did embrace :
Upon the Michigan, three moons ago,
We launched our quivers for the bison chase ;
And with the Hurons planted for a spffce,
With true and faithful hands, the olive-stalk ;
But snakes are in the bosoms of their race,
And though they held with us a friendly talk.
The hollow peace-tree fell beneath their tomahawk!
XVI.
" It was encamping on the' lake's far port,
A cry of Areouski* broke our sleep.
Where stormed an ambushed foe thy nation's fort,
And rapid rapid whoops came o'er the deep ;
• The Indian God of War.
52 Campbell's poems.
But long thy country's war-sign on the steep
Appeared through ghastly intervals of light,
And deathfuUy their thunders seemed to sweep,
Till utter darkness swallowed up the sight.
As if a shower of blood had quenched the fiery fight !
XVII.
" I slept — it rose again — on high their tow'r
Sprung upv/ards like a torch to light the skies,
Then down again it rained an ember shower,
And louder lamentations heard we rise :
As when the evil Manitou* that dries
The Ohio woods, consumes them in his ire,
In vain the desolated panther flies,
And howls, amidst his wilderness of fire :
Alas! too late, we reached and smote those Hurons dif .
XVIII. '
*' But as the fox beneath the nobler hound,
So died their warriors by our battle brand ;
And from the tree we with her child unbound
A lonely mother of the Christian land.
Her lord — the captain of the British band —
Amidst the slaughter of his soldiers lay.
Scarce knew the widow our delivering hand ;
Upon her child she sobbed and swooned away.
Or shrieked unto the God to whom the Christians pray. —
XIX.
" Our virgms fed her with their kindly bo%vls
Of fever-balm, and sweet sagamite ;
But she was journeying to the land of souls,
And lifted up her dying head to pray
That we should bid an ancient friend convey
Her orphan to his home of England's shore ;
And take, she said, this token far away
* Manitou, Spirit or Deity.
CAMPBELL'S POEMS. 53
To one that will remember us of yore, [wore. —
When he beholds the ring that Waldegrave's Julia
XX.
" And Ij the eagle of my tribe,* have rushed
With this lorn dove." — A sage's self-command
Had quelled the tears from Albert's heart that gushed j
But yet his cheek — his agitated hand —
That showered upon the stranger of the land
No common boon, in grief but ill beguiled
A soul that was not wont to be unmanned ;
" And stay," he cried, " dear pilgrim of the wild !
Preserver of my old, my boon companion's child ! —
XXI.
" Child of a race whose name my bosom warms,
On earth's remotest bounds how welcome here !
Whose mother oft, a child, has filled these arms.
Young as thyself, and innocently dear,
Whose grandsire was my early life's compeer.
Ah happiest home of England's happy clime !
How beautiful ev'n now thy scenes appear,
As in the noon and sunshine of my prime !
How gone like yesterday these thrice ten years of time .
XXII.
" And, Julia ! when thou wert like Gertrude now,
Can I forget thee, fav'rite child of yore ?
Or thought I, in thy father's house when thou
Wert lightest hearted on his festive floor
And first of all his hospitable door,
To meet and kiss me at my journey's end ?
But where was I when Waldegrave was no more ?
* The Indians are distinguished both personally and by tribes by tha
name of particular animals, whose qualities they aSect to resemble
either for cunning, strength, swiftness, or other qualities. — As the
otg,\e, the serpent, the fox, or bear-
E 9
54 CAMPBELL S POEMS,
And thou didst pale thy gentle head extend,
In woes, that ev'n the tribe of deserts was thy friend !"
XXIII.
He said — and strained unto his heart the boy:
Far differently the mute Oneyda took
His calumet of peace,* and cup of joy;
As monumental bronze unchanged his look :
A soul that pity touched but never shook :
Trained, from his tree-rocked cradlet to his bier,
The fierce extremes of good and ill to brook
Impassive — fearing but the shame of fear —
A stoic of the woods — a man without a tear. —
XXIV
Yet deem not goodness on the savage stock
Of Outalissi's heart disdained to grow ;
As lives the oak unwithered on the rock
By storms above, and barrenness below ;
He scorned his own, who felt another's wo :
And ere the wolfskin on his back he flung,
Or laced his mocasins, in act to go,
A song of parting to the boy he sung, [tongue.
Who slept on Albert's couch, nor heard his friendly
XXV.
" Sleep Yvearied one ! and in the dreaming land
Shouldst thou to-morrow with thy mother meet,
Oh ! tell her spirit, that the white man's hand
Hath plucked the thorns of sorrow from thy feet;
While I in lonely wilderness shall greet
* Calumet of Peace.— The calumet is the Indian name for the orna-
mented pipe of friendship, which they smoke as a pledge of amity.
t Tree-rocked cradle. — The Indian mothers suspend their children
in their cradles from the boughs of trees, and let them be rocked bf
the wind.
Campbell's poems. 55
Thy little foot prints — or by traces know
The fountain, where at noon I thought it sweet
To feed thee with the quarry of my bow,
And poured the lotus-horn,* or slew the mountain roe.
XXVI.
" Adieu ! sweet scion of the rising sun !
But should affliction's storms thy blossom mock,
Then come again — my own adopted one !
And I will graft thee on a noble stock :
The crocodile, the condor of the rock,
Shall be the pastime of thy sylvan wars ;
And I will teach thee, in the battle's shock.
To pay with Huron blood thy father's scars,
And gratulate his soul rejoicing in the stars I"
XXVII.
So finished he the rhyme (howe'er uncouth)
That true to nature^s fervid feelings ran ; '
(And song is but the eloquence of truth :) '
Then forth uprose that lone way-faring man ;
But dauntless he, nor chart, nor journey's plan
In woods required, whose trained eye was keen
As eagle of the wilderness, to scan
His path, by mountain, swamp, or deep ravine,
Or ken far friendly huts on good savannas green.
XXVIII.
Old Albert saw him from the valley's side —
His pirogue launched — his pilgrimage begun —
Far, like the red-bird's wing he seemed to glide —
Then dived, and vanished in the woodlands dun.
* From a flower shaped like a horn, which Chateaubriand pre-
sumes to be of the lotus kind, the Indians in their travels through ths
desert often find a draught of dew purer than any otlier water.
56 Campbell's poems.
Oft, to that spot by tender memory won,
Would Albert climb the promontory's height,
If but a dim sail glimmered in the sun ;
But never more to bless his longing siglit,
Was Outalissi hailed, with bark and plumage bright.
GERTRUDE OF WYOMING
PART II.
I.
A VALLEY from the river shore withdrawn
Was Albert's home, two quiet woods between,
AVhose lofty verdure overlooked his lawn ;
And waters to their resting place serene
Came fresh'ning, and reflecting all the scene :
(A mirror in the depth of flowery shelves ;)
So sweet a spot of earth, you might, I ween,
Have guessed some congregation of the elves [selves.
To sport by summer moons, had shaped it for them-
II.
Yet wanted not the eye far scope to muse,
Nor vistas opened by the wand'ring stream ;
Both where at evening Allegany views.
Through ridges burning in her western beam,
Lake after lake interminably gleam :
And past those settlers' haunts the eye might roam.
Where earth's unliving silence all would seem ;
Save where on rocks the beaver built his dome,
Or buffalo remote lowed far from human home.
III.
But silent not that adverse eastern path.
Which saw Aurora's hill th' horizon crown ;
There was the river heard, in bed of wrath,
(A precipice of foam from mountains brown.)
Like tumults heard from some far distant town ;
But soft'ning in approach he left his gloom,
And murmured pleasantly, and laid him down
58 Campbell's poems.
To kiss those easy curving banks of bloom,
That lent the windward air an exquisite perfume.
IV.
It seemed as if those scenes sweet influence had
On Gertrude's soul, and kindness like their own
Inspired those eyes aflectionate and glad,
That seemed to love whate'er they looked upon ;
Whether with Hebe's mirth her features shone.
Or if a shade more pleasing them o'ercast,
(As if for heavenly musing meant alone ;)
Yet so becomingly th' expression past,
That each succeeding look was lovelier than the last.
V.
Nor guess I, was that Pennsylvanian home,
With all its picturesque and balmy grace,
And fields that were a luxury to roam.
Lost on the soul that looked from such a face !
Enthusiast of the woods ! when years apace
Had bound thy lovely waist with woman's zone,
The sunrise path, at morn, I see thee trace
To hills with high magnolia overgrown,
And joy to breathe the groves, romantic and alone.
VI.
The sunrise drew her thoughts to Europe forth,
That thus apostrophized its viewless scene :
" Land of my father's love, my mother's birth !
The home of kindred I have never seen !
We know not other — oceans are between ;
Yet say ! far friendly hearts from whence we came,
Of us does oft remembrance intervene !
My mother sure — my sire a thought may claim ;--
But Gertrude is to you an unregarded name,
Campbell's ioems. 59
VII.
" And yet, loved England ! when thy name I trace
In many a pilgrim's tale and poet's song,
How can I choose but wish for one embrace
Of them, the dear unknown, to whom belong
My mother's looks, — perhaps her likeness strong ?
Oh parent ! with what reverential awe.
From features of thine own related throng.
An image of thy face my soul could draw !
And see thee once again whom I too shortly saw !"
VIII.
Yet deem not Gertrude sighed for foreign joy ;
To soothe a father's couch her only care,
And keep his rev'rend head from all annoy :
For this, methinks, her homeward steps repair
Soon as the morning wreath had bound her hair ;
While yet the wild deer trod in spangling dew.
While boatmen carolled to the fresh-blown air.
And woods a horizontal shadow threw.
And early fox appeared in momentary view.
IX.
Apart there ivas a deep untrodden grot,
Where oft the reading hour sweet Gertrude wore ;
Tradition had not named its lonely spot ;
But here, methinks, might Indians' sons explore
Their fathers' dust,* or lift, perchance, of yore,
Their voice to the great Spirit : — rocks sublime
To human art a sportive semblance bore,
And yellow lichens coloured all the clime, [time.
Like moonlight battlements, and toAvers decayed by
• It is a custom of the Indian tribes to visit thp"tombs of their an-
cestors in the cultivated parts of America, who have bean buried for
upwards of a century.
60 Campbell's poems.
X.
But high in amphitheatre above.
His arms the everlasting aloes threvr :
Breathed but an air of heaven, and all the grove
As if with instinct living spirit grevr,
Rolling its verdant gulfs of every hue ;
And now suspended was the pleasing din,
Now from a murmur faint it swelled anew.
Like the first note of organ heard within
Cathedral aisles,— ere yet its symphony begin.
XI.
It was in this lone valley she would charm
The ling'ring noon, where flow'rs a couch had strewn ;
Her cheek reclining, and her snowy arm
On hillock by the palm-tree half o'ergrown ;
And aye that volume on her lap is thrown^
Which every heart of human mould endears ;
With Shakspeare's self she speaks and smiles alone,
And no intruding visitation fears, [tears.
To shame th' unconscious laugh, or stop her sweetest
XII.
And nought within the grove was heard or seen
But stockdoves plaining through its gloom profound,
Or winglet of the fairy humming bird.
Like atoms of the rainbow fluttering round ;
When lo 1 there entered to its inmost ground
A youth, the stranger of a distant land ;
He was, to weet, for eastern mountains bound ;
But late th' equator suns his cheek had tanned.
And California's gales his roving bosom fanned.
xni.
A steed, whose reiu hung loosely o'er his arnij
He led dismounted ; ere his leisure pace,
llO
Campbell's poems. 6i
Amid the brown leaves, could her ear alarm,
Close he had come, and worshipped for a space
Those downcast features : — she her lovely face
Uplift on one whose lineaments and frame
Were youth and manhood's intermingled grace :
Iberian seemed his boot — his robe the same,
And well the Spanish plume his lofty looks became.
XIV.
For Albert's home he sought — her finger fair
Has pointed where the father's mansion stood.
Returning from t^e copse he soon was there ;
And soon has Gerbrude hied from dark green wood ;
Nor joyless, by the converse understood,
Between the man of age and pilgrim young.
That gay congeniality of mood,
And early liking from acquaintance sprung :
Full fluently conversed their guest in England's tongue.
XV.
And well could he his pilgrimage of taste
Unfold, — and much they loved his fervid strain,
While he each fair variety retrac'd
Of climes, and manners, o'er the eastern main :
Now happy Switzer's hills, — romantic Spain, —
Gay lilied fields of France, — or, more refined,
The soft Ausonia's monumental reign ;
Nor less each rural image he designed,
Than all the city's pomp and home of human kind.
XVI.
Anon some wilder portraiture he draws ;
Of Nature's savage glories he would speak,-
The loneliness of earth that overawes, —
Where, resting by some tomb of old cacique,
The lama driver on Peruvia's peak,
Nor living voice nor motion marks around ;
F
62 Campbell's poems.
But storks that to the boundless forest shriek,
Or vviW-cane arch high flung o'er gulf profound,*
That fluctuates when the storms of El Dorado sound. —
XVIi.
Pleased with his guest, the good man still would ply
Each earnest question, and his converse court 5
But Gertrude, as she eyed him, knew not why
A strange and troubling wonder stopt her short.
* In England thou hast been, — and, by report,
An orphan's name (quoth Albert) may'st have known :
Sad tale ! — when latest fell our frontier fort, —
One innocent — one soldier's child — alone [own.
Was spared, and brought to me, who loved him as mj
XVIII.
" Young Henry Waldegrave ! three delightful years
These very walls his infant sports did see ;
But most I loved him when his parting tears
Alternately bedewed my child and me :
His sorest parting, Gertrude, was from thee ;
Nor half its grief his little heart could hold :
By kindred he was sent for o'er the sea,
They tore him from us when but twelve years old,
And scarcely for his loss have I been yet consoled."-
XIX.
His face the wand'rer hid, — but could not hide
A tear, a smile, upon his cheek that dwell ; —
" And speak, mysterious stranger !" (Gertrude cried)
" It is ! — it is ! — I knew — I knew him well !
'Tis Waldegrave's self of Waldegrave come to tell !
•The bridges over narrow streams in many parts of Spanish Amp
rica are said to be built of cane, which howover strong to support th#
passengers, are yet waved in the agitation of the storm, and frequent!/
add to the effect of a mountainous and picturesque scenenr.
Campbell's poems. 63
A burst of joy the father's lips declare ;
But Gertrude speechless on his bosom fell :
At once his open arms embraced the pair,
Was never group more blest, in this wide world of care.
XX.
" And will ye pardon then (replied the youth)
Your Waldegrave's feigned name, and false attire ?
I durst not in the neighbourhood, in truth,
The very fortunes of your house inquire ;
Lest one that knew me might some tidings dire
Impart, and I my weakness all betray;
'For had I lost my Gertrude, and my sire,
I meant but o'er your tombs to weep a day,
Unknown I meant to weep, unknown to pass away.
XXI.
" But here ye live, — ye bloom, — in each dear face
The changing hand of time I may not blame ;
For there, it hath but shed more reverend grace,
And here, of beauty perfected the frame ;
And well I know your hearts are still the same,
They could not change — ye look the very way,
As when an orphan first to you I came.
And have ye heard of my poor guide, I pray ?
Nay, wherefore weep we, friends, onsuch a joyous day?"
XXII.
" And art thou here ? or is it but a dream ?
And wilt thou,Waldegrave, wilt thou leave us more ?" —
" No, never ! thou that yet dost lovelier seem
Than aught on earth — than ev'n thyself of yore-
I will not part thee from thy father's shore ;
But we shall cherish him with mutual arras,
And hand in hand again the path explore,
64 Campbell's poems.
Which every ray of young remembrance warms,
While thou shalt be my own with all thy truth and
charms."
xxin.
At morn, as if beneath a galaxy
Of over-arching groves in blossoms white,
Where all was od'rous scent and harmony.
And gladness to the heart, nerve, ear, and sight :
There if, oh gentle love ! I read aright.
The utterance that sealed thy sacred bond,
'Twas list'ning to these accents of delight,
She hid upon his breast those eyes, beyond
Expression's power to paint, all languishingly fond.
XXIV.
*' Flovirer of my life, so lovely, and so lone !
Whom I would rather in this desert meet.
Scorning, and scorned by fortune's power, than own
Her pomp and splendours lavished at my feet '.
Turn not from me thy breath, more exquisite
Than odours cast on heaven's own shrine — to please-
Give me thy love, than luxury more sweet.
And more than all the wealth that loads the breeze.
When Coromandel's ships return from Indian seas."
XXV.
Then would that home admit them— happier far
Than grandeur's most magnificent saloon,
While here and there, a solitary star
Flushed in the dark'ning firmament of June ;
And silence brought the soul-felt hour, full soon,
Ineflfable, which I may not portray ;
For never did the Hymenean moon
A paradise of hearts more sacred sway,
In all that slept beneath her soft voluptuous ray.
GERTRUDE OF WYOMING
PART III.
I.
O LOVE ' in such a wilderness as this,
Where transport and security entwine,
Here is the empire of thy perfect bliss,
And here thou art a god indeed divine.
Here shall no forms abridge, no hours confine
The views, the walks, that boundless joy inspire !
Roll on, ye days of raptured influence, shine !
Nor blind with ecstasy's celestial fire,
Shall love behold the spark of earth-bom time expire
II.
Three httle moons, how short, amidst the grove,
And pastoral savannas they consume !
While she, beside her buskined youth to rove,
Delights, in fancifully wild costume,
Her lovely brow to shade with Indian plume ;
And forth in hunter-seeming vest they fare;
But not to chase the deer in forest gloom ;
'Tis but the breath of heaven— the blessed air—
And interchange of hearts unknown, unseen to share.
III.
What though the sportive dog oft round them note,
Or fawn or wild bird bursting on the wing- ;
Yet who, in love's own presence, would devote
To death those gentle throats that wake the spring ;
F 2
oQ Campbell's poems.
Or writhing from the brook its victim bring?
No I — nor let fear one little warbler ronse ;
But, fed by Gertrude's hand, still let them sing,
Acquaintance of her path, amidst the bo\]ghs, [vows.
That shade e'en now her love, and witnessed first hei
IV.
Now labyrinths, which but themselves can pierce,
Methinks, conduct them to some pleasant ground,
AVhere welcome hills shut out the universe.
And pines their lawny walk encompass round ;
There, if a pause delicious converse found,
'Twas but when o'er each heart th' idea stole,
(Perchance awhile in joy's oblivion drowned)
That come what may, while life's glad pulses roll,
Indissolubly thus should soul be knit to soul.
V.
And in the visions of romantic youth,
What years of endless bliss are yet to flow !
But mortal pleasure, what art thou in truth !
The torrent's smoothness, ere it dash below !
And must I change my song ? and must I show,
Sweet Wyoming ! the day, when thou wert doomed,
Guiltless, to mourn thy loveliest bow'rs laid low !
When where of yesterday a garden bloomed.
Death overspread his pallj andblack'ning ashes gloomod.
VI.
Sad was the year, by proud oppression driven,
When transatlantic Liberty arose,
Not in the sunshine, and the smile of heaven,
But wrapt in wirlwinds and begirt with woes :
Amidst the strife of fratricidal foes,
Her birth star was the light of burning plains ;•
• Alluding to the miseries that attended the American civil war-
Campbell's poem.^. 67
Her baptism is the weight of blood that flows
From kindred hearts — the blood of British veins —
And famine tracks her steps, and pestilential pains.
VII.
Yet, ere the storm of death had raged remote,
Or siege unseen, in heav'n reflects its beams.
Who now each dreadful circumstance shall note.
That fills pale Gertrude's thoughts, and nightly dreams
Dismal to her the forge of battle gleams
Portentous light ! and Music's voice is dumb ;
Save where the fife its shrill reveille screams,
Or midnight streets re-echo to the drum, [to come.
That speaks of madd'ning strife, and blood-stained fields
VIII.
It was in truth a momentary pang ;
Yet how comprising myriad shapes of wo !
First when in Gertrude's ear the summons rang,
A husband to the battle doomed to go !
" Nay, meet not thou," (she cries,) " thy kindred foe •,
But peaceful let us seek fair England's strand !" —
" Ah, Gertrude 1 thy beloved heart, I know
Would feel like mine, the stigmatizing brand,
Could I forsake the cause of freedom's holy band '
IX.
•* But shame— but flight— a recreant's name to prove,
To hide in exile ignominious fears ;
Say, e'en if this I brooked, the public love
Thy father's bosom to his home endears :
And how could I his few remaining years,
My Gertrude, sever from so dear a child ?"
So, day by day, her boding heart he cheers ;
At last that heart to hope is half beguiled, [smiled.
And pale tlirough tears suppressed the. movirnful beaut r
68 Campbell's poems.
X.
Night came, — and in their lighted bow'r, full late,
The joy of converse had endured — when hark 1
Abrupt and loud, a summons shook their gate ;
And heedless of the dog's obstrep'rous bark,
A form has rushed amidst them from the dark,
And spread his arms, — and fell upon the floor :
Of aged strength his limbs retain the mark ;
But desolate he looked, and famished poor.
As ever shipwrecked wretch lone left on desert shore.
XI.
Upris'n each wond'ring brow is knit and arched :
A spirit from the dead they deem him first :
To speak he tries ; but quivering, pale, and parched
From lips, as by some pow'rless dream accursed,
Emotions unintelligible burst ;
And long his filmed eye is red and dim ;
At length the pity-proflferred cup his thirst
Had half assuaged, and nerved his shuddering limb.
When Albert's hand he grasped ; — but Albert knew not
him.
XII.
" And hast thou then forgot," (he cried forlorn,
And eyed the group with half indignant air)
" Oh ! bast thou. Christian chief, forgot the mom
When I with thee the cup of peace did share ?
Then stately was this head, and dark this hair,
That now is white as Appalachia's snow ;
But, if the weight of fifteen years' despair,
And age hath bowed me, and the tort'ring foe,
Bring me my boy — and he will his deliverer know l"
xm.
It was not long, with eyes and heart of flame
Ere Henry to his loved Oneida flew :
Campbell's poems. 69
" Bless thee, my guide !" — but, backward as he came,
The chief his old bewildered head withdrew, [through.
And grasped his arm, and looked and looked him
'Twas strange — nor could the group a smile control —
The long, the doubtful scrutiny to view : —
At last delight o'er all his features stole,
It is — my own," he cried, and clasped him to his soul.
((
XIV.
" Yes thou recall'st my pride of years, for then
The bowstring of my spirit was not slack.
When, spite of woods, and floods, and ambushed men,
I bore thee like the quiver on my back.
Fleet as the whirlwind hurries on the rack ;
Nor foemen then, nor congar's couch I feared,*
For I was strong as mountain cataract :
And dost thou not remember how we cheered,
Upon the last hill top, when white men's huts appeared?
XV.
" Then welcome be my death song, and my death !
Since I have seen thee, and again embraced."
And longer had he spent his toil worn breath !
But, with affectionate and eager haste.
Was every arm outstretched around their guest,
To welcome, and to bless his aged head.
Soon was the hospitable banquet placed ;
And Gertrude's lovely hand a balsam shed
On wounds with fevered joy that more profusely bled.
XVI.
" But this is not a time," — he started up,
And smote his breast with wo denouncing hand —
• CojiEar, t!ie American Tiger.
70
CAMPBELL S POEMS.
" This is no time to fill the joyous cup,
The Mammoth comes,— the foe, — the Monster Brandt,*
With all his howling desolating band ; —
These eyes have seen their blade, and burning' pine
Awake at once, and silence half your land.
Red is the cup they drink ; but not with wine :
Awake, and watch to-night ! or see no morning shine
XVII.
" Scorning to wield the hatchet for his bribe,
'Gainst Brandt himself I went to battle forth :
Accursed Brandt ! he left of all my tribe
Nor man, nor child, nor thing of living birth :
No ! not the dog, that watched my household hearth,
Escaped, that night of blood, upon our plains I
All perished ! — I alone am left on earth !
To whom nor relative nor blood remains,
No ! — not a kindred drop that runs in human veins !
XVIII.
" But go and rouse your warriors ; — for, if right
These old bewildered eyes could guess, by signs
Of striped and starred banners, on yon height
Of eastern cedars, o'er the creek of pines —
Nome fort embattled by your country shines :
Deep roars th' innavigable gulf below
Its squared rock, and palisaded lines.
Go ! seek the light its warlike beacons show ;
Whilst I in ambush wait, for vengeance, and the foe !"
XIX
Scarce had he uttered, — when heav'n's verge extreme
Reverberates the bomb's descending star,
* Brandt was the leader of those Mohawks, and other savascs, who
laid waste this part of Pennsylvania. — Vide the note at the end of the
volume.
Campbell's poKMf. 71
And sounds, that mingled laugh, — and shout, — and
To freeze the blood, in one discordant jar, [scream.
Rung to the pealing thunderbolts of war.
Whoop after whoop with rack the ear assailed ;
As if unearthly fiends had burst their bar ;
While rapidly the marksman's shot prevailed ; —
And aye, as if for death, some lonely trumpet wailed.—
XX.
Then looked they to the hills, where fire o'erhung
The bandit groups, in one Vesuvian glare ;
Or swept, far seen, the tow'r, whose clock unrung,
Told legible that midnight of despair.
She faints, — she falters not, — th' heroic fair,
As he the sword and plume in haste arrayed.
One short embrace — he clasped his dearest care —
But hark ! what nearer war-drum shakes the glade
Joy, joy ! Columbia's friends are trampling through the
shade !
XXI.
Then came of every race the mingled swarm,
Far rung the groves, and gleamed the midnight grass
With flambeau, javelin, and naked arm ;
As warriors wheeled their culverins of brass,
Sprung from the woods, a bold athletic mass,
Whom virtue fires, and liberty combines :
And first the wild Moravian Yagers pass,
Mis plumed host the dark Iberian joins —
And Scotia's sword beneath the Highland thistle shines,
XXII.
And in, the buskined hunters of the deer,
To Albert's home, with shout and cymbal throng : —
Roused by their warlike pomp, and mirth, and cheer ;
Old OutaJissi woke his battle song,
And, beating with his war-club cadence strong,
72 Campbell's poems.
Tells how his deep stung Indignation smarts,
Of them that wrapt his house in flames, ere long, ,
To whet a dagger on their stony hearts.
And smile avenged ere yet his eagle spirit parts.—
XXIII.
Calm opposite the Christian father rose,
Pale on his venerable brow its rays
Of martyr light the conflagration tnrows ;
One hand upon his lovely child he lays,
And one th' uncovered crowd to silence sways ;
WhilC; though the battle flash is faster driv'n, —
IJnawed, with eye unstartled by the blaze,
He for his bleeding country prays to Heav'n, —
Prays that the men of blood themselves may be forgiven,
XXIV.
Short time is now for gratulating speech ;
And yet beloved Gertrude, ere began
Thy country's flight, yon distant tow'rs to reach,
Looked not on thee the rudest partisan
With brow relaxed to love ! And murmurs ran
As round and round their willing ranks they drew,
From beauty's sight to shield the hostile van.
Grateful, on them a placid look she threw.
Nor wept, but as she bade her mother's grave adieu?
XXV.
Past was the flight, and welcome seemed the towV
That like a giant standard-bearer, frowned
Defiance on the roving Indian pow'r.
Beneath, each bold and promontory mound
With embrasure embossed, and armour crowned,
And arrowy frize, and wedged ravelin.
Wove like a diadem its tracery round
The lofty summit of that mountain green ;
Here stood secure the group, and eyed a distant scene.
CAMPBELL 8 POEMS. 73
XXVI.
A scene of death ! where fires beneath the sun,
And blended arms, and white pavilions glow ;
And for the business of destruction done,
Its requiem the war-horn seemed to blow.
There sad spectatress of her country's wo !
The lovely Gertrude, safe from present harm.
Had laid her cheek, and clasped her hands of snow
On Waldegrave's shoulder, half within his arm
Enclosed, that felt her heart, and hushed its wild alarm I
XXVII.
But short tnat contemplation — sad and short
The pause that bid each much-loved scene adieu !
Beneath the very shadow of the fort,
Where friendly swords were drawn, and banners flew \
Ah ! who could deem that foot of Indian crew
Was near? — yet there, with lust of murd'rous deeds,
Gleamed like a basilisk, from woods in view.
The ambushed foeman's eye — his volley speeds.
And Albert— Albert— falls ! the dear old father bleeds
XXVIII.
And tranced in giddy horror Gertrude swooned ;
Yet, while she clasps him lifeless to her zone,
Say, burst they, borrowed from her father's wounds,
These drops ? — Oh God ! the life-blood is her own ;
And falt'ring, on her Waldegrave's bosom thrown —
*' Weep not, O Love '."—she cries, " to see me bleed—
Thee, Gertrude's sad survivor, thee alone
Heaven's peace commiserate ; for scarce I heed [deed.
These wounds ; — Yet thee to leave is death, is death in-
XXIX.
" Clasp me a little longer, on the brink
Of fate ! while I can feel thy dear caress ;
G
74 CAMPBELL S POEMS.
And when this heart hath ceased to beat — oh ! think,
And let it mitigate thy wo's excess,
That thou hast been to me all tenderness,
And friend to more than human friendship just
Oh ! by that retrospect of happiness,
And by the hopes of an immortal trust,
God shall assuage thy pangs — when I am laid in dust 5
XXX.
" Go, Henry, go not back, when I depart,
The scene thy bursting tears too deep will move,
Where my dear father took thee to his heart.
And Gertrude thought it ecstasy to rove
With thee, as with an angel, through the grove
Of peace, — imagining her lot was cast
In heaven ; for ours was not like earthly love.
And must this parting be our very last ?
No ! I shall love thee still, when death itself is past.
XXXI.
" Half could I bear, methinks, to leave this earth, —
And thee, more loved than aught beneath the sun.
If I had lived to smile but on the birth
Of one dear pledge ; — but shall there then be none
In future times — no gentle little one.
To clasp thy neck, and look, resembling me !
Yet seems it, ev'n while life's last pulses run,
A sweetness in the cup of death to be,
Lord of my bosom's love ! to die beholding thee !"
XXXII,
Hushed were his Gertrude's lips ! but still their blan^
And beautiful expression seemed to meU
W^ith love that could not die ! and still his hand
She presses to the heart no more that felt.
Ah heart ! where once each fond affection dwelt.
CAMPBKLL S POEMS. 75
And features yet that spoke a soul more fair.
Mute, gazing, agonizing as he knelt,
Of them that stood encircling his despair, [were.
He heard some friendly words ; but knew not what they
XXXIII.
For now, to mourn their judge and child, arrives
A faithful band. With solemn rites between,
'Twas sung, how they were lovely in their lives,
And in their deaths had not divided been.
Touched by the music, and the melting scene.
Was scarce one tearless eye amidst the* crowd:
Stern warriors, resting on their swords, were seen
To veil their eyes, as passed each much-loved shroud
While woman's softer soul in wo dissolved aloud.
XXXIV.
Then mournfully the parting bugle bid
Its farewell o'er the grave of worth and truth ;
Prone to the dust, afflicted Waldegrave hid
His face on earth ; him watched in gloomy ruth.
His woodland guide : but words had none to soothe
The grief that knew not consolation's name :
Casting his Indian mantle o'er the youth.
He watched beneath its folds, each burst that came
Convulsive^, ague-like, across his shuddering frame !
XXXV.
" And I could weep ;" th' Oneida chief '
His descant wildly thus begun ;
" But that I may not stain wilh grief
The death-song of my father's son !
Or bow this head in wo ;
For by my wrongs, and by my wrath !
To-morrow, Areouski's breath,
(That fires yon heaven with storms of deathj
Shall light us to the foe :
76 CAMPBELL S POEMS.
And we shall share, my Christian boy !
The foeinan's blood, the avenger's joy !
XXXVI.
But thee, my flower whose bre ath was given
By milder genii o'er the deep,
The spirits of the white man's heaven
Forbid not thee to weep :
Nor will the Christian host,
Nor will thy father's spirit grieve
To see thee, on the battle's eve,
Lamenting take a mournful leave
Of her who loved thee most :
She was the rainbow to thy sigk.
Thy sun — thy heaven — of lost delignt .
XXXVII.
To-morrow let us do or die !
But when the bolt of death is hurled,
Ah ! whither then with thee to fly.
Shall Outalissi roam the world ?
Seek we thy once-loved home ?
The hand is gone that cropt its flowers :
Unheard their clock repeats its hours !
Cold is the hearth within their bow'rs !
And should we thither roam.
Its echoes, and its empty tread,
Would sound like voices from the dead !
XXXVIII.
" Or shall we cross yon mountains blue.
Whose streams my kindred nation quaffed ;
And by my side, in battle true,
A thousand warriors drew the shaft ?
Ah ! there in desolation cold.
Campbell's pof.iMs. 77
The desert serpent dwells alone,
Where grass o'ergrows each mould'ring bone
And stones themselves to ruin grown,
Like me, are death-like old.
Then seek we not their camp — for there —
The silence dwells of my despair !
XXXIX.
" But hark, the trump !— to morrow thou
In glory's fires shalt dry thy tears :
Even from the land of shadows now
My father's awful ghost appears,
Amidst the clouds that round us roll ;
He bids my soul for battle thirst —
He bids me dry the last — the first —
The- only tears that ever burst
From Outalissi's soul ;
Because I may not stain with grief
The death song of an Indian chief."
O'CONNOR'S CHILD,
OR,
THE FLOWER OF LOVE LIES BLEEDING
I.
Oh once the harp of Innisfail*
Was strung full high to notes of gladness j
But vet it often told a tale
Of more prevailing sadness.
Sad was the note, and wild its fall,
As winds that moan at night forlorn
Along the isles of Fion-Gael,
When for O'Connor's child to mourn,
The harper told, how lone, how far
From any mansion's twinkling star,
From any path of social men,
Or voice, b.it from the fox's den,
The Lady in the desert dwelt.
And yet no wrongs, no fear she felt :
Say, why should dwell in place so wild
The lovely pale O'Connor's child ?
II.
Sweet lady ! she no more mspires
Green Erin's heart with beauty's pow'r,
As in the palace of her sires
She bloomed a peerless flow'r.
Gone from her hand and bosom, gone,
The regal broche, the jewelled ring,
* The ancient name of Ireland.
Campbell's poems. 79
That o'er her dazzling whiteness shone
Like dews on lilies of the spring.
Yet why, though fallen her brother's kerne,*
Beneath De Bourgo's battle stern,
While yet in Leinster unexplored,
Her friends survive the English sword;
Why lingers she from Erin's host,
So far on Galway's shipwrecked coast ;
Why wanders she a huntress wild —
The lovely pale O'Connor's child ?
III.
And fixed on empty space, why burn
Her eyes with momentary wildness ;
And wherefore do they then return
To more than woman's mildness ?
Dishevelled are her raven locks,
On Connocht Moran's name she calls ;
And oft amidst the lonely rocks
She sings sweet madrigals.
Placed in the foxglove and the moss.
Behold a parted warrior's cross !
That is the spot where, evermore,
The lady, at her shielingt door,
Enjoys that in communion sweet.
The living and the dead can meet :
For lo ! to lovelorn fantasy,
The hero of her heart is nigh.
IV.
Bright as the bow that spans the storm,
In Erin's yellow vesture clad,
A son of light — a lovely form.
He comes and makes her glad :
* Kerne, the ancient Irish foot soldiery. /
t Kude but, or cabiu.
80 Campbell's poems.
Now on the grass-green turf he sits,
His tasselled horn beside him laid ;
hvw o'ev the hills in chase he flits,
The hunter and the deer a shade !
Sweet mourner ! those are shadows vain,
That cross the twilight of her brain ;
Yet she will tell you, she is blest.
Of Connocht Moran's tomb possessed.
More richly than in Aghrim's bow'r.
When bards high praised her beauty's pow'r.
And kneeling pages offered up
The morat* in a golden cup. \
V.
" A hero's bride ! this desert bow'r.
It ill befits thy gentle breeding :
And wherefore dost thou love this flow'r
To call — My love lies bleeding ?"
" This purple flow'r my tears have nursed;
A heroe's blood supplied its bloom :
I love it, for it was the first
That grew on Connocht Moran's tomb.
Oh ! hearken, stranger, to my voice !
This desert mansion is my choice ;
And blest, though fatal, be the star
That led me to its wilds afar :
For here these pathless mountains free
Gave shelter to my love and me ;
And every rock and every stone
Bare witness that he was my own.
VI.
" O'Connor's child, I was the bud
Of Erin's royal tree of glory ;
But wo to them that wrapt in blood
The tissue of my story !
* A drink made of the juice of mulberry mixed with honair.
Campbell's poems. 81
Still as I clasp my burning brain,
A death-scene rushes on my sight ;
It rises o'er and o'er again,
The bloody feud,— the fatal night,
When chafing Connocht Moran's scorn,
They called my hero basely born ;
And bade him choose a meaner bride
Than from O'Connor's house of pride.
Their tribe, they said, their high degree,
Was sung in Tara's psaltery ;*
Witness their Eath's victorious brand,t
And Cathal of the bloody hand, —
Glory (they said) and power and honour
Were in the mansion of O'Connor ;
But he, my lov'd one. bore in field
A meaner crest upon his shield.
VII.
" Ah, brothers ! what did it avail,
That fiercely and triumphantly
Ye fought the English of the pale,
And stemmed De Bourgo's chivalry ?
And what was it to love and me.
That barons by your standard rode ;
Or beal-firest for your jubilee,
Upon a hundred mountains glowed.
What tho' the lords of tower and dome
From Shannon to the North-sea foam,—
Thought ye j-our iron hands of pride
Could break the knot that love had tied ?
No : — let the eagle change his plume,
The leaf its hue, the flower its bloom ;
* The psalter of Tara was the great national register of the ancient
Trish.
t Vide the note upon the victories of the house of O'Connor.
t Fires lighted on May-day on tlie liiil topi by the Irish. Vide the
aote on stanza VU.
82 CAMPBELL S POEMS.
But ties around this heart were spun,
That could not, would not, be undone
viir.
" At bleating of the wild watch fold
Thus sang my love — ' come with me
Our bark is on the lake : behold,
Our steeds are fastened to the tree.
Come far from Castle-Connor's clans —
Come with thy belted forestere.
And I, beside the lake of swans.
Shall hunt for thee the fallow deer ;
And build thy hut and bring thee home
The wild fowl and the honeycomb ;
And berries from the wood provide.
And play my clarshech* by thy side.
Then come, my love !' — How could I stay
Our nimble stag-hounds tracked the way,
And 1 pursued by moonless skies,
The light of Connocht Moran's eyes.
IX.
" And fast and far, before the star
Of dayspring rushed me thro' the glade
And saw at dawn the lofty bawnf
Of Castle Connor fade.
Sweet was to us the hermitage
Of this unploughed, untrodden shore :
Like birds all joyous from the cage,
For man's neglect we loved it more.
And well he knew, my huntsman dear,
To search the game with hawk and spear ;
While I, his evening food to dress,
Would sing to him in happiness.
• The harp. t Ancient fortification
CAMI'EELL'i rOEMS 83
But oh, that midnight of despair !
When I was doomed to rend my hair:
The night, to me, of shrieking sorrow !
The night, to him, that had no morrow!
X.
" When all was hushed at eventide^
I heard the baying of their beagle :
Be hushed ! my Connocht Moran cried,
'Tis but the screaming of the eagle.
Alas ! 'twas not the eyrie's sound,
Their bloody bands had tracked us out :
Up-list'ning starts our couchant hound —
And hark ! again, that nearer shout
Brings faster on the murderers.
Spare— spare him— Bazil— Desmond fierce'.
In vain — no voice the adder charms ;
Their weapons crossed my sheltering arms :
Another's sword has laid him low—
Another's and another's ;
And every hand that dealt the blow —
Ah me ! it was a brother's !
Yes, when his moanings died away.
Their iron hands had dug the clay,
And o'er his burial turf they trod.
And I beheld— Oh God ! Oh God !
His life-blood oozing from the sod !
XI.
" Warm in his death-wounds sepulchred,
Alas ! my warrior's spirit brave,
Nor mass nor uUa-lulla* heard,
Lamenting soothe his grave.
Dragged to their hated mansion back,
How long in thraldom's grasp I lay,
* Tbe Irish lamentation for tbedead
84 CAMPBELL S POEMS.
I know not, for mj soul was black,
And knew no change of night or day.
One night of horror round me grew ;
Or if I saw, or felt, or knew,
'Twas but when those grim visages.
The angry brothers of my race,
Glared on each eyeball's aching throb,
And checked my bosom's pow'r to sob ;
Or when my heart with pulses drear.
Beat like a deathwatch to my ear.
XII.
" But Heav'n, at last, my soul's eclipse
Did with a vision bright inspire :
I woke, and felt upon my lips
A prophetess's fire.
Thrice in the east a war-drum beat,
I heard the Saxon's trumpet sound.
And ranged as to the judgment seat
My guilty, trembling brothers round.
Clad in the helm and shield they came;
For now De Bourgo's sword and flame
Had ravaged Ulster's boundaries.
And lighted up the midnight skies.
The standard of O'Connor's sway
Was in the turret where I lay :
That standard, with so dire a look,
As ghastly shone the moon and pale,
I gave, — that every bosom shook
Beneath its iron mail.
XIII.
*' And go ; I cried, the combat seek,
Yet hearts that unappalled bore
The anguish of a sister's shriek,
Go ! — and return no more '
CAMPBELL S POEMS. 85
For sooner guilt the ordeal brand
Shall grasp unhurt, than ye shall hold
The banner with victorious hand,
Beneath a sister's curse unrolled.
Oh stranger ! by my country's loss !
And by my love ! and by the cross !
I swear I never could have spoke
The curse that severed nature's yoke ;
But that a spirit o'er me stood,
And fired me with the wrathful mood;
And frenzy to my heart was giv'n,
To speak the malison of heav'n.
XIV.
" They would have crossed themselves all mutt,
They would have prayed to burst the spell ;
But at the stamping of my foot
Each hand down pow'rless fell !
And go to Athunree 1* I cried.
High lift the banner of your pride !
But know that where its sheet unrolls
The weight of blood is on your souls !
Go where the havoc of your kerne
Shall float as high as mountain fern !
Men shall no more your mansion know !
The nettles on your heart shall grow !
Dead as the green oblivious flood,
That mantles by your walls, shall be
The glory of O'Connor's blood !
Away ! away to Athunree !
Where downward when the sun shall fall
The raven's wing shall be your pall ;
• Athunree, the battle fought in 1314, which decided the fate of
freland.
II
86 CAMPBELL S POEMS.
And not a vassal shall unlace
The vizor from your dying face !
XV.
" A bolt that overhung our dome
Suspended till my curse was given,
Soon as it passed these lips of foam
Pealed in the blood-red heaven.
Dire was the look that o'er their backs
The angry parting brothers threw ;
But now, behold ! like cataracts,
Come down the hills in view.
O'Connor's plumed partisans.
Thrice ten Innisfallian clar.s
"Were marching to their doom :
A sadden stcTm their plumage tossed,
A flash of lightning o'er them crossed,
And all again was gloom ;
But once again in heaven the bands
9f thunder spirits clapt their hands.
XVI.
" Stranger ! I fled the home of grief,
At Connocht Moran's tomb to fall ;
I found the helmet of my chief,
His bow still hanging on our wall ;
And took it down, and vowed to rove
This desert place a huntress bold ;
Nor would I change my buried love
For any heart of living mould.
No ! for I am a hero's child,
I'll hunt my quarry in the wild ;
And still my home this mansion make,
Of all unheeded and unheeding,
And cherish for my warrior's sake,
The flower of love lies bleeding."
CAMPBELL S POEMS. 87
LOCHIEL'S WARNING
WIZARD— LOCHIEL.
WIZARD.
LocHiEL ' Lochiel, beware of the day
When the Lowlands shall meet thee in battle array
For a field of the dead rushes red on my sight,
And the clans of Culloden are scattered in fight :
They rally, they bleed, for their kingdom and crown ;
Wo, wo to the riders that trample them down !
Proud Cumberland prances, insulting the slain.
And their hoof-beaten bosoms are trod to the plain.
But hark ! through the fast-flashing lightning of war,
What steed to the desert flies frantic and far ?
'Tis thine, oh Glenullin ! whose bride shall await,
Like a love-lighted watchfire, all night at the gate.
A steed comes at morning : no rider is there ;
But its bridle is red with the sign of despair.
Weep, Albin ! to death and captivity led !
Oh weep ! but thy tears cannot number the deac :
For a merciless sword on Culloden shall wave,
Culloden ! that reeks with the blood of the brave. .
LOCHIEL.
Go, preach to the coward, thou death telling seer
Or, if gory Culloden so dreadful appear.
Draw, dotard, around thy old wavering sight '.
This mantle, to cover the phantoms of fright.
88 Campbell's poems.
WIZARD.
Ha ! laugh'st thou. Lochiel, my vision to scorn r
Proud bird of the mountain, thy plume shall be torn 1
Say, rushed the bold eagle exultingly forth,
From his home, in the dark rolling clouds of the north
Lo ! the death-shot of foeman outspeeding, he rode
Companionless, bearing destruction abroad ;
But down let him stoop from his havoc on high '.
Ah ! home let him speed— for the spoiler is nigh.
Why flames the far summit? Why shoot to the blast
Those embers, like stars from the firmament cast?
'Tis the fire-shovFer of ruin all dreadfully driven
From his eyrie, that beacons the darkness of heaven.
Oh, crested Lochiel ! the peerless in might,
Whose banners arise on the battlements' height,
Heaven's fire is around thee, to blast and to burn ;
Return to thy dwelling ! all lonely return !
For the blackness of ashes shall mark where it stood,
And a wild mother scream o'er her famishing brood
LOCHIEL.
False.Wizard avaunt ! I have marshalled my clan :
Their swords are a thousand, their bosoms are one !
They are true to the last of their blood and their breath.
And like reapers descend to the harvest of death.
Then welcome be Cumberland's steed to the shock !
Let him dash his proud foam like a wave on the rock
But wo to his kindred, and wo to his cause,
When Albin her claymore indignantly draws ;
When her bonnetted chieftains to victory crowd,
Clanranald the dauntless, and Moray the proud ;
All plaided and plumed in their tartan array
WIZARD.
Lochiel, Lochiel, beware of the day !
For, dark and despairing, my sight I may seal.
But man cannot cover what God would reveal :
Campbell's poems. 89
'Tis the sunset of life gives me mystical lore,
And coming events cast their shadows before.
I tell thee, CuUoden's dread echoes shall ring
With the bloodhounds, that bark for thy fugitive king.
Lo ! anointed by heaven with the vials of wrath,
Behold, where he flies on his desolate path !
Now, in darkness and billows, he sweeps from my sight:
Rise ! rise ! ye wild tempests, and cover his flight !
'Tis finished. Their thunders are hushed on the moors ;
Culloden is lost, and my country deplores ;
But where is the iron-bound prisoner ? Where ?
For the red eye of battle is shut in despair.
Say, mounts he the ocean-wave, banished, forlorn.
Like a limb from his country cast bleeding and torn?
Ah no ! for a darker departure is near ;
The war-drum is muffled, and black is the bier ;
His death-bell is tolling ; oh ! mercy, dispel
Yon sight that it freezes my spirit to tell !
Life flutters convulsed in his quivering limbs,
And his blood-streaming nostril in agony swims.
Accursed be the faggots, that blaze at his feet.
Where his heart shall be thrown ere it ceases to beat,
With the smoke of its ashes to poison the gale
LOCHIEL.
-Down soothless insulter! I trust not the tale : [gore,
Though my perishing ranks should be strewed in their
Like ocean-weeds heaped on the surf-beaten shore,
Lochiel, untainted by flight or by chains,
While the kindling of life in his bosom remains,
Shall victor exult, or in death be laid low.
With his back to the field, and his feet to the foe !
And leaving in battle no blot on his name,
Look proudly to heaven from the death-bed of fame.
H2
90 Campbell's poems.
SPECIMENS
OF
TRANSLATION FROM MEDEA.
Medea, v. 194,/?. 33, Glasg. edit.
Tell me, ye bards, whose skill sublime
First charmed the ear of youthful Time,
With numbers wrapt in heav'nly fire ;
Who bade delighted Echo swell
The trembling transport of the lyre,
The murmur of the shell, —
Why to the burst of Joy alone
Accords sweet Music's soothing tone ?
Why can no bard, with magic strain,
In slum be is steep the heart of pain ?
While varied tones obey your sweep,
The mild, the plaintive, and the deep,
Bends not despairing Grief to hear
Your golden lute, with ravished ear?
Oh ! has your sweetest shell no power to bind
The fiercer pangs that shake the mind.
And lull the wrath, at whose command
Murder bares her gory hand ?
When flushed with joy, the rosy throng
Weave the light dance, ye swell the song '
Cease, ye vain warblers ! cease to charm
The breast with other raptures warm !
Cease ! till your hand with magic strain
In slumbers steep the heart of pain !
Campbell's poems. 91
SPEECH OF THE CHORUS
JN
THE SAME TRAGEDY,
To dissuade Medea from her purpose of pulling her
children to death, and flying for protection to Athens.
haggard queen ! to Athens dost thou guide
Thy glowing chariot, steeped in kindred gore ;
Or seek to hide thy damned parricide
Where Peace and Mercy dwell for ever more ?
The land where Truth, pure, precious, and sublime,
Woos the deep silence of sequestered bowers,
And warriors, matchless since the first of Time,
Rear their bright banners o'er unconquered towers I
Where joyous Youth, to Music's mellow strain.
Twines in the dance with Nymphs for ever fair,
While Spring eternal, on the Tilied plain.
Waves amber radiance throug-h the fields of air !
The tuneful Nine (so sacred legends tell)
First waked their neavenly lyre these scenes among ;
Still in your greenwood bowers they love to dwell ;
Still in your vales they swell the choral song !
For there the tuneful, chaste, Pierian fair.
The guardian nymphs of green Parnassus now.
Sprung from Harmonia, while her graceful hair
Waved in bright auburn o'er her polished brow »
92 Campbell's poems. •
ANTISTROPHE I.
Where silent vales, and glades of green array,
The murm'ring wreaths of cool Cephisus lave,
There as the Muse hath sung, at noon of day,
The Q,ueen of Beauty bowed to taste the wave ;
And blest the stream, and breathed across the land.
The soft sweet gale that fans yon summer bowers
And there the sister Loves, a smiling band,
Crowned with the fragrant wreaths of rosy flowers 1
" And go, she cries, in yonder valleys rove
With Beauty's torch the solemn scenes illume ;
Wake in each eye the radiant light of Love,
Breathe on each cheek young Passion's tender bloom!
Entwine with myrtle chains, your soft control.
To sway the hearts of Freedom's darling kind !
With glowing charms enrapture Wisdom's soul.
And mould to grace ethereal Virtue's mind."
STROPHE II.
The land where Heaven's own hallowed waters play,
Where friendship binds the generous and the good,
Say, shall it hail thee from thy frantic way.
Unholy woman ! with thy hands imbrued
In thine own children's gore ? — Oh ! ere they bleed,
Let Nature's voice thy ruthless heart appal !
Pause at the bold, irrevocable deed —
The mother strikes — the guiltless babes shall fall !
&'
Think what remorse thy maddening thoughts shall sting,
When dying pangs their gentle bosoms tear ;
Where shalt thou sink, when ling'ring echoes ring
The screams of horror in thy tortured ear '
Campbell's poems. 93
No ! let thy bosom melt to Pity's cry, —
In dust we kneel — by sacred Heaven implore —
! stop thy lifted arm, ere yet they die,
Nor dip thy horrid hands in infant gore I
ANTISTROPHE II.
Say, how shalt thou that barb'rous soul assume.
Undamped by horror at the daring plan ?
Hast thou a heart to work thy children's doom ?
Or hands to finish what thy wrath began ?
When o'er each babe you look a last adieu,
And gaze on innocence that smiles asleep,
Shall no fond feeling beat, to nature true,
Charm thee to pensive thought — and bid thee weep ?
When the young suppliants clasp their parent dear,
Heave the deep sob, and pour the artless prayer, —
Ay I thou shalt melt ; — and many a heart-shed tear
Gush o'er the hardened features of despair !
Nature shall throb in ev'ry tender string.
Thy trembling heart the ruffian's task deny ;
rhy horror-smitten hands afar shall fling
The blade, undrenched in blood's eternal dye
CHORtrS.
Hallowed Earth ! with indignation
Mark, oh mark, the murd'rous deed !
Radiant eye of wide creation,
Watch the damned parricide 1
Yet, ere Colchia's rugged daughter
Perpetrate the dire design.
And consign to kindred slaughter
Children of thy golden line ;
94 Campbell's poems.
Shall the hand, with murder gory,
Cause immortal blood to flow ?
Sun of Heav'n — arrayed in glory !
Rise, — ^forbid, — avert the blow !
In the vales of placid gladness
Let no rueful maniac range ;
Chase afar the fiend of Madness
Wrest the dagger from Revenge!
Say, hast thou, with kind protection.
Reared thy smiling race in vain ;
Fost'i'ing Nature's fond affection.
Tender cares, and pleasing pain ?
Hast thou, on the troubled ocean.
Braved the tempest loud and strong,
Where the waves, in wild commotion,
Roar Cyanean rocks among?
Didst thou roam the paths of danger,
Hymenean joys to prove ?
Spare, sanguinary stranger.
Pledges of thy sacred love !
Shall not Heaven, with indignation
Watch thee o'er the barb'rous deed ?
Shalt thou cleanse, with expiation,
Monstrous, murd'rous, parricide ?
Campbell's poems. 95
LOVE AND MADNESS.
AN ELEGY.
Written in 1795.
Hark ! from the battlements of yonder tower*
The solemn bell has tolled the midnight hour !
Roused from drear visions of distempered sleep,
Poor B k wakes — in solitude to weep !
" Cease, Mem'ry cease (the friendless mourner cried)
To probe the bosom too severely tried !
Oh ever cease, my pensive thoughts, to stray
Through the bright fields of Fortune's better day :
When youthful hope, the music of the mind,
Tuned all its charms, and E n was kind !
" Yet, can I cease, while glows this trembling frame
In sighs to speak thy melancholy name ?
I hear thy spirit wail in every storm !
In midnight shades I view thy passing form !
Pale as in that sad hour, when doomed to feel,
Deep in thy perjured heart the bloody steel 1
" Demons of Vengeance ! ye at whose command
grasped the sword with more than woman's hand
Say ye, did Pity's trembling voice control,
Or horror damp the purpose of my soul ?
No ! my wild heart sat smiling o'er the plan.
Till Hate fulfilled what baffled Love began !
• Warwick Castle.
96 Campbell's poems.
" Yes ; let the clay-cold breast, that never knew
One tender pang to generoas Nature true,
Half mingling pity with the gall of scorn,
Condemn this heart that bled in love forlorn !
" And ye, proud fair, whose soul no gladness vvannh.
Save Rapture's homage to your conscious charms !
Delighted idols of a gaudy train !
Ill can your blunter feelings guess the pain,
When the fond faithful heart, inspired to prove
Friendship refined, the calm delight of love.
Feels all its tender strings with anguish torn,
And bleeds at perjured Pride's inhuman scorn !
" Say, then, did pitying Heav'n condemn the deed,
When Vengeance bade thee, faithless lover! bleed?
Long had I watched thy dark foreboding brow.
What time thy bosom scorned its dearest vow !
Sad, though I wept the friend, the lover changed.
Still thy cold look was scornful and estranged.
Till from thy pity, love, and shelter thrown,
I wandered hopeless, friendless, and alone '
" Oh ! righteous Heav'n ! 'twas then my tortured soul
First gave to wrath unlimited control !
Adieu the silent look ! the streaming eye !
The murmured plaint ! the deep heart-heaving sigh '
Long slumb'ring Vengeance wakes to better deeds ;
He shrieks, he falls, the perjured Lover bleeds !
Now the last laugh of agony is o'er.
And pale in blood he sleeps, to wake no more !
" 'Tis done ! the flame of hate no longer burns ;
Nature relents, but ah ! too late returns !
Why does my soul this gush of fondness feel ?
Tremblimg and faint, I drop the guilty steel !
CAMPBELL 9 POEMS. 97
Cold on my heart the hand of terror lies,
And shades of horror close my languid eyes ! —
" Oh ! 'twas a deed of Murder's deepest grain !
Could B k's soul so (rue to wrath remain?
A friend long true, a once fond lover fell ! —
Where Love was fostered, could not Pity dwell ?
" Unhappy youth ! while yon pale crescent glows.
To watch on silent Nature's deep repose,
Thy sleepless spirit, breathing from the tomb,
Foretells my fate, and summons me to come !
Once more I see thy sheeted spectre stand.
Roll the dim eye, and wave the paly hand !
" Soon may this fluttering spark of vital flame
Forsake its languid melancholy frame !
Soon may these eyes their trembling lustre close,
Welcome the dreamless night of long repose !
Soon may this wo-worn spirit seek the bourne !
Where, lulled to slumber, Grief forgets to mourn '"
THE WOUNDED HUSSAR.
Alone by the banks of the dark rolling Danube
Fair Adelaide hied when the battle was o'er :
Oh whither, she cried, hast thou wandered, my lover,
Or here dost thou welter, and bleed on the shore I
What voice did I hear? 'twas my Henry that sighed'.
All mournful she hastened, nor wandered she far.
When bleeding, and low, on the heath she descried.
By the light of the moon, her poor wounded Hussar !
I
98 Campbell's poems.
From his bosom that heaved, the last torrent was stream-
ing,
And pale was his visage, deep marked with a scar ;
And dim was that eye, once expressively beaming,
That melted in love, and that kindled in war !
How smit was poor Adelaide's heart at the sight !
How bitter she wept o'er the victim of war !
Hast thou come my fond Love, this last sorrowful night.
To cheer the lone heart of your wounded Hussar ?
Thou shalt live, she replied, Heav'n's mercy relieving
Each anguishing wound, shall forbid me to mourn !
Ah, no ! the last pang in my bosom is heaving!
No light of the morn shall to Henry return !
Thou charmer of life, ever tender and true :
Ye babes of my love that await me afar ! —
His faltering tongue scarce could murmur adieu,
When he sunk in her arms — the poor wounded
Hussar !
GILDEROY.
The last, the fatal hour is come,
That bears my love from me ;
I hear the dead note of the drum,
I mark the gallows tree !
The bell has tolled ; it shakes my heart ;
The trumpet speaks thy name ;
And must my Gilderoy depart
To bear a death of shame ?
Campbell's poems. 99
No bosom trembles for thy doom;
No mourner wipes a tear;
The gallows' foot is all thy tomb,
The sledge is all thy bier '
Oh, Gilderoy ! bethought we then
So soon, so sad, to part,
When first in Roslin's lovely glen
You triumphed o'er my heart ?
Your locks they glittered to the sheen
Your hunter garb was trim ;
And graceful was the ribbon green
That bound your manly limb !
Ah ! little thought I to deplore
These limbs in fetters bound ;
Or hear, upon thy scaffold floor,
The midnight hammer sound.
*o"
Ye cruel, cruel, that combined
The guiltless to pursue ;
My Gilderoy was ever kind.
He could not injure you !
A long adieu ! but where shall fly
Thy widow all forlorn,
When every mean and cruel eye
Regards my wo with scorn ?
Yes ! they will mock thy widow's tears,
And hate thine orphan boy ;
Alas ! his infant beauty wears
The form of Gilderoy !
Then will I seek the dreary mound
That wraps thy mouldering clay ;
And weep and linger on the ground,
And sigh my heart away.
100 Campbell's poems.
THE HARPER.
On the green banks of Shannon, when Sheelah wi.9
No blithe Irish lad was so happj as I ; ["'gh'
No harp like my own could so cheerily play,
And wherever I went was my poor dog Tray.
When at last I was forced from my Sheelah to part,
She said (while the sorrow was big at her heart)
Oh ! remember your Sheelah when far, far away ;
And be kind, my dear Pat, to our poor dog Tray.
Poor dog! he was faithful and kind, to be sure,
And he constantly loved me, although I was poor; ^
When the sour-looking folks sent me heartless away.
I had always a friend in my poor dog Tray.
When the road was so dark, and the night was so cold.
And Pat and his dog were grown weary and old,
How snugly we slept in my old coat of gray,
And he licked me for kindness — my poor dog Tray.
Though my wallet was scant, I remembered his case
Nor refused my last crust to his pitifui face ;
But he died at my feet on a cold winter day.
And I played a sad lament for my poor dog Tray.
Where now shall I go, poor, forsaken, and blind T
Can I find one to guide me, so faithful and kind }
To my sweet native village, so far, far away,
I can never more return with my poor dog Tray
CAMPBELL S POEMS. 101
SONG.
My mind is my kingdom, but if thou wilt deign
A queen there to sway without measure ;
Then come, o'er its wishes and homage to reign,
And make it an empire of pleasure.
Then of thoughts and emotions each mutinous crowd.
That rebelled at stern reason and duty,
Returning — shall yield all their loyalty proud
To the Halcyon dominion of beauty.
THE BEECH TREE'S PETITION.
Oh ! leave this barren spot to me,
Spare, woodman, spare the beechen tree.
Though shrub or flow'ret never grow,
My wan unwanning shade below,
Nor fruits of autumn blossom born.
My green and glossy leaves adorn,
Nor murmuring tribes from me derive
The ambrosial treasures of the hive.
Yet leave this little spot to me.
Spare, woodman, spare the beechen tree.
Thrice twenty summers I have stood
In bloomless, fruitless solitude ;
Since childhood in my rustling bower
First spent its sweet and sportive hour,
Since youthful lovers in my shade
Their vows of truth and rapture paid,
12
102 Campbell's poems.
And on my trunk's surviving frame
Carved many a long forgotten name.
Oh, by the vows of gentle sound
First breathed upon this sacred ground,
By all that Love hath whispered here,
Or beauty heard with ravished ear,
As Love's own altar honour me,
Spare, woodman, spare the beechen tree
HOHENLINDEN.
Oh Linden, when the sun was low,
All bloodless lay th' untrodden snow.
And dark as winter was the flow
Of Iser, rolling rapidly.
But Linden saw another sight,
When the drum beat, at dead of night,
Commanding fires of death to light
The darkness of her scenery.
By torch and trumpet fast arrayed,
Each horseman drew his battle blade.
And furious every charger neighed,
To join the dreadful revelry.
Then shook the hills with thunder riv'n,
Then rushed the steed to battle driv'n,
And louder than the bolts of heaven,
Far flashed the red artillery.
And redder yet those fires shall glow,
On Linden's hills of blood stained snow.
And darker yet shall be the flow
Of Iser, rolling rapidly.
Campbell's poems. 103
'Tis morn, but scarce yon lurid sun
Can pierce the war-clouds, rolling dun,
Where furious Frank, and fiery Hun,
Shout mid their sulph'rous canopy.
The combat deepens. On, ye brave.
Who rush to glory, or the grave !
Wave, Munich, all thy banners wave !
And charge with all thy chivalry !
Ah ! few shall part where many meet !
The snow shall be their winding sheet,
And every turf beneath their feet,
Shall be a soldier's sepulchre.
YE MARINERS OF ENGLAND.
A NAVAL ODE.
L
Fe Mariners of England !
That guard our native seas ;
Whose flag has braved, a thousand years,
The battle and the breeze !
Your glorious standard launch again
To match another foe !
And sweep through the deep.
While the stormy tempests blow;
While the battle rages loud and long,
And the stormy tempests blow.
104 Campbell's poems.
II.
The spirits of your fathers
Shall start from every wave, —
For the deck it was their field of fame,
And Ocean was their grave :
Where Blake and mighty Nelson fell
Your manly hearts shall glow,
As ye sweep through the deep,
While the stormy tempests blow ;
While the battle rages loud and long,
And the stormy tempests blow.
III.
Britannia needs no bulwark,
No towers along the steep ;
Her march is o'er the mountain waves,
Her home is on the deep.
With thunders from her native oak,
She quells the floods below —
As they roar on the shore,
When the stormy tempests blow ;
When the battle rages loud and long,
And the stormy tempests blow.
IV.
The meteor flag of England
Shall yet terrific burn ;
Till danger's troubled night depart,
And the star of peace return.
Then, then, ye ocean warriors !
Our song and feast shall flow
To the fame of your name,
When the storm has ceased to blow ;
When the fiery fight is heard no more,
Aod the storm has ceased to blow.
Campbell's poems. 105
GLENARA.
O HEARD ye yon pibroch sound sad in the gale,
Where a band cometh slowly with weeping and wail !
'Tis the chief of Glenara laments for his dear ;
And her sire, and the people, are called to her bier.
Glenara came first with the mourners and shroud ;
Her kinsmen they followed, but mourned not aloud :
Their plaids all their bosoms were folded around ;
They marched all in silence — they looked on the ground
In silence they reached over mountain and moor.
To a heath, where the oak-tree grew lonely and hoar •
' Now here let us place the gray stone of her cairn .•
Why speak ye no word !" — said Glenara the stern.
" And tell me, I charge you I ye clan of my spouse,
Why fold ye your mantles, why cloud ye your brows ?"
So spake the rude chieftain : — no answer is made.
But each mantle unfolding a dagger displayed.
" I dreamt of my lady, I dreamt of her shroud,"
Cried a voice from the kinsmen, all wrathful and ion,
" And empty that shroud, and that coffin did seem :
Glanara ! Glanara ! now read mo my dream !"
! pale grew the cheek of that chieftain, I ween,
When tlie shroud was unclosed, and no lady was seen;
*\'iien a voice from the kinsmen spoke louder in scorn,
Iwas the youth who had loved tiie fair Ellen of Lorn :
" I dreamt of my lady, I dreamt of her grief,
[ dreamt that her lord was a barbarous chief:
On a rock of the ocean fair Ellen did seem ;
Glenara ! Glenara ! now read me mj'^ dream I"
106 Campbell's poems.
In dust, low the traitor has knelt to the ground,
And the desert revealed where his lady was found ^
From a rock of the ocean that beauty is borne,
Now joy to the house of fair Ellen of Lorn '.
BATTLE OF THE BALTIC.
I.
Of Nelson and the North,
Sings the glorious day's renown,
When to battle fierce came forth
All the might of Denmark's crown,
And her arms along the deep proudly shone;
By each gun the lighted brand,
In a bold determined hand,
i^nd the Prince of all the land
Led them on. —
n.
Like leviathans afloat.
Lay their bulwarks on the brine ;
"While the sign of battle flew
On the lofty British line :
It was ten of April morn by the chime
As they drifted on their path.
There was silence deep as death ;
And the boldest held his breath,
For a time. —
in.
But the might of England flushed
To anticipate the scene ;
And her van the fleeter rushed
O'er the deadly space between.
CAMPBELL S POEMS. 107
"Hearts of oak," our captains cried; when each guu
From its adamantine lips
Spread a death-shade round the ships,
Like the hurricane eclipse
Of the sun. —
IV.
Again ! again ! again !
And the havoc did not slack,
Till a feeble cheer the Dane
To our cheering sent us back; —
Their shots along the deep slowly boom:— -
Then ceased — and all is wail,
As they strike the shattered sail;
Or, in conflagration pale,
Light the gloom. —
V.
Outspoke the victor then,
As he hailed them o'er the wave,
" Ye are brothers ! ye are men I
And we conquer but to save : —
So peace instead of death let us bring.
But yield, proud foe, thy fleet.
With the crews, at England's feet.
And make submission meet
To our king."
Yl.
Then Denmark blest our chief,
That he gave her wounds repose ;
And the sounds of joy and grief.
From her people wildly rose ;
As death withdrew his shades from the day.
"While the sun looked smiling bright
O'er a wide and woful sight,
Where the fires of funeral light
Died away. — ,
108 Campbell's poems.
vir.
Now joy, old England, raise !
For the tidings of thy might,
By the festal cities' blaze,
While the wine cup shines in light;
And yet amidst that joy and uproar
Let us think of them that sleep,
Full many a fathom deep.
By thy wild and stormy steep,
Elsinore ! —
VIII.
Brave hearts ! to Britain's pride
Once so faithful and so true.
On the deck of fame that died, —
With the gallant good Riou :*
Soft sigh the winds of heaven o'er their grave ?
While the billow mournful rolls,
And the mermaid's song condoles
Singing glory to the souls
Of the brave ! —
LORD ULLIN'S DAUGHTER.
A CHIEFTAIN to the Highlands bound.
Cries, " Bo:>fmen, do not tarry !
And I'll give thee a silver pound,
To row us o'er the ferry." —
• Captain Riou, justly entitled the gallant and the goi)d, hjr Lord
NclsuQ, vviieii lie wrote lioioe his despatches.
Campbell's poems. 109
* Now who be ye, would cross Lochgyle,
This dark and stormy water !" —
' Oh I'm the chief Of Ulva's isle,
And this Lord UUin's daughter. —
• And fast before her father's men
Three days we've fled together,
For should he find us in the glen,
My blood would stain the heather.
" His horsemen hard behind us ride ;
Should they our steps discover,
Then who will cheer my bonny bride
When they have slain her lover?"
Outspoke the hardy Highland wight,
' I'll go, my chief — I'm ready : —
It is not for your silver bright,
But for your winsome lady :
* And by my word ! the bonny bird
In danger shall not tarry ;
So, though the waves are raging white,
I'll row you o'er the ferry."
By this the storm grew loud apace,
The water wraith was shrieking;*
And in the scowl of heav'n each face
Grew dark as they were speaking.
But still as wilder blew the wind,
And as the night grew drearer,
Adown the glen rode armed men,
Their trampling sounded nearer. —
* The evil spirit of the waten.
K
1 10 Campbell's poems.
•' O haste thee, haste !" the lady cries,
" Though tempests round us gather ;
I'll meet the raging of the skies :
But not an angry father."
The boat has left a stormy land,
A stormy sea before her, —
When oh ! too strong for human hand,
The tempest gathered o'er her. —
And still they rowed amidst the roar
Of waters fast prevailing :
Lord Uilin reached that fatal shore,
His wrath was changed to wailing. —
For sore dismayed, through storm and shade
His child he did discover :
. One lovely hand she stretched for aid,
And one was round her lover
" Come back ! come back !" he cried in grief,
Across this stormy water :
" And I'll forgive your Highland chief.
My daughter ! — oh my daughter !" —
'Twas vain : the loud waves lashed the shore
Return or aid preventing : —
The waters wild went o'er his child —
And he was left lamenting
CAMFBELL S POEMS. Ill
LINES
OS THB
GRAVE OF A SUICIDE.
By strangers left upon a lonely shore,
Unknown, unhonoured, was the friendless dead
For child to weep, or widow to deplore,
There never came to his unburied head —
All from his dreary habitation fled.
Nor will the lanterned fisherman at eve
Launch on the water by the witches' tow'r,
Where hellebore and hemlock seem to weave
Round its dark vaults a melancholy bow'r,
For spirits of the dead at night's enchanted hour
They dread to meet thee, poor unfortunate !
Whose crime it was, on life's unfinished road
To feel the stepdame buffetings of fate,
And render back thy being's heavy load.
Ah ! once, perhaps, the social passions glowed
In thy devoted bosom — and the hand
That smote its kindred heart, might yet be prone
To deeds of mercy. Who may understand
Thy many woes, poor suicide, unknown ? —
He who thy being gave shall judge of thee alone.
112 Campbell's poems.
ODE TO WINTER.
When first the fiery-mantled sun ,
His heavenly race began to run,
Round the earth and ocean blue,
His children four the Seasons flew.
First, in green apparel dancing,
The young Spring smiled with angel grace ;
Rosy Summer next advancing,
Rushed into her sire's embrace :
Her bright-haired sire, who bade her keep
J'or ever nearest to his smiles,
On Calpe's olive-shaded steep.
On India's citron-covered isles :
More remote and buxom-brown.
The Queen of vintage bowed before his throne
A rich pomegranate gemmed her crown,
A ripe sheaf bound her zone. "^
But howling Winter fled afar.
To hills that prop the polar star.
And loves on deer borne car to ride,
With barren darkness by his side.
Round the shore where loud Lofoden
Whirls to death the roaring whale,
Round the hall where Runic Odin
Howls his war-song to the gale ;
Save when adown the ravaged globe
He travels on his native storm,
Deflow'ring nature's grassy robe.
And trampling on her faded form : —
Till light's returning lord assume
The shaft that drives him to his polar field
CAMPBELL S I'OEMS. 13
Of power to pierce his raven plume,
And crystal covered shield.
Oh, sire of storms ! whose savage ear
The Lapland drum delights to hear,
When Frenzy with her bloodshot eye
Implores thy dreadful deity.
Archangel ! power of desolation '.
Fast descending as thou art,
Say, hath mortal invocation
Spells to touch thy stony heart ?
Then sullen Winter hear my prayer,
And gently rule the ruined year ;
Nor chill the wand'rer's bosom bare.
Nor freeze the wretch's falling tear ; —
To shuddering want's unmantled bed,
Thy horror-breathing agues cease to lend,
And gently on the orphan head
Of innocence descend. —
But chiefly spare, O king of clouds !
The sailor on his airy shrouds :
When wrecks and beacons strew the steep,
And spectres walk along- the deep.
Milder yet thy snowy breezes
Pour on yonder tented shores.
Where the Rhine's broad billow freezes,
Or the dark-brown Danube roars.
Oh winds of winter ! list ye there
To many a deep and dying groan ;
Or start, ye demons of the midnight air,
At shrieks and thunders louder than your own.
Alas ! ev'n your unhallowed breath
May spare the victim, fallen low ;
But man will ask no truce to death,-^ -
No bounds to human wo.*
* This ode was written in Germany, at the close of 1800 baforo »he
ciinclusinn of hostilities
114 Campbell's poems.
THE SOLDIER'S DREAM.
Our bugles sang truce — for the night-cloud had lowered
And the sentinel stars set their watch in the sky ;
And thousands had sunk on the ground overpowered,
The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die.
When reposing that night on my pallet of straw,
By the wolf-scaring faggot that guarded the slain ;
At the dead of the night a sweet vision I saw,
And thrice ere the morning I dreamt it again.
Methought from the battle-field's dreadful array,
Far, far I had roamed on a desolate track ;
'Twas autumn — and sunshine arose on the way
To the home of my fathers, that welcomed me back.
I flew to the pleasant fields traversed so oft
In life's morning march, when my bosom was young ;
I heard my own mountain-goats bleating aloft,
And knew the sweet strain that the corn-reapers sung
Then pledged we the wine-cup, and fondly I swore
From my home and my weeping friends never to part;
My little ones kissed me a thousand times o'er
And my wife sobbed aloud in her fulness of heart.
Stay, stay with us — rest, thou art weary and worn
And fain was their war-broken soldier to stay ;
But sorrow returned with the dawning of morn.
And the voice in my dreaming ear melted away.
Campbell's poems. 115
THE TURKISH LADY.
'TwAS the hour when rites unholy-
Called each Paynini voice to prayer,
And the star that faded slowly
Left to dews the freshened air.
Day her sultry fires had wasted,
Calm and sweet the moonlight rose ;
Ev'n a captive's spirit tasted
Half oblivion of his woes.
Then 'twas from an Emir's palace
Came an eastern lady bright ;
She, in spite of tyrants jealous,
Saw and loved an English knight.
" Tell me, captive, why in anguish
Foes have dragged thee here to dwell,
Where poor Christians as they languish
Hear no sound of sabbath bell ?" —
" 'Twas on Transylvania's Bannat
When the crescent shone afar,
Like a pale disastrous planet
O'er the purple tide of war —
" In that day of desolation.
Lady, I was captive made ;
Bleeding for my Christian nation
By the walls of high Belgrade."
" Captive ! could the brightest jewel
From my turban set thee free ?" —
" Lady, no ! — the gift were cruel,
Ransomed, yet if reft of thee.
116 CAMPBELL'S POEMS.
" Say, fair princess ! would it grieve thee
Christian climes should we behold ?" —
" Nay, bold knight ! I would not leave thee
Were thy ransom paid in gold !"
Now in heaven's blue expansion
Rose the midnight star to view.
When to quit her father's mansion,
Thrice she wept, and bade adieu .
" Fly we then, while none discover ;
Tyrant barks, in vain ye ride !"
Soon at Rhodes the British lover
Clasped his blooming Eastern bride.
EXILE OF ERIN.
There came to the beach a poor Exile of Erin,
The dew on his thin robe was heavy and chill :
For his country he sighed, when at twilight repairing
To wander alone by the wind beaten hill.
But the daystar attracted his eye's sad devotion,
For it rose o'er his own native isle of the ocean,
Where once, in the fire of his youthful emotion,
He sang the bold anthem of Erin go bragh.
Sad is my fate ! said the heart-broken stranger,
The wild deer and wolf to a covert can flee ;
But I have no refuge from famine and danger,
A home and a cou.itiy remain not to me.
Never again in the green sunny bowers, [houi-s.
Where my forefathers lived, shall I spend the sweet
Or cover my harp with the wild woven flowers.
And strike to the numbers of Erin go bragh '
Campbell's poems. 117
Erin my country ! though sad and forsaken,
In dreams I revisit thy seabeaten shore ;
But alas ! in a fair foreign land I awaken,
And sigh for the friends who can meet me no more
Oh cruel fate ! will thou never replace me
In a mansion of peace — where no perils can chase me ?
Never again, shall my brothers embrace me ?
They died to defend me, or live to deplore !
Where is my cabin-door, fast by the wild wood ?
Sisters and sire ! did ye weep for its fall ?
Where is the mother thai looked on my childhood?
And where is the bosom friend, dearer than all ?
Oh ! my sad heart ! long abandoned by pleasure,
Why did it doat on a fast fading treasure !
Tears like the rain drop, may fall without measure ;
But rapture and beauty they cannot recall.
Yet all its sad recollection suppressing,
One dying wish my lone bosom can draw,
Erin ! an exile bequeaths thee his blessing !
Land of my forefathers ! Erin go bragh !
Buried and cold, when my heart stills her motion,
Green be thy fields — sweetest isle of the ocean !
And thy harp striking bards sing aloud with devotion —
Erin mavournin ! — Erin go bragh !*
LINES,
Written at the request of the Highland Society in Lon-
don, when met to eonmemorate the 21 »< of March, the
day of victory in Egypt.
Pledge to the much loved land that gave us birth
Invincible romantic Scotia's shore !
* Ireland my darling— Ireland for ever.
118 Campbell's poems.
Pledge to the memory of her parted worth !
And first amid the brave, remember'Moore !
And be it deemed not wrong that name to give,
In festive hours, which prompts the patriot's sigh '
Who would not envy such as Moore to live ?
And died he not as heroes wish to die ?
Yes, though too soon attaining glory's goal,
To us his bright career too short was giv'n ;
Yet in a mighty cause his phcenix soul
Rose on the flames of victory to Heav'n !
How oft (if beats in subjugated Spain
One patriot heart) in secret shall it mourn
For him ! — how oft on fair Corunna's plain
Shall British exiles weep upon his urn !
Peace to the mighty dead ! — our bosom thanks
In sprightlier strains they living may inspire 1
Joy to the chiefs that lead old Scotia's ranks,
Of Roman garb and more than Roman fire !
Triumphant be the thistle still unfurled.
Dear symbol wild ! on freedom's hills it grows,
Where Fingal stemmed the tyrants of the world,
And Roman eagles found unconquered foes.
Joy to the band* this day on Egypt's coast
Whose valour tamed proud France's tricolor.
And wrenched the banner from her bravest host,
Baptized Invincible in Austria's gore !
Joy for the day on red Vimeria's strand.
When bayonet to bayonet opposed
First of Britannia's hosts her Highland band
Gave but the death shot once, and foremost closed
* The 42d Regiment
CAMPBELL'S POEMS. 119
Is there a son of generous England here
Or fervid Erin ? — he with us shall join,
To pray that in eternal union dear,
The rose, the shamrock, and the thistle twine !
Types of a race who shall the invader scorn,
As rocks resist the billows round their shore ;
Types of a race who shall to time unborn
Their country leave unconquered as of yore !
LINES,
WRITTEN ON VISITING A SCENE IN AR6TLESHIRE.
At the silence of twilight's contemplative hour,
I have mused in a sorrowful mood,
On the wind shaken weeds that embosom the bower.
Where the home of my forefathers stood.
All ruined and wild is their roofless abode,
And lonely the dark raven's sheltering tree
And travelled by few is the grass covered road.
Where the hunter of deer and the warrior trode
To his hills that encircle the sea.
Yet wandering, I found on my ruinous walk,
By the dial stone aged and green,
One rose of the wilderness left on its stalk.
To mark where a garden had been.
Like a brotherless hermit, the last of its race.
All wild in the silence of Nature, it drew.
From each wandering sunbeam, a lonely embrace;
For the night weed and thorn overshadowed the place,
Where the flower of my forefathers grew.
120 Campbell's poems.
Sweet bud of the wilderness ! emblem of all
That remains in this desolate heart !
The fabric of bliss to its centre may fall ;
But patience shall never depart !
Though the wilds of enchantment, all vernal and bright,
In the days of delusion by hncy combined,
With the vanishing phantoms of love and delight
Abandon my soul like a dream of the night,
And leave but a desert behind.
Be hushed, my dark spirit! for wisdom condemns
When the faint and the feeble deplore ;
Be strong as the rock of the ocean that stems '
A thousand wild waves on the shore !
Through the perils of chance, and the scowl of disdain,
May thy front be unaltered, thy courage elate !
Yea ! even the name I have worshipped in vain
Shall awake not the sigh of remembrance again ;
To bear is to conquer our fate.
PATRIOTIC STANZAS,
Composed and recited at a meeting of A'orth Britons, in
London, on Monday, the Sth of Auguat, 1303.
Our bosoms we'll bare to the glorious strife.
And our oath is recorded on high.
To prevail in the Cause that is dearer than life.
Or, crushed in its ruins to die.
Then rise, fellow freemen, and stretch the right-hand.
And swear to prevail in your dear native land.
'Tis the home we hold sacred is laid to our trust.
God bles» the green Isle of the brave !
CAMPBELLS !'0EM3. 121
Should a conqueror tread on our forefi'thers' dust,
It would raise the old dead from their grave.
Then rise, &c.
In a Briton's sweet home shall a spoiler abide,
Profaning its loves and its charms ?
Shall a Frenchman insult a loved fair at our side ?
To arms — my Country, to arms ! —
Then rise, &,c.
Shall tyrants enslave us, my countrymen '' — No —
Their heads to the sword shall be given ;
Let a death bed repentance await the proud foe
And his blood be an offering to Heaven !
Then rise, Stc.
CAROLINE.
PART I.
I'll bid my hyacinth to blow,
I'll teach my grotto green to be ;
And sing vr.y true love, all below
The holly bower and myrtle tree.
There, all his wild-wood scents to bring,
The sweet South Wind shall wander by ;
And with the music of his wins.
Delight my rustling canopy.
Come to my close and clustering bower,
Thou spirit of a milder clime !
Fresh with the dews of fruit and flower,
Of mountain heath and moory thyme.
122 Campbell's poems
i
With all thy rural echoes come,
Sweet comrade of the rosy day,
Wafting the wild bee's gentle hum,
Or cuckoo's plaintive roundelay.
Where'er thy morning breath has played,
Whatever isles of ocean fanned.
Come to my blossom woven shade,
Thou wandering wind of fairy land !
For sure from some enchanted isle,
Where Heav'n and love their sabbath hold.
Where pure and happy spirits smile,
Of beauty's fairest, brightest mould :
From some green Eden of the deep,
Where pleasure's sigh alone is heaved^
Where tears of rapture lovers weep.
Endeared, undoubting, undeceived ;
From some sweet paradise afar,
Thy music wanders, distant, lost ;
Where nature lights her leading star,
And love is never, never crossed.
Oh ! gentle gale of Eden bowers,
If back thy rosy feet should roam,
To revel with the cloudless hours.
In nature's more propitious home-
Name to thy loved Elysian groves,
That o'er enchanted spirits twine,
A fairer form than cherub loves,
And let the name be Caroline.
Campbell's poems. 123
I CAROLINE.
PART II.
Gem of the crimson coloured even,
Companion of retiring day
Why at the closing gates of heaven.
Beloved star, dost thou delay ?
So fair thy pensile beauty burns,
"When soft the tear of twilight flow^s.
So due thy plighted step returns.
To chambers brighter than the rose ;
To peace, to pleasure, and to love
So kind a star thou seem'st to be,
Sure some enamoured orb above
Descends and burns to meet with thee.
Thine is the breathing, blushing hour,
When all unheavenly passions fly ;
Chased by the soul subduing power
Of love's delicious witchery.
Oh ! sacred to the fall of day,
Queen of propitious stars, appear !
And early rise, and long delay,
When Caroline herself is here.
Shine on her chosen green resort.
Where trees the sunward summit crown ;
And wanton flowers, that well may court
An angel's feet to tread them down.
Shine on her sweetly scented road,
Thou star of evening's purple dome !
That lead'st the nightingale abroad,
And guid'st the pilgrim to his home.
124 CAMPBELI-'s POEMS.
Shine, where my charmer's sweeter breath
EnibahTis thy soft exhaling de^v ;
Where dying winds a sigh bequeath
To iiiss her cheek of rosy hue.
Where, winnowed by the gentle air,
Her silken tresses darkly flow,
And fall upon her brows so fair,
Like shadows on the mountain snow.
Thus, ever thus, at day's decline
In converse s^veet to wander far,
Oh ! bring with thee my Caroline,
And thou shall be my ruling star'.
ODE
TO THE
MEMORY OF BURNS.
Soul of the Poet ! wheresoe'er
Reclaimed from earth thy genius plume
Her wings of immortality ;
Suspend thy harp in happier sphere,
Am! with thine influence illume
The gladness of our jubilee.
And fly like fiends from secret spell,
Discord and strife, at Biirns^s name,
Exorcised by his memory ;
For he was chief of bards that swell
The heart with songs of social flame,
And high delicious revelry.
Campbell's poems, 125
And Love's own strain to him was giv'n
To warble all its ecstasies,
With Pythian words unsought, unwilled,
Love the, surviving gift of Heaven,
The choicest sweet of Paradise
In life's else bitter cup distilled.
(
Who that has melted o'er his lay-
To Mary's soul in Heav'n above,
But pictured sees in fancy strong,
The landscape and the livelong day
That smiled upon their mutual love, —
Who that has felt forgets the song ?
Nor skilled one flame alone to fan —
His country's high souled peasantry
What patriot pride he taught ! — how muca
To weigh the inborn worth of man !
And rustic life and poverty
Grow beautiful beneath his touch.
Him in his claj'-built cot* the muse
Entranced and showed him all the forms
Of fairy-light and wizard gloom,
(That only gifted Poet view,)
The Genii of the floods and storms,
And martial shades from glory's tomb.
On Bannock field what thoughts arouse •
The Swain whom Burns''s song inspires ?
Beat not his Caledonian veins,
As o'er the heroic turf he ploughs,
With all the spirit of his sires,
And all their scorn of death and chains ?
•Burns was born in a Clay cottage, which his father had huiit with
bis own handa.
L2
126 Campbell's
POEMS.
And see the Scottish exile tanned,
By many a far and foreign clime,
Bend o'er his homeborn verse and weep,
In memory of his native land.
With love that scorns the lapse of time.
And ties that stretch beyond the deep.
Encamped by Indian rivers wild
The soldier resting on his arms,
In Burns's carrol sweet recalls
The scenes that blest him when a child,
And glows and gladdens at the charms
Of Scotia's woods and waterfalls.
deem not midst this worldly strife,
An idle art the poet brings,
Let high Philosophy control
And sages calm the stream of life,
'Tis he refines its fountain springs.
The nobler passions of the soul.
It is the muse that consecrates
The native banner of the brave,
Unfurling at the trumpet's breath,
Rose, thistle, harp ; "tis she elates
To sweep the field or ride the wave,
A sunburst in the storm of death.
And thou, young hero, when thy pall
Is crossed with mournful sword and plume,
When public grief begins to fade.
And only tears of kindred fall,
Who but the Bard shall dress thy tomb,
And greet with fame thy gallant shade ?
Campbell's poems. 127
Such was the soldier, — Burns forgive
That sorrows of mine own intrude,
In strains to thy great memory due.
In verse like thine, Oh ! could he live,
The friend I mourned — the brave, the good-
Edward that died at Waterloo !*
Farewell, high chief of Scottish song,
That could'st alternately impart
Wisdom and rapture in thy page,
And brand each vice with satire strong,
Whose lines are mottoes of the heart,
Whose truths electrify the sage.
Farewell, and ne'er may envy dare
To ring one baleful poison drop
From the crushed laurels of thy bust ;
But while the lark sings sweet in air
Still may the grateful pilgrim stop.
To bless the spot that holds thy dust.
•• Major Edward Hodge, of the 7th Hussars, who fell at the head of
Ills squadron ia the attack of the Polish Lancers.
T H E O D R I C
DOMESTIC TALE.
'TwAS sunset, and the Ranz des Vaches was sung.
And lights were o'er the Helvetian mountains flung,
That gave the glacier tops their richest glow,
And tinged the lakes like molten gold below.
Warmth flushed the wonted regions of the stqrm,
Where, Phoenix-like, you saw the eagle's form,
Thar high in Heav'n's vermilion wheeled and soared.
Woods nearer frowned, and cataracts dashed and roared,
From heights bronzed by the bounding bouquetin ;
Herds tinkling roamed the long-drawn vales between,
And hamlets glittered white, and gardens flourished
'Twas transport to inhale the bright sweet air'I [green.
The mountain-bee was revelling in its glare.
And roving with his minstrelsy across
The scented Avild weeds, and enamelled moss.
Eaith's features so harmoniously were link'd,
She seemed one great glad form, with life instinct,
Tliat felt Heav'n's ardent breath, and smiled below
Us flush of love, with consentaneous glow.
A Gothic church was near; the spot around
Was beautiful, even though sepulchral ground ;
For there nor j'ew nor cj^press spread their gloom,
But roses blossomed by each rustic tomb.
Amidst them one of spotless marble shone —
A maiden's grave — and 'twas inscribed thereon,
Campbell's poems. 129
That young and loved she died whose dust was there :
** Yes," said my comrade, " young she died, and fair !
Grace formed her, and the soul of gladness plajed
Once in the blue eyes of that mountain-maid :
Her fingers witched the chords they passed along,
And her lips seemed to kiss the soul in song :
Yet wooed, and worshipped as she was, till few
Aspired to hope, 'twas sadly, strangely true,
That heart, the martyr of its fondness burned
And died of love that could not be returned.
Her father dwelt where yonder Castle shines
O'er clust'ring trees and terrace-mantling vines.
As gay as ever, the laburnum's pride
Waves o'er each walk where she was wont to glide, —
And still the garden whence she graced her brow,
As lovely blooms, though trode by strangers now.
How oft from yonder window o'er the lake.
Her song of wild Helvetian swell and shake,
Has made the rudest fisher bend his ear,
And rest enchanted on his oar to hear !
Thus bright, accomplished, spirited, and bland,
Well-born, and wealthy for that simple land.
Why had no gallant native youth the art
To win so warm — so exquisite a heart ?
She, midst these rocks inspired with feelings strong
By mountain-freedom — music — fancy — song.
Herself descended from the bi'ave in arms,
And conscious of romance-inspiring charms.
Dreamt of heroic beings ; hoped to find
Some extant spirit of c'livalric kind ;
And scorning wealth, looked cold e'en on the claim
Of manly worth, that lacked the wreath of fame.
Her younger brother, sixteen summers old.
And much her likeness both in mind and mould.
130 Campbell's poems.
Had gone, poor boy ! in soldiership to shine,
And bore an Austrian banner on the Rhine.
'Twas when, alas ! our empire's evil star
Shed all the plagues, without the pride of war;
When patriots bled, and bitterer anguish crossed
Our brave, to die in battles foully lost.
The youth wrote home the rout of many a day;
Yet still he said, and still with truth could say,
Onie corps had ever made a valiant stand, —
The corps ir. which he served, — Theodric's band.
His fame, forgotten chief, is now gone by,
Eclipsed by brighter orbs in glory's sky ;
Yet once it shone, and veterans, when they show
Our fields of battle twenty years ago,
Will tell you feats his small brigade performed,
In charges nobly faced and trenches stormed.
Time was, when songs were chanted to his fame.
And soldiers loved the march that bo-re his name ;
The zeal of martial hearts was at his call,
And that Helvetian, Udolph's, most of all.
'Twas touching, when the storm of war blew wild.
To see a blooming boy, — almost a child, —
Spur fearless at his leader's words and signs.
Brave death in reconnoitring hostile lines,
And speed each task, and tell each message clear,
In scenes where war-trained men were stunned with fear
Theodric praised him, and they wept for joy
In yonder house, — when letters from the boy
Thanked Heav'n for, life, and more, to use his phrase,
Than twenty lives — his own commander's praise
Then followed glowing pages, blazoning forth
The fancied image of his leader's worth,
With such hyperboles of youthful style
As made his parents dry their tears and smile :
Campbell's poems. 131
But differently far his words impressed
A vvondVing sister's well-believing breast; —
She caught th' illusion, blest Theodric's name,
And wildly magnified his worth and fame ;
Rejoicing life's reality contained
One, heretofore, her fancy had but feigned,
^¥hose love could make her proud ; and time and chance
To passion raised that day-dream of Romance.
Once, when with hasty charge of horse and man
Our arriere guard had checked the Gallic van,
Theodric, visiting the outposts, found
His Udolph wounded, weltering on the ground : —
Sore crushed, — half-swooning, half-upraised he lay,
And bent his brow, fair boy ! and grasped the clay.
His fate moved e'en the common soldier's ruth —
Theodric succoured him ; nor left the youth
To vulgar hands, but brought him to his tent,
And lent what aid a hrother would have lent.
Meanwhile, to save his kindred half the smart
The war-gazette's dread blood-roll might impart.
He wrote th' event to them ; and soon could tell
Of pains assuaged and symptoms auguring well ;.
And last of all, prognosticating cure.
Enclosed the leech's vouching signature.
Their answers, on whose pages you might note
That tears had fallen, whilst trembling fingers wrote
Gave boundless thanks for benefits conferred,
Of which the boy, in secret, sent them word,
Whose memory Time, they said, would never blot-
But which the giver had himself forgot.
In time the stripling, vigorous and healed.
Resumed his barb and banner in the field.
132 Campbell's poems.
And bore himself right soldier-like, till now
The third campaign had manlier bronzed his brow;
When peace, though but a scanty pause for breath, —
A curtain-drop between the acts of death, —
A check in frantic war's unfinished game.
Yet dearly bought, and direly welcome, came.
The camp broke up, and Udolph left his chief
As with a son's or younger brother's grief:
But journeying home, how rapt his spirits roset
How light his footsteps crushed St. Gothard's snows ?
How dear seemed ev'n the waste and wild Shreckhorn,
Though wrapt in clouds, and frowning as in scorn
Upon a downward world of pastoral charms ;
Where, by the very smell of dairy-farms,
And fragrance from the mountain-herbage blown,
Blindfold his native hills he could have known !
His coming down yon lake, — his boat in view
Of windows where love's fluttering kerchief flew, —
The arms spread out for him — the tears that burst, —
('Twas Julia''s, 'twas his sister's met him first i)
Their pride to see war's medal at his breast.
And all their rapture's greeting, may be guessed.
Ere long, his bosom triumphed to unfold
A gift he meant their gayest room to hold, —
The picture of a friend in warlike dress ;
And who it was he first bade Julia guess.
" Yes," she replied, " 'twas he methought in sleep,
When you were wounded, told me not to weep."
The painting long in that sweet mansion drew
Regards its livinjr semblance little knew.
'a
Meanwhile Theodric, who had years before
Learnt England's tongue, and loved her classic lore,
A glad enthusiast now explored the land.
Where Nature, Freedom, Art, smile hand in hand :
Campbell's poems. 133
Htr women fair ; her men robust for toil ;
Her vigorous souls, high-cultured as her soil;
Her towns, where civic independence flings
The gauntlet down to senates, courts, and kings ;
Her works of art, resembling magic's powers ;
Her mighty fleets, and learning's beauteous bowers,-
These he had visited, with wonder's smile,
And scarce endured to quit so fair an isle.
But how our fates from unmomentous things
May rise, like rivers out of little springs !
A trivial chance postponed his parting day.
And public tidings caused, in that delay,
An English jubilee. 'Twas a glorious sight ;
At eve stupendous London, clad in light.
Poured out triumphant multitudes to gaze ;
Youth, age, wealth, penury, smiling in the blaze :
Th' illumined atmosphere was warm and bland,
And Beauty's groups, the fairest of the land,
Conspicuous, as in some wide ^estive room,
In open chariots passed with pearl and plume.
Amidst them he remarked a lovelier mien
Than e'er his thoughts had shaped, or eyes had seen :
The throng detained her till he reined his steed,
And, ere the beauty passed, had time to read
The motto and the arms her carriage bore.
Led by that clue, he left not England's shore
Till he had known her : and to know her well
Prolonged, exalted, bound enchantment's spell ;
For with affections warm, intense, refined,
She mixed such calm and holy strength of mind,
That, like Heav'n's image in the smiling brook,
Celestial peace was pictured in her look.
Her's was the brow, in trials unperplexed,
That cheered the sad and tranquillized the vextd :
M
134
Campbell's poems
She studied not the meanest to eclipse,
And yet the wisest listened to her lips ;
She sang not, knew not Music's magic skill,
But yet her voice had tones that swayed the will.
He sought— he won her— and resolved to make
His future home in England for her sake.
Yet, ere they wedded, matters of concern
To Ccesar's Court commanded his return,
A season's space, — and on his Alpine way,
He reached those bowers, that rang with joy that day ;
The boy was half beside himself,— the sire,
All frankness, honour, and Helvetia^ fire.
Of speedy parting would not hear him speak ;
And tears bedewed and brightened Julia's cheek.
Thus, loth to wound their hospitable pride,
A month he promised with them to abide ;
As blithe he trode the mountain-sward as they,
And felt his joy make ev'n the young more gay.
How jocund was their breakfast parlour fanned
By yon blue water's breath,— their walks how bland !
Fair Julia seemed her brother's softened sprite —
A gem reflecting Nature's purest light,—
And with her graceful wit there was inwrought
A wildly sweet unworldiness of thought.
That almost childlike to his kindness drew,
And twin with JJdolph in his friendship grew.
But did his thoughts to love one moment range ? —
No ! he who had loved Constance could not change !
Besides, till grief betrayed her undesigned,
The unlikely thought could scarcely reach his mind,
That eyes so young on years like his should beam
Unwooed devotion back for pure esteem.
True she sang to his very soul and brought
Those trains before him of luxuriant thought,
Campbell's poems. 135
Which only Music's Heav'n-born art can bring
To sweep across the mind with angel wing,
Once, as he smiled amidst that waking trance,
She paused o'ercome : he thought it might be chance,
And, when his first suspicions dimly stole,
Rebuked them back like phantoms from his soul.
But when he saw his caution gave her pain.
And kindness brought suspense's rack again,
Faith, honour, friendship bound him to unmask
Truths which her timid fondness feared to ask.
And yet with gracefully ingenuous power
Her spirit met the explanatory hour ; —
Even conscious beauty brightened in her eyes,
That told she knew their love no vulgar prize ;
And pride, like that of one more woman-grown,
Enlarged her mien, enriched her voice's tone.
'Twas then she struck the keys, and music made
That mocked all skill her hand had e'er displayed :
Inspired and warbling, rapt from things around,
She looked the very Muse of magic sound,
Painting in sound the forms of joy and wo.
Until the mind's eye saw them melt and glow.
Her closing strain composed and calm she played,
And sang no words to give its -pathos aid ;
But grief seemed ling'ring in its lengthened swell,
And like so many tears the trickling touches fell.
Of Constance then she heard Theodric speak,
And steadfast smoothness still possessed her cheek;
But when he told her how he oft had planned
Of old a journey to their mountain-land.
That might have brought him hither years before,
'■' Ah! then," she cried, " you knew not England's shore:
And, had you come, — and wherefore did you not ?"
' Ye'i " he replied, " it would have changed our lot ''
136 Campbell's poems.
Then burst her tears through pride's restraining bands
And with her handkerchief, and both her hands,
She hid her face and wept. — Contrition stung
Tlieodric for the tears his words had wrung.
" But no," she cried, " unsay not Tihat you've said,
Nor grudge one prop on which n y pride is stayed ;
To tiiink I could have merited y pur faith,
Shall be my solace even unto df ath !"
" Julia," Theodoric said, with purposed look
Of firmness, " my reply deserved rebuke ;
But by your pure and sacred peace of mind.
And by the dignity of womankind.
Swear that when I am gone you'll do your best
To chase this dream of fondness from your breast.''
Th' abrupt appeal electrified her thought ; —
She looked to Heaven, as if its aid she sought,
Dried hastily the tear-drops from her cheek,
And signified the vow she could not speak.
Ere long he communed with her mother mild :
" Alas !" she said, " I warned — conjured my child,
And grieved for this aft'ection from the first,
But like fatality it has been nursed ;
For when her filled eyes on your picture fixed,
And when your name in all she spoke was mixed,
'Twas hard to chide an over-grateful mind !
Then each attempt a iikelier choice to find
Made only fresh-rejected suitors grieve.
And Udolpli's pride — perhaps her own — believe
That could she meet, she might enchant ev'n you.
"^ou came. — I augured the event, 'tis true,
R ^-. how was Udolph^s mother to exclude
The guest that claimed our boundless gratitude I
And that unconf,cious you had cast a spell
On Jul- $ peaco, my pride refused to tell.
Campbell's poems. 131
Yet in my child's illusion I have seen,
Believe me well, how blameless you have been:
Nor can it cancel, hovvsoe'er it end,
Our debt of friendship to our boy's best friend."
At night he parted with the aged pair ;
At early morn rose Julid (o prepare
The last repast her hands for him should make ;
And Udolpli to convey him o'er the lake.
The parting was to her such bitter grief,
That of her own accord she made it brief;
But ling'ring at her window, long surveyed
His boat's last glimpses melting into shade.
Theodric sped to Austria, and achieved
His journey's object. Much was he relieved
\Vhen TJdolplCs letters told that Julians mind
Had borne his loss firm, tranquil, and resigned.
He took the Rhenish rout to England, high
Elate with hopes, — fulfilled their ecstasy,
And interchanged with Constance^s own breath
The sweet eternal vows that bound their faith.
To paint that being to a grovelling mind
Were like portraying pictures to the blind.
'Twas needful even infectiously to feel
Her temper's fond and firm and gladsome zeal,
To share existence with her, and to gain
Sparks from her love's electrifying chain,
Of that pure pride, which less'ning to her breast
Life's ills, gave all its joys a treble zest,
"Before the mind completely understood
That mighty truth — how happy are the good ! —
Ev'n when her light forsook him, it bequeathed
Ennobling sorrow ; and her memory breathed
A sweetness that survived her living days
As od'rous scents outlast the censer's blaze.
M 2
138 Campbell's poems.
Or if a trouble dimmed their golden joy,
'Twas outward dross, and not infused alloy :
Their home knew but affection's looks and speech—
A little Heaven, above dissention's reach.
But midst her kindred there was strife and gall ;
Save one congenial sister, they were all
Such foils to her bright intellect and grace,
As if she had engrossed the virtue of her race
Her nature strove th' unnatural feuds to heal,
Her wisdom made the weak to her appeal ;
And though the wounds she cured were soon unclose,
[Juwearied still her kindness interposed.
Oft on those errands though she went, in vain,
And home, a blank without her, gave him pain;
He bore her absence for its pious end.
But public grief his spirit came to bend;
For war laid waste his native land once more,
And German honour bled at every pore.
Oh ! were he there, he thought, to rally back
One broken band, or perish in the wrack !
Nor think that Constance sought to move or melt
His purpose : like herself she spoke and felt: —
" Your fame is mine, and I will bear all wo
Except its loss ! — but with you let me go
To arm you for, to embrace you from, the fight;
Harm will not reach me — hazards will delight I"
He knew those hazards better ; one campaign
In England he conjured her to remain,
And she expressed assent, although her heart
In secret had resolved they should not part.
How oft the wisest on misfortune's shelves
Are wrecked by errors most unlike themselves !
That little fault, that fraud of love's romance,
That plan's concealment, wrought their whole nuschanw>
CA.rfPEELl/S rOKM.S. 139
He knew it not preparing to embark,
But felt extinct his comfort's latest spark,
When, 'midst those numbered days, she made repair
Again to kindred worthless of her care.
'Tis true she said the tidings she should write
Would make her absence on his heart sit light ;
But, haplessly, revealed not yet her plan,
And left him in his home a lonely man.
Thus damped in thoughts, he mused upon the past :
'Twas long since he had heard from Udolph last,
And deep misgivings on his spirit fell.
That all with Udolph's household was not well.
'Twas that too true prophetic mood of fear
That augurs griefs inevitably near.
Yet makes them not less startling to the mind.
When come. Least looiced-for then of human kind
His Udolph ('twas, he thought at first, his sprite
With mournful joy that morn surprised his sight.
How changed was Udolph .' Scarce Theodric durst
Inquire his tidings, — he revealed the worst.
" At first," he said, as '" Julia bade me tell,
She bore her fate high-mindedly and well.
Resolved from common eyes her grief to hide.
And from the world's compassion saved our pride ;
But still her health gave way to secret wo,
And long she pined — for broken hearts die slow!
Her reason went, but came returning, like
The warning of her death-hour soon to strike
And all for which she now, poor sufferer ! sighs,
Fs once to see Theodric ere she dies.
Why should I come to tell you this caprice ?
Forgive me ! for my mind has lost its peace,
I blame myself, and ne'er shall cease to blame.
That my insane ambition for the name
no Campbell's poei»:s.
Of 'orother to Tlieodric, founded all
1 hose high-built hopes that crushed her by their falL
I made her slight a mother's counsel sage,
But now my parents droop with grief and age ;
And though my sister's eye mean no rebuke,
They overwhelm me with thtir dying look.
The journey's long, but you are full of ruth ;
And she who shares your heart, and knows its truth,
Has faith in your affection, far above
The fear of a poor dying object's love." —
" She has, my Udolph,'' he replied, " 'tis true ;
And oft we talk of Julia — oft of you."
Their converse came abruptly to a close ;
Fu- '»-al». 2 could each his troubled looks compose,
vVhen visitants, to Constance near akin, '
(In all but traits of soul) were ushered in.
They brought not her, nor 'midst their kindred band
The sister who alone, like her, was bland ;
But said — and smiled to see it give him pain —
That Constance would a fortnight yet remain.
Vexed by their tidings, and the haughty view
They cast on TJdolph as the youth withdrew
Theodric blamed his Constance's intent. —
The demons went, and left him as they went,
To read, when they were gone beyond recall,
A note from her loved hand, explaining all.
She said, that with their house she only staid
That parting peace might with them all be made ;
But prayed for love to share his foreign life,
And shun all future chance of kindred strife.
He wrote with speed, his soul's consent to say :
The letter missed her on her homeward way.
In SIX hours Constance was within his arms :
Moved, flushed, unlike her wonted calm of charm».
And breathless — with uplifted hands outspread-^
BiiFSt into tears upon his neck, and said,—
Campbell's poems. Ml
" 1 <new that those who brought your message laughed
With poison of their own to point the shaft ;
And this my one kind sister thought, yet loath
Confessed she feared 'twas true you had been vvi ^th.
But here you are, and smile on me : my pain
Is gone, and Constance is herself again."
His ecstasy, it may be guessed, was much,
Yet pain's extreme and pleasure's seemed to touc u
What pride ! embracing beauty's perfect mould ;
What terror ! lest his few rash words, mistold,
Had agonized her pulse to fever's heat ;
But calmed again so soon it healthful heat,
And such sweet tones were in her voice's sound,
Composed herself, she breathed composure round.
Fair being ! with what sympathetic grace
She heard, bewailed, and pleaded Julia's case ;
Implored he would her dying wish attend,
" And go," she said, " to-morrow with your frien' j
I'll wait for your return on England's shore,
And then we'll cross the deep and part no more."
To-morrow both his soul's compassion drew
To Julia's call, and Constance urged anew
That not to heed her now would be to bind
A load of pain for life upon his mind.
He went with UJolpli — from his Constance went--
Stifling, alas ! a dark presentiment
Some ailment lurked, ev'n whilst she smiled, to mctk
His fears of harm from yester-morning's shock.
Meanwhile a faithful page he singled out,
To watch at home, and follow straight hi« route,
If aught of threatened change her health should show:
— With Udolph then he reached the house of wo.
That winter's eve how darkly Nature's brow
^cowled on the scenes it lights so lovely now !
142 Campbell's pclms.
The tempest, raging o'er the reahns of ics,
Shook fragments from the rifted precipice ;
And whilst their falling echoed to the wir.d,
The wolf's long howl in dismal discord joined,
While white yon water's foam was raised m clouds
That whirled like spirits wailing in their shrouds ;
Without was Nature's elemental din —
And beauty died, and friendship wept within !
Sweet Julia, though her fate was finished half,
Still knew him — smiled on him with feeble laugh,
And blest him, till she drew her latest sigh!
But lo ! while Udolpli's bursts of agony.
And age's tremulous wailings, round him rose.
What accents pierced him deeper yet than those !
'Twas tidings — by his English messenger
Of Constance — brief and terrible they were.
She still was living when the page set out
From home, but whether now was left in doubt.
Poor Julia ! saw he then thy death's relief —
Stunned into stupor more than wrung with grief?
It was not strange ; for in the human breast
Two master-passions cannot coexist.
And that alarm which now usurped his brain
Shut out not only peace, but other pain.
'Twas fancying Constance underneath the shroud
That covered Julie:, made him first weep loud,
And tear himself away from them that wept.
Fast hurrying homeward, night nor day he slept.
Till, launched at sea, he dreamt that his soul's saint
Clung to him on a bridge of ice, pale, faint,
O'er cataracts of blood. Awake, he blessed
The shore ; nor hope left utterly his breast,
Till reaching home, terrific omen ! there
The straw-laid street preluded his despair —
Campbell's poems. 143
The servant's look — tlie table that revealed
His letter sent to Constance last, still sealed,
Though speech and hearing left him, told too clear
That he had now to suffer — rot to fear.
He felt as if he ne'er should cease to feel —
A wretch live-broken on misfortune's wheel : [Heaven.
Her death's cause — he might make his jyeace with
Absolved from guilt, but never self-forgiven.
The ocean has its ebbings — so has grief.
'Twas vent to anguish, if 'twas not relief.
To lay his brow even on her death^cold cheek.
Then first he heard her one kind sister speak :
She bade him, in the name of Heaven, forbear
With self-reproach to deepen his despair :
" 'Twas blame," she said, " I shudder to relate,
But none of yours that caused our darling's fate ;
Her mother (must I call her such ?) foresaw,
Should Constance leave the land, she would withdrawr
Our house's charm against the world's neglect.
The Only gem that drew it some respect.
Hence, when you went, she came and vainly spoke
To change her purpose — grew incensed, and broke
With execrations from her kneeling child.
Start not ! your angel from her knee rose mild,
Feared that she should not long the scene outlive,
Yet bade e'en you the unnatural one forgive.
Till then her ailment had been slight, or none ;
But fast she drooped, and fatal pains came on :
Foreseeing their event, she dictated
And signed these words for you." The letter said —
" Theodric, this is destiny above
Our power to baffle ; bear it then, my love !
Rave not to learn the usage I have borne,
For one true sister left me not forlorn ;
144 Campbell's poems.
And though you're absent in another land,
Sent from me by my own well-meant command,
Your soul, 1 know, as firm is knit to mine
As these clasped hands in blessing you now join :
Shape not imagined horrors in my fate —
Even now my sufferings are not very great ;
And when your grief's first transports shall subside,
f call upon your strength of soul and pride
To piy my memory, if 'tis worth the debt,
Love's glorying tribute — not forlorn regret :
I charge my name with power to conjure up
Reflection's balmy, not its bitter cup.
My pard'ning angel, at the gates of Heaven,
Shall look not more regard than you have given
'"^0 me ; and our life's union has been clad
smiles of bliss as sweet as life e'er had.
*<hall gloom be from such bright remembrance cast.'
Shall bitterness outflow from .*'*eetness past ?
No ! imaged in the sanctuarj; r/f your breast,
There let me smile, amidst high thoughts at rest;
And let contentment on your spirit shine,
As if its peace were still a part of mine :
For if you war not proudly with your pain.
For you I shall have worse than lived in vain.
But I conjure your manliness to bear
My loss with noble spirit — not despair :
I ask you by your love to promise this.
And kiss these words where I have left a kiss, —
The latest from my living lips for yours." —
Words that will solace him while life endures :
For though his spirit from affliction's surge
Could ne'er to life, as life had been, emerge,
Yet still that mind whose harmony elate
Rang sweetness, ev'n beneath the crush of fate.
Campbell's poems. 145
That mind in whose regard all things were placed
In views that softened them, or lights that graced, —
That soul's example could not but dispense
A portion of its own blessed influence ;
Invoking him to peace, and that self-sway
Which fortune cannot giv6, nor take away :
And though he mourned her long, 'twas with such wo
As if her spirit watched him still below.
TO THE RAINBOW.
Tkiumjphal arch, that fill'st the sky
When storms prepare to part,
I ask not proud philosophy
To teach me what thou art —
Still seem as to my childhood's sight,
A midway station given
Tor happy spirits to alight
Betwixt the earth and heaven.
Can all that optic teach, unfold
Thy form to please me so,
As when I dreamt of gems and gold
Hid in thy radiant bow ?
When Science from Creation's face
Enchantment's veil withdraws,
What lovely visions yield their place
To cold material laws !
N
146 Campbell's poems.
And yet, fair bow, no fabling dreams,
But words of the Most High,
Have told why first thy robe of beams
Was woven in the sky.
When o'er the green undeluged earth
Heaven's covenant thou didst shine,
How came the world's gray fathers forth
To watch thy sacred sign.
And when its yellow lustre smiled
O'er mountains yet untrod.
Each mother held aloft her child
To bless the bow of God.
Methinks, thy jubilee to keep,
The first made anthem rang
On earth delivered from the deep,
And the first poet sang.
Nor ever shall the Muse's eye
Unraptured greet thy beam :
Theme of primeval prophecy.
Be still the poet's theme !
The earth to thee her incense yields,
The lark thy welcome sings,
When glittering in the freshened fields
The snowy mushroom springs.
How glorious is thy girdle cast
O'er mountain, tower, and town,
Or mirrored in the ocean vast,
A thousand fathoms dovni I
As fresh in yon horizon dark.
As young thy beauties seem,
As when the eagle from the ark,
Fil^t sported in thy beam.
Campbell's poems. I47
For, faithful to its sacred page,
Heaven still rebuilds thy span.
Nor lets the type grow pale with age
That first spoke peace to man.
THE BRAVE ROLAND.*
The brave Roland ! — the brave Roland !—
False tidings reached the Rhenish strand
That he had fall'n in fight :
And thy faithful bosonn swooned with pain,
O loveliest maiden of Allemayne !
For the loss of thine own true knight.
But why so rash has she ta'en the veil,
In yon Nonnenwerder's cloisters pale ?
For her vow had scarce been sworn,
And the fatal mantle o'er her flung,
When the Drachenfells to a trumpet rung,
'Twas her own dear warrior's horn !
Wo ! wo t each heart shall bleed — shall break !
She would have hung upon his neck.
Had he come but yester-even ;
And he had clasped those peerless charms
That shall never, never fill his arms,
Or meet him but in heaven.
rhe tradition wliich forms the substance of these stanzas is still
preserved in Germany. An ancient tower on a height, called the Ro-
landseck, a few miles above Bonn on the Rhine, is shown as the habita-
tion which Roland built in sight of a nunnery, into which his niiatress
had retired, on having heard an unfounded account of his death.
Whatever may be thought of the credibility of the legend, its scenery
must be recollected with pleasure by every one who has ever visited the
romantic landscape of the Drachenfells, the Rolandseck, and the beau
tiful adjacent islet of tha Rbine, where a nunnery still stands.
148 Campbell's
POEMS.
Yet Roland the brave— Roland the true —
He could not bid that spot adieu ;
It was dear still 'midst his woes ;
For he loved to breathe the neighb'ring air,
And to think she blest him in her prayer,
When the Halleluiah rose.
There's yet one window of that pile,
Which he built above the Nun's green Isle ;
Thence sad and oft looked he
(When the chant and organ sounded slow)
On the mansion of his love below,
For herself he might not see.
She died ! — He sought the battle-plain ;
Her image filled his dying brain,
When he fell, and wished to fall ;
And her name was in his latest sigh,
When Roland, the flower of chivalry.
Expired at Roncevail.
THE SPECTRE BOAT.
A BALLAD.
Light rued false Ferdinand, to leave a lovely nr ii<3
forlorn,
Who broke her heart and died to hide her blushing
cheek from scorn.
One night he dreamt he wooed her in their wonted
bower of love.
Where the flowers sprang thick around them, and the
birds sang sweet above.
Campbell's poems. 149
But the scene was swiftly changed into a church-yard's
dismal view,
And her lips grew black beneath his kiss, from love's
delicious hue.
What more he dreamt, he told to none ; but shuddering,
pale, and dumb.
Looked out upon the waves, like one that knew his hour
was come.
'Twas now the dead watch of the night, — the helm was
lashed a-lee.
And the ship rode where Mount ^tna lights the deep
Levantine sea ;
When beneath its glare a boat came, rowed by a woman
in her shroud,
Who, with eyes that made our blood run cold, stood up
and spoke aloud :
"Come, Traitor, down, for whom my ghost still wanders
unforgiven !
Come down, false Ferdinand, for whom I broke my
peace with heaven !" —
It was vain to hold the victim, for he plunged to mee'
her call.
Like the bird that shrieks and flutters in the gazmg
serpent's thrall.
You may guess the boldest mariner shrunk daunted
from the sight,
For the spectre and her winding-sheet shone blue with
hideous light ;
Like a fiery wheel the boat spun with the waving of her
hand.
And round they went, and down they went, as the cock
' crew from the land.
N 2
150 Campbell's poems.
SONG.
TO THE EVENING STAR.
Star that bringest home the bee,
And sett'st the weary labourer free !
If any star shed peace, 'tis thou.
That send'st it from above,
Appearing when Heaven's breath and brow,
Are sweet as her's we love.
Come to the luxuriant skies,
Whilst the landscape's odours rise,
Whilst far-ofif lowing herds are heard,
And songs, when toil is done.
From cottages whose smoke unstirred
Curls yellow in the sun.
Star of love's soft interviews,
Parted lovers on thee muse ;
Their remembrancer in Heaven
Of thrilling vows thou art.
Too delicious to be riven
By absence from the heart.
VALEDICTORY STANZAS
TO J. P. KEMBLE, Esq.
Composed for a public meeting held in June, 1817.
Pride of the British stage,
A long and last adieu !
Whose image brought th' heroic age
, Revived to Fancy's view
Campbell's poems. 151
Like fields refreshed with dewy light
When the sun smiles his last,
Thy parting presence makes more bright
Our memory of the past ;
And memory conjures feelings up
That wine or music need not swell,
As high we lift the festal cup
To Kemble ! fare thee well !
His was the spell o'er hearts
AVhich only acting lends, —
The youngest of the sister Arts,
Where all their beauty blends :
For ill can Poetry express
Full many a tone of thought sublime.
And Painting, mute and motionless.
Steals but a glance of time.
But by the mighty actor brought,
Illusion's perfect triumphs come —
Verse ceases to be airy thought,
And Sculpture to be dumb.
Time may again revive,
But ne'er eclipse the charm,
When Cato spoke in him alive.
Or Hotspur kindled warm.
What soul was not resigned entire
To the deep sorrows of the Moor, —
What English heart was not on fire
With him at Agincourt ?
And yet a majesty possessed
His transport's most impetuous tone,
And to each passion of his breast
The Graces gave their zone.
High were the task — too high,
Ye conscious bosoms here !
In words to paint your memory
Of Kemble and of Lear ;
152 Campbell's poems.
But who forgets that white discrowned hea.
Those bursts of reason's half-extinguish'd glare-
Those tears upon Cordelia's bosom shed.
In doubt more touching than despair,
If 'twas reality he felt ?
Had Shakspeare's self amidst you been,
Friends, he had seen you melt,
And triumphed to have seen !
And there was many an hour
Of blended kindred fame.
When Siddon's auxiliar power
And sister magic came.
Together at the Muse's side
The tragic paragons had grown —
They were the children of her pride,
The columns of her throne,
And undivided favour ran
From heart to heart in their applause,
Save for the gallantry of man.
In lovelier woman's cause.
Fair as some classic dome,
Robust and richly graced,
Your Kemble's spirit was the home
Of genius and of taste : —
Taste like the silent dial's power.
That when supernal light is given.
Can measure inspiration's hour,
And tell its height in heaven.
At once ennobled and correct,
His mind surveyed the tragic page,
And what the actor could effect.
The scholar could presage.
These were his traits of worth : —
And must we lose them now !
Campbell's poems. 153
And shall the scene no more show forth
His sternly pleasing brow !
Alas, the moral brings a tear ! —
'Tis all a transient hour below;
And we that would detain thee here,
Ourselves as fleetly go !
Yet shall our latest age
This parting scene review : —
Pride of the British stage,
A long and last adieu I
LINES,
SPOSEN BY MR.****, AT DR0RY LANE THEATRE,'
On the first opening of the House after the death of tlif-
Princess Charlotte, 1817
Britons ! although our task is but to show
The scenes and passions of fictitious wo,
Think not we come this night without a part
In that deep sorrow of the public heart,
Which like a shade hath darkened ev'ry place.
And moistened with a tear the manliest face !
The bell is scarcely hushed in Windsor's piles.
That tolled a requiem from the solemn aisles.
For her, the royal flower, low laid in dust,
That was your fairest hope, your fondest trust.
Unconscious of the doom, we dreamt, alas !
That ev'n these walls, ere many months should pass,
Which but return sad accents for her now,
Perhaps had witnessed her benignant brow,
154 Campbell's poems.
Cheered by the voice you would have raised on high,
la bursts of British love and loyalty.
But, Britain ! now thy chief, thy people mourn,
And Claremont's home of love is left forlorn : —
There, where the happiest of the happy dwelt,
The 'scutcheon glooms, and royalty hath felt
A wound that ev'ry bosom feels its own, —
The blessing of a father's heart o'erthrown —
The most beloved and most devoted bride
Torn from an agonized husband's side.
Who " long as memory holds her seat" shall vievy
That speechless, more than spoken last adieu,
When the fixed eye long looked connubial faith,
And beamed affection in the trance of death.
Sad was the pomp that yesternight beheld,
As with the mourner's heart the anthem swelled ;
While torch succeeding torch illumed each high
And bannered arch of England's chivalry.
le rich plumed canopy, the gorgeous pall,
The sacred march, and sable-vested wall —
These were not rites of inexpressive show,
But hallowed as the types of real wo !
Daughter of England ! for a nation's sighs,
A rtation's heart went with thine obsequies ! —
And oft shall time revert a look of grief
On thine existence, beautiful and brief.
Fair spirit ! send thy blessing from above
On realms where thou art canonized by love '
Give to a father's, husband's bleeding mind.
That peace that angels lend to humankind ;
To us who in thy loved remembrance feel
A sorrowing, but a soul ennobling zeal —
A loyalty that touches all the best
And loftiest principles of England's breast !
Still may thy name speak concord from the tomb ;
Still in the Muse's breath thv memory bloom 1
Campbell's poems, 155
They shall describe thy life— thy form portray
But all the love that mourns thee swept away,
'Tis not in language or expressive arts
To paint — ^ye feel it, Britons, in your hearts I
LINES,
On receiving a seal with the Campbell Crest, from
K. M. , before her marriage.
This wax returns hot back more fair,
Th' impression of the gift you send,
Than stamped upon my thoughts I bear
The image of your worth, my friend ! —
We are not friends of yesterday : —
But poet's fancies are a little
Disposed to heat and cool, (they say,)—
By turns impressible and brittle.
Well ! should its frailty e'er condemn
My heart to prize or please you less,
Your type is still the sealing gem.
And mine the waxen brittleness.
What transcripts of my weal and wo
This little signet yet may lock,—
What utt'rances to friend or foe.
In reason's calm or passion's shock '.
What scenes of life's yet curtained page
May own its confidential die.
Whose stamp awaits th' unwritten page
And feelings of futurity !—
156 Campbell's poems.
Yet wheresoe'er my pen I lift
To date th' epistolary sheet.
The blest occasion of the gift
Shall make its recollection sweet ;
Sent when the star that rules your fates
Hath reached its influence most benign —
When every heart congratulates,
And none more cordially than mine.
So speed my song — marked with the crest
That erst th' advent'rous Norman* wore,
Who won the Lady of the West,
The daughter of Macaillain Mor.
Crest of my sires ! whose blood it sealed
With glory in the strife of swords.
Ne'er may the scroll that bears it yield
Degenerate thoughts or faithless words !
I Yet little might I prize the stone.
If it but typed the feudal tree
From whence, a scattered leaf, I'm blown
In Fortune's mutability.
No ! — but it tells me of a heart,
Allied by friendship's living tie ;
A prize beyond the herald's art —
Our soul-sprung consanguinity !
Kaiherine ! to many an hour of mine
Light wings and sunshine you have lent;
And so adieu, and still be thine
The all in-all of life— Content !
• A Norman leader, in the service of the king of Scotland, married
the heiress of Lochow in the twelfth century, and from him the Camp-
belis are sprung.
Campbell's poems, 157
STANZAS
To the memory of the Spanish Patriots latest killed in re-
sisting the Regency and the Duke of Angoulcme.
Brave men who at the Trocadero fell —
Beside your cannons conquered not, though slain.
There is a Victory in dying well
For Freedom, — and ye have not died in vain ;
For come what may there shall be hearts in Spain
To honour, ay embrace your martyred lot.
Cprsing the Bigot's and the Bourbon's chain,
And looking on your graves, though trophied not,
As holier, hallowed ground than priests could make the
spot 1
What though your cause be baffled — freemen cast
In dungeons — dragged to death, or forced to flee ;
Hope is not withered in affliction's blast —
The patriot's blood's the seed of Freedom's tree ;
And short your orgies of revenge shall be,
Cowled demons of the Iijquisitorial cell !
Earth shudders at your victory, — for ye
Are worse than common fiends from Heaven tliat fell,
The baser, ranker sprung Jlutochthones of hell 1
Go to your bloody rites again — bring back
The hall of horrors and the assessor's pen.
Recording answers shrieked upon the rack ;
Smile o'er the gaspings of spine-broken men ; —
Preach, perpetrate damnation in your den ; —
Then let your altars, ye blasphemers ! peal
With thanks to Heaven, that let you loose again,
To practise deeds with torturing fire and steel
No eye may search — no tongue may challenge orreveal I
n
158 Campbell's poems.
Yet laugh not in your carnival of crime
Too proudly, ye oppressors ! — Spain was free,
Her soil has felt the foot-prints, and her clime
Been winnovv'd by the wings of Liberty;
And these even parting scatter as they flee
Thoughts — influences, to live in hearts unborn,
Opinions that shall wrench the prison-key
From Persecution — show her mask otf-torn,
And tramp her bloated head beneath the foot of Scorn I
Glory to them that die in this great cause !
Rings, Bigots, can inflict no brand of shame,
Or shape of death, to shroud them from applause :
No ! — manglers of the martyr's earthly frame !
Your hangmen fingers cannot touch his fame.
Still in your prostrate land there shall be some
Proud hearts, the shrines of Freedom's vestal flame.
Long trains of ill may pass unheeded, dumb.
But vengeance is behind, and justice is to come.
LINES
INSCRIBED ON THE MONUMENT LATELT FINISHED BT
MR. CHANTRET,
Which has been erected by the widow of Mmiral Sir O
Campbell, K. C. B. to the memory of her husband.
To him, whose loyal, brave, and gentle heart
Fulfilled the hero's and the patriot's part, —
Whose charity, like that which Paul enjoin'd,
Was warm, beneficent, and unconfined,: —
Campbell's poems. 159
This stone is reared to public duty true,
The seaman's friend, the father of his crew —
Mild in reproof, sagacious in command,
He spread fraternal zeal throughout his band,
And led each arm to act, each heart to feel,
What British valour owes to Britain's weal.
These were his public virtues : — but to trace
His private life's fair purity and grace,
To paint the traits that drew aflfection strong
From friends, an ample and an ardent throng.
And, more, to speak his memory's grateful claim
On her who mourns him most, and bears his name —
O'ercomes the trembling hand of widowed grief,
O'ercomes the heart, unconscious of relief,
Save in religion's high and holy trust.
Whilst placing their memorial o'er his dust.
SONG OF THF^ GREEKS.
Again to the battle, Acbaians !
Our hearts bid the tyrants defiance :
Our land, the first garden of Liberty's tree —
It has been, and shall yet be the land of the free :
For the cross of our faith is replanted.
The pale dying crescent is daunted.
And we march that the footprints of Mahomet's slaves
May be washed out in blood from our forefathers' graves.
Their spirits are hovering o'er us,
And the sword shall to glory restore us.
Ah ! what though no succour advances,
Nor Christendom's chivalrous lances
160 Campbell's poems.
Are stretched in our aid — be the combat our own !
And we'll perish or conquer more proudly alone :
For we've sworn by our Country's assaulters,
By the virgins they've dragged from our altars,
By our massacred patriots, our children in chains,
By our heroes of old, and their blood in our veins,
That living, we shall be victorious,
Or that dying, our deaths shall be glorious.
A breath of submission we breathe not ;
The sword that we've drawn we will sheathe not !
Its scabbard is left where our martyrs are laid,
And the vengeance of ages has whetted its blade.
Earth may hide — waves engulf— fire consume us,
But they shall not to slavery doom us :
If they rule, it shall be o'er our ashes and graves ;
But we've smote them already with fire on the waves,
And new triumphs on land are before us.
To the charge ! — Heaven's banner is o'er us.
This day shall ye blush for its story,
Or brighten your lives with its glory ?
Our women, Oh, say, shall they shriek in despair.
Or embrace us from conquest with wreaths in their hair?
Accursed may his memory blacken.
If a coward there be that would slacken [worth
Till we've trampled the turban and shown ourselves
Being sprung from and named for the godlike of earth.
Strike home, and the world shall revere us
As heroes descended from heroes.
Old Greece lightens up with emotion
Her inlands, her isles of the Ocean ;
Fanes rebuilt and fair towns shall with jubilee ring.
And the Nine shall new hallow their Helicon's spring :
Campbell's poems. 161
Our hearths shall be kindled in gladness,
That were cold and extinguished in sadness ; [arms,
Whilst our maidens shall dance with their white waving
Singing joy to the brave that delivered their charms,
When the blood of yon Mussulman cravens,
Shall have purpled the beaks of our ravens.
THE LOVER TO HIS MISTRESS
ON HER BIRTHDAY.
If any white winged Power above
My joys and griefs survey,
The day when thou wert born, my love —
He surely blessed that day.
I laughed (till taught by thee) when told
Of beauty's magic powers,
That ripened life's dull ore to gold,
And changed its weeds to flowers.
My mind had lovely shapes portrayed ;
But thought I earth had one
Could make e'en Fancy's visions fade
Like stars before the sun ?
I gazed and felt upon my lips
Th' unfinished accents hang :
One moment's bliss, one burning kiss,
To rapture changed each pang.
And though as swift as lightning's flash
Those tranced moments flew.
Not all the waves of time shall wash
Their memory from my view.
O 2
163 Campbell's poems.
But duly shall my raptured song,
And gladly shall my eyes.
Still bless this day's return, as long
Is thou shalt see it rise
SONG
" MEN OF ENGLAND."
Men of England ! who inherit
Rights that cost your sires their blood'.
Men whose undegenerate spirit
Has been proved on land and flood : —
By the foes ye've fought uncounted,
By the glorious deeds ye've done,
Trophies captured — breaches mounted —
Navies conquered — kingdoms won !
Yet, remember, England gathers
Hence but fruitless wreaths of fame,
If the patriotism of your fathers
Glow not in your hearts the same.
What are monuments of bravery,
Where no public virtues bloom ?
What avail in lands of slavery,
Trophied temples, arch and tomb ?
Pageants ! — Let the world revere U5_
For our people's rights and laws,
And the breasts of civic heroes
Bared in Freedom's holy cause.
Yours are Hampden's, Russell's glory,
Sydney's matchless shade is yours, —
CAMPBELL S POEMS. 163
Martyrs in heroic story,
Worth a hundred Agincourts !
We're the sons of sires that baffled
Crowned and mitred tyranny :
They defied the field and scafibld
For their birthrights — so will we !
ADELGITHA.
The ordeal's fatal trumpet sounded,
And sad pale Jldelgitha came,
When forth a valiant champion bounded.
And slew the slanderer of her fame.
She wept, delivered from her danger ;
But when he knelt to claim her glove
" Seek not," she cried, " oh ! gallant stranger.
For hapless Adelgithd's love.
" For he is in a foreign far land
Whose arm should now have set me free :
And I must wear the willow garland
For him that's dead, or false to me."
*' Nay ! say not that his faith is tainted !"
He raised his vizor — At the sight
She fell mto his arms and fainted ;
It was indeed her own true knight I
SONG.
Drink ye to her that each loves best,
And if you nurse a flame
That's told but to her mutual breast,
We will not ask her name.
164 Campbell's poems.
Enough, while memory tranced and glad
Paints silently the fair,
That each should dream of joys he's had.
Or yet may hope to share.
Yet far, far hence be jest or boast
From hallowed thoughts so dear :
But drink to them that we love most,
As they would love to hear.
SONG.
When Napoleon was flying
From the field of Waterloo,
A British soldier dying,
To his brother bade adieu !
" And take," he said, "this token
To the maid that owns my faith,
With the v/ords that I have spoken
In affection's latest breath."
Sore mourned the brother's heart,
When the youth beside him fell ;
But the trumpet warned to part,
And they took a sad farewell.
There was many a friend to lose him,
For that gallant soldier sighed ;
But the maiden of his bosom
Wept when all their tears were dried.
SONG
Oh how hard it is to find
The one just suited to our mind ;
And if that one should be
Campbell's poems. 165
False, unkind, or found too late
What can we do but sigh at fate.
And sin"; Wo's me — Wo's me !
Love's a boundless burning waste,
"Where bliss's stream we seldom taste,
And still more solemn flee
Suspense's thorns, Suspicion's stings ;
Yet somehow Love a somethinij brings
That's sweet — ev'n when we sigh Wo's me !
SONG.
Earl March looked on his dying child,
And smit with grief to view her —
The youth, he cried, whom I exiled.
Shall be restored to woo her.
She's at the window many an hour
His coming to discover :
And her love looked up to Ellen's bower,
And she looked on her lover —
But ah ! so pale, he knew her not.
Though her smile on him was dwelling.
And am I then forgot — forgot ? —
It broke the heart of Ellen.
In vain he weeps, in vain he sighs.
Her cheek is cold as ashes ;
Nor love's own kiss shall wake those eyes
To lift their silken lashes.
166 Campbell's poems.
ABSENCE.
'Tis not the loss of love's assurance,
It is not doubting what thou art,
But 'tis the too, too long endurance
Of absence, that afflicts my heart.
The fondest thoughts two hearts can cherish,
When each is lonely doomed to %veep.
Are fruits on desert isles that perish,
Or riches buried in the deep.
What though, untouched by jealous madness,
Our bosom's peace may fall tc wreck ;
Th' undoubting heart, that breaks with sadness
Is but more slowly doomed to break.
Absence ! is not the soul torn by it
From more than light, or life, or breath ?
'Tis Lethe's gloom, but not its quiet —
The pain without the peace of death !
SONG.
Withdraw not yet those lips and fingers.
Whose touch to mine is rapture's spell ;
Life's joy for us a moment lingers,
And death seems in the word — farewell.
The hour that bids us part and go.
It sounds not yet, oh ! no, no, no.
Time, while I gaze upon thy sweetness.
Flies like a courser nigh the goal ;
To-morrow where shall be his fleetness.
When thou art parted from my soul ?
Our hearts shall beat, our tears shall flow,
But not together — no, no, no !
Campbell's poems. 167
THE LAST MAN.
All worldly shapes shall melt in gloom.
The Sun himself nmst die,
Before this mortal shall assume
Its Immortality !
I saw a vision in my sleep,
That gave my spirit strength to sweep
Adown the gulf of Time !
I saw the last of human mould, ,
That shall Creation's death behold,
As Adam saw her prime !
The Sun's eye had a sickly glare
The Earth with age was wan_.
The skeletons of nations were
Around that lonely man I
Some had expired in tight,— the brands
Still rusted in their bony hands:
In plague and famine some !
Earth's cities had no sound nor tread
And ships were drifting with the dead
To shores where all was dumb !
Yet, prophet like, that lone one stood.
With dauntless words and high,
Tliat shook the sere leaves from the wood
As if a storm passed by,
Saying, We are twins in death, proud Sun,
Thy face is cold, thy race is run,
'Tis Mercy bids thee go.
For thou ten thousand thousand years
Hast seen the tide of human tears,
That shall no longer flow.
What though beneath thee man put forth
His pomp, his pride, his skill ;
,168 Campbell's poems.
And arts that made fire, floods, and earth.
The vassals of his will ;
Yet mourn not I thy parted sway,
Thou dim discrowned king of day :
For all those trophied arts
And triumphs that beneath thee sprang,
Healed not a passion or a pang
Entailed on human hearts.
Go, let oblivion's curtain fall
Upon the stage of men,
Nor with thy rising beams recall
Life's tragedy again.
Its piteous pageants bring not back,
Nor waken flesh upon the rack
Of pain anew to writhe ;
Stretched in disease's shapes abhorred.
Or mown in battle by the sword,
Like grass beneath the scythe.
Ev'n I am weary in yon skies
To watch thy fading fire ;
Test of all sumless agonies,
Behold not me expire.
My lips that speak thy dirge of death —
Their rounded gasp and girgling bitath
To see thou shalt not boast.
The eclipse of Nature spreads my pall,—
The majesty of Darkness shall
Receive my parting ghost !
This spirit shall return to Him
That gave its heavenly spark ;
Yet think not. Sun, it shall be dim
When thou thyself art dark I
No ! it shall live again, and shine
In bliss unknown to beams of thine,
By him recalled to breath.
Campbell's poems. 169
Who captive led captivity,
Who robbed the grave of Victory, —
And toolc the sting from death !
Go, Sun, while Mercy holds me up
On Nature's awful waste
To drink this last and bitter cup
Of grief that man shall taste — .
Go, tell that night that hides thy face,
Thou saw'st the last of Adams race,
On Earth's sepulchral clod,
The dark'ning universe defy
To quench his Immortality,
Or shake his trust in God !
THE RITTER BANN.
The Ritter Bann from Hungary
Came back, renowned in arms,
But scorning jousts of chivalry
And love and ladies' charms.
While other knights held revels, he
Was wrapt in thoughts of gloom,
And in Vienna's hostelrie
Slow paced his lonely room.
There entered one whose face he knew -
Whose voice, he was aware,
He oft at mass had listened to.
In the holy house of prayer.
'Twas the Abbot of St. James's monks,
A fresh and fair old man ;
His reverend air arrested ev'n
The gloomy Ritter Bann.
170 Campbell's poems.
But seeing with him an ancient dame
Come clad in Scotch attire,
The Ritter's colour went and came,
And loud he spoke in ire,
" Ha ! nurse of her that was my bane,
Name not her name to me ;
I wish it blotted from my brain :
Art poor? — take alms, and flee."
" Sir Knight," the abbot interposed,
" This case your ear demands ;"
And the crone cried, with a cross enclosed
In both her trembling hands :
" Remember, each his sentence waits ;
And he that shall rebut
Sweet Mercy's suit, on him the gates
Of Mercy shall be shut.
You wedded undispensed by Church,
Your cousin Jane in Spring ; —
In Autumn, when you went to search
For Churchmen's pardoning.
Her house denounced your marriage-band.
Betrothed her to De Grey,
And the ring you put upon her hand
Was wrenched by force away
Then wept your Jane upon my neck.
Crying, * Help me, nurse, to flee
To my Howel Bann's Glamorgan hills :'
But word arrived — ah me ! —
You were not there ; and 'twas their threat^
By foul means or by fair,
To-morrow morning was to set
The seal on her despair.
Campbell's poems. 171
I had a son, a sea-boy, in
A ship at Hartland bay;
By his aid from her cruel kin
I bore ray bird away.
To Scotland from the Devon's
Green myrtle shores we fled ;
And the Hand that sent the ravens
To Elijah, gave us bread.
She wrote you by my son, but he
From England sent us word
You had gone into some far countrie,
In grief and gloom he heard.
For they had wronged you, to elude
Your wrath, defamed my child ;
And you — ay, blush. Sir, as you should—
Believed, and were beguiled.
To die but at your feet, she vowed
To roam the world ; and we •
Would both have sped and begged our bread,
But so it might not be.
For when the snow-storm beat our roof,
She bore a boy, Sir Bann,
Who grew as fair your likeness proof
As child e'er grew like man.
'Twas smiling on that babe one morn
While health bloomed on the moor,
Her beauty struck young Lord Kinghorn
As he hunted past our door.
She shunned him, but he raved of Jane,
And roused his mother's pride ;
Who came to us in high disdain,
' And Where's the face,' she cried,
172 Campbell's poems.
' Has witched my boy to wish for one
So wretched for his wife ?
Dost love thy husband ? Know, my son
Has sworn to seek his life.'
Her anger sore dismayed us,
For our mite was wearing scant,
And, unless that dame would aid us,
There was none to aid our want.
So I told her, weeping bitterly,
What all our woes had been ;
And, though she was a stern ladie,
The tears stood in her een.
And she housed us both, when, cheerfully,
My child to her had sworn,
That even if made a widow, she
Would never wed Kinghorn."
Here paused the nurse, and then began
The abbot, standing by :
" Three months ago a wounded man
To our abbey came to die.
^ He heard me long, with ghastly eyes
And hand obdurate clenched.
Speak of the worm that never dies.
And the fire that is not quenched.
At last by what this scroll attests
He left atonement brief,
For years of anguish to the breasts
His guilt had wrung with grief.
* There lived,' he said, ' a fair young dame
Beneath my mother's roof;
I loved her, but against my flame
Her purity was proof.
Campbell's poems. 173
I feigned repentance, friendship jmre ;
That mood she did not checif,
But let her liusband's miniature
Be copied from her neck.
As means to search him, my deceit
Took car«> to him was borne
Nought but his picture's counterfeit,
And Jane's reported scorn.
The treachery took : she waited wild ;
My slave came back and lied
Whate'er I wished ; she clasped her child.
And swooned, and all but died.
I felt her tears for years and years
Quench not my flame, but stir :
The very hate I bore her mate
Increased my love for her.
Fame told us of his glory, while
Joy flushed the face of Jane ;
And whilst she blessed his name, her smile
Struck fire into my brain.
No fears could damp ; I reached the camp,
Sought out its champion ;
And if my broadsword failed at last,
'Twas long and well laid on.
a
This wound's my meed, my name's Kinghorn,
My foe's the Ritter Bann.'
The wafer to his lips was borne.
And we shrived the d3dng man.
He died not till you went to fight
The Turks at Warradein ;
But I see my tale has changed you pale."
The Abbot went for wine ;
P 2
174 Campbell's poems.
And brought a little page who poured
It out, and knelt and smiled :
The stunned knight saw himself restored
To childhood in his child ;
And stooped and caught him to his breast,
Laughed loud and wept anon,
^nd with a shower of kisses pressed
The darling little one.
" And where went Jane ?" — " To a nunnery. Sir —
Look not again so pale —
Kinghorn's old dame grew harsh to her." —
" And has she ta'en the veil ?"
" Sit down. Sir," said the priest, " I bar
Rash words." — They sat all three.
And the boy played with the knight's broad star,
As he kept him on his knee.
" Think ere you ask her dwelling-place,"
The abbot further said ;
" Time draws a veil o'er beauty's face
More deep than cloister's shade.
Grief may have made her what you can
Scarce love perhaps for life."
" Hush, abbot," cried the Ritter Bann,
" Or tell me where's my wife."
The priest undid two doors that hid
The inn's adjacent room,
And there a lovely woman stood,
Tears bathed her beauty's bloom.
One moment may with bliss repay
Unnumbered hours of pain ;
Such was the throb and mutual sob
Of the Knight embracing Jane.
Campbell's toems. 1T5
A DREAM.
I
Well may sleep present us fictions,
Since our waking moments teem
With such fanciful convictions
As make life itself a dream. —
Half our daylight faith's a fable ;
Sleep disports with shadows too,
Seeming in their turn as stable
As the world we wake to view.
Ne'er by day did Reason's mint
Give my thoughts a clearer print
Of assured reality,
Than was left by Phantasy
Stamped and coloured on my sprite
In a dream of yesternight.
In a bark, methought, lone steering,
I was cast on Ocean's strife ;
This, 'twas whispered in my hearing,
Meant the sea of life.
Sad regrets from past existence
Came, like gales of chilling breath ;
Shadowed in the forward distance
Lay the land of death.
Now seeming more, now less remote,
On that dim-seen shore, methought,
I beheld two hands a space
Slow unshroud a spectre's face ;
And my flesh's hair upstood, —
'Twas mine own similitude.
But my soul revived at seeing
Ocean, like an emerald spark.
Kindle, while an air-dropt being
Smiling steered my bark.
176 Campbell's poems.
Heaven-like — yet he looked as human
As supernal beauty can,
More compassionate than woman,
Lordly more than man.
And as some sweet clarion's breath
Stirs the soldier's scorn of death —
So his accents bade me brook
The spectre's eyes of icy look,
Till it shut them — turned its head,
Like a beaten foe, and fled.
" Types not this," I said, " fair spirit !
That my death-hour is not come ?
Say, what days shall I inherit ? —
Tell my soul their sum."
" No," he said, " yon phantom's aspect.
Trust me, would appal thee worse,
Held in clearly measured prospect : —
Ask not for a curse !
Make not, for I overhear
Thine unspoken thoughts as clear
As thy mortal ear could catch
The close brought tickings of a watch.
Make not the untold request
That's now revolving in thy breast.
" 'Tis to live again, remeasuring
Youth's years, like a scene rehearsed,
In thy second lifetime treasuring
Knowledge from the first.
Hast thou felt, poor self-deceiver !
Life's career so void of pain,
As to wish its fitful fever
New begun again ?
Could experience, ten times thine,
Pain from Being disentwine —
Campbell's toems. 177
Threads by Fate together spun ?
Could thy flight heaven's lightning shun ?
No, nor could thy foresight's glance
'Scape the myriad shafts of chance.
" Would'st thou bear again Love's trouble —
Friendship's death-dissevered ties ;
Toil to grasp or miss the bubble
Of ambition's prize ?
Say thy life's new-guided action
Flowed from Virtue's fairest springs —
Still would Envy and Detraction
Double not their stings ?
Worth itself is but a charter
To be mankind's distinguished martyr."
— I caught the moral, and cried, " Hail,
Spirit ! let us onward sail
Envying, fearing, hating none,
Guardian Spirit, steer me on !"
REULLURA*.
Star of the morn and eve,
Reullura shone like thee,
And well for her might Aodh grieve,
The dark-attired Culdee.f
Peace to their shades ! the pure Culdees
Were Albyn's earliests priests of God,
♦Reullura, in Gaelic, signifies " beautiful star."
t The Culdees were the primitive clerey of Scotland, and apparently
teronly clergy from the sixth to the eleventh century. They were of
Irish origin, and tlieir monastery on the island of lona or Ikolmill. was
the seminary of Christianity in North Britain. Presbyterian writers
have wished to prove them to have been a surt of Presbyters, strangers
M the Roman Church and Episcopacy. It seems to be established that
they were not enemies to Episcopacy : — hut that they were not slavishly
subjected to Rome, like the clergy of later periods, appears by their re
Bistinsr the Papal ordinances respecting the celibacy of relitrinns men, on
which account they were ultimately displaced by the Scottish sovereigns
to make way for more Popish canons.
178 Campbell's poems.
Ere yet an island of her seas
By foot of Saxon monk was trode,
Long ere her churchmen by bigotry
Were barred from holy wedlock's tie.
'Tvvas then that Aodh, famed afar,
In lona preached the word with power,
And ReuUura, beauty's star,
Was the partner of his bower.
But, Aodh, the roof lies low,
And the thistle-down waves bleaching.
And the bat flits to and fro
Where the Gael once heard thy preaching ;
And fall'n in is each columned isle
Where the chiefs and the people knelt.
'Twas near that temple's goodly pile
That honoured of men they dwelt.
For Aodh was wise in the sacred law,
And bright Reullura's eyes oft saw
The veil of fate uplifted.
Alas, with what visions of awe
Her soul in that hour was gifted —
When pale in the temple and faint,
With Aodh she stood alone
By the statue of an aged saint !
Fair sculptured was the stone,
It bore a crucifix ;
Fame said it once had graced
A Christian temple, which the Picts
In the Briton's land laid waste :
The Pictish men, by St. Columb taught,
Had hither the holy relic brought.
Reullura eyed the statue's face,
And cried, " It is, he shall come,
" Even he in this very place.
To avenge my martyrdom.
Campbell's poems. 179
For, wo to the Gael people !
Ulvfagre is on the main,
And lorta shall look from tower and steeple
On the coming ships of the Dane ;
And, dames and daughters, shall all your locks
With the spoiler's grasp entwine ?
No ! some shall have shelter in caves and rocks,
And the deep sea shall be mine.
Baffled by me shall the Dane return,
And here shall his torcii in the temple burn.
Until that holy man shall plough
The waves from Innisfail.
His sail is on the deep e'en now,
And swells to the southern gale."
o"-
" Ah ! knowest thou not, my bride,"
The holy Aodh said,
" That the saint whose form we stand beside
Has for ages slept with the dead?"
" He liveth, he liveth," she said again,
" For the span of his life tenfold extends
Beyond the wonted years of men.
He sits by the graves of well-loved friends
That died ere thy grandsire's grandsire's birth ;
The oak is decayed with old age on earth,
"Whose acorn-seed had been planted by him ;
And his parents remember the day of dread.
When the sun on the cross looked dim.
And the graves gave up their dead.
Yet preaching from clime to clime.
He hath roamed the earth for ages,
And hither he shall come in time
When the wrath of the heathen rages^.
In time a remnant from the sword —
Ah ! but a remnant to deliver :
180 Campbell's poems.
Yet, blest be the name of the Lord !
His martyrs shall go into bliss for ever,
Lochlin,* appalled, shall put up her steel,
And thou shalt embark on the bounding keel ;
Safe shalt thou pass through her hundred ships^
With the Saint and a remnant of the Gael,
And the Lord will instruct thy lips
To preach jn Innisfail.""!
The sun, now about to set,
Was burning o'er Tiriee,
And no gathering cry rose yet
O'er the isles of Albyn's sea.
Whilst Reullura saw far rowers dip
Their oars beneath the sun,
And the phantom of many a Danish ship,
Where ship there yet was none.
And the shield of alarmj was dumb,
Nor did their warning till midnight come.
AVhen watchfires burst from across the main
From Rona and Uist and Skey,
To tell that the ships of the Dane
And the red-haired slayers were nigh.
Our islemen arose from slumbers,
And buckled on their arms ;
But few, alas ! were their numbers
To Lochlin's mailed swarms.
And the blade of the bloody Norse
Has filled the shores of the Gael
With many a floating corse,
And with many a woman's wail.
They have lighted the islands with ruin's tonij
And the holy men of lona's church
* Denmark. t Ireland.
I Striking the shield was an ancient mode of convocation to wu
among the Gael.
Campbell's poems. 181
In the temple of God lay slain ;
All but Aodh, the last culdee,
But bound with many an iron chain,
Bound in that church was he.
And where is Aodh's bride ?
Rocks of the ocean flood !
Plunged she not from your heights in pride.
And mocked the men of blood ?
Then Ulvfagre and his bands
In the temple lighten their banquet up,
And the print of their blood-red hands
Was left on the altar cup.
Twas then that the Norseman to Aodh said,
" Tell where thy church's treasure's laid,
Or I'll hew thee limb from limb."
As he spoke the bell struck three,
And every torch grew dim
That lighted their revelry.
But the torches again burnt bright.
And brighter than before,
When an aged man of majestic height
Entered the temple door.
Hushed was the reveller's sound,
They were struck as mute as the dead,
And their hearts were appalled by the very sound
Of his footstep's measured tread.
Nor word was spoken by one beholder, [der.
While he flung his white robe back on his shoul-
And stretching his arms — as eath
Unriveted Aodh's bands.
As if the gyves had been a wreath
Of willows in his hands.
All saw the stranger's similitude
To the ancient statue's form ;
Q
182 Campbell's poems.
The Saint before his own image stood,
And grasped Ulvfagre's arm.
Then uprose the Danes at last to deliver
Their chief, and shouting with one accord.
They drew the shaft from its rattling quiver,
They lifted the spear and sword.
And levelled their spears in rows.
But down went axes and spears and bows,
When the Saint with his crosier signed,
The archer's hand on the string was stopt.
And down, like reeds laid flat by the wind,
Their lifted weapons dropt.
The Saint then gave a signal mute,
And though Ulvfagre willed it not.
He came and stood at the statue's foot,
Spell-riveted to the spot,
Till hands invisible shook the wall.
And the torturing image was dashed
Down from its lofty pedestal.
On Ulvfagre's helm it crashed —
Helmet, and skull, and flesh, and brain,
It crushed as millstone crushes the grain.
Then spoke the Saint, whilst all and each
Of the Heathen trembled round,
And the pauses amidst his speech
Were as awful as the sound :
" Go back, ye wolves, to your dens," (he cried,)
" And tell the nations abroad.
How the fiercest of your herd has died
That slaughtered the flock of God.
Gather him bone by bone.
And take with you o'er the flood
The fragments of that avenging stone
That drank his heathen blood.
Campbell's poems. 183
These are the spoils from lona's sack,
The only spoils ye shall carry back ;
For the hand that uplifteth spear or sword
Shall be withered by palsy's shock,
And I come in the name of the Lord
To deliver a remnant of his flock."
A remnant was called together,
A doleful remnant of the Gael, [hither
And the Saint in the ship that had brought hini
Took the mourners to Innisfail.
Unscathed they left lona's strand,
When the opal morn first flushed the sky,
For the Norse dropt spear, and bow and brand,
And looked on them silently ;
Safe from their hiding-places came
Orphans and mothers, child and dame :
But, alas ! when the search of Reullura spread.
No answering voice was given.
For the sea had gone o'er her lovely head,
And her spirit was in heaven.
NOTES
ON THK
PLEASURES OF HOPE.
PART I.
Note (a) ^nd such thy strength-inspiring aid that bore
The hardij Byron to his native shore.
The following picture of his own distress, given by
Byron in his simple and interesting narrative, justifies
the description in page 10.
After relating the barbarity of the Indian cacique ta
his child, he proceeds thus : — " A day or two after, we
put to sea again, and crossed the great bay 1 mentioned
we had been at the bottom of when we first hauled away
to the westward. The land here was very low and
sandy, and something like the mouth of a river which
discharged itself into the sea, and which had been taken
no notice of by us before, as it was so shallow that the
Indians were obliged to take every thing out of their
canoes, and carry it over land. We rowed up the river
four or five leagues, and then took into a branch of it
that ran first to the eastward, and then to the northward ;
here it became much narrower, and the stream exces-
sively rapid, so that we gained but little way, though we
wrought very hard. At night we landed upon its banks,
and had a most uncomfortable lodging, it being a perfect
swamp ; and we had nothing to cover us, though it rain
ed excessively. The Indians were little better off than
we, as there was no wood here to make their wigwams ;
so that all they could do was to prop up the bark, which
they carry in the bottom of their canoes, and shelter
themselves as well as they could to the leeward of it,
Knowing the difficulties they had to encounter here, they
had provided themselves with some seal ; but Me had
not a morsel to eat, after the heavy fatigues of the day,
excepting a sort of root we saw the" Indians make use of,
(12
3 NOTES.
which Avas very disagreeable to the taste. We laboured
all next day against the stream, and fared as we had done
the day belbre. The next day brought us to the carry-
ing place. Here was plenty of wood, but nothing to be
got for sustenance. We passed this night as we had
frequently done, under a tree ; but what we suffered at
this time is not easy to be expressed. I had been three
days at the oar, without any kind of nourishment except
the wretched root above mentioned. I had no shirt, for
it had rotted off by bits. AJl my clothes consisted of a
short grieko, (something like a bear-skin,) a piece of
red cloth which had once been a waistcoat, and a
ragged pair of trowsers, without shoes or stockings."
Note (b.) A Briton and a friend.
Don Patricio Gedd, a Scotch physician in one of the
Spanish settlements, hospitably relieved Byron and his
wretched associates, of which the Commodore speaks
in the warmest terms of gratitude.
Note (c.) Qr yield the lyre of heaven another string.
The seven strings of Apollo's harp were the symboli-
cal representation of the seven planets. Herschel, by
discovering an eighth, might be said to add another
string to the instrument.
Note (d.) The Swedish sage. Linnaeus.
Note (e.) Deep from his vaults the Loxian murmiirsjlow.
Loxias is a name frequently given to Apollo by
Greek writers : it is met with more than once in the
Choepharoe of JEschylus.
Note (/.) Unlocks a generous store at thy command,
Like HorcVs rock beneath the prophet's hand.
See Exodus, chap. xvii. 3, 5, 6.
Note (i.) Wild Obi flies.
Among the negroes of the West Indies, Obi or Obiah
is the name of a magical power, which is believed by
them to affect the object of its malignity with dismal
calamities. Such a belief must undoubtedly have been
deduced from the superstitious mythology of their kins-
men on the coast of Africa. I have therefore personified
Obi as the evil spirit of the African, although the his-
tory of the African tribes mentions the evil spirit of
their religious creed by a different appellation.
. NOTES. 9
Note (g.) Sibir^s dreanj mines.
Mr. Bell of Antermony, in his tiavels through Sibe-
ria, informs us that the name of tlie country is univer-
sally pronounced Sibir by the Russians.
Note (/t.) Presaging wrath to Poland — and to man !
The history of the partition of Poland, of the nnassa-
cre in the suburbs of Warsaw, and on the bridge of
Prague, the triumphant entry of Suwarrow into the
, Polish capital, and the insult oflTered to human nature,
by the blasphemous thanks offered up to Heaven, foi
victories obtained over men fighting in the sacred cause
of liberty, by murderers and oppressors, are events
generally known.
Note (fc.) The shrill horn blew.
The negroes in the West Indies are summoned to
their morning work by a shell or a horn.
Note (I) How long was Timotir''s iron sceptre swayed ?
To elucidate this passage, I shall subjoin a quotation
from the Preface to letters from a Hindoo Rajah, a
work of elegance and celebrity.
" The impostor of Mecca had established, as one of
the principles of his doctrine, the merit of extending it,
either by persuasion, or the sword, to all parts of the
earth. How steadily this injunction was adhered to by
his followers, and with what success it was pursued,
is well known to all who are in the least conversant in
history.
" The same overwhelming torrent, which had inun-
dated the greater part of Africa, burst its way into the
very heart of Europe, and covered many kingdoms of
Asia with unbounded desolation, directed its baleful
course to the flourishing provinces of Hindostan. Hert
these fierce and hardy adventurers, whose only im-
provement had been in the science of destruction, who
added the fury of fanaticism to the ravages of war,
found the great end of their conquests opposed by ob-
jects which neither the ardour of their persevering zeal,
nor savage barbarity could surmount. Multitudes were
sacrificed by the cruel hand of religious persecution,
and whole countries were deluged in blood, in the vain
hope, that by the destiuction of a part, the remainder
4 NOTES.
might be persuaded, or terrified, into the profession of
Mahomedanism ; but all these sanguinary efforts were
ineffectual ; and at length, being fully convinced, that
though they might extirpate, they could never hope to
convert any number of the Hindoos, they relinquished
the impracticable idea, with which they had entered
upon their career of conquest, and contented themselves
with the acquirement of the civil dominion and almost
universal empire of Hindostan."
Letters from a Hindoo Rajah, by Eliza Hamilton. •
Note (m.) And braved the stormy spirit of the Cape.
See the description of the Cape of Good Hope, trans-
lated from Camoens, by Mickle.
Note (n.) While famished nations died along the shore.
The following account of the British conduct, and its
consequences, in Bengal, will afford a sufficient idea of
the fact alluded to in this passage. After describing the
monopoly of salt, betel nut, and tobacco, the historian
proceeds thus : — " Money in this current came but bj
drops ; it could not quench the thirst of those who wait-
ed in India to receive it. An expedient, such as it was,
remained to quicken its pace. The natives could live
with little salt, but could not want food. Some of the
agents saw themselves well situated for collecting the
rice into stores : they did so. They knew the Gentoos
would rather die than violate the principles of their re-
ligion by eating flesh. The alternative would therefore
be between giving what they had or dying. The inha-
bitants sunk ;— they that cultivated the land, and saw
the harvest at the disposal of others, planted in doubt —
scarcity ensued. Then the monopoly was easier managed
—sickness ensued. In some districts the languid living
left the bodies of their numerous dead unburied."
Short History of English Transactions in the
East Indies, page 145.^
Note (o.) jyine times hath Brama's loheels of lightning
hurled
His awful presence o'er the prostrate world !
Among the sublime fictions of the Hindoo mythology,
it is one article of belief, that the Deity Brama has de-
scended nine times upon the world in various forms, and
NOTES. 6
that he is yet to appear a tenth time, in the figure of a
warrior upon a white horse, to cut off all incorrigible of-
fenders. Avater is the word used to express his descent.
Note (jo.) And Camdeo bright, and Ganesa sublime.
Camdeo is the God of Love in the mythology of the
Hindoos. Ganesa and Seriswattee correspond to the
Pagan deities Janus and Minerva.
NOTES
ON THE
PLEASURES OF HOPE.
PART II.
Note (fl.) The noon of Manhood to a myrtle shade !
Sacred to Venus is the myrtle shade. — Dryden.
Note (6.) Thy woes, Arion !
Falconer in his poem. The Shipwreck, speaks of him-
self by the name of Arion. — See Falconer's Shipwreck^
Canto III.
Note (c.) The robber Moor.
See Schiller's tragedy of the Robbers, scene v.
Note (rf.) What millions died that Ccesar might be great.
The carnage occasioned by the wars of Julius Caesar
has been usually estimated at two millions of men.
Note (e.) Or learn the fate that bleeding thousands bore.
Marched by their Charles to Dneiper's swampy
shore.
In this extremity, (says the biographer of Charles
XII. of Sweden, speaking of his military exploits before
the battle of Pultowa,) the memorable winter of 1709,
which was still more remarkable in that part of Europe
than in France, destroyed numbers of his troops : for
Charles resolved to brave the seasons as he had done
6 NOTES.
bis enemies, «na ventured to make long marches during
this mortal cold. It was in one of these marches that two
thousand men fell down dead with cold before his eyes.
Note (/.) As on lona's height.
The natives of the island of lona have an opinion,
tliat on certain evenings every year, the tutelary saint
Columba is seen on the top of the church spires count-
ing the surrounding islands, to see that they have noi
been sunk by the power of witchcraft.
Note (g-.) And part, like Ajiit,— never to return !
See the history of Ajut and Anningait in the Rambier.
NOTES
OR
GERTRUDE OF WYOMING.
PART I.
Stanza 3. I. 6.
From merry mock-bird's song.
The mocking bird is of the form, but larger, than the
thrush ; and the colours are a mixture of black, white,
and gray. What is said of the nightingale, by its
greatest admirers, is, what may with more propriety
apply to this bird, who, in a natural state, sings with
very superior taste. Towards evening I have heard
one begin softly, reserving its breath to swell certain
notes, which, by this means, had a most astonishing ef-
fect. A gentleman in London had one of these birds for
six years. During the space of a minute he was heard
to imitate the woodlark, chaffinch, blackbird, thrush,
and sparrow. In this country (America) I have fre-
quently known the mockingbirds so engaged in this mi-
mickry, that it was with much difficulty I could ever
obtain an opporiuruty of hearing their own natural note.
NOTES. 7
Some go so far as to say, that they have neither pecu-
liar notes, nor favourite imitations. This may be de-
nied. Their few natural notes resemble those of the
(European) nightingale. Their song, however, has a
greater compass and volume than the nightingales', and
they have the faculty of varying all intermediate notes
in a manner which is truly delightful. — Ashe's Travels
in America, Vol. II. p. 73.
Stanza 5. 1. 9.
Or distant isles that hear the loud Corbrechtan roar.
The Corybrechtan, or Corbrechtan, is a whirlpool on
the western coast of Scotland, near the island of Jura,
which is heard at a prodigious distance. Its name signi-
fies the whirlpool of the prince of Denmark ; and there
is a tradition that a Danish prince once undertook, for a
wager, to cast anchor in it. He is said to have used
woollen instead of hempen ropes, for greater strength,
but perished in the attempt. On the shores of Argyle-
shire I have often listened with great delight to the sound
of this vortex, at the distance of many leagues. When
the weather is calm, and the adjacent sea scarcely heard
on these picturesque shores, its sound, which is like the
sound of innumerable chariots, creates a magnificent
and fine effect.
Stanza 13. 1. 4.
Of buskined limb and swarthy lineament.
In the Indian tribes ther*". is a great similarity in their
colour, stature, &c. The/ are all, except the Snake In-
dians, tall in stature, straight and robust. It is very sel-
dom they are deformed, which has given rise to the sup-
position that they put to death their deformed children.
Their skin is of a copper colour; their eyes large, bright,
black, and sparkling, indicative of a subtle and discern*
ing mind : their hair is of the same colour, and prone to
be long, seldom or never curled. Their teeth are large
and white ; I never observed any decayed among them,
which makes their breath as sweet as the air they inhale,
— Travels through America by Captains Lewis and
Clarke, in 1804-5-6.
Stanza 14. 1. 6.
Feace he to thee — mi) words this belt approve.
The Indians of North America accompany every
8 ^ NOTES.
formal address to strangers, with whom they form or re-
cognize a treaty of amity, with a present of a string, oi
belt, of wampum. Wampum (says Cadwallader Col-
den) is made of the large whelk shell, Briccinium, and
shaped like long beads : it is the current money of the
Indians. — History of the five Indian Nations, page 34,
New- York edition.
Stanza 14.1. 7.
The paths of peace my steps have hither led.
In relating an interview of Mohawk Indians with the
governor of New- York, Colden quotes the following pas-
sages as a specimen of their metaphorical manner:
" Where shall I seek the chair of peace ? Where shall I
find it but upon our path ? and whither doth our path lead
us but unto this house ?"
Stanza 15. 1. 2.
Our wampum league thy brethren did embrace.
When they solicit the alliance, offensive or defensive,
of a whole nation, they send an embassy with a large
belt of wampum and a bloody hatchet, inviting them to
come and drink the blood of their enemies. The wam-
pum made use of on these and other occasions before
their acquaintance with the Europeans, was nothing but
small shells which they picked up by the seacoasts, and
on the banks of the lakes ; and now it is nothing but a
kind of cylindrical beads, made of shells, white and
black, which are esteemed among them as silver a '
gold are among us. The black they call the most valu-
able, and both together are their greatest riches and or-
naments ; these among them answering all the end that
money does among us. They have the art of stringing,
twisting, and interweaving them into their belts, collars,
blankets, and moccasins, &c., in ten thousand different
sizes, forms, and figures, so as to be ornaments for every
part of dress, and expressive to them of all their impor-
tant transactions. They dye the wampum of various co-
lours and shades, and mix and dispose them with great
ingenuity and order, and so as to be significant among
themselves of almost every thing they please ; so that by
these their words are kept, and their thoughts communi-
eated to one another, as ours are by writing. The belti
NOTES. 9
that pass from one nation to another in all treaties, decla-
rations, and inaportant transactions, are very carefully
preserved in the cabins of their chiefs, and serve not only
as a kind of record or history, but as a public treasure.
— Major Rogers's account of North America.
Stanza 17. /. 5.
Jls u'hen the evil Manitou.
It is certain that the Indians acknowledge one supreme
being, or giver of life, who presides over all things ; that
IS the Great Spirit: and they look up to him as the source
of good from whence no evil can proceed. They also
believe in a bad Spirit, to whom they ascribe great pow-
er ; and suppose that through his power all the evils
which liefall mankind are inllicted. To him therefore
they pray in their distresses, begging that he would
either avert their troubles, or moderate them when they
are no longer avoidable.
They hold also that there are good spirits of a lower
degree, who have their particular departments, in which
they are constantly contributing to the happiness of mor-
tals. These they suppose to preside over all the extra-
ordinary productions of Nature, such as those lakes, ri-
vers and mountains that are of an uncommon magnitude ;
and likewise the beasts, birds, fishes, and even vegeta-
bles or stones that exceed the rest of their species in size
or singularity. — Clarke's Travels among the Indians.
The supreme Spirit of good is called by the Indians
Kitchi Manitou; and the Spirit of evil Matchi Manitou.
Stanza 19. 1. '2.
Feverhalm and sweet sagamite.
The feverhalm is a medicine used by these tribes ; it
is a decoction of a bush called the Fevertree. Sagamite
is a kind of soup administered to their sick.
Stanza 20. 1 2.
^nd I, the eagle of my tribe, have rushed
With this lorn dove. —
The testimony of all travellers among the American
Indians, who mention their hieroglyphics, authorizes me
in putting this figurative language in the mouth of Outa-
lissi. The dove is among them, as elsewhere, an emblem
of meekness ; and the eagle, that of a bold, noble, and
R
10 NOTES.
liberal mind. When the Indians speak of a warrior
who soars above the multitude in person and endow-
ments, they say, " he is like the eagle who destroys his
enemies, and gives protection and abundance to the weak
of his own tribe.
Stanza 23. I. 2.
Far differently the mute Oneida took, &c.
They are extremely circumspect and deliberate in
"ivery word and action ; nothing hurries them into any
intemperate wrath, but that inveteracy to their enemies
which is rooted in every Indian's breast. In all other in-
stances they are cool and deliberate, taking care to sup-
press the emotions of the heart. If an Indian has disco-
vered that a friend of his is in dnnii^r of being cut off by
u lurking enemy, he does not tell liim of his danger in
direct terms as though he were in fear, but he first coolly
asks him which way he is going that day, and having his
answer with the same indifference, tells him that he has
been informed that a noxious beast lies on the route he is
going. This hint proves sufficient, and his friend avoids
the danger with as much caution as though every design
and motion of his enemy had been pointed out to him.
If an Indian has been engaged for several daj's in tiie
chase, and by accident continued long without food,
when he arrives at the hut of a friend, where he knows
that his wants will be immediately supplied, he takes
care not to show the least sympioms of impatience, or
betray the extreme hunger that he is tortured with; but
on being invited in, sits contentedly down and smokes
his pipe with as much composure as if his appetite was
cloyed and he was perfectly at ease. He does the same
if among strangers. This custom is strictly adhered to
by every tribe, as they esteem it a proof of fortitude,
and think the reverse would entitle them to the appel-
lation of old women.
If you tell an Indian that his children have greatly
signalized themselves against an enem3', have taken
many scalps, and brought home many prisoners, he does
not appear to feel any strong emotions of pleasure on
the occasion ; his answer generally is — " they have done
well ;" and makes but very little inquiry about the mat-
ter ; on the contrary, if you inform him that his children
NOTES. 11
are slain or taken prisoners, he makes no complaints :
he only replies, " it is unfortunate ;" — and for some time
asks no questions about how it happened. — Lewis and
Clarke's Travels.
Stanza 23. I. 3.
His calumet of peace, S^c.
Nor is the calumet of less importance or less revered
than the wampum in many transactions relative both to
peace and war. The bowl of this pipe is made of a
kind of soft red stone, which is easily wrought and hol-
lowed out ; the stem is of cane, elder, or some kind of
light wood, painted with different colours, and decorated
with the heads, tails and feathers of the most beautiful
birds. The use of the calumet is to smoke either to-
bacco or some bark, leaf, or herb, which they often use
instead of it, when they enter into an alliance or any
serious occasion or solemn engagements ; this being
among them the most sacred oath that can be taken, the
violation of vt'hich is esteemed most infamous, and de-
serving of severe punishment from Heaven. When they
treat of war, the whole pipe and all its ornaments are
red, sometimes it is red only on one side, and by the dis-
position of the feathers, &,c. one acquainted with their
customs will know at first sight what the nation who
presents it intends or desires. Smoking the calumet is
also a religious ceremony on some occasions, and in all
treaties is considered as a witness between the parties,
or rather as an instrument by which they invoke the sun
and moon to witness their sincerity, and to be as it were
a guarantee of the treaty between them. This custom
of the Indians, thovgh to appearance somewhat ridicu-
lous, is not without its reasons ; for as they find that
smoking tends to disperse the vapours of the brain, to
raise the spirits, and to qualify them for thinking and
judging properly, they introduced it into their councils,
where, after their resolves, the pipe was considered as
a seal of their decrees ; and, as a pledge of their per-
formance thereof, it was sent to those they were con-
sulting, in alliance or treaty with ; — so that smoking
among them at the same pipcj is equivalent to our
12 . NOTES.
drinking together and out of the same cup, — Major
Rogers's Account of North America, 1766.
The lighted calumet is also used among them for a
purpose still more interesting than the expression of so-
cial friendship. The austere manners of the Indians for-
bid any appearance of gallantry between the sexes in
daytime ; but at night the young lover goes a calumet-
ting, as his courtship is called. As these people live in
a state of equality, and without fear of internal violence
or theft in their own tribes, they leave their doors open
by night as well as by day. The lover takes advantage
of this liberty, lights his calumet, enters the cabin of
his mistress, and gently presents it to her. If she ex-
tinguishes it, she admits his addresses ; but if she suf-
fers it to burn unnoticed, he retires with a disappointed
and throbbing heart. — Ashe's Travels.
Stanza 23. I. 6.
Trained from his tree-rocked cradle to his bier.
An Indian child, as soon as he is born, is swathed
with clothes, or skins, and being laid on its back, is
bound down on a piece of thick board, spread over with
soft moss. The board is somewhat larger and broader
than the child, and bent pieces of wood, like pieces of
hoops, are placed over its face to protect it ; so that if
the machine were suffered to fall, the child probably
would not be injured. When the women have any
business to transact at home, they hang the board on a
tree, if there be one at hand, and set them a swinging
from side to side, like a pendulum, in order to exercise
the children.— Weld, Vol. II. p, 246.
Stanza 23. I 7.
The fierce extremes of good and ill to brook
Impassive —
Of the active as well as the passive fortitude of the
Indian character, the following is an instance related
by Adair in his travels.
A party of the Seneca Indians came to war against
the Katahba, bitter enemies to each other. — In the
woods the former discovered a sprightly warrior be-
longing to the latter, hunting in their usual light dress :
on his perceiving them, he sprung off for a hollow rock
NOTES. 13
four or five miles distant, as they intercepted him from
running homeward. He was so extremely swift and
skilful with the gun, as to kill seven of them in the run-
ning fight before they were able to surround and take
him. They carried him to their country in sad triumph ;
but though he had tilled them with uncommon grief
and shame for the loss of so many of their kindred, yet
the love of martial virtue induced them to treat him,
during their long journey, with a great deal more civi-
lity than if he had acted the part of a coward. The
women and children when they met him at their seve-
ral towns, beat and whipped him in as severe a manner
as the occasion required, according to their law of jus-
tice, and at last he was formally condemned to die b}^
the fiery torture. It might reasonably be imagined that
what he had for some time gone through, by being fed
with a scanty hand, a tedious march, lying at night on
the bare ground, exposed to the changes of the weather,
with his arms and legs extended in a pair of rough
stoclis, and suffering such punishment on his entering
into their hostile towns, as a prelude to those sharp
torments for which he was destined, would have so
impaired his health and affected his imagination as to
have sent him to his long sleep, out of the way of any
more sufferings. — Probably this would have been the
case with the major part of white people under similar
circumstances ; but I never knew this with any of the
Indians : and this cool-headed, brave warrior did not
deviate from their rough lessons of martial virtue, but
acted his part so well as to surprise and sorely vex his
numerous enemies : — for when they were taking him,
unpinioned, in their wild parade, to the place of torture,
which lay near to a river, he suddenly dashed down
those who stood in his way, sprung off, and plunged
into the water, swimming underneath like an otter, only
rising to take breath, till he reached the opposite shore.
He now ascended the steep bank, but though he had
good reason to be in a hurry, as many of the enemy
were in the water, and others running, very like blood
hounds, in pursuit of him, ar.d the bullets flying around
him from the time he took to the river, yet his heart
did not allow him to leave them abruptly, without
R2
14 NOTES.
taking leave in a formal manner, in return for the ex-
traordinary favours they had done, and intended to do
him. — After slapping a part of his body, in defiance to
them (continues the author,) he put up the shrill war-
whoop, as his last salute, till some more convenient op-
portunity ofiered, and darted off in the manner of a beast
broke lose from its torturing enemies. — He continued
his speed, so as to run by about midnight of the same
day, as far as his eager pursuers were two days in
reaching. — There he rested, till he happily discovered
five of those Indians who had pursued him : — he lay
hid a little way off their camp, till they were sound
asleep. Every circumstance of his situation occurred
to him, and inspired him with heroism. — He was naked,
torn and hungry, and his enraged enemies were come
up with him ; — but there was now every thing to relieve
his wants, and a fair opportunity to save his life, and
get great honour and sweet revenge by cutting them off.
Resolution, a convenient spot, and sudden surprise,
would effect the main object of all his \yishes and hopes.
He accordingly creeped, took one of their tomciliavvks,
and killed them all on the spot — clothed himself, took
a choice gun, and as much ammunition and provisions
as he could well carry in a running march. He set off
afresh with a light heart, and did not sleep for several
successive nights, only when he reclined, as usual, a
little before day, with his back to a tree. As it were
by instinct, when he found he was free from the pur-
suing enemy, he made directly to the very place where
he had killed seven of his enemies, and was taken by
them for the fiery torture. — He digged them up — burnt
their bodies to ashes, and went home in safety with
singular triumph. — Other pursuing enemies came, on
the evening of the second day, to the camp of their dead
people, when the sight gave them a greater shock than
they had ever known before. In their chilled war coun-
cil they concluded, that as he had done such surprising
things in his defence before he was captured, and since
that in his naked condition, and now was well armed,
if they continued the pursuit he would spoii them all,
for he surely was an enemy wizard, — and therefore
NOTES. 15
they returned home. — Adair^s General Observations on
the American Indians, p. 394.
It is surprising, says the same author, to see the long
continued speed of the Indians. — Though some of us
have often ran the swiftest of them out of sight for
about the distance of twelve miles, yet afterwards,
without any seeming toil, they would stretch on — leave
us out of sight, and outwind any horse. — Ibid. p. 318.
If an Indian were driven out into the extensive woods,
with only a knife and a tomahawk, or a small hatchet,
^t is not to be doubted but he would fatten even where
a wolf would starve. — He would soon collect fire by
rubbing two pieces of wood together, make a bark hut,
earthen vessels, and a bow and arrows ; then kill wild
game, fish, fresh water tortoises, gather a plentiful va-
riety of vegetables, and live in affluence. — Ibid. p. 410.
Stanza 25. I. 1.
Slcep^ xceancd one ! and in the dreaming land
Shouldst thou the spirit of thy mother greet.
There is nothing (says Charlevoix) in which these
barbarians carry their superstitions farther, than in
what regards dreams ; but they vary greatly in theix
manner of explaining themselves on this point. Some-
times it is the reasonable soul which ranges abroad,
while the sensitive continues to animate the body.
Sometimes it is the familiar genius who gives salutary
counsel with respect to what is going to happen. Some-
times it is a visit made by the soul of the object of
which he dreams. But in whatever manner the dream
is conceived, it is always looked upon as a thing sacred,
and as the most ordinary way in which the gods make
known their will to men.
Filled with this idea, they cannot conceive how we
should pay no regard to them. For the most part they
look upon them either as a desire of the soul, inspired
by some genius, or an order from him, and in conse-
quence of this principle they hold it a religious duty to
obey them. An Indian having dreamt of having a
finger cut off, had it really cut off as soon as he awoke,
having first prepared himself for this important action
by a feast. — Another having dreamt of being a prisoner,
and in the hands of his enemies, was much at a loss
16 NOTES.
what to do. He consulted the jugglers, and by their
advice caused himself to be tied to a post, and burnt
in several parts of the body. — Charlevoix, Journal of a
voyage to North America.
Stanza 25. I. 5.
The crocodile, the condor of the rock —
The alligator, or American crocodile, when full
grown (says Bartram) is a very large and terrible crea-
ture, and of prodigious strength, activity, and swiftness
in the water. — I have seen them twenty feet in lengtli^
and some are supposed to be twenty-two or twenty*
three feet in length. Their body is as large as that of
a horse, their shape usually resembles that of a lizard,
which is flat, or cuneiform, being compressed on each
side, and gradually diminisliing from the abdomen to
the extremity, which, with the whole body, is covered
with horny plates, or squamae, impenetrable when on
the body of the live animal, even to a rifle ball, except
about their head, and just behind their fore-legs or
arms, where, it is said, they are only \-ulnerable. The
head of a full grown one is about three feet, and the
mouth opens nearly the same length. Their eyes are
small in proportion, and seem sunk in the head by
means of the prominency of the brows ; the nostrils are
large, inflated, and prominent on the top, so that the
head on the M-ater resembles, at a distance, a great
chunk of wood floating about : only the upper jaw
moves, which they raise almost perpendicular, so as to
form a right angle with the lower one. In the fore part
of the upper jaw, on each side, just under the nostrils,
are two very large, thick, strong teeth, or tusks, not very
sharp, but rather the shajjc of a cone : these are as
white as the finest polished ivory, and are not covered
by any skin or lips, but always in sight, which gives the
creature a frightful appearance ; in the lower jaw are
holes opposite to these teeth to receive them; when
they clap their jaws together, it causes a surprising
noise, like that which is made by forcing a heavy plank
with violence upon the ground, and may be heard at a
great distance. — But what is yet more surprising to a
stranger is the incredibly loud and terrifying roar which
they are capable of making, especially in breeding time.
^OTES. 17
It most resembles very heavy distant thunder, not only
shaking the air and waters, but causing the earth to
tremble ; and when hundreds are roaring at the same
time, you can scarcely be persuaded but that tlie whole
globe is violently and dangerously agitated. — An old
champion, who is, perhaps, absolute sovereign of a little
lake or lagoon, (when fifty less than himself are obliged
to content themselves with swelling and roaring in little
coves round about,) darts forth from the reedy coverts,
all at once, on the surface of the waters in a right line,
at first seemingly as rapid as lightning, but gradually
more slowly, until he arrives at the centre of the lake,
where he stops. He now swells himself, by drawing in
wind and water through his mouth, which causes a loud
sonorous rattling in the throat for near a minute ; but it
is immediately forced out again through his mouth and
nostrils with a loud noise, brandishing his tail in the
air, and the vapour running from his nostrils li|ie smoke.
At other times, when swoln to an extent ready to burst,
his head and tail lifted up, he spins or twirls round on
the surface of the water. He acts his part like an In-
dian chief, when rehearsing his feats of war. — Bartram's
Travels in North America.
Stanza 28. 1. 4.
Then forth uprose that lone wayfaring man.
They discover an amazing sagacity, and acquire,
with the greatest readiness, any thing that depends upon
the attention of the mind. By experience, and an acute
observation, they attain many perfections, to which
Americans are strangers. — For instance, they will cross
a forest, or a plain, which is two hundred miles in
breadth, so as to reach with great exactness, the point
at which they intend to arrive, keeping, during the
whole of that space, in a direct line, without any mate-
rial deviations : and this they will do with the same
ease, let the weather be fair or cloudy. — With equal
acuteness they will point to that part of the heavens the
sun is in, though it be intercepted by clouds or fogs.
Besides this, they are able to pursue, with incredible fa-
cility, the traces of man or beast, either on leaves or
grass ; and on this account it is with great difficulty
they escape discovery. — They are indebted for these ta-
18 NOTES
lents not only to nature, but to an extraordinary cona-
mand of the intellectual qualities, which can only be
acquired by an unremitted attention, and by long ex-
perience. — They are in general very happy in a reten-
tive memory. They can recapitulate every particular
that has been treated of in council, and remember the
exact time when they were held. Their belts of wam-
pum preserve the substance of treaties they have con-
cluded with the neighbouring tribes for ages back : to
which they will appeal and refer with as much perspi-
cuity and readiness as Europeans can to their written
records.
The Indians are totally unskilled in geography, as
well as all the other sciences, and yet they draw on their
birch bark very exact charts or maps of the countries
they are acquainted with. — The latitude and longitude
only are wanting to make them tolerably complete.
Their sole knowledge in astronomy consists in being
able to point out the polar star, by which they regulate
their course when they travel in the night.
They reckon the distance of places not by miles or
leagues, but by a day's journey, which, according to the
best calculation I could make, appears to be about
twenty English miles. These they also divide into
halves and quarters, and will demonstrate them in their
maps with great exactness by the hieroglyphics just
mentioned, when they regulate in council their war-
parties, or their most distant hunting excursions. —
darkens and Leung's Travels.
Some of the French missionaries have supposed that
the Indians are guided by instinct, and have pretended
that the Indian children can find their way through a
forest as easily as a person of maturer years ; but this
IS a most absurd notion. It is unquestionably by a
close attention to the growth of the trees, and position
of the sun, that they find their way. On ihe northern
side of a tree there is generally the most rnoss 5, and the
bark on that side, in general, differs from that on the
opposite one. The branches towards the south are, for
the most part, more luxuriant than those on ihe other
sides of trees, and several other distinctions also subsist
between the northern and southern sides, conspicuous
NOTES. 19
tc Indians, being taught from their infancy to attend to
then\, vvliicli a common observer, would, perhaps, never
notice. Being accustomed from their infancy likewise
to pay great attention to the position of the sun, tliey
learn to make tlie most accurate allowance for its ap-
parent motion from one part of the heavens to another;
and in every part of the day they will point to the part
of the heavens where it is, although the sky be obscured
by clouds or mists.
An instance of their dexterity in finding their way
through an unknown country, came under my observa-
tion when I was at Staunton, situated behind the Blue
Mountains, Virginia. A numoer of the Creek nation
had arriveil at that town on their way to Philadelphia,
whither they were going upon some affiiirs of impor-
tance, and had stopped there for the night. In the
morning some circumstance or another, whicli could
not be learned, induced one half of the Indians tp set
off without their companions, who did not follow until
some hours afterwards. When these last were ready
to pursue their journey, several of the towns i)eople
mounted their horses to escort them part of the way.
They proceeded along the high road for some miles,
but. all at once, liastily turning aside into the woods,
though there was no path, the Indians advanced confi-
dently forward. The people who accompanied them,
surprised at this movement, informed them that they
were quitting the road to Philadelphia, and expressed
their fear lest they should miss their companions who
had gone on before. They answered that they knew
better, that the way through the woods was the shortest
to Philadelphia, and that they knew very well that their
companions had entered the wood at the very place
where they did. Curiosity led some of the horsemen
to go on ; and to their astonishment, for their was ap-
parently no track, they overtook the other Indians in
the thickest part of the wood. But what appeared most
singular was, that the route which they took was found,
on examining a map, to be as direct for Philadelphia as
if they had taken the bearings by a mariner's compass.
From others of their nation, who had been at Philadel-
phia at a former period, they had probably learned the
t20 NOTES.
exact direction of that city from their villages, and had
never lost sight of it, although they had already travel-
led three hundred miles through the woods, and had
upwards of four hundred miles more to go before they
could reach the place of their destination. Of the ex-
actness with which they can find out a strange place to
which they have been once directed by their own peo-
ple, a striking example is furnished, I think, by Mr.
Jefferson, in his account of the Indian graves in Virgi-
nia. These graves are nothing more than large mounds
of earth in the woods, which, on being opened, are
found to contain skeletons in an erect posture : the In-
dian mode of sepulture has been too often described to
remain unknown to you. But to come to my story. A
party of Indians that were passing on to some of the
seaports on the Atlantic, just as the Creeks, above-
mentioned, were going to Philadelphia, were observed,
all on a sudden, to quit the straight road by which they
were proceeding, and without asking any questions, to
strike through the woods, in a direct line, to one of these
graves, which lay at the distance of some miles from
the road. Now very near a century must have passed
over since the part of Virginia, in which this grave was
situated, had been inhabited by Indians, and these In-
dian travellers, who were to visit it by themselves, had
unquestionably never been in that part of the country
before : they must have found their way to it, simply
from the description of its situation, that had been
handed down to them by tradition. — JVeld's Travels in
North America, Vol. II.
NOTES
GERTRUDE OF WYOMING.
PART III.
Stanza 16. I. 4.
The Mammoth comes.
That I am justified in making the Indian chief allude
to the mammoth as an emblem of terror and destruction,
will be seen by the authority quoted below. Speaking
of the mammoth, or big buffalo, Mr. Jefferson states,
that a tradition is preserved among the Indians of that
animal still existing in the northern parts of America.
" A delegation of warriors from the Delaware tribe
having visited the governor of Virginia during the re-
volution, on matters of business, the governor asked
"them some questions relative to their country, and,
among others, what they knew or had heard of the ani-
mal whose bones were found at the Saltlicks on the
Ohio. Their chief speaker immediately put himself
into an attitude of oratory, and with a pomp suited to
what he conceived the elevation of his subject, informed
him, that it was a tradition handed down from their fa-
thers, that in ancient times a herd of these tremendous
animals came to the Big-bone-licks, and began an uni-
versal destruction of the bear, deer, elk, buffalo, and
other animals which had been created for the use of the
Indians. That the Great Man above, looking down and
seeing this, was so enraged, that he seized his lightning,
descended on earth, seated himself on a neighbouring
mountain on a rock, of which his seat, and the prints of
his feet, are still to be seen, and hurled his bolts among
them, till the whole were slaughtered except the big
bull, who presenting his forehead to the shafts, shook
them off as they fell, but, missing one at length, it
wounded him on the side, whereon, springing round, he
bounded over the Ohio, over the Wabash, the Illinois,
S
22 NOTES.
and finally over the great lakes, where he is living at
this day." — Jefferson^s Notes on Virginia.
Stanza 17. /. 1.
Scorning to wield the hatched for his bride,
'Gainst Brandt himself I went to battle fm-th.
This Brandt was a warrior of the Mohawk nation,
who was engaged to allure by bribes, or to force by
threats, many Indian tribes to the expedition against
Pennsylvania. His blood, I believe, was not purely
Indian, but half German. He disgraced, however, his
European descent by more than savage ferocity. Among
many anecdotes which are given of him, the following
is extracted from a traveller in America, already quoted.
" With a considerable body of his troops he joined the
forces under the command of Sir John Johnson. A
skirmish took place with a body of American troops ;
the action was warm, and Brandt was shot by a musket
ball in his heel, but the Americans, in the end were de-
feated, and an officer, with sixty men, were taken pri-
soners. — The officer, after having delivered up his
sword, had entered into conversation with Sir John
Johnson, who commanded the British troops, and they
were talking together in the most friendly manner, when
Brandt, having stolen slily behind them, laid the Ame-
rican officer low wath a blow of his tomahawk. The
indignation of Sir John Johnson, as may be readily sup-
posed, was roused by such an act of treachery, and he
resented it in the warmest terms. Brandt listened to
him unconcernedly, and when he had finished, told him,
that he was sorry for his displeasure, but that, indeed,
his heel was extremely painful at the moment, and he
could not help revenging himself on the only chief of
the party that he saw taken. Since he had killed the
officer, he added, his heel was much less painful to him
than it had been before. — W^eM's Travels, Vol, II. p. 297.
Stanza 17. 7. 8 and 9.
To whom, nor relative nor blood remains,
JVb, not a kindred drop that runs in human veins.
Every one who recollects the specimen of Indian elo-
quence given in the speech of Logan, a Mingo chief, to
the governor of Virginia, will perceive that I have at-
tempted to paraphrase its concluding and most striking
NOTES. 23
expression — There runs not a drop of my blood in the
Vf ins of any livii g creature. The similar salutations
of the fictitious personage in my story, and the real In-
dian orator, make it surely allowable to borrow such an
expression ; and if it appears, as it cannot but appear,
to less advantage than in the original, I beg the reader
to reflect how difficult it is to transpose such exquisite-
ly simple words, without sacrificing a portion of their
effect.
In the spring of 1774, a robbery and murder were
committed on an inhabitant of the frontiers of Virginia,
by two Indians of the Shawanee tribe. The neighbour-
ing whites, according to their custom, undertook to pu-
nish this outrage in a summary manner. Colonel Cre-
eap, a man infamous for the many murders he had com-
mitted on those much injured people, collected a party
and proceeded down the Kanaway in quest of ven-
geance. Unfortunately, a canoe with women and chil-
dren, with one man only, was seen coming from the op-
posite shore unarmed, and unsuspecting an attack from
the whites. Cresap and his party concealed themselves
on the bank of the river, and the moment the canoe
reached the shore, singled out their objects, and at one
fire killed every person in it. This happened to be the
family of Logan, who had long been distinguished as a
friend of the whites. This unworthy return provoked
his vengeance ; he accordingly signalized himself in the
war which ensued. In the autumn of the same year a
decisive battle was fought at the mouth of the great
Kanaway, in which the collected force of the Shawa-
nees, Mingoes, and Delawares, were defeated by a de-
tachment of the Virginia militia. The Indians sued
for peace.-^Logan, however, disdained to be seen among
the supplicants ; but lest the sincerity of the treaty
should be distrusted from which so distinguished a chief
abstracted himself, he sent, by a messenger, the follow-
ing speech to be delivered to Lord Dunmore. " I ap-
peal to any white man if ever he entered Logan's cabin
hungry, and he gave him not to eat ; if ever he came
cold and naked and he clothed him not. During the
course of the last long and bloody war Logan remained
idle in his cabin, an advocate for peace. Such was my
24 NOTES.
love for the whites, that my countrymen pointed as they
passed, and said, Logan is the friend of white men. I
had even thought to have lived with you but for the in-
juries of one man. Colonel Cresap, the last spring, in
cold blood, murdered all the relations of Logan, even
my women and children.
" There runs not a drop of my blood in the veins of
any living creature. — This called on me for revenge. —
I have fought for it — I have killed many. — I have fully
glutted my vengeance. — For my country I rejoice at the
beams of peace — but do not harbour a thought that
mine is the joy of fear. — Logan never felt fear. — He
will not turn on his heel to save his life. — Who is there
to mourn for Logan .'' not one !" — Jefferson's Notes on
Virginia.
NOTES
ON
O'CONNOR'S CHILD.
Verse 2. I. 9.
Kerne, the plural of Kern, an Irish foot soldier. In
this sense the word is used by Shakspeare. Gainsford
in his Glory's of England says, " They (the Irish) are
desperate in revenge, and their kerne think no man
dead until his head be off."
Verse 4. /. 2.
In Erin's yellow vesture dad.
Yellow dyed from saffron, was the favourite colour of
the ancient Irish, as it was among the BeJgic Gauls ; a
circumstance which favours the supposition of those
who deduce the origin of the former from the latter peo-
ple. The Irish chieftains who came to treat with queen
Elizabeth's lord lieutenant, appeared as we are told by
Sir John Davies, in saflfron coloured uniform
NOTES. 85
Verse 6. I. 13 and 14.
Their tribe, thexj mid, their high degree,
Was sung in Tara' s psalterij .
The pride of the Irish in ancestry was so great, that
one of the O'Neals being told that Barrett of Castle-
mone had been there only 400 years, he replied, — that
he hated the clown as if he had come there but yester-
day.
Tara was the place of assemblage and feasting of the
petty princes of Ireland. Very splendid and fabulouj
descriptions are given by the Irish historians of the pomp
and luxury of those meetings. The psaltery of Tara
was the grand national register of Ireland. The grand
epoch of political eminence in the early history of the
Irish is the reign of their great and favourite monarch
Ollan Fodlah, who reigned, according to Keating, about
950 years before the Christian era.. Under him was in-
stituted the great Fes at Tara, which it is pretended
was a triennial convention of the states, or a parliament ;
the members of which were the Druids, and other learn-
ed men, who represented the people in that assembly.
Very minute accounts are given by Irish annalists of the
magnificence and order of these entertainments ; from
which, if credible, we might collect the earliest traces
of heraldry that occur in history. To preserve order
and regularity in the great number and variety of the
members who met on such occasions, the Irish histo-
rians inform us that when the banquet was ready to be
served up, the shield-bearers of the princes, and other
members of the convention, delivered in their shields
and targets, which were readily distinguished by the
coats of arms emblazoned upon them. These were ar-
ranged by the grand marshal and principal herald, and
hung upon the walls on the right side of the table ; and
upon entering the apartments, each member took his
seat under his respective shield or target, without the
slightest disturbance. The concluding days of the
meeting, it is allowed by the Irish antiquarians, were
spent in very free excess of conviviality ; but the first
six, they say, were devoted to the examination and set-
tlement of the annals of the kingdom. These were
publicly rehearsed. When they had passed the appro-
26 NOTES.
bation of the assembly they were transcribed into the
authentic chronicles of the nation, which was called the
Register, or Psalter, of Tara.
Col. Valency gives a translation of an old Irish frag-
ment, found in Trinity College, Dublin, in which the
palace of the above assembly is thus described, as it
existed in the reign of Cormac.
" In the reign of Cormac, the Palace of Tara was
nine hundred feet square ; the diameter of the sur-
rounding rath seven dice or casts of a dart ; it contained
one hundred and fifty apartments ; one hundred and fifty
dormitories, or sleeping rooms for guards, and sixty men
in each : the height was twenty-seven cubits ; there
were one hundred and fifty common drinking horns,
twelve doors, and one thousand guests daily, besides
princes, orators, and men of science, engravers of gold
and silver, carvers, modellers, and nobles. The Irish
description of the banqueting-hall is thus translated:
twelve stalls or divisions in each wing; sixteen at-
tendants on each side, and two to each table ; one hun
dred guests in all."
Verse 7. I. 3.
Ye fought the English of the pale.
he Englisl pale generally meant Louth in Ulster,
and Meath, Dublin, and Kildare in Leinster. — Molt
neaux's History of Ireland.
Verse 7. I. 4.
And stemmed De Bourgo^s chivalry.
The house of O'Connor had a right to boast of their
victories over the English. It was a chief of the O'Con-
nor race who gave a check to the English Champion,
De Courcey, so famous for his personal strength, and
for cleaving a helmet at one blow of his sword, in the
presence of the kings of France and England, when the
French champion declined the combat with him.
Though ultimately conquered by the English under I>e
Bourgo, the O'Connors had also humbled the pride oi
that name on a memorable occasion : viz. when Walter
De Bourgo, an ancestor of that De Bourgo who won
the battle of Athunree, had become so insolent as to
make excessive demands upon the territories of Con-
naught, and to bid defiance to all the rights and proper-
NOTES. 27
ties reserved by the Irish cliiefs. Eath O'Connor, a
near descendant of the famous Cathal, surnamed of the
Bloody Hand, rose against the usurper, and defeated
the English so sev'ereljj that their general died of cha-
grin after the battle.
Verse 7. I. 7.
Or Beal-fires for your jubilee.
The month of May is to this day called Mi Beal
tiennie, i. e. the month of Beal's fire, in the original lan-
guage of Ireland. These fires were lighted on the sum-
mits of mountains (the Irish antiquaries say) in honour
of the sun : and are supposed, by those conjecturing
gentlemen, to prove the origin of the Irish from some
nation who worshipped Baal or Belus. Many hills iu
Ireland still retain the name of Cnoc Greine, i. e. the
hill of the sun ; and on all are to be seen the ruins of
druidical altars.
Verse 8./. 11.
And play my clarshech by thy side.
The clarshech, or harp, the principal musical instru-
ment of the Hibernian bards, does not appear to be of
Irish origin, nor indigenous to any of the British Is-
lands. — The Britons undoubtedly were not acquainted
with it during the residence of the Romans in their
country, as in all their coins, on which musical instru-
ments are represented, we see only the Roman lyre, and
not the British teylin or harp.
Verse 9. I. 3.
And saw at dawn the lofty bawn.
Daingean is a Celtic word expressing a close fast
place and afterwards a fort. — This the English called a
Bawn, from the Teutonic baiven, to construct and secure
with branches of trees. The Daingean was the primi-
tive Celtic fortification ; which was made by digging a
ditch, throwing up a rampart, and on the latter fixing
stakes, which were interlaced with boughs of trees. —
An extempore defence used by all nations, and particu-
larly by the Romans.
Non te fossa patens
Objectu sudium coronat agger.
In this manner the first English adventurers secured
28 NOTES.
their posts at Ferns and Idrone. When king Dennod
entered Ossory, he found that Donald its tossarch had
plashed a pace, i. e. made large and deep trenches with
hedges upon them. Four hundred years afterwards,
the Irish had the same mode of defence. Within half
a mile of the entrance of the Moiry, the English found
that pace by which they were to pass, being naturally
one of the most difficult passages in Ireland, fortified
with good art and admirable industry. The enemy
having raised from mountain to mountain, from wood
to wood, and from bog to bog, traverses with huge and
high flankers of great stones, mingled with turf and
staked down on both sides, with pallisades wattled.
Plashing from the Franco-gallic Plesser, is to entw'ine,
and is equivalent to the Teutonic bawen. — Ledwick'i
Antiquities of Ireland.
Verse 13. I. 16.
To speak the malison of Heaven.
If the wrath which I have ascribed to the heroine of
this little piece should seem to exhibit her character as
too unnaturally stript of patriotic and domestic affec-
tions, I must beg leave to plead the authority of Cor-
neille in the representation of a similar passion : I al-
lude to the denunciation of Camille in the tragedy of
Horace. When Horace, accompanied by a soldier
bearing the three swords of the Curiatii, meets bis sis-
ter, and invites her to congratulate him on his victory,
she expresses only her grief, which he attributes at first
only to her feelings for the loss of her two brothers ; but
when she bursts forth into reproaches against him as
the murderer of her lover, the last of the Curiatii, he
exclaims
" Ciel, qui vit jamais une pareille rage,
Crois tu done que je suis insensible a I'outrage
Que je souffre en mon sang ce mortel deshonneur:
Aime, Aime cette mort qui fait notre bonheur,
Et prefere du moins au souvenir d'un homme
Ce que doit ta naissance aux intertts de Rome."
At the mention of Rome, Camille breaks out into this
apostrophe :
NOTES. 29
" Rome, I'unique objet de mon ressentiment !
Rome, a qui vient ton bias d'immolcr mon amant !
Rome, qui t'a vu naitre et que ton cceur adore !
Rome enfin que je liais, paicequ'elle t'honore !
Puisent tous ses voisiiis, ensemble conjures,
Sapper ses fondemens encore mal assures ;
Et, si ce n'est assez de toute I'ltalie,
Que rOrient, contie elle, a TOccident s'allie ;
Que cent peuples unis, des bouts de I'Univers
Passe nt, pour la detruire, et les monts et les mers:
Qu'elle-meme sur soi renverse ses murailles,
Et de ses propres mains dechire ses entrailles ;
Que le courroux du Ciel, ailume par mes voeux,
Fasse pleuvoir sur elle \in deluge de feux !
Puissai-je de mes yeux y voir tomber ce foudre.
Voir ses maisons en cendre, et tes lauriers en poudre,
Voir le dernier Romain a son dernier soupir,
Moi seule en etre cause, et mourir de plaisir !"
Verse 14. I. 5.
And go to Athunree, I cried —
In the reign of Edward the second, the Irish present-
ed to Pope John the Twenty-second, a memorial of their
sufferings under the English, of which the language ex-
hibits all the strength of des{)air. — " Ever since the
English (say they) first appeared upon our coasts, they
entered our territories under a certain specious pretence
of charity, and external hypocritical show of religion
endeavouring at the same time, by every artifice malice
could suggest, t6 extirpate us root and branch, and with-
out any other right than that of the strongest, they have
so far succeeded by base fraudulence and cunning, that
they have forced us to quit our fair and ample habita-
tions and. inheritances, and to take refuge like wild
beasts in the mountains, the woods, and the morasses of'
the country ; — nor even can the caverns and dens pro-
tect us against their insatiable avarice. Thej^ pursue
us even into these frightful abodes ; endeavouring to
dispossess us of the wild uncultivated rocks, and arro-
gate to themselves the property of every place on which
we can stamp the figure of our feet."
The greatest effort ever made by the ancient Irish to
regain their native independence was made at the time
so NOTES.
when they called over the brother of Robert Bruce from
Scotland. — William de Bourijo, brother to the Earl of
Ulster, and Richard de Birmingham, were sent against
the main body of the native insurgents, who were head-
ed rather than commanded bj^ Felim O'Connor. — The
important battle, Avhich decided the subjection of Ire-
land, took place on the 10th of August, 1S15. It was
the bloodiest that ever was fought between the two na-
tions, and continued throughout the whole day, from
the rising to the setting sun. The Irish fought with in-
ferior discipline, but with great enthusiasm. They lost
ten thousand men, among whom were twenty-nine chiefs
of Connaught. — Tradition states that after this terrible
day, the O'Connor family, like the Fabian, were so
nearly exterminated, that throughout all Connaught not
one of the name remained, except Felim's brother, who
"as capable of bearing arms.
NOTES
TO
LOCHIEL'S WARNING.
Lochiel, the chief of the warlike clan of the Camerons.
and descended from ancestors distinguished in their
narrow sphere for great personal prowess, was a man
worthy of a better cause and fate than that in which he
embarked, the enterprise of the Stuarts in 1745. His
memory is still fondly cherished among the Highlan-
ders, by the appellation of the gentle Lochiel, for he
was famed for his social virtues as much as his martial
and magnanimous (though mistaken) loyalty. His in-
fluence was so important among the Highland chiefs,
that it depended on his joining with his clan whether the
standard of Charles should be raised or not in 1745.
Lochiel was himself too wise a man to be blind to the
consequences of so hopeless an enterprise, but his sen
<(
NOTES. 31
sibility to the point of honour overruled his wisdom.
Charles appealed to his loyalty, and he could not brook
the reproaches of his prince. When Charles landed at
Borrodale, Lochiel went to meet him, but, on his way,
called at his brother's house (Cameron of Fassafern,)
and told him on what errand he was going; adding,
however, that he meant to dissuade the prince from his
enterprise. Fassafern advised him in that case to com-
municate his mind by letter to Charles. " No," said
Lochiel, " I think it due to my prince to give him my
reasons in person for refusing to join his standard."
Brother," replied Fassafern, " I know you better than
you know yourself; if the prince once sets his ej'es on
you, he will make you do what he pleases." The in-
terview accoi-dingly took place, and Lochiel, with many
arguments, but in vain, pi-essed the Pretender to return
to France, and reserve himself and his friends for a more
favourable occasion, as he had come, by his own ac-
knowledgment, without arms, or money, or adherents ;
or, at all events, to remain concealed till his friends
should meet and deliberate what was best to be done,
Charles, whose mind was wound up to the utmost im
patience, paid no regard to this proposal, but answ.ered,
" that he was determined to put all to the hazard. In a
few days," said he, " I will erect the royal standard, and
proclaim to the people of Great Britain, that Charles
Stuart is come over to claim the crown of his ancestors,
and to win it or perish in the attempt. Lochiel, who
by my father has often told me he was our firmest
friend, may stay at home, and learn from the newspa-
pers the fate of his prince." " No," said Lochiel, " I
will share the fate of my prince, and so shall every man
over whom nature or fortune hath given me any power."
The other chieftains who followed Charles embraced
his cause with no better hopes. It engages our sympa-
thy most strongly in their behalf, that no motive, but
their fear to be reproached with cowardice or disloyal-
ty, impelled them to the hopeless adventure. Of this
we have an example in the interview of prince Charles
with Clanronald, another leading chieftain in the rebel
army.
" Charles," says Home, " almost reduced to despair,
in his discourse with Boisdale, addressed the two High
32 NOTES.
landers with great emotion, and, summing up his argu-
ments for taking arms, conjured them to assist their
prince, their countryman, in his utmost need. Clan-
ronald and his friend, though well inclined to the cause,
positively refused, and told him that to take up arms
without concert or support was to pull down certain
ruin on their 6wn heads. Charles persisted, argued,
and, implored. During this conversation (they were on
shipboard) the parties walked backwards and forwards
on the deck ; a Highlander stood near them, armed at
all points, as was then the fashion of his country. He
was a younger brother of Kinloch Moidart, and had
come off to the ship to inquire for news, not knowing
who was aboard. When he gathered from their dis
course that the stranger was the prince of Wales ; when
he heard his chief and his brother refuse to take arms
with their prince, his colour went and came, his eyes
sparkled, he shifted his place, and grasped his sword.
Charles observed his demeanour, and turning briskly
to him, called out, " Will you assist me?" " I will, I
will," said Ronald, " though no other man in the High
lands should draw a sword, I am ready to die for you !"
Charles, with a profusion of thanks to his champion,
said, he wished all the Highlanders were like him.
Without farther deliberation the two Macdonalds de-
clared that they would also join, and use their utmost
endeavours to engage their countrymen to take arms."—
Home's Hist. Rebellion, p. 40.
Page 115, Z. 11 and 12.
Lo ! anointed by heaven with the vials of wrath,
Behold, where hejiies on his desolate path !
The lines allude to the many hardships of the royal
sufferer.
An account of the second sight, in Irish called Taisb,
is thus given in Martin's description of the Western
Isles of Scotland. " The second sight is a singular fa-
culty of seeing an otherwise invisible object, without
any previous means vised by the person who sees it, for
that end. The vision makes such a lively impression
upon the seers, that they neither see nor think of any
thing else except the vision as long as it continues ; and
NOTES. 33
then they appear pensive or jovial according to the ob-
ject which was represented to them.
" At the siglit of the vision the eyehds of the person
are erected, and the eyes continue staring until the ob-
ject vanish. This is obvious to others who are stand-
ing by when the persons happen to see a vision ; and
occurred more than once to my own observation, and to
others that were with me.
" There is one in Skie, of whom his acquaintance
observed, that when he sees a vision the inn( r parts of
his eyelids turn so Air upwards, that after the object
disappears, he must draw them down with his fingers,
and sometimes emp'oys others to draw them down,
which he finds to be the easier way.
" This faculty of tb^ second sight does not lineally de-
scend in a family, as some have imagined ; for I know
several parents who are endowed with it, and their chil-
dren are not : and vice versa. Neither is it acquired
by any previous compact. And after strict inquiry, J
could never learn from any among them, that this facul-
ty was communicable to any whatsoever. The seer
knows neither the object, time, nor place of a vision be-
fore it appears ; and the same object is often seen by
different persons living at a considerable distance from
one another. The true way of judging as to the time
and circumstances is by observation ; for several per-
sons of judgment whj are without this faculty are more
capable to judge of the design of a vision than a novice
that is a seer. If an object appear in the day or night,
it will come to pass sooner or later accordingly.
" If an object is seen early in the morning, which is
not frequent, it will be accomplished in a few hours
afterwards ; if at noon, it will probably be accomplish-
ed that very day ; if in the evening, perhaps that night ;
if after candles be lighted, it will be accomplished that
night: the latter always an accomplishment by weeks,
months, and sometimes years, according to the time of
the night the vision is seen.
"When a shroud is seen about one, it is a sure prog-
nostic of death. The time is judged according to the
height of it about the person ; for if it is not seen above
the middle, death is not to be expected for the space oS
a year, and perhaps some months longer : and as it i»
T
S4 NOTES.
frequentlj' seen to ascend higher towards the head, death
is concluded to be at hand within a few days, if not
hours, as daily experience confirms. Examples of thi*
kind were shown me, when the person of whom the ob*
servations were then made was in perfect health.
" It is ordinary with them to see houses, gardens, and
trees, in places void of all these, and this in process of
time is wont to be accomplished ; as at Mogslot, in the
isle of Skie, where there were but a few sorry low
houses thatched with s,traw ; yet in a few years the vi-
sion, which appeared often, was accomplished by thfc
building of several good houses in the very spot repre-
sented to the seerSj and by the planting of orchards
there.
" To see a spark of fire is a forerunner of a dead
child, to be seen in the arms of those persons; of which
there are several instances. To see a seat empty at th&
time of sitting in it, is a presage of that person's death
quickly after it.
'* When a novice, or one that has lately obtained the
second sight, sees a vision in the night time without
doors, and comes near a fire, he presently falls into a
swoon.
" Some find themselves as it were in a crowd of peo-
ple, having a corpse, which they carry along with them ;
and after such visions the seers come in sweating, and
describe the vision that appeared. If there be any o(
their acquaintance among them, they give an account of
their names, as also of the bearers ; but they know no-
thing concerning the corpse."
Horses and cows (according to the same credulous
author) have certainly sometimes the same faculty:
and he endeavours to prove it by the signs of fear which
the animals exhibit, when second-sighted persons see
visions in the same place.
" The seers (he continues') are generally illiterate
and well meaning people, and altogether void of design :
nor could I ever learn that any of them ever made the
least gain by it; neither is it reputable among them to
have that faculty. Besides, the people of the isles are
not so cred'',lous as to believe implicitly before the thing
predicted is accomplished ; but when it is actually ac-
complished afterwards, it is not in their power to deny
i
NOTES. 3J
it, without offering violence to their own sense and rea-
son. Besides, if the seers were deceivers, can it be rea-
sonaMe to imagine that all the islanders who have not
the second sight should combine together, and offer vio-
lence to their understandings and senses, to enforce
themselves to believe a lie from age to age. There are
h'iveral persons among them whose title and education
raise them above the suspicion of concurring with an
impostor, merely to gratify an illiterate, contemptible
set of persons; nor can reasonable persons believe that
cliildren, horses, and cows, should be pre-engaged in a
combination in favour of the second sight." — Martin's
Description of the Western Islands of Scotland, p. 3, 1 !•
Pagell5, i. 20.
Like a limhfrom his country cast bleeding andtom^
An English historian, after enumerating the severe
execution of the Highland rebels at CuUoden, Carlisle,
and other places, concludes by informing us that many
thousands experienced his majesty's mercy, in being
transported for life to the plantations.
Page 115, ?. 21.
Ah no ! for a darker departure is near.
The brother of Lochiel returning to England ten years
tfter the rebellion, though he acted only as a surgeon in
^he rebel army, suffered the dreadful fate here predict-
ed, by a sentence which happily has no parallel for
tteedless severity in the modern history of state trials in
(his humane age and country.
NOTES
TO
THEODRIC.
Line 3.
'* That ifave the glacier tops their richest glsj}.*
The sight of the glaciers of Switzerland, I am told,
has often tlisajijiointed travellers who had perused the
accounts of their splendour and sublimity given by
Bourrit and other describers of Swiss scenery. Possi-
bly Bourrit, who has spent his life in an enamoured fa-
miliarity with the beauties of Nature in Switzarland,
may have leaned to the romantic side of description.
One can jiatdona man for a sort of idolatry of those im-
posing oIijcH tii of N;iture which heighten our ideas of
the bounty ol' Nature or Providence, when we reflect
that the glacieis -those seas of ice — are not oniy sub-
lime but useful : tliey are the inexhaustible reiserA-oirs
which su]>jily the principal nvers of Europe ; and their
annual meltii.g is in proportion to the summer heat
which dries uji thosis rivers and makes them need that
supply.
That th3 pictiires(]ue grandeur of the glaciers should
sometimes disappoint the traveller, will not seem sur-
prising to any one who has been much in a mountainous
country, and recollects that the beauty of Nature in
such countries is not only variable, but capriciously
dependent on the weathe? and sunihine. There are
about four hundred different glaciers,* according to the
computation of M. Bourrit, between Mont Blanc and
the frontiers of the Tyrol. The full effect of the most
lofty and picturesque of them can, of course, only be
produced by the richest and warmest light of the atmos-
phere ; and the very beat which illuminates them most
* Occupying, if taken together, a surface of 130 «nMire
leagues'.
NOTES. 37
have a changing influence on many of their appearances.
I imagine it is owing to this circumstance, namely, the
casualty and changeableness of the appearance of some
of the glaciers, that the impressions made by them on
the minds of other and more transient travellers have
been less enchanting than those described by M. Bour-
rit. On one occasion M. JBourrit seems even to speak
of a past phenomenon, and certainly one which no other
spectator attests in the same terms, when he says, that
there once existed between the Kandel Steig and Lau-
terbrun, " a passage amidst singular glaciers, sometimes
resembling magical towns of ice, with pilasters, pyra-
mids, columns, and obelisks, reflecting to the sun the
most brilliant hues of the finest gems." — M. Bourrit's
description of the Glacier of the Rhone is quite en-
chanting. — " To form an idea," he says, " of this su-
perb spectacle, figure in your mind a scafifolding of
transparent ice, filling a space of two miles, rising to
the clouds, and darung flashes of light like the sun.
Nor were the several parts less magnificent and sur-
prising. One might see, as it were, the streets and
buildings of a city, erected in the form of an amphi-
theatre, and embellished with pieces of water, cascades,
and torrents. The effects were as prodigious as the
immensity and the height ; — the most beautiful azure —
the most splendid white — the regular appearance of a
thousand pyramids of ice, are more easy to be imagin-
ed than described." — Bourrit, iii. 163.
Line 9.
" Fi'om heights bronzed by the bounding bouquetin."
liaborde, in his " Tableau de la Suisse," gives a cu-
rious account of this animal, the wild sharp cry and
elastic movements of which must heighten the pic-
turesque appearance of its haunts. — " Nature," says
Laborde, " has destined it to mountains covered with
snow : if it is not exposed to keen cold it becomes blind.
Its agility in leaping much surpasses that of the cha-
mois, and would appear incredible to those who have
not seen it. There is not a mountain so high or steep
to which it will not trust itself, provided it has room to
place its feet ; it can scramble along the highest wall, if
its surface be rigged."
38 NOTES.
Line 15.
" Enamelled moss."
The moss of Switzerland, as well as that of the Ty-
rol, is remarkable for a bright smoothness approaching
to the appearance of enamel.
Line 136.
" How dear seemed evi'n the waste and wild Sh eckliom."
The Shreckhorn means in German, the Peak of
Terror.
Line 141.
" Blindfold his native hills he could have known."
I have here availed myself of a striking expression of
the Emperor Napoleon respecting his recollections of
Corsica, which is recorded in Las Cases's History of the
Emperor's abode at St. Helena.
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