PART SIXTH.
CONCLUSION The tale is done; it little needs To track their after ways, And string again the golden beads Of love's uncounted days.
They leave the fair ancestral isle For bleak New England's shore; How gracious is the courtly smile Of all who frowned before! Again through Lisbon's orange bowers They watch the river's gleam, And shudder as her shadowy towers Shake in the trembling stream.
Fate parts at length the fondest pair; His cheek, alas! grows pale; The breast that trampling death could spare His noiseless shafts assail.
He longs to change the heaven of blue For England's clouded sky,-- To breathe the air his boyhood knew; He seeks then but to die.
Hard by the terraced hillside town, Where healing streamlets run, Still sparkling with their old renown,-- The "Waters of the Sun,"-- The Lady Agnes raised the stone That marks his honored grave, And there Sir Harry sleeps alone By Wiltshire Avon's wave.
The home of early love was dear; She sought its peaceful shade, And kept her state for many a year, With none to make afraid.
At last the evil days were come That saw the red cross fall; She hears the rebels' rattling drum,-- Farewell to Frankland Hall! I tell you, as my tale began, The hall is standing still; And you, kind listener, maid or man, May see it if you will.
The box is glistening huge and green, Like trees the lilacs grow, Three elms high-arching still are seen, And one lies stretched below.
The hangings, rough with velvet flowers, Flap on the latticed wall; And o'er the mossy ridge-pole towers The rock-hewn chimney tall.
The doors on mighty hinges clash With massive bolt and bar, The heavy English-moulded sash Scarce can the night-winds jar.
Behold the chosen room he sought Alone, to fast and pray, Each year, as chill November brought The dismal earthquake day.
There hung the rapier blade he wore, Bent in its flattened sheath; The coat the shrieking woman tore Caught in her clenching teeth;-- The coat with tarnished silver lace She snapped at as she slid, And down upon her death-white face Crashed the huge coffin's lid.
A graded terrace yet remains; If on its turf you stand And look along the wooded plains That stretch on either hand, The broken forest walls define A dim, receding view, Where, on the far horizon's line, He cut his vista through.
If further story you shall crave, Or ask for living proof, Go see old Julia, born a slave Beneath Sir Harry's roof.
She told me half that I have told, And she remembers well The mansion as it looked of old Before its glories fell;-- The box, when round the terraced square Its glossy wall was drawn; The climbing vines, the snow-balls fair, The roses on the lawn.
And Julia says, with truthful look Stamped on her wrinkled face, That in her own black hands she took The coat with silver lace.
And you may hold the story light, Or, if you like, believe; But there it was, the woman's bite,-- A mouthful from the sleeve.
Now go your ways;--I need not tell The moral of my rhyme; But, youths and maidens, ponder well This tale of olden time! THE PLOUGHMAN ANNIVERSARY OF THE BERKSHIRE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY, OCTOBER 4, 1849 CLEAR the brown path, to meet his coulter's gleam! Lo! on he comes, behind his smoking team, With toil's bright dew-drops on his sunburnt brow, The lord of earth, the hero of the plough! First in the field before the reddening sun, Last in the shadows when the day is done, Line after line, along the bursting sod, Marks the broad acres where his feet have trod; Still, where he treads, the stubborn clods divide, The smooth, fresh furrow opens deep and wide; Matted and dense the tangled turf upheaves, Mellow and dark the ridgy cornfield cleaves; Up the steep hillside, where the laboring train Slants the long track that scores the level plain; Through the moist valley, clogged with oozing clay, The patient convoy breaks its destined way; At every turn the loosening chains resound, The swinging ploughshare circles glistening round, Till the wide field one billowy waste appears, And wearied hands unbind the panting steers.
These are the hands whose sturdy labor brings The peasant's food, the golden pomp of kings; This is the page, whose letters shall be seen Changed by the sun to words of living green; This is the scholar, whose immortal pen Spells the first lesson hunger taught to men; These are the lines which heaven-commanded Toil Shows on his deed,--the charter of the soil.
O gracious Mother, whose benignant breast Wakes us to life, and lulls us all to rest, How thy sweet features, kind to every clime, Mock with their smile the wrinkled front of time We stain thy flowers,--they blossom o'er the dead; We rend thy bosom, and it gives us bread; O'er the red field that trampling strife has torn, Waves the green plumage of thy tasselled corn; Our maddening conflicts sear thy fairest plain, Still thy soft answer is the growing grain.
Yet, O our Mother, while uncounted charms Steal round our hearts in thine embracing arms, Let not our virtues in thy love decay, And thy fond sweetness waste our strength away.
No! by these hills, whose banners now displayed In blazing cohorts Autumn has arrayed; By yon twin summits, on whose splintery crests The tossing hemlocks hold the eagles' nests; By these fair plains the mountain circle screens, And feeds with streamlets from its dark ravines, True to their home, these faithful arms shall toil To crown with peace their own untainted soil; And, true to God, to freedom, to mankind, If her chained bandogs Faction shall unbind, These stately forms, that bending even now Bowed their strong manhood to the humble plough, Shall rise erect, the guardians of the land, The same stern iron in the same right hand, Till o'er their hills the shouts of triumph run, The sword has rescued what the ploughshare won! SPRING WINTER is past; the heart of Nature warms Beneath the wrecks of unresisted storms; Doubtful at first, suspected more than seen, The southern slopes are fringed with tender green; On sheltered banks, beneath the dripping eaves, Spring's earliest nurslings spread their glowing leaves, Bright with the hues from wider pictures won, White, azure, golden,--drift, or sky, or sun,-- The snowdrop, bearing on her patient breast The frozen trophy torn from Winter's crest; The violet, gazing on the arch of blue Till her own iris wears its deepened hue; The spendthrift crocus, bursting through the mould Naked and shivering with his cup of gold.
Swelled with new life, the darkening elm on high Prints her thick buds against the spotted sky On all her boughs the stately chestnut cleaves The gummy shroud that wraps her embryo leaves; The house-fly, stealing from his narrow grave, Drugged with the opiate that November gave, Beats with faint wing against the sunny pane, Or crawls, tenacious, o'er its lucid plain; From shaded chinks of lichen-crusted walls, In languid curves, the gliding serpent crawls; The bog's green harper, thawing from his sleep, Twangs a hoarse note and tries a shortened leap; On floating rails that face the softening noons The still shy turtles range their dark platoons, Or, toiling aimless o'er the mellowing fields, Trail through the grass their tessellated shields.
At last young April, ever frail and fair, Wooed by her playmate with the golden hair, Chased to the margin of receding floods O'er the soft meadows starred with opening buds, In tears and blushes sighs herself away, And hides her cheek beneath the flowers of May.
Then the proud tulip lights her beacon blaze, Her clustering curls the hyacinth displays; O'er her tall blades the crested fleur-de-lis, Like blue-eyed Pallas, towers erect and free; With yellower flames the lengthened sunshine glows, And love lays bare the passion-breathing rose; Queen of the lake, along its reedy verge The rival lily hastens to emerge, Her snowy shoulders glistening as she strips, Till morn is sultan of her parted lips.
Then bursts the song from every leafy glade, The yielding season's bridal serenade; Then flash the wings returning Summer calls Through the deep arches of her forest halls,-- The bluebird, breathing from his azure plumes The fragrance borrowed where the myrtle blooms; The thrush, poor wanderer, dropping meekly down, Clad in his remnant of autumnal brown; The oriole, drifting like a flake of fire Rent by a whirlwind from a blazing spire.
The robin, jerking his spasmodic throat, Repeats, imperious, his staccato note; The crack-brained bobolink courts his crazy mate, Poised on a bulrush tipsy with his weight; Nay, in his cage the lone canary sings, Feels the soft air, and spreads his idle wings.
Why dream I here within these caging walls, Deaf to her voice, while blooming Nature calls; Peering and gazing with insatiate looks Through blinding lenses, or in wearying books?
Off, gloomy spectres of the shrivelled past! Fly with the leaves that fill the autumn blast Ye imps of Science, whose relentless chains Lock the warm tides within these living veins, Close your dim cavern, while its captive strays Dazzled and giddy in the morning's blaze! THE STUDY YET in the darksome crypt I left so late, Whose only altar is its rusted grate,-- Sepulchral, rayless, joyless as it seems, Shamed by the glare of May's refulgent beams,-- While the dim seasons dragged their shrouded train, Its paler splendors were not quite in vain.
From these dull bars the cheerful firelight's glow Streamed through the casement o'er the spectral snow; Here, while the night-wind wreaked its frantic will On the loose ocean and the rock-bound hill, Rent the cracked topsail from its quivering yard, And rived the oak a thousand storms had scarred, Fenced by these walls the peaceful taper shone, Nor felt a breath to slant its trembling cone.
Not all unblest the mild interior scene When the red curtain spread its falling screen; O'er some light task the lonely hours were past, And the long evening only flew too fast; Or the wide chair its leathern arms would lend In genial welcome to some easy friend, Stretched on its bosom with relaxing nerves, Slow moulding, plastic, to its hollow curves; Perchance indulging, if of generous creed, In brave Sir Walter's dream-compelling weed.
Or, happier still, the evening hour would bring To the round table its expected ring, And while the punch-bowl's sounding depths were stirred,-- Its silver cherubs smiling as they heard,-- Our hearts would open, as at evening's hour The close-sealed primrose frees its hidden flower.
Such the warm life this dim retreat has known, Not quite deserted when its guests were flown; Nay, filled with friends, an unobtrusive set, Guiltless of calls and cards and etiquette, Ready to answer, never known to ask, Claiming no service, prompt for every task.
On those dark shelves no housewife hand profanes, O'er his mute files the monarch folio reigns; A mingled race, the wreck of chance and time, That talk all tongues and breathe of every clime, Each knows his place, and each may claim his part In some quaint corner of his master's heart.
This old Decretal, won from Moss's hoards, Thick-leaved, brass-cornered, ribbed with oaken boards, Stands the gray patriarch of the graver rows, Its fourth ripe century narrowing to its close; Not daily conned, but glorious still to view, With glistening letters wrought in red and blue.
There towers Stagira's all-embracing sage, The Aldine anchor on his opening page; There sleep the births of Plato's heavenly mind, In yon dark tomb by jealous clasps confused, "Olim e libris" (dare I call it mine ?) Of Yale's grave Head and Killingworth's divine! In those square sheets the songs of Maro fill The silvery types of smooth-leaved Baskerville; High over all, in close, compact array, Their classic wealth the Elzevirs display.
In lower regions of the sacred space Range the dense volumes of a humbler race; There grim chirurgeons all their mysteries teach, In spectral pictures, or in crabbed speech; Harvey and Haller, fresh from Nature's page, Shoulder the dreamers of an earlier age, Lully and Geber, and the learned crew That loved to talk of all they could not do.
Why count the rest,--those names of later days That many love, and all agree to praise,-- Or point the titles, where a glance may read The dangerous lines of party or of creed?
Too well, perchance, the chosen list would show What few may care and none can claim to know.
Each has his features, whose exterior seal A brush may copy, or a sunbeam steal; Go to his study,--on the nearest shelf Stands the mosaic portrait of himself.
What though for months the tranquil dust descends, Whitening the heads of these mine ancient friends, While the damp offspring of the modern press Flaunts on my table with its pictured dress; Not less I love each dull familiar face, Nor less should miss it from the appointed place; I snatch the book, along whose burning leaves His scarlet web our wild romancer weaves, Yet, while proud Hester's fiery pangs I share, My old MAGNALIA must be standing _there_! THE BELLS WHEN o'er the street the morning peal is flung From yon tall belfry with the brazen tongue, Its wide vibrations, wafted by the gale, To each far listener tell a different tale.
The sexton, stooping to the quivering floor Till the great caldron spills its brassy roar, Whirls the hot axle, counting, one by one, Each dull concussion, till his task is done.
Toil's patient daughter, when the welcome note Clangs through the silence from the steeple's throat, Streams, a white unit, to the checkered street, Demure, but guessing whom she soon shall meet; The bell, responsive to her secret flame, With every note repeats her lover's name.
The lover, tenant of the neighboring lane, Sighing, and fearing lest he sigh in vain, Hears the stern accents, as they come and go, Their only burden one despairing No! Ocean's rough child, whom many a shore has known Ere homeward breezes swept him to his own, Starts at the echo as it circles round, A thousand memories kindling with the sound; The early favorite's unforgotten charms, Whose blue initials stain his tawny arms; His first farewell, the flapping canvas spread, The seaward streamers crackling overhead, His kind, pale mother, not ashamed to weep Her first-born's bridal with the haggard deep, While the brave father stood with tearless eye, Smiling and choking with his last good-by.
'T is but a wave, whose spreading circle beats, With the same impulse, every nerve it meets, Yet who shall count the varied shapes that ride On the round surge of that aerial tide! O child of earth! If floating sounds like these Steal from thyself their power to wound or please, If here or there thy changing will inclines, As the bright zodiac shifts its rolling signs, Look at thy heart, and when its depths are known, Then try thy brother's, judging by thine own, But keep thy wisdom to the narrower range, While its own standards are the sport of change, Nor count us rebels when we disobey The passing breath that holds thy passion's sway.
NON-RESISTANCE PERHAPS too far in these considerate days Has patience carried her submissive ways; Wisdom has taught us to be calm and meek, To take one blow, and turn the other cheek; It is not written what a man shall do, If the rude caitiff smite the other too! Land of our fathers, in thine hour of need God help thee, guarded by the passive creed! As the lone pilgrim trusts to beads and cowl, When through the forest rings the gray wolf's howl; As the deep galleon trusts her gilded prow When the black corsair slants athwart her bow; As the poor pheasant, with his peaceful mien, Trusts to his feathers, shining golden-green, When the dark plumage with the crimson beak Has rustled shadowy from its splintered peak,-- So trust thy friends, whose babbling tongues would charm The lifted sabre from thy foeman's arm, Thy torches ready for the answering peal From bellowing fort and thunder-freighted keel! THE MORAL BULLY YON whey-faced brother, who delights to wear A weedy flux of ill-conditioned hair, Seems of the sort that in a crowded place One elbows freely into smallest space; A timid creature, lax of knee and hip, Whom small disturbance whitens round the lip; One of those harmless spectacled machines, The Holy-Week of Protestants convenes; Whom school-boys question if their walk transcends The last advices of maternal friends; Whom John, obedient to his master's sign, Conducts, laborious, up to ninety-nine, While Peter, glistening with luxurious scorn, Husks his white ivories like an ear of corn; Dark in the brow and bilious in the cheek, Whose yellowish linen flowers but once a week, Conspicuous, annual, in their threadbare suits, And the laced high-lows which they call their boots, Well mayst thou shun that dingy front severe, But him, O stranger, him thou canst not _fear_.
Be slow to judge, and slower to despise, Man of broad shoulders and heroic size The tiger, writhing from the boa's rings, Drops at the fountain where the cobra stings.
In that lean phantom, whose extended glove Points to the text of universal love, Behold the master that can tame thee down To crouch, the vassal of his Sunday frown; His velvet throat against thy corded wrist, His loosened tongue against thy doubled fist.
The MORAL BULLY, though he never swears, Nor kicks intruders down his entry stairs, Though meekness plants his backward-sloping hat, And non-resistance ties his white cravat, Though his black broadcloth glories to be seen In the same plight with Shylock's gaberdine, Hugs the same passion to his narrow breast That heaves the cuirass on the trooper's chest, Hears the same hell-hounds yelling in his rear That chase from port the maddened buccaneer, Feels the same comfort while his acrid words Turn the sweet milk of kindness into curds, Or with grim logic prove, beyond debate, That all we love is worthiest of our hate, As the scarred ruffian of the pirate's deck, When his long swivel rakes the staggering wreck! Heaven keep us all! Is every rascal clown Whose arm is stronger free to knock us down?
Has every scarecrow, whose cachectic soul Seems fresh from Bedlam, airing on parole, Who, though he carries but a doubtful trace Of angel visits on his hungry face, From lack of marrow or the coins to pay, Has dodged some vices in a shabby way, The right to stick us with his cutthroat terms, And bait his homilies with his brother worms?
THE MIND'S DIET No life worth naming ever comes to good If always nourished on the selfsame food; The creeping mite may live so if he please, And feed on Stilton till he turns to cheese, But cool Magendie proves beyond a doubt, If mammals try it, that their eyes drop out.
No reasoning natures find it safe to feed, For their sole diet, on a single creed; It spoils their eyeballs while it spares their tongues, And starves the heart to feed the noisy lungs.
When the first larvae on the elm are seen, The crawling wretches, like its leaves, are green; Ere chill October shakes the latest down, They, like the foliage, change their tint to brown; On the blue flower a bluer flower you spy, You stretch to pluck it--'tis a butterfly; The flattened tree-toads so resemble bark, They're hard to find as Ethiops in the dark; The woodcock, stiffening to fictitious mud, Cheats the young sportsman thirsting for his blood; So by long living on a single lie, Nay, on one truth, will creatures get its dye; Red, yellow, green, they take their subject's hue,-- Except when squabbling turns them black and blue! OUR LIMITATIONS WE trust and fear, we question and believe, From life's dark threads a trembling faith to weave, Frail as the web that misty night has spun, Whose dew-gemmed awnings glitter in the sun.
While the calm centuries spell their lessons out, Each truth we conquer spreads the realm of doubt; When Sinai's summit was Jehovah's throne, The chosen Prophet knew his voice alone; When Pilate's hall that awful question heard, The Heavenly Captive answered not a word.
Eternal Truth! beyond our hopes and fears Sweep the vast orbits of thy myriad spheres! From age to age, while History carves sublime On her waste rock the flaming curves of time, How the wild swayings of our planet show That worlds unseen surround the world we know.
THE OLD PLAYER THE curtain rose; in thunders long and loud The galleries rung; the veteran actor bowed.
In flaming line the telltales of the stage Showed on his brow the autograph of age; Pale, hueless waves amid his clustered hair, And umbered shadows, prints of toil and care; Round the wide circle glanced his vacant eye,-- He strove to speak,--his voice was but a sigh.
Year after year had seen its short-lived race Flit past the scenes and others take their place; Yet the old prompter watched his accents still, His name still flaunted on the evening's bill.
Heroes, the monarchs of the scenic floor, Had died in earnest and were heard no more; Beauties, whose cheeks such roseate bloom o'er-spread They faced the footlights in unborrowed red, Had faded slowly through successive shades To gray duennas, foils of younger maids; Sweet voices lost the melting tones that start With Southern throbs the sturdy Saxon heart, While fresh sopranos shook the painted sky With their long, breathless, quivering locust-cry.
Yet there he stood,--the man of other days, In the clear present's full, unsparing blaze, As on the oak a faded leaf that clings While a new April spreads its burnished wings.
How bright yon rows that soared in triple tier, Their central sun the flashing chandelier! How dim the eye that sought with doubtful aim Some friendly smile it still might dare to claim How fresh these hearts! his own how worn and cold! Such the sad thoughts that long-drawn sigh had told.
No word yet faltered on his trembling tongue; Again, again, the crashing galleries rung.
As the old guardsman at the bugle's blast Hears in its strain the echoes of the past, So, as the plaudits rolled and thundered round, A life of memories startled at the sound.
He lived again,--the page of earliest days,-- Days of small fee and parsimonious praise; Then lithe young Romeo--hark that silvered tone, From those smooth lips--alas! they were his own.
Then the bronzed Moor, with all his love and woe, Told his strange tale of midnight melting snow; And dark--plumed Hamlet, with his cloak and blade, Looked on the royal ghost, himself a shade.
All in one flash, his youthful memories came, Traced in bright hues of evanescent flame, As the spent swimmer's in the lifelong dream, While the last bubble rises through the stream.
Call him not old, whose visionary brain Holds o'er the past its undivided reign.
For him in vain the envious seasons roll Who bears eternal summer in his soul.
If yet the minstrel's song, the poet's lay, Spring with her birds, or children at their play, Or maiden's smile, or heavenly dream of art, Stir the few life-drops creeping round his heart, Turn to the record where his years are told,-- Count his gray hairs,--they cannot make him old! What magic power has changed the faded mime?
One breath of memory on the dust of time.
As the last window in the buttressed wall Of some gray minster tottering to its fall, Though to the passing crowd its hues are spread, A dull mosaic, yellow, green, and red, Viewed from within, a radiant glory shows When through its pictured screen the sunlight flows, And kneeling pilgrims on its storied pane See angels glow in every shapeless stain; So streamed the vision through his sunken eye, Clad in the splendors of his morning sky.
All the wild hopes his eager boyhood knew, All the young fancies riper years proved true, The sweet, low-whispered words, the winning glance From queens of song, from Houris of the dance, Wealth's lavish gift, and Flattery's soothing phrase, And Beauty's silence when her blush was praise, And melting Pride, her lashes wet with tears, Triumphs and banquets, wreaths and crowns and cheers, Pangs of wild joy that perish on the tongue, And all that poets dream, but leave unsung! In every heart some viewless founts are fed From far-off hillsides where the dews were shed; On the worn features of the weariest face Some youthful memory leaves its hidden trace, As in old gardens left by exiled kings The marble basins tell of hidden springs, But, gray with dust, and overgrown with weeds, Their choking jets the passer little heeds, Till time's revenges break their seals away, And, clad in rainbow light, the waters play.
Good night, fond dreamer! let the curtain fall The world's a stage, and we are players all.
A strange rehearsal! Kings without their crowns, And threadbare lords, and jewel-wearing clowns, Speak the vain words that mock their throbbing hearts, As Want, stern prompter! spells them out their parts.
The tinselled hero whom we praise and pay Is twice an actor in a twofold play.
We smile at children when a painted screen Seems to their simple eyes a real scene; Ask the poor hireling, who has left his throne To seek the cheerless home he calls his own, Which of his double lives most real seems, The world of solid fact or scenic dreams?
Canvas, or clouds,--the footlights, or the spheres,-- The play of two short hours, or seventy years?
Dream on! Though Heaven may woo our open eyes, Through their closed lids we look on fairer skies; Truth is for other worlds, and hope for this; The cheating future lends the present's bliss; Life is a running shade, with fettered hands, That chases phantoms over shifting sands; Death a still spectre on a marble seat, With ever clutching palms and shackled feet; The airy shapes that mock life's slender chain, The flying joys he strives to clasp in vain, Death only grasps; to live is to pursue,-- Dream on! there 's nothing but illusion true! A POEM DEDICATION OF THE PITTSFIELD CEMETERY, SEPTEMBER 9,1850 ANGEL of Death! extend thy silent reign! Stretch thy dark sceptre o'er this new domain No sable car along the winding road Has borne to earth its unresisting load; No sudden mound has risen yet to show Where the pale slumberer folds his arms below; No marble gleams to bid his memory live In the brief lines that hurrying Time can give; Yet, O Destroyer! from thy shrouded throne Look on our gift; this realm is all thine own! Fair is the scene; its sweetness oft beguiled From their dim paths the children of the wild; The dark-haired maiden loved its grassy dells, The feathered warrior claimed its wooded swells, Still on its slopes the ploughman's ridges show The pointed flints that left his fatal bow, Chipped with rough art and slow barbarian toil,-- Last of his wrecks that strews the alien soil! Here spread the fields that heaped their ripened store Till the brown arms of Labor held no more; The scythe's broad meadow with its dusky blush; The sickle's harvest with its velvet flush; The green-haired maize, her silken tresses laid, In soft luxuriance, on her harsh brocade; The gourd that swells beneath her tossing plume; The coarser wheat that rolls in lakes of bloom,-- Its coral stems and milk-white flowers alive With the wide murmurs of the scattered hive; Here glowed the apple with the pencilled streak Of morning painted on its southern cheek; The pear's long necklace strung with golden drops, Arched, like the banian, o'er its pillared props; Here crept the growths that paid the laborer's care With the cheap luxuries wealth consents to spare; Here sprang the healing herbs which could not save The hand that reared them from the neighboring grave.
Yet all its varied charms, forever free From task and tribute, Labor yields to thee No more, when April sheds her fitful rain, The sower's hand shall cast its flying grain; No more, when Autumn strews the flaming leaves, The reaper's band shall gird its yellow sheaves; For thee alike the circling seasons flow Till the first blossoms heave the latest snow.
In the stiff clod below the whirling drifts, In the loose soil the springing herbage lifts, In the hot dust beneath the parching weeds, Life's withering flower shall drop its shrivelled seeds; Its germ entranced in thy unbreathing sleep Till what thou sowest mightier angels reap! Spirit of Beauty! let thy graces blend With loveliest Nature all that Art can lend.
Come from the bowers where Summer's life-blood flows Through the red lips of June's half-open rose, Dressed in bright hues, the loving sunshine's dower; For tranquil Nature owns no mourning flower.
Come from the forest where the beech's screen Bars the fierce moonbeam with its flakes of green; Stay the rude axe that bares the shadowy plains, Stanch the deep wound That dries the maple's veins.
Come with the stream whose silver-braided rills Fling their unclasping bracelets from the hills, Till in one gleam, beneath the forest's wings, Melts the white glitter of a hundred springs.
Come from the steeps where look majestic forth From their twin thrones the Giants of the North On the huge shapes, that, crouching at their knees, Stretch their broad shoulders, rough with shaggy trees.
Through the wide waste of ether, not in vain, Their softened gaze shall reach our distant plain; There, while the mourner turns his aching eyes On the blue mounds that print the bluer skies, Nature shall whisper that the fading view Of mightiest grief may wear a heavenly hue.
Cherub of Wisdom! let thy marble page Leave its sad lesson, new to every age; Teach us to live, not grudging every breath To the chill winds that waft us on to death, But ruling calmly every pulse it warms, And tempering gently every word it forms.
Seraph of Love! in heaven's adoring zone, Nearest of all around the central throne, While with soft hands the pillowed turf we spread That soon shall hold us in its dreamless bed, With the low whisper,--Who shall first be laid In the dark chamber's yet unbroken shade ?-- Let thy sweet radiance shine rekindled here, And all we cherish grow more truly dear.
Here in the gates of Death's o'erhanging vault, Oh, teach us kindness for our brother's fault Lay all our wrongs beneath this peaceful sod, And lead our hearts to Mercy and its God.
FATHER of all! in Death's relentless claim We read thy mercy by its sterner name; In the bright flower that decks the solemn bier, We see thy glory in its narrowed sphere; In the deep lessons that affliction draws, We trace the curves of thy encircling laws; In the long sigh that sets our spirits free, We own the love that calls us back to Thee! Through the hushed street, along the silent plain, The spectral future leads its mourning train, Dark with the shadows of uncounted bands, Where man's white lips and woman's wringing hands Track the still burden, rolling slow before, That love and kindness can protect no more; The smiling babe that, called to mortal strife, Shuts its meek eyes and drops its little life; The drooping child who prays in vain to live, And pleads for help its parent cannot give; The pride of beauty stricken in its flower; The strength of manhood broken in an hour; Age in its weakness, bowed by toil and care, Traced in sad lines beneath its silvered hair.
The sun shall set, and heaven's resplendent spheres Gild the smooth turf unhallowed yet by tears, But ah! how soon the evening stars will shed Their sleepless light around the slumbering dead! Take them, O Father, in immortal trust! Ashes to ashes, dust to kindred dust, Till the last angel rolls the stone away, And a new morning brings eternal day! TO GOVERNOR SWAIN DEAR GOVERNOR, if my skiff might brave The winds that lift the ocean wave, The mountain stream that loops and swerves Through my broad meadow's channelled curves Should waft me on from bound to bound To where the River weds the Sound, The Sound should give me to the Sea, That to the Bay, the Bay to thee.
It may not be; too long the track To follow down or struggle back.
The sun has set on fair Naushon Long ere my western blaze is gone; The ocean disk is rolling dark In shadows round your swinging bark, While yet the yellow sunset fills The stream that scarfs my spruce-clad hills; The day-star wakes your island deer Long ere my barnyard chanticleer; Your mists are soaring in the blue While mine are sparks of glittering dew.
It may not be; oh, would it might, Could I live o'er that glowing night! What golden hours would come to life, What goodly feats of peaceful strife,-- Such jests, that, drained of every joke, The very bank of language broke,-- Such deeds, that Laughter nearly died With stitches in his belted side; While Time, caught fast in pleasure's chain, His double goblet snapped in twain, And stood with half in either hand,-- Both brimming full,--but not of sand! It may not be; I strive in vain To break my slender household chain,-- Three pairs of little clasping hands, One voice, that whispers, not commands.
Even while my spirit flies away, My gentle jailers murmur nay; All shapes of elemental wrath They raise along my threatened path; The storm grows black, the waters rise, The mountains mingle with the skies, The mad tornado scoops the ground, The midnight robber prowls around,-- Thus, kissing every limb they tie, They draw a knot and heave a sigh, Till, fairly netted in the toil, My feet are rooted to the soil.
Only the soaring wish is free!-- And that, dear Governor, flies to thee! PITTSFIELD, 1851.
TO AN ENGLISH FRIEND THE seed that wasteful autumn cast To waver on its stormy blast, Long o'er the wintry desert tost, Its living germ has never lost.
Dropped by the weary tempest's wing, It feels the kindling ray of spring, And, starting from its dream of death, Pours on the air its perfumed breath.
So, parted by the rolling flood, The love that springs from common blood Needs but a single sunlit hour Of mingling smiles to bud and flower; Unharmed its slumbering life has flown, From shore to shore, from zone to zone, Where summer's falling roses stain The tepid waves of Pontchartrain, Or where the lichen creeps below Katahdin's wreaths of whirling snow.
Though fiery sun and stiffening cold May change the fair ancestral mould, No winter chills, no summer drains The life-blood drawn from English veins, Still bearing wheresoe'er it flows The love that with its fountain rose, Unchanged by space, unwronged by time, From age to age, from clime to clime! 1852.
AFTER A LECTURE ON WORDSWORTH COME, spread your wings, as I spread mine, And leave the crowded hall For where the eyes of twilight shine O'er evening's western wall.
These are the pleasant Berkshire hills, Each with its leafy crown; Hark! from their sides a thousand rills Come singing sweetly down.
A thousand rills; they leap and shine, Strained through the shadowy nooks, Till, clasped in many a gathering twine, They swell a hundred brooks.
A hundred brooks, and still they run With ripple, shade, and gleam, Till, clustering all their braids in one, They flow a single stream.
A bracelet spun from mountain mist, A silvery sash unwound, With ox-bow curve and sinuous twist It writhes to reach the Sound.
This is my bark,--a pygmy's ship; Beneath a child it rolls; Fear not,--one body makes it dip, But not a thousand souls.
Float we the grassy banks between; Without an oar we glide; The meadows, drest in living green, Unroll on either side.
Come, take the book we love so well, And let us read and dream We see whate'er its pages tell, And sail an English stream.
Up to the clouds the lark has sprung, Still trilling as he flies; The linnet sings as there he sung; The unseen cuckoo cries, And daisies strew the banks along, And yellow kingcups shine, With cowslips, and a primrose throng, And humble celandine.
Ah foolish dream! when Nature nursed Her daughter in the West, The fount was drained that opened first; She bared her other breast.
On the young planet's orient shore Her morning hand she tried; Then turned the broad medallion o'er And stamped the sunset side.
Take what she gives, her pine's tall stem, Her elm with hanging spray; She wears her mountain diadem Still in her own proud way.
Look on the forests' ancient kings, The hemlock's towering pride Yon trunk had thrice a hundred rings, And fell before it died.
Nor think that Nature saves her bloom And slights our grassy plain; For us she wears her court costume,-- Look on its broidered train; The lily with the sprinkled dots, Brands of the noontide beam; The cardinal, and the blood-red spots, Its double in the stream, As if some wounded eagle's breast, Slow throbbing o'er the plain, Had left its airy path impressed In drops of scarlet rain.
And hark! and hark! the woodland rings; There thrilled the thrush's soul; And look! that flash of flamy wings,-- The fire-plumed oriole! Above, the hen-hawk swims and swoops, Flung from the bright, blue sky; Below, the robin hops, and whoops His piercing, Indian cry.
Beauty runs virgin in the woods Robed in her rustic green, And oft a longing thought intrudes, As if we might have seen.
Her every finger's every joint Ringed with some golden line, Poet whom Nature did anoint Had our wild home been thine.
Yet think not so; Old England's blood Runs warm in English veins; But wafted o'er the icy flood Its better life remains.
Our children know each wildwood smell, The bayberry and the fern, The man who does not know them well Is all too old to learn.
Be patient! On the breathing page Still pants our hurried past; Pilgrim and soldier, saint and sage, The poet comes the last! Though still the lark-voiced matins ring The world has known so long; The wood-thrush of the West shall sing Earth's last sweet even-song! AFTER A LECTURE ON MOORE SHINE soft, ye trembling tears of light That strew the mourning skies; Hushed in the silent dews of night The harp of Erin lies.
What though her thousand years have past Of poets, saints, and kings,-- Her echoes only hear the last That swept those golden strings.
Fling o'er his mound, ye star-lit bowers, The balmiest wreaths ye wear, Whose breath has lent your earth-born flowers Heaven's own ambrosial air.
Breathe, bird of night, thy softest tone, By shadowy grove and rill; Thy song will soothe us while we own That his was sweeter still.
Stay, pitying Time, thy foot for him Who gave thee swifter wings, Nor let thine envious shadow dim The light his glory flings.
If in his cheek unholy blood Burned for one youthful hour, 'T was but the flushing of the bud That blooms a milk-white flower.
Take him, kind mother, to thy breast, Who loved thy smiles so well, And spread thy mantle o'er his rest Of rose and asphodel.
The bark has sailed the midnight sea, The sea without a shore, That waved its parting sign to thee,-- "A health to thee, Tom Moore!" And thine, long lingering on the strand, Its bright-hued streamers furled, Was loosed by age, with trembling hand, To seek the silent world.
Not silent! no, the radiant stars Still singing as they shine, Unheard through earth's imprisoning bars, Have voices sweet as thine.
Wake, then, in happier realms above, The songs of bygone years, Till angels learn those airs of love That ravished mortal ears! AFTER A LECTURE ON KEATS "Purpureos spargam flores." THE wreath that star-crowned Shelley gave Is lying on thy Roman grave, Yet on its turf young April sets Her store of slender violets; Though all the Gods their garlands shower, I too may bring one purple flower.
Alas! what blossom shall I bring, That opens in my Northern spring?
The garden beds have all run wild, So trim when I was yet a child; Flat plantains and unseemly stalks Have crept across the gravel walks; The vines are dead, long, long ago, The almond buds no longer blow.
No more upon its mound I see The azure, plume-bound fleur-de-lis; Where once the tulips used to show, In straggling tufts the pansies grow; The grass has quenched my white-rayed gem, The flowering "Star of Bethlehem," Though its long blade of glossy green And pallid stripe may still be seen.
Nature, who treads her nobles down, And gives their birthright to the clown, Has sown her base-born weedy things Above the garden's queens and kings.
Yet one sweet flower of ancient race Springs in the old familiar place.
When snows were melting down the vale, And Earth unlaced her icy mail, And March his stormy trumpet blew, And tender green came peeping through, I loved the earliest one to seek That broke the soil with emerald beak, And watch the trembling bells so blue Spread on the column as it grew.
Meek child of earth! thou wilt not shame The sweet, dead poet's holy name; The God of music gave thee birth, Called from the crimson-spotted earth, Where, sobbing his young life away, His own fair Hyacinthus lay.
The hyacinth my garden gave Shall lie upon that Roman grave! AFTER A LECTURE ON SHELLEY ONE broad, white sail in Spezzia's treacherous bay On comes the blast; too daring bark, beware I The cloud has clasped her; to! it melts away; The wide, waste waters, but no sail is there.
Morning: a woman looking on the sea; Midnight: with lamps the long veranda burns; Come, wandering sail, they watch, they burn for thee! Suns come and go, alas! no bark returns.
And feet are thronging on the pebbly sands, And torches flaring in the weedy caves, Where'er the waters lay with icy hands The shapes uplifted from their coral graves.
Vainly they seek; the idle quest is o'er; The coarse, dark women, with their hanging locks, And lean, wild children gather from the shore To the black hovels bedded in the rocks.
But Love still prayed, with agonizing wail, "One, one last look, ye heaving waters, yield!" Till Ocean, clashing in his jointed mail, Raised the pale burden on his level shield.
Slow from the shore the sullen waves retire; His form a nobler element shall claim; Nature baptized him in ethereal fire, And Death shall crown him with a wreath of flame.
Fade, mortal semblance, never to return; Swift is the change within thy crimson shroud; Seal the white ashes in the peaceful urn; All else has risen in yon silvery cloud.
Sleep where thy gentle Adonais lies, Whose open page lay on thy dying heart, Both in the smile of those blue-vaulted skies, Earth's fairest dome of all divinest art.
Breathe for his wandering soul one passing sigh, O happier Christian, while thine eye grows dim,-- In all the mansions of the house on high, Say not that Mercy has not one for him! AT THE CLOSE OF A COURSE OF LECTURES As the voice of the watch to the mariner's dream, As the footstep of Spring on the ice-girdled stream, There comes a soft footstep, a whisper, to me,-- The vision is over,--the rivulet free.
We have trod from the threshold of turbulent March, Till the green scarf of April is hung on the larch, And down the bright hillside that welcomes the day, We hear the warm panting of beautiful May.
We will part before Summer has opened her wing, And the bosom of June swells the bodice of Spring, While the hope of the season lies fresh in the bud, And the young life of Nature runs warm in our blood.
It is but a word, and the chain is unbound, The bracelet of steel drops unclasped to the ground; No hand shall replace it,--it rests where it fell,--- It is but one word that we all know too well.
Yet the hawk with the wildness untamed in his eye, If you free him, stares round ere he springs to the sky; The slave whom no longer his fetters restrain Will turn for a moment and look at his chain.
Our parting is not as the friendship of years, That chokes with the blessing it speaks through its tears; We have walked in a garden, and, looking around, Have plucked a few leaves from the myrtles we found.
But now at the gate of the garden we stand, And the moment has come for unclasping the hand; Will you drop it like lead, and in silence retreat Like the twenty crushed forms from an omnibus seat?
Nay! hold it one moment,--the last we may share,-- I stretch it in kindness, and not for my fare; You may pass through the doorway in rank or in file, If your ticket from Nature is stamped with a smile.
For the sweetest of smiles is the smile as we part, When the light round the lips is a ray from the heart; And lest a stray tear from its fountain might swell, We will seal the bright spring with a quiet farewell.
THE HUDSON AFTER A LECTURE AT ALBANY 'T WAS a vision of childhood that came with its dawn, Ere the curtain that covered life's day-star was drawn; The nurse told the tale when the shadows grew long, And the mother's soft lullaby breathed it in song.
"There flows a fair stream by the hills of the West,"-- She sang to her boy as he lay on her breast; "Along its smooth margin thy fathers have played; Beside its deep waters their ashes are laid." I wandered afar from the land of my birth, I saw the old rivers, renowned upon earth, But fancy still painted that wide-flowing stream With the many-hued pencil of infancy's dream.
I saw the green banks of the castle-crowned Rhine, Where the grapes drink the moonlight and change it to wine; I stood by the Avon, whose waves as they glide Still whisper his glory who sleeps at their side.
But my heart would still yearn for the sound of the waves That sing as they flow by my forefathers' graves; If manhood yet honors my cheek with a tear, I care not who sees it,--no blush for it here! Farewell to the deep-bosomed stream of the West! I fling this loose blossom to float on its breast; Nor let the dear love of its children grow cold, Till the channel is dry where its waters have rolled! December, 1854.
THE NEW EDEN MEETING OF THE BERKSHIRE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY, AT STOCKBRIDGE, SEPTEMBER 13,1854 SCARCE could the parting ocean close, Seamed by the Mayflower's cleaving bow, When o'er the rugged desert rose The waves that tracked the Pilgrim's plough.
Then sprang from many a rock-strewn field The rippling grass, the nodding grain, Such growths as English meadows yield To scanty sun and frequent rain.
But when the fiery days were done, And Autumn brought his purple haze, Then, kindling in the slanted sun, The hillsides gleamed with golden maize.
The food was scant, the fruits were few A red-streak glistening here and there; Perchance in statelier precincts grew Some stern old Puritanic pear.
Austere in taste, and tough at core, Its unrelenting bulk was shed, To ripen in the Pilgrim's store When all the summer sweets were fled.
Such was his lot, to front the storm With iron heart and marble brow, Nor ripen till his earthly form Was cast from life's autumnal bough.
But ever on the bleakest rock We bid the brightest beacon glow, And still upon the thorniest stock The sweetest roses love to blow.
So on our rude and wintry soil We feed the kindling flame of art, And steal the tropic's blushing spoil To bloom on Nature's ice-clad heart.
See how the softening Mother's breast Warms to her children's patient wiles, Her lips by loving Labor pressed Break in a thousand dimpling smiles, From when the flushing bud of June Dawns with its first auroral hue, Till shines the rounded harvest-moon, And velvet dahlias drink the dew.
Nor these the only gifts she brings; Look where the laboring orchard groans, And yields its beryl-threaded strings For chestnut burs and hemlock cones.
Dear though the shadowy maple be, And dearer still the whispering pine, Dearest yon russet-laden tree Browned by the heavy rubbing kine! There childhood flung its rustling stone, There venturous boyhood learned to climb,-- How well the early graft was known Whose fruit was ripe ere harvest-time! Nor be the Fleming's pride forgot, With swinging drops and drooping bells, Freckled and splashed with streak and spot, On the warm-breasted, sloping swells; Nor Persia's painted garden-queen,-- Frail Houri of the trellised wall,-- Her deep-cleft bosom scarfed with green,-- Fairest to see, and first to fall.
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