Miscellaneous Poems. ODE TO SUPERSTITION. I. 1. When, with a frown that froze the peopled earth, Ha! what withering phantoms glare! As blows the blast with many a sudden swell, 3 And, through the mist, reveals the terrors of his form. I. 3. O'er solid seas, where Winter reigns, Smit by the scorchings of the noontide beam. She hurls the torch! she fans the fire! She clasps her lord to part no more, Written in early youth. The sacrifice of Iphigenia. Lucretius, I, 63. 4 The funeral rite of the Hindoos. The Fates of the Northern Mythology. See Mallet's Antiquities. While the lone shepherd, near the shipless main, ' Sees o'er her hills advance the long-drawn funeral train. II. 1. Thou spakest, and lo! a new creation glow'd. Grasp'd the globe with iron hand. And braves the efforts of a host of years. Sweet Music breathes her soul into the wind; And bright-eyed Painting stamps the image of the mind. II. 2. Round their rude ark old Egypt's sorcerers rise! But ah! what myriads claim the bended knee? 5 Charm'd with perennial sweets, and smiling at decay? II. 3. 8 On yon hoar summit, mildly bright Silver notes ascend the skies: An allusion to the Second Sight. The Sibyl speaks, the dream is o'er, Breathing a prophetic flame. The cavern frowns; its hundred mouths unclose! And in the thunder's voice, the fate of empire flows! III. 1. Mona, thy Druid-rites awake the dead! Rites thy brown oaks would never dare Rites that have chain'd old Ocean on his bed. Thy magic bids the imperial eagle fly, ' Hark, the bard's soul inspires the vocal string! At every pause dread Silence hovers o'er : While murky Night sails round on raven-wing, Deepening the tempest's howl, the torrent's roar; Chased by the Morn from Snowdon's awful brow, Where late she sate and scowl'd on the black wave below. III. 2. gorgeous Lo, steel-clad War his Veiling from the eye of day, In cloister'd solitude she sits and sighs, While from each shrine still, small responses rise. Hear, with what heart-felt beat, the midnight bell Swings its slow summons through the hollow pile! The weak, wan votarist leaves her twilight-cell, To walk, with taper dim, the winding isle; With choral chantings vainly to aspire, Beyond this nether sphere, on Rapture's wing of fire. III. 3. Lord of each pang the nerves can feel, Hence with the rack and reeking wheel. Faith lifts the soul above this little ball! While gleams of glory open round, And circling choirs of angels call, Canst thou, with all thy terrors crown'd, Hope to obscure that latent spark, Destined to shine when suns are dark? Thy triumphs cease! through every land, Hark! Truth proclaims, thy triumphs cease! Her heavenly form, with glowing hand, Benignly points to piety and peace. Flush'd with youth her looks impart Each fine feeling as it flows; Her voice the echo of a heart Pure as the mountain-snows: She smiles! and where is now the cloud 1 See Tacitus, 1. xiv, c. 29. * This remarkable event happened at the siege and sack of Jerusalem in the last year of the eleventh century. Matth. Paris, p. 34. Her touch unlocks the day-spring from above, And lo! it visits man with beams of light and love. VERSES WRITTEN TO BE SPOKEN BY MRS SIDDONS. ' YES, 't is the pulse of life! my fears were vain; -To drop all metaphor, that little bell Is here no other actress? let me ask. First, how her little breast with triumph swells, A school-girl next, she curls her hair in papers, And mimic's father's gout, and mother's vapours; Discards her doll, bribes Betty for romances; Playful at church, and serious when she dances; Tramples alike on customs and on toes, And whispers all she hears to all she knows; Terror of caps, and wigs, and sober notions! A romp! that longest of perpetual motions! -Till tamed and tortured into foreign graces, She sports her lovely face at public places; And with blue, laughing eyes, behind her fan, First acts her part with that great actor, MAN. Too soon a flirt, approach her and she flies! Frowns when pursued, and, when entreated, sighs! Plays with unhappy men as cats with mice; Till fading beauty hints the late advice. Her prudence dictates what her pride disdain'd, And now she sues to slaves herself had chain'd! Then comes that good old character, a Wife, With all the dear distracting cares of life; A thousand cards a day at doors to leave, And, in return, a thousand cards receive; Rouge high, play deep, to lead the ton aspire, With nightly blaze set Portland-place on fire; Snatch half a glimpse at Concert, Opera, Ball, A meteor, traced by none, though seen by all; After a Tragedy, performed for her benefit, at the Theatre Royal in Drury-lane, April 27, 1795. And, when her shatter'd nerves forbid to roam, Last the grey Dowager, in ancient flounces, FROM EURIPIDES. THERE is a streamlet issuing from a rock. At once spoke joy and sadness to my soul! Dear is that valley to the murmuring bees; Oft have I heard a child, gay among flowers, CAPTIVITY. CAGED in old woods, whose reverend echoes wake THE SAILOR. THE Sailor sighs as sinks his native shore, Ah! now, each dear, domestic scene he knew, Recall'd and cherish'd in a foreign clime, Charms with the magic of a moonlight view; Its colours mellow'd, not impair'd, by time. True as the needle, homeward points his heart, Through all the horrors of the stormy main ; This, the last wish that would with life depart, To see the smile of her he loves again. When Morn first faintly draws her silver line, Or Eve's grey cloud descends to drink the wave; When sea and sky in midnight-darkness join, Still, still he views the parting look she gave. Her gentle spirit, lightly hovering o'er, Carved is her name in many a spicy grove, But lo, at last he comes with crowded sail! WELL may you sit within, and, fond of grief, Changed is that lovely countenance, which shed Those lips so pure, that moved but to persuade, On the death of a younger sister. ON A TEAR. On! that the Chemist's magic art Could crystallize this sacred treasure! Long should it glitter near my heart, A secret source of pensive pleasure. The little brilliant, ere it fell, Sweet drop of pure and pearly light! Benign restorer of the soul! The sage's and the poet's theme, Thou charm'st in Fancy's idle dream, That very law which moulds a tear, And bids it trickle from its source, That law preserves the earth a sphere, And guides the planets in their course. TO A VOICE THAT HAD BEEN LOST. 2 Vane, quid affectas faciem mihi ponere, pictor? Aeris et linguæ sum filia; Et, si vis similem pingere, pinge sonum. ONCE more, Enchantress of the soul, The law of gravitation. In the winter of 1805. Arrested in the realms of Frost, Far happier thou! 't was thine to soar, Yet round her couch indulgent Fancy drew And now to thee she comes; still, still the same As in the hours gone unregarded by! To thee, how changed! comes as she ever came, Health on her cheek, and pleasure in her eye! Nor less, less oft, as on that day, appears, When lingering, as prophetic of the truth, By the way-side she shed her parting tearsFor ever lovely in the light of Youth! from Heaven! FROM A GREEK EPIGRAM. WHILE on the cliff with calm delight she kneels, Far better taught, she lays her bosom bare, And the fond boy springs back to nestle there. TO THE FRAGMENT OF A STATUE OF COMMONLY CALLED THE TORSO. AND dost thou still, thou mass of breathing stone What though the Spirits of the North, that swept An! little thought she, when, with wild delight, By many a torrent's shining track she flew, When mountain-glens and caverns full of night O'er her young mind divine enchantment threw, That in her veins a secret horror slept, That her light footsteps should be heard no more, That she should die-nor watch'd, alas, nor wept By thee, unconscious of the pangs she bore. 1 Mrs Sheridan's. In the gardens of the Vatican, where it was placed by Julius II, it was long the favourite study of those great men to whom we owe the revival of the arts, Michael Angelo, Raphael, and the Carracci. Once in the possession of Praxiteles, if we may believe an ancient epigram on the Gnidian Venus. — Analecta Vet. Poetarum, III. 200. 4 On the death of her sister. WRITTEN IN A SICK CHAMBER. THERE, in that bed so closely curtain'd round, Worn to a shade, and wan with slow decay, A father sleeps! Oh hush'd be every sound! Soft may we breathe the midnight hours away! He stirs yet still he sleeps. May heavenly dreams Long o'er his smooth and settled pillow rise; Till through the shutter'd pane the morning streams, And on the hearth the glimmering rush-light dies. THE BOY OF EGREMOND. ' SAY, what remains when Hope is fled?» She answer'd, Endless weeping!» For in the herdsman's eye she read Who in his shroud lay sleeping. At Embsay rung the matin-bell, The Boy of Egremond was seen. There now the matin-bell is rung; In the twelfth century William Fitz-Duncan laid waste the vallies of Craven with fire and sword; and was afterwards established there by his uncle, David King of Scotland. He was the last of the race; his son, commonly called the Boy of Egremond, dying before him in the manner here related; when a Priory was removed from Embsay to Bolton, that it might be as near as possible to the place where the accident happened. That place is still known by the name of the Strid; and the mother's answer, as given in the first stanza, is to this day often repeated in Wharfedale. -See Whitaker's Hist. of Craven. |