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POEMS COMPOSED OR SUGGESTED DURING A TOUR IN THE SUMMER OF 1833 (45) - ZaunköniG - 30.09.2007 POEMS COMPOSED OR SUGGESTED DURING A TOUR IN THE SUMMER OF 1833 I ADIEU, Rydalian Laurels! that have grown And spread as if ye knew that days might come When ye would shelter in a happy home, On this fair Mount, a Poet of your own, One who ne'er ventured for a Delphic crown To sue the God; but, haunting your green shade All seasons through, is humbly pleased to braid Ground-flowers, beneath your guardianship, self-sown. Farewell! no Minstrels now with harp new-strung For summer wandering quit their household bowers; Yet not for this wants Poesy a tongue To cheer the Itinerant on whom she pours Her spirit, while he crosses lonely moors, Or musing sits forsaken halls among. II WHY should the Enthusiast, journeying through this Isle Repine as if his hour were come too late? Not unprotected in her mouldering state, Antiquity salutes him with a smile, 'Mid fruitful fields that ring with jocund toil, And pleasure-grounds where Taste, refined Co-mate Of Truth and Beauty, strives to imitate, Far as she may, primeval Nature's style. Fair land! by Time's parental love made free, By Social Order's watchful arms embraced; With unexampled union meet in thee, For eye and mind, the present and the past; With golden prospect for futurity, If that be reverenced which ought to last. III THEY called Thee MERRY ENGLAND, in old time; A happy people won for thee that name With envy heard in many a distant clime; And, spite of change, for me thou keep'st the same Endearing title, a responsive chime To the heart's fond belief; though some there are Whose sterner judgments deem that word a snare For inattentive Fancy, like the lime Which foolish birds are caught with. Can, I ask, This face of rural beauty be a mask For discontent, and poverty, and crime; These spreading towns a cloak for lawless will? Forbid it, Heaven!--and MERRY ENGLAND still Shall be thy rightful name, in prose and rhyme! IV TO THE RIVER GRETA, NEAR KESWICK GRETA, what fearful listening! when huge stones Rumble along thy bed, block after block: Or, whirling with reiterated shock, Combat, while darkness aggravates the groans: But if thou (like Cocytus from the moans Heard on his rueful margin) thence wert named The Mourner, thy true nature was defamed, And the habitual murmur that atones For thy worst rage, forgotten. Oft as Spring Decks, on thy sinuous banks, her thousand thrones Seats of glad instinct and love's carolling, The concert, for the happy, then may vie With liveliest peals of birth-day harmony: To a grieved heart, the notes are benisons. V. TO THE RIVER DERWENT AMONG the mountains were we nursed, loved Stream Thou near the eagle's nest--within brief sail, I, of his bold wing floating on the gale, Where thy deep voice could lull me! Faint the beam Of human life when first allowed to gleam On mortal notice.--Glory of the vale, Such thy meek outset, with a crown, though frail, Kept in perpetual verdure by the steam Of thy soft breath!--Less vivid wreath entwined Nemaean victor's brow; less bright was worn, Meed of some Roman chief--in triumph borne With captives chained; and shedding from his car The sunset splendours of a finished war Upon the proud enslavers of mankind! 1819. VI. IN SIGHT OF THE TOWN OF COCKERMOUTH A POINT of life between my Parent's dust, And yours, my buried Little-ones! am I; And to those graves looking habitually In kindred quiet I repose my trust. Death to the innocent is more than just, And, to the sinner, mercifully bent; So may I hope, if truly I repent And meekly bear the ills which bear I must: And You, my Offspring! that do still remain, Yet may outstrip me in the appointed race, If e'er, through fault of mine, in mutual pain We breathed together for a moment's space, The wrong, by love provoked, let love arraign, And only love keep in your hearts a place. VII. ADDRESS FROM THE SPIRIT OF COCKERMOUTH CASTLE "THOU look'st upon me, and dost fondly think, Poet! that, stricken as both are by years, We, differing once so much, are now Compeers, Prepared, when each has stood his time, to sink Into the dust. Erewhile a sterner link United us; when thou, in boyish play, Entering my dungeon, didst become a prey To soul-appalling darkness. Not a blink Of light was there;--and thus did I, thy Tutor, Make thy young thoughts acquainted with the grave; While thou wert chasing the winged butterfly Through my green courts; or climbing, a bold suitor, Up to the flowers whose golden progeny Still round my shattered brow in beauty wave." VIII. NUN'S WELL, BRIGHAM THE cattle crowding round this beverage clear To slake their thirst, with reckless hoofs have trod The encircling turf into a barren clod; Through which the waters creep, then disappear, Born to be lost in Derwent flowing near; Yet, o'er the brink, and round the limestone cell Of the pure spring (they call it the "Nun's Well," Name that first struck by chance my startled ear) A tender Spirit broods--the pensive Shade Of ritual honours to this Fountain paid By hooded Votaresses with saintly cheer; Albeit oft the Virgin-mother mild Looked down with pity upon eyes beguiled Into the shedding of "too soft a tear." IX. TO A FRIEND ON THE BANKS OF THE DERWENT PASTOR and Patriot!--at whose bidding rise These modest walls, amid a flock that need, For one who comes to watch them and to feed, A fixed Abode--keep down presageful sighs. Threats, which the unthinking only can despise, Perplex the Church; but be thou firm,--be true To thy first hope, and this good work pursue, Poor as thou art. A welcome sacrifice Dost Thou prepare, whose sign will be the smoke Of thy new hearth; and sooner shall its wreaths, Mounting while earth her morning incense breathes, From wandering fiends of air receive a yoke, And straightway cease to aspire, than God disdain This humble tribute as ill-timed or vain. X. MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS LANDING AT THE MOUTH OF THE DERWENT, WORKINGTON DEAR to the Loves, and to the Graces vowed, The Queen drew back the wimple that she wore; And to the throng, that on the Cumbrian shore Her landing hailed, how touchingly she bowed! And like a Star (that, from a heavy cloud Of pine-tree foliage poised in air, forth darts, When a soft summer gale at evening parts The gloom that did its loveliness enshroud) She smiled; but Time, the old Saturnian seer, Sighed on the wing as her foot pressed the strand, With step prelusive to a long array Of woes and degradations hand in hand-- Weeping captivity, and shuddering fear Stilled by the ensanguined block of Fotheringay! XII. IN THE CHANNEL, BETWEEN THE COAST OF CUMBERLAND AND THE ISLE OF MAN RANGING the heights of Scawfell or Blackcomb, In his lone course the Shepherd oft will pause, And strive to fathom the mysterious laws By which the clouds, arrayed in light or gloom, On Mona settle, and the shapes assume Of all her peaks and ridges. What he draws From sense, faith, reason, fancy, of the cause, He will take with him to the silent tomb. Or, by his fire, a child upon his knee, Haply the untaught Philosopher may speak Of the strange sight, nor hide his theory That satisfies the simple and the meek, Blest in their pious ignorance, though weak To cope with Sages undevoutly free. XIII. AT SEA OFF THE ISLE OF MAN BOLD words affirmed, in days when faith was strong And doubts and scruples seldom teased the brain, That no adventurer's bark had power to gain These shores if he approached them bent on wrong; For, suddenly up-conjured from the Main, Mists rose to hide the Land--that search, though long And eager, might be still pursued in vain. O Fancy, what an age was 'that' for song! That age, when not by 'laws' inanimate, As men believed, the waters were impelled, The air controlled, the stars their courses held; But element and orb on 'acts' did wait Of 'Powers' endued with visible form, instinct With will, and to their work by passion linked. XIV DESIRE we past illusions to recall? To reinstate wild Fancy, would we hide Truths whose thick veil Science has drawn aside? No,--let this Age, high as she may, instal In her esteem the thirst that wrought man's fall, The universe is infinitely wide; And conquering Reason, if self-glorified, Can nowhere move uncrossed by some new wall Or gulf of mystery, which thou alone, Imaginative Faith! canst overleap, In progress toward the fount of Love,--the throne Of Power whose ministers the records keep Of periods fixed, and laws established, less Flesh to exalt than prove its nothingness. XV. ON ENTERING DOUGLAS BAY, ISLE OF MAN "Dignum laude virum Musa vetat mori." THE feudal Keep, the bastions of Cohorn, Even when they rose to check or to repel Tides of aggressive war, oft served as well Greedy ambition, armed to treat with scorn Just limits; but yon Tower, whose smiles adorn This perilous bay, stands clear of all offence; Blest work it is of love and innocence, A Tower of refuge built for the else forlorn. Spare it, ye waves, and lift the mariner, Struggling for life, into its saving arms! Spare, too, the human helpers! Do they stir 'Mid your fierce shock like men afraid to die? No; their dread service nerves the heart it warms, And they are led by noble HILLARY. XVI. BY THE SEASHORE, ISLE OF MAN WHY stand we gazing on the sparkling Brine, With wonder smit by its transparency, And all-enraptured with its purity?-- Because the unstained, the clear, the crystalline, Have ever in them something of benign; Whether in gem, in water, or in sky, A sleeping infant's brow, or wakeful eye Of a young maiden, only not divine. Scarcely the hand forbears to dip its palm For beverage drawn as from a mountain-well; Temptation centres in the liquid Calm; Our daily raiment seems no obstacle To instantaneous plunging in, deep Sea! And revelling in long embrace with thee. XVII. ISLE OF MAN A YOUTH too certain of his power to wade On the smooth bottom of this clear bright sea, To sight so shallow, with a bather's glee Leapt from this rock, and but for timely aid He, by the alluring element betrayed, Had perished. Then might Sea-nymphs (and with sighs Of self-reproach) have chanted elegies Bewailing his sad fate, when he was laid In peaceful earth: for, doubtless, he was frank, Utterly in himself devoid of guile; Knew not the double-dealing of a smile; Nor aught that makes men's promises a blank, Or deadly snare: and He survives to bless The Power that saved him in his strange distress. XVIII. ISLE OF MAN DID pangs of grief for lenient time too keen, Grief that devouring waves had caused, or guilt Which they had witnessed--sway the man who built This Homestead, placed where nothing could be seen, Nought heard, of ocean troubled or serene? A tired Ship-soldier on paternal land, That o'er the channel holds august command, The dwelling raised,--a veteran Marine. He, in disgust, turned from the neighbouring sea To shun the memory of a listless life That hung between two callings. May no strife More hurtful here beset him, doomed though free, Self-doomed, to worse inaction, till his eye Shrink from the daily sight of earth and sky! XIX. BY A RETIRED MARINER, H. H. FROM early youth I ploughed the restless Main, My mind as restless and as apt to change; Through every clime and ocean did I range, In hope at length a competence to gain; For poor to Sea I went, and poor I still remain. Year after year I strove, but strove in vain, And hardships manifold did I endure, For Fortune on me never deigned to smile; Yet I at last a resting-place have found, With just enough life's comforts to procure, In a snug Cove on this our favoured Isle, A peaceful spot where Nature's gifts abound; Then sure I have no reason to complain, Though poor to Sea I went, and poor I still remain. XX. AT BALA-SALA, ISLE OF MAN BROKEN in fortune, but in mind entire And sound in principle, I seek repose Where ancient trees this convent-pile enclose, In ruin beautiful. When vain desire Intrudes on peace, I pray the eternal Sire To cast a soul-subduing shade on me, A grey-haired, pensive, thankful Refugee; A shade--but with some sparks of heavenly fire Once to these cells vouchsafed. And when I note The old Tower's brow yellowed as with the beams Of sunset ever there, albeit streams Of stormy weather-stains that semblance wrought, I thank the silent Monitor, and say "Shine so, my aged brow, at all hours of the day!" XXI. TYNWALD HILL ONCE on the top of Tynwald's formal mound (Still marked with green turf circles narrowing Stage above stage) would sit this Island's King, The laws to promulgate, enrobed and crowned: While, compassing the little mount around, Degrees and Orders stood, each under each: Now, like to things within fate's easiest reach The power is merged, the pomp a grave has found. Off with yon cloud, old Snafell! that thine eye Over three Realms may take its widest range; And let, for them, thy fountains utter strange Voices, thy winds break forth in prophecy, If the whole State must suffer mortal change Like Mona's miniature of sovereignty. XXII DESPOND who will--'I' heard a voice exclaim, "Though fierce the assault, and shattered the defence, It cannot be that Britain's social frame, The glorious work of time and providence, Before a flying season's rash pretence, Should fall; that She, whose virtue put to shame, When Europe prostrate lay, the Conqueror's aim, Should perish, self-subverted. Black and dense The cloud is; but brings 'that' a day of doom. To Liberty? Her sun is up the while, That orb whose beams round Saxon Alfred shone: Then laugh, ye innocent Vales! ye Streams, sweep on, Nor let one billow of our heaven-blest Isle Toss in the fanning wind a humbler plume." XXIII. IN THE FRITH OF CLYDE, AILSA CRAG DURING AN ECLIPSE OF THE SUN, JULY 17 SINCE risen from ocean, ocean to defy, Appeared the crag of Ailsa, ne'er did morn With gleaming lights more gracefully adorn His sides, or wreathe with mist his forehead high: Now, faintly darkening with the sun's eclipse, Still is he seen, in lone sublimity, Towering above the sea and little ships; For dwarfs the tallest seem while sailing by, Each for her haven; with her freight of Care, Pleasure, or Grief, and Toil that seldom looks Into the secret of to-morrow's fare; Though poor, yet rich, without the wealth of books, Or aught that watchful Love to Nature owes For her mute Powers, fixed Forms, or transient Shows. XXIV. ON THE FRITH OF CLYDE IN A STEAMBOAT ARRAN! a single-crested Teneriffe, A St. Helena next--in shape and hue, Varying her crowded peaks and ridges blue; Who but must covet a cloud-seat, or skiff Built for the air, or winged Hippogriff? That he might fly, where no one could pursue, From this dull Monster and her sooty crew; And, as a God, light on thy topmost cliff. Impotent wish! which reason would despise If the mind knew no union of extremes, No natural bond between the boldest schemes, Ambition frames, and heart-humilities. Beneath stern mountains many a soft vale lies, And lofty springs give birth to lowly streams. XXV. ON REVISITING DUNOLLY CASTLE THE captive Bird was gone;--to cliff or moor Perchance had flown, delivered by the storm; Or he had pined, and sunk to feed the worm: Him found we not: but, climbing, a tall tower, There saw, impaved with rude fidelity Of art mosaic, in a roofless floor, An Eagle with stretched wings, but beamless eye-- An Eagle that could neither wail nor soar. Effigy of the Vanished--(shall I dare To call thee so?) or symbol of fierce deeds And of the towering courage which past times Rejoiced in--take, whate'er thou be, a share, Not undeserved, of the memorial rhymes That animate my way where'er it leads! XXVI. THE DUNOLLY EAGLE NOT to the clouds, not to the cliff, he flew; But when a storm, on sea or mountain bred, Came and delivered him, alone he sped Into the castle-dungeon's darkest mew. Now, near his master's house in open view He dwells, and hears indignant tempests howl, Kennelled and chained. Ye tame domestic fowl, Beware of him! Thou, saucy cockatoo, Look to thy plumage and thy life!--The roe, Fleet as the west wind, is for 'him' no quarry; Balanced in ether he will never tarry, Eyeing the sea's blue depths. Poor Bird! even so Doth man of brother man a creature make That clings to slavery for its own sad sake. XXVIII. CAVE OF STAFFA WE saw, but surely, in the motley crowd, Not One of us has felt the far-famed sight; How 'could' we feel it? each the other's blight, Hurried and hurrying, volatile and loud. O for those motions only that invite The Ghost of Fingal to his tuneful Cave By the breeze entered, and wave after wave Softly embosoming the timid light! And by 'one' Votary who at will might stand Gazing and take into his mind and heart, With undistracted reverence, the effect Of those proportions where the almighty hand That made the worlds, the sovereign Architect, Has deigned to work as if with human Art! XXIX. CAVE OF STAFFA AFTER THE CROWD HAD DEPARTED THANKS for the lessons of this Spot--fit school For the presumptuous thoughts that would assign Mechanic laws to agency divine; And, measuring heaven by earth, would overrule Infinite Power. The pillared vestibule, Expanding yet precise, the roof embowed, Might seem designed to humble man, when proud Of his best workmanship by plan and tool. Down-bearing with his whole Atlantic weight Of tide and tempest on the Structure's base, And flashing to that Structure's topmost height, Ocean has proved its strength, and of its grace In calms is conscious, finding for his freight Of softest music some reponsive place. XXX. CAVE OF STAFFA YE shadowy Beings, that have rights and claims In every cell of Fingal's mystic Grot, Where are ye? Driven or venturing to the spot, Our fathers glimpses caught of your thin Frames, And, by your mien and bearing knew your names; And they could hear 'his' ghostly song who trod Earth, till the flesh lay on him like a load, While he struck his desolate harp without hopes or aims. Vanished ye are, but subject to recall; Why keep 'we' else the instincts whose dread law Ruled here of yore, till what men felt they saw, Not by black arts but magic natural! If eyes be still sworn vassals of belief, Yon light shapes forth a Bard, that shade a Chief. XXXI. FLOWERS ON THE TOP OF THE PILLARS AT THE ENTRANCE OF THE CAVE HOPE smiled when your nativity was cast, Children of Summer! Ye fresh Flowers that brave What Summer here escapes not, the fierce wave, And whole artillery of the western blast, Battering the Temple's front, its long-drawn nave Smiting, as if each moment were their last. But ye, bright Flowers on frieze and architrave Survive, and once again the Pile stands fast: Calm as the Universe, from specular towers Of heaven contemplated by Spirits pure With mute astonishment, it stands sustained Through every part in symmetry, to endure, Unhurt, the assault of Time with all his hours, As the supreme Artificer ordained. XXXII. IONA ON to Iona!--What can she afford To 'us' save matter for a thoughtful sigh, Heaved over ruin with stability In urgent contrast? To diffuse the WORD (Thy Paramount, mighty Nature! and Time's Lord) Her Temples rose, 'mid pagan gloom; but why, Even for a moment, has our verse deplored Their wrongs, since they fulfilled their destiny? And when, subjected to a common doom Of mutability, those far-famed Piles Shall disappear from both the sister Isles, Iona's Saints, forgetting not past days, Garlands shall wear of amaranthine bloom, While heaven's vast sea of voices chants their praise. XXXIII. IONA UPON LANDING HOW sad a welcome! To each voyager Some ragged child holds up for sale a store Of wave-worn pebbles, pleading on the shore Where once came monk and nun with gentle stir, Blessings to give, news ask, or suit prefer. Yet is yon neat trim church a grateful speck Of novelty amid the sacred wreck Strewn far and wide. Think, proud Philosopher! Fallen though she be, this Glory of the west, Still on her sons, the beams of mercy shine; And "hopes, perhaps more heavenly bright than thine, A grace by thee unsought and unpossest, A faith more fixed, a rapture more divine, Shall gild their passage to eternal rest." XXXIV. THE BLACK STONES OF IONA HERE on their knees men swore: the stones were black, Black in the people's minds and words, yet they Were at that time, as now, in colour grey. But what is colour, if upon the rack Of conscience souls are placed by deeds that lack Concord with oaths? What differ night and day Then, when before the Perjured on his way Hell opens, and the heavens in vengeance crack Above his head uplifted in vain prayer To Saint, or Fiend, or to the Godhead whom He had insulted--Peasant, King, or Thane? Fly where the culprit may, guilt meets a doom; And, from invisible worlds at need laid bare, Come links for social order's awful chain. XXXV HOMEWARD we turn. Isle of Columba's Cell, Where Christian piety's soul-cheering spark (Kindled from Heaven between the light and dark Of time) shone like the morning-star, farewell!-- And fare thee well, to Fancy visible, Remote St. Kilda, lone and loved sea-mark For many a voyage made in her swift bark, When with more hues than in the rainbow dwell Thou a mysterious intercourse dost hold, Extracting from clear skies and air serene, And out of sun-bright waves, a lucid veil, That thickens, spreads, and, mingling fold with fold, Makes known, when thou no longer canst be seen, Thy whereabout, to warn the approaching sail. XXXVI. GREENOCK Per me si va nella Citta dolente. 'WE' have not passed into a doleful City, We who were led to-day down a grim dell, By some too boldly named "the Jaws of Hell:" Where be the wretched ones, the sights for pity? These crowded streets resound no plaintive ditty:-- As from the hive where bees in summer dwell, Sorrow seems here excluded; and that knell, It neither damps the gay, nor checks the witty. Alas! too busy Rival of old Tyre, Whose merchants Princes were, whose decks were thrones; Soon may the punctual sea in vain respire To serve thy need, in union with that Clyde Whose nursling current brawls o'er mossy stones, The poor, the lonely, herdsman's joy and pride. XXXVII "THERE!" said a Stripling, pointing with meet pride Towards a low roof with green trees half concealed, "Is Mosgiel Farm; and that's the very field Where Burns ploughed up the Daisy." Far and wide A plain below stretched seaward, while, descried Above sea-clouds, the Peaks of Arran rose; And, by that simple notice, the repose Of earth, sky, sea, and air, was vivified. Beneath "the random 'bield' of clod or stone" Myriads of daisies have shone forth in flower Near the lark's nest, and in their natural hour Have passed away; less happy than the One That, by the unwilling ploughshare, died to prove The tender charm of poetry and love. XXXVIII. THE RIVER EDEN, CUMBERLAND EDEN! till now thy beauty had I viewed By glimpses only, and confess with shame That verse of mine, whate'er its varying mood, Repeats but once the sound of thy sweet name: Yet fetched from Paradise that honour came, Rightfully borne; for Nature gives thee flowers That have no rivals among British bowers; And thy bold rocks are worthy of their fame. Measuring thy course, fair Stream! at length I pay To my life's neighbour dues of neighbourhood; But I have traced thee on thy winding way With pleasure sometimes by this thought restrained-- For things far off we toil, while many a good Not sought, because too near, is never gained. XXXIX. MONUMENT OF MRS. HOWARD by Nollekens IN WETHERAL CHURCH, NEAR CORBY, ON THE BANKS OF THE EDEN STRETCHED on the dying Mother's lap, lies dead Her new-born Babe; dire ending of bright hope! But Sculpture here, with the divinest scope Of luminous faith, heavenward hath raised that head So patiently; and through one hand has spread A touch so tender for the insensate Child-- (Earth's lingering love to parting reconciled, Brief parting, for the spirit is all but fled)-- That we, who contemplate the turns of life Through this still medium, are consoled and cheered; Feel with the Mother, think the severed Wife Is less to be lamented than revered; And own that Art, triumphant over strife And pain, hath powers to Eternity endeared. XL. SUGGESTED BY THE FOREGOING TRANQUILLITY! the sovereign aim wert thou In heathen schools of philosophic lore; Heart-stricken by stern destiny of yore The Tragic Muse thee served with thoughtful vow; And what of hope Elysium could allow Was fondly seized by Sculpture, to restore Peace to the Mourner. But when He who wore The crown of thorns around his bleeding brow Warmed our sad being with celestial light, 'Then' Arts which still had drawn a softening grace From shadowy fountains of the Infinite, Communed with that Idea face to face: And move around it now as planets run, Each in its orbit round the central Sun. XLI. NUNNERY THE floods are roused, and will not soon be weary; Down from the Pennine Alps how fiercely sweeps CROGLIN, the stately Eden's tributary! He raves, or through some moody passage creeps Plotting new mischief--out again he leaps Into broad light, and sends, through regions airy, That voice which soothed the Nuns while on the steeps They knelt in prayer, or sang to blissful Mary. That union ceased: then, cleaving easy walks Through crags, and smoothing paths beset with danger, Came studious Taste; and many a pensive stranger Dreams on the banks, and to the river talks. What change shall happen next to Nunnery Dell? Canal, and Viaduct, and Railway, tell! XLII. STEAMBOATS, VIADUCTS, AND RAILWAYS MOTIONS and Means, on land and sea at war With old poetic feeling, not for this, Shall ye, by Poets even, be judged amiss! Nor shall your presence, howsoe'er it mar The loveliness of Nature, prove a bar To the Mind's gaining that prophetic sense Of future change, that point of vision, whence May be discovered what in soul ye are. In spite of all that beauty may disown In your harsh features, Nature doth embrace Her lawful offspring in Man's art; and Time, Pleased with your triumphs o'er his brother Space, Accepts from your bold hands the proffered crown Of hope, and smiles on you with cheer sublime. XLIII. THE MONUMENT COMMONLY CALLED LONG MEG AND HER DAUGHTERS, NEAR THE RIVER EDEN A WEIGHT of awe, not easy to be borne, Fell suddenly upon my Spirit--cast From the dread bosom of the unknown past, When first I saw that family forlorn. Speak Thou, whose massy strength and stature scorn The power of years--pre-eminent, and placed Apart, to overlook the circle vast-- Speak, Giant-mother! tell it to the Morn While she dispels the cumbrous shades of Night; Let the Moon hear, emerging from a cloud; At whose behest uprose on British ground That Sisterhood, in hieroglyphic round Forth-shadowing, some have deemed, the infinite The inviolable God, that tames the proud! 3 XLIV. LOWTHER LOWTHER! in thy majestic Pile are seen Cathedral pomp and grace, in apt accord With the baronial castle's sterner mien; Union significant of God adored, And charters won and guarded by the sword Of ancient honour; whence that goodly state Of polity which wise men venerate, And will maintain, if God his help afford. Hourly the democratic torrent swells; For airy promises and hopes suborned The strength of backward-looking thoughts is scorned. Fall if ye must, ye Towers and Pinnacles, With what ye symbolise; authentic Story Will say, Ye disappeared with England's Glory! XLV. TO THE EARL OF LONSDALE "Magistratus indicat virum" LONSDALE! it were unworthy of a Guest, Whose heart with gratitude to thee inclines, If he should speak, by fancy touched, of signs On thy Abode harmoniously imprest, Yet be unmoved with wishes to attest How in thy mind and moral frame agree Fortitude, and that Christian Charity Which, filling, consecrates the human breast. And if the Motto on thy 'scutcheon teach With truth, "THE MAGISTRACY SHOWS THE MAN;" 'That' searching test thy public course has stood; As will be owned alike by bad and good, Soon as the measuring of life's little span Shall place thy virtues out of Envy's reach. XLVII. TO CORDELIA M---- HALLSTEADS, ULLSWATER NOT in the mines beyond the western main, You say, Cordelia, was the metal sought, Which a fine skill, of Indian growth, has wrought Into this flexible yet faithful Chain; Nor is it silver of romantic Spain But from our loved Helvellyn's depths was brought, Our own domestic mountain. Thing and thought Mix strangely; trifles light, and partly vain, Can prop, as you have learnt, our nobler being: Yes, Lady, while about your neck is wound (Your casual glance oft meeting) this bright cord, What witchery, for pure gifts of inward seeing, Lurks in it, Memory's Helper, Fancy's Lord, For precious tremblings in your bosom found! XLVIII MOST sweet it is with unuplifted eyes To pace the ground, if path be there or none, While a fair region round the traveller lies Which he forbears again to look upon; Pleased rather with some soft ideal scene, The work of Fancy, or some happy tone Of meditation, slipping in between The beauty coming and the beauty gone. If Thought and Love desert us, from that day Let us break off all commerce with the Muse: With Thought and Love companions of our way, Whate'er the senses take or may refuse, The Mind's internal heaven shall shed her dews Of inspiration on the humblest lay. |