Survey where PLINY'S villa stood,3
Along the green Laurentine wood;

Where CICERO, LUCRETIA dwelt,'
Her breast the self-aimed poniard felt;

The Saracens o'er meadows damp,

In many a savage glittering rank, Beleaguering the Alban camp;

Mountains of dead all cold and dank

The conquered army fast receding; Stern warriors on the red field bleeding; Proud cities now in queenly pride,

Then floating down oblivion's tide,

Where empires wrapped in dust are hid

Review again the Æneid.

VII.

Thence to TORQUATO's cell I go,
And hear his mournful tale of woe,
Of ESTE's rage-ALPHONSO's ire,
That he presumptuous should aspire

So high as LEONORA's hand,
Or dare resist his high command.
Next DANTE in the exile's land,
His snowy locks by zephyrs fanned,
Weeping along the desert wold,
All pale and haggard, I behold ;

Or on the rock he often sought,5

Near the old castle Tulmino,

Or midst the hills of Gubbio,
Moulding imperishable thought;
And linger long in PETRARCH'S grove
To hear him sing immortal love,

His sorrows to the breezes pour,

And chant his LAURA'S beauty o'er.

VIII.

Why my sad thoughts do rove to thee

O bright, enchanting Italy!

Enamored thus, I cannot say,-

But oft, methinks, when sleep controls

The sense, the spirit steals away

To mingle with congenial souls,

Who down from some more hallowed sphere Descending, come to linger near

The cherished spot which gave them birth,

And guard the pure and loved on earth.

THE RUINS OF PALENQUE.1

AMIDST this dense and wavy wood,

These wild birds' melody, Death rears, in regal solitude,

A throne in mystery;

And fanes and temples prostrate lie,
Beneath decay's dark pall,
Proclaiming-ah! too mournfully,

A nation's rise and fall.

Here mould-clad lies the royal hearth,
The monarch's gorgeous home;

The shrine where knelt the proud of earth,

And

many a fallen dome

A sepulchre-a buried crown,

Where Death doth vigil keep,

By those who calmly have lain down

To their eternal sleep;

The sculptured urn, the breathing bust,

By burning Genius wrought, Arise amidst the mouldering dust

Stern chronicles of thought;
And through the dim veil of decay
Departed splendors shine,

And relics of a brighter day
Survive the wreck of time.

As if in mockery of decay,

A rose smiles on yon tomb,

And cypresses, in dark array,

Hang round their shadowy gloom;

Deep tones come on the swelling breeze,

Of nature's minstrelsy;

Wild anthems warble from the trees,

But bring no tale of thee.—

Wake! oh, ye slumbering ruins wake!

Arise, ye desolate ;

And from oblivion's tomb, oh, break

The mystery of thy fate!

Send forth upon the echo's breath,

Ye long deserted halls

The tale of woe, and blood, and death,

Of thy beleaguered walls!

Rise! thou dark spirit of decay,
Burst from thy gloomy cell,
Tell by what hand, or in what way
A mighty city fell !—

Tell me if shepherds once dwelt here,
Or warriors fierce and bold,

A desert race, or Turk, or Seer,
Or Israel's tribes of old?

Oh! say, if here the holy fire
Was o'er these altars shed;
If Priest or Prophet struck the lyre,
Or hallowed victim bled;
Around this consecrated shrine
If thousands gathering trod,
And upward swelled the song divine,
And bent the knee to God?

No history chronicles thy tale,

No minstrel in his song,

Thy battles fierce, or shout, or wail,

Or chivalry hath sung;

But moat, and tower, and sculptured pier,

And battlement, speak loud

That glory's footsteps lingered here,

The mighty and the proud: