My Thrasymedes, with his cloak alone

Protecting his own head and mine from harm."
"Didst thou not once before," cried Hippias,
Regardless of his sister, hoarse with wrath
At Thrasymedes, "didst thou not, dog-eyed,
Dare, as she walked up to the Parthenon
On the most holy of all holy days,
In sight of all the city, dare to kiss
Her maiden cheek?"

66

Ay, before all the gods,

Ay, before Pallas, before Artemis,
Ay, before Aphrodite, before Herè,

I dared; and dare again. Arise, my spouse!
Arise! and let my lips quaff purity

From thy fair open brow."

The sword was up,

And yet he kissed her twice. Some god withheld The arm of Hippias; his proud blood seethed slower

And smote his breast less angrily; he laid

His hand on the white shoulder and spoke thus: "Ye must return with me. A second time

Offended, will our sire Peisistratos

Pardon the affront? Thou shouldst have asked thyself
That question ere the sail first flapt the mast."
"Already thou hast taken life from me;
Put up thy sword," said the sad youth, his eyes
Sparkling; but whether love or rage or grief
They sparkled with, the gods alone could see.
Peirceus they re-entered, and their ship
Drove up the little waves against the quay,
Whence was thrown out a rope from one above,
And Hippias caught it. From the virgin's waist
Her lover dropped his arm, and blushed to think
He had retained it there, in sight of rude
Irreverent men; he led her forth nor spake.
Hippias walked silent too, until they reached
The mansion of Peisistratos, her sire.
Serenely in his sternness did the prince

Look on them both awhile: they saw not him,
For both had cast their eyes upon the ground.
"Are these the pirates thou hast taken, son?"
Said he. 66
Worse, father! worse than pirates they
Who thus abuse thy patience, thus abuse
Thy pardon, thus abuse the holy rites
Twice over."

"Well hast thou performed thy duty,"

Firmly and gravely said Peisistratos.

"Nothing, then, rash young man! could turn thy heart From Eunöe my daughter ?"

"Nothing, Sir,

I can die but once

Shall ever turn it.

And love but once.

O Eunöe! farewell;"

"Nay, she shall see what thou canst bear for her."
"O father! Shut me in my chamber, shut me
In my poor mother's tomb, dead or alive,

But never let me see what he can bear;

I know how much that is when borne for me."

"Not yet: come on. And lag not thou behind,
Pirate of virgin and of princely hearts!

Before the people, and before the goddess,
Thou hadst evinced the madness of thy passion,

And now wouldst bear from home and plenteousness

To poverty and exile, this my child."

Then shuddered Thrasymedes, and exclamed,

"I see my crime; I saw it not before.

The daughter of Peisistratos was born
Neither for exile nor for poverty,

Ah! nor for me!" He would have wept, but one
Might see him, and weep worse. The prince unmoved
Strode on, and said, “To-morrow shall the people
All who beheld thy trespasses, behold
The justice of Peisistratos, the love
He bears his daughter, and the reverence
In which he holds the highest law of God."
He spake; and on the morrow they were one.

Did not Mr. Landor write this scene of Orestes one fine June morning, seated on a garden-roller in the court before Mr. Kenyon's house in London? fitting home for such an inspiration! And is not that the way that such scenes are written? not sitting down with malice prepense to compose poetry, but letting it come when it will and how it will, and striking it off at a heat.

THE DEATH OF CLYTEMNESTRA.

ORESTES AND ELECTRA.

Electra. Pass on, my brother! she awaits the wretch,

Dishonourer, despoiler, murderer

None other name shall name him-she awaits

Give the sword scope-think what a man was he,
How fond of her! how kind to all about,

That he might gladden and teach us-how proud
Of thee, Orestes! tossing thee above

His joyous head, and calling thee his crown.
Ah! boys remember not what melts our hearts
And marks them evermore!

Bite not thy lip,

Nor tramp as an unsteady colt the ground,
Nor stare against the wall, but think again
How better than all fathers was our father.

Go.

Orestes. Loose me, then! for this white hand, Electra, Hath fastened upon mine with fiercer grasp

Than I can grasp the sword.

Electra.

Go, sweet Orestes,

I knew not I was holding thee-Avenge him!

(Alone.) How he sprang from me!

The room before the bath!

Sure he now hath reached

The bath-door creaks!

It hath creaked thus since he-since thou, O father!
Ever since thou didst loosen its strong valves,
Hither with all thy dying weight, or strength
Agonized with her stabs-

Our father she made thee the scorn of slaves;

Me (son of him who ruled this land and more)
She made an outcast-

Would I had been so

Oh that Zeus

For ever! ere such vengeance—

Electra.

Had let thy arm fall sooner at thy side

Without those drops! list! they are audible

For they are many-from the sword's point falling
And down from the mid blade!

Too rash Orestes!

Couldst thou not then have spared our wretched mother?

Orestes. The Gods could not.
Electra.

She was not theirs, Orestes!

"Twas I! 'twas I who did it!

Orestes. And didst not thou,-
Electra.

Of our unhappy house the most unhappy!
Under this roof, by every God accurst,
There is no grief, there is no guilt, but mine.
Orestes. Electra! no!

'Tis now my time to suffer-

Mine be, with all its pangs, the righteous deed!

What a picture is that of Agamemnon and his boy,

"Tossing thee above

His joyous head, and calling thee his crown!"

Long may Mr. Landor conceive such pictures, and write such scenes!

The days are happily past when the paltry epithet of "Cockney Poets" could be bestowed upon Keats and Leigh Hunt: the world has outlived them. People would as soon think of applying such a word to Dr. Johnson. Happily, too, one of the delightful writers who were the objects of these unworthy attacks has outlived them also; has lived to attain a popularity of the most genial kind, and to diffuse, through a thousand pleasant channels, many of the finest parts of our finest writers. He has done good service to literature in another way, by enriching our language with some of the very best translations since Cowley. Who ever thought to see Tasso's famous passage in the "Amyntas" so rendered?

ODE TO THE GOLDEN AGE.

O lovely age of gold!

Not that the rivers rolled

With milk, or that the woods wept honey-dew;
Not that the reedy ground

Produced without a wound,

Or the mild serpent had no tooth that slew;

Not that a cloudless blue

For ever was in sight;

Or that the heaven which burns,

And now is cold by turns,

Looked out in glad and everlasting light;

No, nor that even the insolent ships from far

Brought war to no new lands, nor riches worse than war.

Who, again, ever hoped to see such an English version of one of Petrarch's most characteristic poems, conceits and all?