Such to the tender-hearted maid
Even ere her joys begin to fade;
Such, haply, to the rugged chief
By fortune crushed, or tamed by grief;
Appears, on Morven's lonely shore,
Dim-gleaming through imperfect lore,
The Son of Fingal; such was blind
Mæonides of ampler mind;

Such Milton, to the fountain head
Of glory by Urania led!

1824.

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 responsive place.

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 cach 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.

[See Martin's Voyage among the Western Isles.]

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

Per me si va nella Città 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.

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

Communed with that Idea face to face: From shadowy fountains of the Infinite, 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,

*The chain of Crossfell.

bar

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 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 in-
finite,

The inviolable God, that tames the proud!

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.

XLVI.

THE SOMNAMBULIST.

LIST, ye who pass by Lyulph's Tower*
At eve; how softly then
Doth Aira-force, that torrent hoarse,
Speak from the woody glen!
Fit music for a solemn vale!

And holier seems the ground
To him who catches on the gale
The spirit of a mournful tale,
Embodied in the sound.

Not far from that fair site whereon
The Pleasure-house is reared,
As story says, in antique days
A stern-brow'd house appeared;
Foil to a Jewel rich in light

There set, and guarded well;
Cage for a Bird of plumage bright,
Sweet-voiced, nor wishing for a flight
Beyond her native dell.

To win this bright Bird from her cage,
To make this Gem their own,
Came Barons bold, with store of gold,
And Knights of high renown;
But one She prized, and only o`e;
Sir Eglamore was he;

Full happy season, when was known,
Ye Dales and Hills! to you alone
Their mutual loyalty-

Known chiefly, Aira! to thy glen,
Thy brook, and bowers of holly;

Where Passion caught what Nature taught,
That all but love is folly;

Where Fact with Fancy stooped to play;
Doubt came not, nor regret-
To trouble hours that winged their way,
As if through an immortal day

Whose sun could never set.

But in old times Love dwelt not long
Sequester'd with repose;
Best throve the fire of chaste desire,
Fanned by the breath of foes.
"A conquering lance is beauty's test,

A pleasure-house built by the late Duke of FORCE Norfolk upon the banks of Ullswater. is the word used in the Lake District for Waterfall.

Τ

Yet blest was Emma when she heard

Her Champion's praise recounted; Though brain would swim, and eyes grow dim, And high her blushes mounted; Or when a bold heroic lay

She warbled from full heart;
Delighted blossoms for the May
Of absence! but they will not stay,
Born only to depart.

Hope wanes with her, while lustre fills
Whatever path he chooses;
As if his orb, that owns no curb,

Received the light hers loses.
He comes not back; an ampler space
Requires for nobler deeds;
He ranges on from place to place,
Till of his doings is no trace,

But what her fancy breeds.

His fame may spread, but in the past
Her spirit finds its centre;
Clear sight She has of what he was,
And that would now content her.
"Still is he my devoted Knight?"
The tear in answer flows;

Month falls on month with heavier weight;
Day sickens round her, and the night

Is empty of repose.

In sleep She sometimes walked abroad, Deep sighs with quick words blending, Like that pale Queen whose hands are seen With fancied spots contending;

But she is innocent of blood,-

The moon is not more pure

That shines aloft, while through the wood She thrids her way, the sounding Flood Her melancholy lure!

While 'mid the fern-brake sleeps the doe,
And owls alone are waking,

In white arrayed, glides on the Maid
The downward pathway taking,
That leads her to the torrent's side

And to a holly bower;

By whom on this still night descried?

By whom in that lone place espied?
By thee, Sir Eglamore!

A wandering Ghost, so thinks the Knight,
His coming step has thwarted,

Beneath the boughs that heard their vows,
Within whose shade they parted.
Hush, hush, the busy Sleeper see!
Perplexed her fingers seem,
As if they from the holly tree
Green twigs would pluck, as rapidly
Flung from her to the stream.

What means the Spectre? Why intent
To violate the Tree,
Thought Eglamore, by which I swore
Untading constancy?

Here am I, and to-morrow's sun,
To her I left, shall prove
That bliss is ne'er so surely won
As when a circuit has been run

Of valour, truth, and love.

So from the spot whereon he stood,
He moved with stealthy pace;
And, drawing nigh, with his living eye,
He recognised the face;

And whispers caught, and speeches small,
Some to the green-leaved tree,

Some muttered to the torrent-fall ;-
"Roar on, and bring him with thy call;
I heard, and so may He!"

Soul-shattered was the Knight, nor knew
If Emma's Ghost it were,

Or boding Shade, or if the Maid

Her very self stood there.

He touched; what followed who shall tell?
The soft touch snapped the thread
Of slumber-shrieking back she fell,
And the Stream whirled her down the dell
Along its foaming bed.

In plunged the Knight!-when on firm ground
The rescued Maiden lay,

Her eyes grew bright with blissful light,
Confusion passed away;

She heard, ere to the throne of grace
Her faithful Spirit flew,

His voice-beheld his speaking face;
And, dying, from his own embrace,
She felt that he was true.

So was he reconciled to life:
Brief words may speak the rest;
Within the dell he built a cell,
And there was Sorrow's guest;
In hermits' weeds repose he found,
From vain temptations free,
Beside the torrent dwelling-bound
By one deep heart-controlling sound,
And awed to piety.

Wild stream of Aira, hold thy course,

Nor fear memorial lays,

Where clouds that spread in solemn shade, Are edged with golden rays!

Dear art thou to the light of heaven,

Though minister of sorrow;
Sweet is thy voice at pensive even;
And thou, in lovers' hearts forgiven,
Shalt take thy place with Yarrow!
1833.

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,