CLXVI. And send us prying into the abyss, To gather what we shall be when the frame Shall be resolv'd to something less than this Its wretched essence; and to dream of fame, And wipe the dust from off the idle name We never more shall hear, but never more, Oh, happier thought! can we be made the same: -It is enough in sooth that once we bore These fardels of the heart-the heart whose sweat was gore. CLXVII. Hark! forth from the abyss a voice proceeds, With some deep and immedicable wound; Through storm and darkness yawns the rending ground, The gulf is thick with phantoms, but the chief Seems royal still, though with her head discrown'd, And pale, but lovely, with maternal grief She clasps a babe, to whom her breast yields no relief. 177 CLXVIII. Scion of chiefs and monarchs, where art thou? CLXIX. Peasants bring forth in safety. - Can it be, Beheld her Iris. Thou, too, lonely lord, And desolate consort vainly wert thou wed! The husband of a year! the father of the dead! M CLXX. Of sackcloth was thy wedding garment made; The fair-hair'd Daughter of the Isles is laid, CLXXI. Woe unto us, not her; for she sleeps well: The fickle reek of popular breath, the tongue Of hollow counsel, the false oracle, Which from the birth of monarchy hath rung Its knell in princely ears, till the o'erstung Nations have arm'd in madness, the strange fate 69 Which tumbles mightiest sovereigns, and hath flung Against their blind omnipotence a weight Within the opposing scale, which crushes soon or late, CLXXII. These might have been her destiny; but no, But now a bride and mother and now there! How many ties did that stern moment tear! CLXXIII. 70 Lo, Nemi! navell'd in the woody hills A deep cold settlet aspect nought can shake, CLXXIV. And near Albano's scarce divided waves. Shine from a sister valley; and afar The Tiber winds, and the broad ocean laves The Latian coast where sprung the Epic war, "Arms and the Man," whose re- ascending star Rose o'er an empire; - but beneath thy right Tully repos'd from Rome; -and where yon bar Of girdling mountains intercepts the sight The Sabine farm was till'd, the weary bard's delight. 7× CLXV. But I forget. My pilgrim's shrine is won, Yet once more let us look upon the sea; And from the Alban Mount we now behold Our friend of youth, that ocean, which when we Beheld it last by Calpe's rock unfold Those waves, we follow'd on till the dark Euxine roll'd |