WRITTEN IN A HERMITAGE ON THE SEA-SHORE.
O WANDERER! would thy heart forget
Each earthly passion and regret,
And would thy wearied spirit rise
To commune with its native skies;
Pause for awhile, and deem it sweet
To linger in this calm retreat;
And give thy cares, thy griefs, a short suspense,
Amidst wild scenes of lone magnificence.
Unmixed with aught of meaner tone,
Here nature's voice is heard alone:
When the loud storm, in wrathful hour,
Is rushing on its wing of power,
And spirits of the deep awake,
And surges foam, and billows break,
And rocks and ocean-caves around,
Reverberate each awful sound;
That mighty voice, with all its dread control,
To loftiest thought shall wake thy thrilling soul.
But when no more the sea-winds rave,
When peace is brooding on the wave,
And from earth, air, and ocean rise
No sounds but plaintive melodies:
Soothed by their softly mingling swell,
As daylight bids the world farewell,
The rustling wood, the dying breeze,
The faint, low rippling of the seas,
A tender calm shall steal upon thy breast,
A gleam reflected from the realms of rest.
Is thine a heart the world hath stung,
Friends have deceived, neglect hath wrung?
Hast thou some grief that none may know,
Some lonely, secret, silent wo?
Or have thy fond affections fled
From earth to slumber with the dead?
Oh! pause awhile-the world disown,
And dwell with nature's self alone!
And though no more she bids arise
Thy soul's departed energies,
And though thy joy of life is o'er,
Beyond her magic to restore;
Yet shall her spells o'er every passion steal,
And sooth the wounded heart they can not heal.
THE DEATH-DAY OF KÖRNER.*
A SONG for the death-day of the brave-
A song of pride!
The youth went down to a hero's grave,
With the Sword, his bride.t
⚫ On reading part of a letter from Körner's father, addressed to Mr. Richardson, the translator of his works, in which he speaks of "The death-day of his son."
↑ See the Sword-song, composed on the morning of his
He went, with his noble heart unworn, And pure, and high,
An eagle stooping from clouds of morn, Only to die!
He went with the Lyre, whose lofty tone Beneath his hand
Had thrill'd to the name of his God alone, And his Father-land.
And with all his glorious feelings yet
Like a southern stream that no frost hath met To chain its flow.
A song for the death-day of the brave-
A song of pride!
For him that went to a hero's grave,
With the Sword, his bride.
He hath left a voice in his trumpet-lays
To turn the flight,
And a guiding spirit for after days,
Like a watch-fire's light.
And a grief in his father's soul to rest,
Midst all high thought,
And a memory unto his mother's breast,
With healing fraught.
And a name and fame above the blight
Of earthly breath,
Beautiful-beautiful and bright,
A song for the death-day of the brave-
A song of pride!
For him that went to a hero's grave,
With the Sword, his bride!
HUSHED is the world in night and sleep, Earth, Sea, and Air, are still as death; Too rude to break a calm so deep,
Were music's faintest breath. Descend, bright Visions! from aerial bowers, Descend to gild your own soft, silent hours.
In hope or fear, in toil or pain, The weary day have mortals past, Now, dreams of bliss, be yours to reign, And all your spells around them cast; pang, their eyes the tear, Steal from their hearts the And lift the veil that hides a brighter sphere.
Oh! bear your softest balm to those,
Who fondly, vainly, mourn the dead,
To them that world of peace disclose,
Where the bright soul is fled:
Where Love, immortal in his native clime,
Shall fear no pang from fate, no blight from time.
Or to his loved, his distant land,
On your light wings the exile bear;
To feel once more his heart expand,
In his own genial mountain-air;
Hear the wild echoes well-known strains repeat,
And bless each note, as heaven's own music sweet.
But oh! with Fancy's brightest ray,
Blest dreams! the bard's repose illume;
Bid forms of heaven around him play,
And bowers of Eden bloom!
And waft his spirit to its native skies,
Who finds no charms in life's realities.
No voice is on the air of night,
Through folded leaves no murmurs creep,
Nor star nor moonbeam's trembling light
Falls on the placid brow of sleep.
Descend, bright visions, from your airy bower,
Dark, silent, solemn, is your favourite hour.
TO THE MEMORY OF GENERAL SIR
E-D P-K-M.
BRAVE spirit! mourned with fond regret,
Lost in life's pride, in valour's noon,
Oh! who could deem thy star should set
So darkly and so soon?
Fatal, though bright, the fire of mind,
Which marked and closed thy brief career,
And the fair wreath, by Hope entwined,
Lies withered on thy bier.
The soldier's death hath been thy doom,
The soldier's tear thy meed shall be;
Yet, son of war! a prouder toinb
Might Fate have reared for thee.
Thou shouldst have died, O high-souled chief!
In those bright days of glory fled,
When triumph so prevailed o'er grief,
We scarce could mourn the dead.
Noontide of fame! each tear-drop then
Was worthy of a warrior's grave-
When shall affection weep again
So proudly o'er the brave?
There, on the battle-fields of Spain,
'Midst Roncesvalles' mountain-scene,
Or on Vittoria's blood-red plain,
Meet had thy death-bed been.
We mourn not that a hero's life,
Thus in its ardent prime should close;
Hadst thou but fallen in nobler strife,
But died 'midst conquered foes!
Yet hast thou still (though victory's flame
In that last moment cheered thee not)
Left Glory's isle another name,
That ne'er may be forgot:
And many a tale of triumph won
Shall breathe that name in Memory's ear,
And long may England mourn a son
Without reproach or fear.
TO THE MEMORY OF SIR H-Y
E-LL-S.
WHO FELL IN THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO.
"Happy are they who die in their youth, when their reOssian. nown is around them."
WEEP'ST thou for him, whose doom was sealed
On England's proudest battle-field?
For him, the lion-heart, who died,
In victory's full, resistless tide?
Oh! mourn him not,
By deeds like his that field was won,
And Fate could yield to Valour's son,
No brighter lot.
He heard his band's exulting cry,
He saw the vanquished eagles fly;
And envied be his death of fame,
It shed a sunbeam o'er his name,
That nought shall dim-
No cloud obscured his glory's day,
It saw no twilight of decay—
Weep not for him!
And breathe no dirge's plaintive moan,
A hero claims far loftier tone!
Oh! proudly should the war-song swell,
Recording how the mighty fell
In that dread hour,
When England, 'midst the battle-storm,
Th' avenging angel-reared her form
In tenfold power.
Yet, gallant heart! to swell thy praise,
Vain were the minstrel's noblest lays;
Since he, the soldier's guiding-star,
The victor-chief, the lord of war,
Has owned thy fame:
And oh! like his approving word,
What trophied marble could record
A warrior's fame?
Founded on the story related of the Spanish Patriot, Mina.
OH! forget not the hour, when through forest and
vale,
We returned with our chief to his dear native hills;
Through the woody Sierra there sighed not a gale,
And the moonbeam was bright on his battlement-
walls;
And nature lay sleeping, in calmness and light,
Round the home of the valiant, that rose on our
sight.
We entered that home-all was loneliness round, The stillness, the darkness, the peace of the grave; Not a voice, not a step, bade its echoes resound, Ah! such was the welcome that waited the brave! For the spoilers had passed, like the poison-wind's breath,
And the loved of his bosom lay silent in death.
Oh! forget not that hour-let its image be near,
In the light of our mirth, in the dreams of our rest,
Let its tale awake feelings too deep for a tear,
And rouse into vengeance each arm and each
breast,
Till cloudless the dayspring of liberty shine
O'er the plains of the olive, and hills of the vine.
THE AGED INDIAN.
WARRIORS! my noon of life is past,
The brightness of my spirit flown;
I crouch before the wintry blast,
Amidst my tribe I dwell alone;
The heroes of my youth are fled,
They rest among the warlike dead.
Ye slumberers of the narrow cave!
My kindred-chiefs in days of yore,
Ye fill an unremembered grave,
Your fame, your deeds, are known no more.
The records of your wars are gone,
Your names forgot by all but one.
Soon shall that one depart from earth,
To join the brethren of his prime:
Then will the memory of your birth
Sleep with the hidden things of time!
With him, ye sons of former days!
Fades the last glimmering of your praise.
His eyes that hailed your spirit's flame,
Still kindling in the combat's shock,
Have seen, since darkness veiled your fame,
Sons of the desert and the rock!
Another, and another race,
Rise to the battle, and the chace
Descendants of the mighty dead! Fearless of heart, and firm of hand! Oh! let me join their spirits fled, Oh! send me to their shadowy land. Age hath not tamed Ontara's heart, He shrinks not from the friendly dart.
These feet no more can chase the deer,
The glory of this arm is flown-
Why should the feeble linger here,
When all the pride of life is gone?
Warriors! why still the stroke deny,
Think ye Ontara fears to die?
He feared not in his flower of days,
When strong to stem the torrent's force,
When through the desert's pathless maze,
His way was as an eagle's course!
When war was sunshine to his sight,
And the wild hurricane, delight!
Shall then the warrior tremble now?
Now when his envied strength is o'er?
Hung on the pine his idle bow,
His pirogue useless on the shore?
When death hath dimmed his failing eye,
Shall he, the joyless, fear to die?
Sons of the brave! delay no more,
The spirits of my kindred call;
'Tis but one pang, and all is o'er!
Oh! bid the aged cedar fall!
To join the brethren of his prime,
The mighty of departed time.
DIRGE OF THE HIGHLAND CHIEF IN "WAVERLEY."
SON of the mighty and the free!
High-minded leader of the brave!
Was it for lofty chief like thee,
To fill a nameless grave?
Oh! if, amidst the valiant slain,
The warrior's bier hath been thy lot,
E'en though on red Culloden's plain,
We then had mourned thee not.
But darkly closed thy dawn of fame, That dawn whose sunbeam rose so fair; Vengeance alone may breathe thy name,
The watchword of Despair!
Yet oh! if gallant spirit's power
Had e'er enobled death like thine,
Then glory marked thy parting hour,
Last of a mighty line!
O'er thy own towers the sunshine falls,
But can not chase their silent gloom;
Those beams, that gild thy native walls,
Are sleeping on thy tomb!
Spring on thy mountains laughs the while,
Thy green woods wave in vernal air,
But the loved scenes may vainly smile-
Not e'en thy dust is there.
On thy blue hills no bugle-sound
Is mingling with the torrent's roar,
Unmarked the wild deer sport around--
Thou lead'st the chace no more!
Thy gates are closed, thy halls are still,
Those halls where pealed the choral strain,
They hear the wind's deep murmuring thrill-
And all is hushed again.
No banner from the lonely tower
Shall wave its blazoned folds on high;
There the tall grass and summer flower,
Unmarked shall spring and die.
No more thy bard, for other ear,
Shall wake the harp once loved by thine-
Hushed be the strain thou canst not hear,
Last of a mighty line.
CHIEFTAINS, lead on! our hearts beat high,
Lead on to Salem's towers!
Who would not deem it bliss to die,
Slain in a cause like ours?
The brave who sleep in soil of thine,
Lie not entombed, but shrined, O Palestine;
Souls of the slain in holy war!
Look from your sainted rest! Tell us ye rose in Glory's car,
To mingle with the blest;
Tell us how short the death-pang's power, How bright the joys of your immortal bower.
Strike the loud harp, ye minstrel train!
Pour forth your loftiest lays; Each heart shall echo to the strain
Breathed in the warrior's praise. Bid every string triumphant swell Th' inspiring sounds that heroes love so well.
Salem! amidst the fiercest hour
The wildest rage of fight,
Thy name shall lend our falchions power, And nerve our hearts with might,
Envied be those for thee that fall,
Who find their graves beneath thy sacred wall.
For them no need that sculptured tomb
Should chronicle their fame,
Or pyramid record their doom,
Or deathless verse their name;
It is enough that dust of thine
Should shroud their forms, O blessed Palestine!
Chieftains, lead on! our hearts beat high
For combat's glorious hour;
Soon shall the red-cross banner fly
On Salem's loftiest tower!
We burn to mingle in the strife,
Where but to die ensures eternal life.
It was in the battle of Sheriffmoor that young Clanronald fel!, leading on the Highlanders of the right wing. His death dispirited the assailants, who began to waver. But Glengary, chief of a rival branch of the Clan Colla, started from the ranks, and waving his bonnet round his head, cried out, "Today for revenge, and to-morrow for mourning!" The Highlanders received a new impulse from his words, and, charging with redoubled fury, bore down all before them.-See the Quarterly Review, article of "Culloden Papers."
OH! ne'er be Clanronald the valiant forgot!
Still fearless and first in the combat he fell;
But we paused not one tear-drop to shed o'er the
spot,
We spared not one moment to murmur "Farewell.” We heard but the battle-word given by the chief, "To-day for revenge, and to-morrow for grief!"
And wildly Clanronald! we echoed the vow, With the tear on our cheek, and the sword in our hand;
And oh! when thought, in ecstacy sublime, That soars triumphant o'er the bounds of time, Fires thy keen glance with inspiration's blaze,
Young son of the brave! we may weep for thee The light of heaven, the hope of nobler days,
For well has thy death been avenged by thy band, When they joined in wild chorus the cry of the chief,
"To-day for revenge, and to-morrow for grief!"
Thy dirge in that hour was the bugle's wild call,
The clash of the claymore, the shout of the brave;
But now thy own bard may lament for thy fall,
And the soft voice of melody sigh o'er thy grave,
While Albyn remembers the words of the chief,
"To-day for revenge, and to-morrow for grief!"
Thou art fallen, O fearless one! flower of thy race!
Descendant of heroes! thy glory is set!
But thy kindred, the sons of the battle and chase,
Have proved that thy spirit is bright in them yet!
Nor vainly have echoed the words of the chief,
"To-day for revenge, and to-morrow for grief!"
THRONE of expression! whence the spirit's ray
Pours forth so oft the light of mental day,
Where fancy's fire, affection's melting beam,
Thought, genius, passion, reign in turn supreme,
And many a feeling, words can ne'er impart,
Finds its own language to pervade the heart;
Thy power, bright orb, what bosom hath not felt,
To thrill, to rouse, to fascinate, to melt?
And by some spell of undefined control,
With magnet-influence touch the secret soul!
Light of the features! in the morn of youth
Thy glance is nature, and thy language, truth:
And ere the world, with all-corrupting sway,
Hath taught e'en thee to flatter and betray,
Th' ingenuous heart forbids thee to reveal,
Or speak one thought that interest would conceal;
While yet thou seem'st the cloudless mirror, given
But to reflect the purity of heaven;
Oh! then how lovely, there unveiled to trace
Th' unsullied brightness of each mental grace!
When Genius lends thee all his living light,
Where the full beams of intellect unite,
When Love illumes thee with his varying ray,
Where trembling Hope and tearful Rapture play;
Or Pity's melting cloud thy beam subdues,
Tempering its lustre with a vale of dews;
Still does thy power, whose all-commanding spell
Can pierce the mazes of the soul so well,
Bid some new feeling to existence start,
From its deep slumbers in the inmost heart.
(As glorious dreams, for utterance far too high, Flash through the mist of dim mortality;) Who does not own, that through thy lightning
A flame unquenchable, unearthly, streams? That pure, though captive effluence of the sky, The vestal-ray, the spark that can not die;
THE HERO'S DEATH.
LIFE'S parting beams were in his eye,
Life's closing accents on his tongue,
When round him, pealing to the sky,
The shout of victory rung!
Then, ere his gallant spirit fled,
A smile so bright illumed his face-
Oh! never, of the light it shed,
Shall memory lose a trace!
His was a death, whose rapture high
Transcended all that life could yield;
His warmest prayer was so to die,
On the red battle-field!
And they may feel, who love him most,
A pride so holy and so pure-
Fate hath no power o'er those who boast
A treasure thus secure!
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MARKED ye the mingling of the city's throng,
Each mien, each glance, with expectation bright?
Prepare the pageant and the choral song,
The pealing chimes, the blaze of festal light!
And hark! what rumor's gathering sound is nigh?
It is the voice of joy, that murmur deep?
Away, be hushed! ye sounds of revelry!
Back to your homes, ye multitudes, to weep!
Weep! for the storm hath o'er us darkly past,
And England's royal flower is broken by the blast!
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