The lights are high on beacon and from bower, And 'midst them Conrad seeks Medora's tower:

He looks in vain-'tis strange-and all remark,
Amid so many, hers alone is dark.

'Tis strange-of yore its welcome never fail'd,
Nor now perchance extinguish'd, only veil'd.
With the first boat descends he for the shore,
And looks impatient on the lingering oar.
Oh! for a wing beyond the falcon's flight,
To bear him like an arrow to that height?
With the first pause the resting rowers gave,
He waits not, looks not-leaps into the wave,
Strives through the surge, bestrides the beach,
and high

Ascends the path familiar to his eye.

He reach'd his turret door-he paused-no sound

Broke from within; and all was night around.
He knock'd, and loudly-footstep nor reply
Announced that any heard or deem'd him nigh;
He knock'd, but faintly-for his trembling
hand

Refused to aid his heavy heart's demand.
The portal opens-'tis a well-known face-
But not the form he panted to embrace.
Its lips are silent-twice his own essay'd,
And fail'd to frame the question they delayed;
He snatch'd the lamp-its light will answer all—
It quits his grasp, expiring in the fall.

He would not wait for that reviving ray-
As soon could he have linger'd there for day;
But, glimmering through the dusky corridore,
Another chequers o'er the shadow'd floor;
His steps the chamber gain-his eyes behold
All that his heart believed not-yet foretold!
XX.

He turn'd not-spoke not-sunk not-fix'd his look,

And set the anxious frame that lately shook:
He gazed-how long we gaze despite of pain,
And know, but dare not own, we gaze in vain!
In life itself she was so still and fair,
That death with gentler aspect wither'd there :
And the cold flowers her colder hand contain'd,
In that last grasp as tenderly were strain'd
As if she scarcely felt, but feign'd a sleep,-

And made it almost mockery yet to weep:
The long dark lashes fringed her lids of snow,
And veil'd-thought shrinks from all that lurk'd

below

Oh! o'er the eye death most exerts his might, And hurls the spirit from her throne of light! Sinks those blue orbs in that long last eclipse, But spares, as yet, the charm around her lips-Yet, yet they seem as they forbore to smile, But the white shroud, and each extended tress, And wish'd repose-but only for a while; Long-fair-but spread in utter lifelessness, Which, late the sport of every summer wind, Escaped the baffled wreath that strove to bind: These-and the pale pure cheek, became the bier

But she is nothing- wherefore is he here?

By those, that deepest feel, is ill exprest
The indistinctness of the suffering breast;
Where thousand thoughts begin to end in one,
Which seeks from all the refuge found in none;
No words suffice the secret soul to show,
And Truth denies all eloquence to Woe.
On Conrad's stricken soul exhaustion prest,
And stupor almost lull'd it into rest;
So feeble now-his mother's softness crept
To those wild eyes, which like an infant's wept:
It was the very weakness of his brain,
Which thus confess'd without relieving pain.
None saw his trickling tears-perchance, if seen,
That useless flood of grief had never been:
Nor long they flow'd-he dried them to depart,
In helpless-hopeless-brokenness of heart:
The sun goes forth-but Conrad's day is dim ;
And the night cometh-ne'er to pass from him.
There is no darkness like the cloud of mind,
On Grief's vain eye-the blindest of the blind!
Which may not-dare not see-but turns aside
To blackest shade-nor will endure a guide!

now.

The thunder came-that bolt hath blasted both,
The Granite's firmness and the Lily's growth:
The gentle plant hath left no leaf to tell
Its tale, but shrunk and wither'd where it fell;
And of its cold protector, blacken round
But shiver'd fragments on the barren ground!

XXIV.

'Tis morn-to venture on his lonely hour Few dare; though now Anselmo sought his

tower.

He was not there-nor seen along the shore; Ere night, alarm'd, their isle is traversed o'er: Another morn-another bids them seek,

Mount, grotto, cavern, valley search'd in vain, They find on shore a sea-boat's broken chain; Their hope revives-they follow o'er the main. 'Tis idle all-moons roll on moons away, And Conrad comes not-came not since that day:

Nor trace, nor tidings of his doom declare
Where lives his grief, or perish'd his despair!
Long mourn'd his band whom none could mourn
beside;

And fair the monument they gave his bride :
For him they raise not the recording stone--
His death yet dubious, deeds too widely known;
He left a Corsair's name to other times,
Link'd with one virtue, and a thousand
crimes.

And Lara left in youth his fatherland;
But from the hour he waved his parting hand
Each trace wax'd fainter of his course, till all
Had nearly ceased his memory to recall.
His sire was dust, his vassals could declare,

Twas all they knew, that Lara was not there;
Nor sent, nor came he, till conjecture grew
Cold in the many, anxious in the few.
His hall scarce echoes with his wonted name,
His portrait darkens in its fading frame.
Another chief consoled his destined bride,
The young forgot him, and the old had died;
"Yet doth he live!" exclaims the impatient
heir,

*The reader is apprised that the name of Lara being Spanish, and no circumstance of local or national description fixing the scene or hero of the poem to any country or age, the word "Serf," which could not be correctly applied to the lower classes in Spain, who were never vassals of the soil, has nevertheless been employed to designate the followers of our fictitious chieftain. He is meant for noble of the Morea.

And sighs for sables which he must not wear. A hundred scutcheons deck with gloomy grace The Lara's last and longest dwelling-place; But one is absent from the mouldering file, That now were welcome in that Gothic pile.

IV.

He comes at last in sudden loneliness,
And whence they know not, why they need not

guess;

They more might marvel, when the greeting's

o'er,

Not that he came, but came not long before:
No train is his beyond a single page,
Of foreign aspect, and of tender age.
Years had roll'd on, and fast they speed away
To those that wander as to those that stay:
But lack of tidings from another clime
Had lent a flagging wing to weary Time.
They see, they recognise, yet almost deem
The present dubious, or the past a dream.
Though sear'd by toil, and something touch'd
He lives, nor yet is past his manhood's prime,

by time;

His faults, whate'er they were, if scarce forgot,
Might be untaught him by his varied lot;
Nor good nor ill of late were known, his name
Might yet uphold his patrimonial fame.
His soul in youth was haughty, but his sins
No more than pleasure from the stripling wins;
And such, if not yet harden'd in their course,
Might be redeem'd, nor ask a long remorse.

V.

And they indeed were changed--'tis quickly Whate'er he be, 'twas not what he had been:

seen,

That brow in furrow'd lines had fix'd at last,
And spake of passions, but of passion past;
The pride, but not the fire, of early days,
Coldness of mien, and carelessness of praise,
A high demeanour, and a glance that took
Their thoughts from others by a single look;
And that sarcastic levity of tongue,
The stinging of a heart the world hath stung,
That darts in seeming playfulness around,
And makes those feel that will not own the
wound:

All these seem'd his, and something more beneath

Than glance could well reveal, or accent breathe.
Ambition, glory, love, the common aim,
That some can conquer, and that all would

claim,

Within his breast appear'd no more to strive,