And now on the Saxons his clansmen advance,
With a shout from each heart, and a soul in each lance:
He rushed, like a storm, o'er the night-covered heath,
And swept through their ranks like the angel of death.
Then hurrah! for thy glory, young chieftain, hurrah!
O! had we such lightning-souled heroes to-day,
Again would our "sunburst" expand in the gale
And Freedom exult o'er the green Innisfail!
WHEN Music, Heavenly maid, was young,
While yet in early Greece she sung,
The Passions oft, to hear her shell,
Thronged around her magic cell;
Exulting, trembling, raging, fainting
Possessed beyond the Muse's painting,
By turns, they felt the glowing mind
Disturbed, delighted, raised, refined:
Till once, 't is said, when all were fired,
Filled with fury, rapt, inspired,
From the supporting myrtles round
They snatched her instruments of sound;
And, as they oft had heard apart
Sweet lessons of her forceful art,
Each for Madness ruled the hour
Would prove his own expressive power.
First, Fear his hand, its skill to try,
Amid the chords bewildered laid;
And back recoiled, he knew not why,
Even at the sound himself had made.
Next, Anger rushed, his eyes on fire,
In lightnings owned his secret stings:
In one rude clash he struck the lyre,
And swept, with hurried hands, the strings.
With woful measures, wan Despair
Low sullen sounds! - his grief beguiled; A solemn, strange, and mingled air;
"T was sad, by fits, by starts, 't was wild.
But thou, O Hope! with eyes so fair, What was thy delighted measure? Still it whispered promised pleasure, And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail! Still would her touch the strain prolong; And, from the rocks, the woods, the vale,
She called on Echo still through all her song;
And, where her sweetest theme she chose,
A soft responsive voice was heard at every close;
And Hope, enchanted, smiled, and waved her golden hair.
And longer had she sung-but, with a frown,
Revenge impatient rose.
He threw his blood-stained sword in thunder down;
And, with a withering look,
The war-denouncing trumpet took,
And blew a blast, so loud and dread,
Were ne'er prophetic sounds so full of woe;
And, ever and anon, he beat
The doubling drum with furious heat.
And though, sometimes, each dreary pause between,
Dejected Pity, at his side,
Her soul-subduing voice applied,
Yet still he kept his wild unaltered mien;
While each strained ball of sight seemed bursting from his bead.
Thy numbers, Jealousy, to naught were fixed;
Sad proof of thy distressful state!
Of differing themes the veering song was mixed:
And now it courted Love now, raving, called on Hate
With eyes upraised, as one inspired,
Pale Melancholy sat retired;
And, from her wild sequestered seat,
In notes, by distance made more sweet,
Poured through the mellow horn her pensive soul:
And, dashing soft, from rocks around,
Bubbling runnels joined the sound;
Through glades and glooms the mingled measure stole :
Or o'er some haunted streams, with fond delay-
Round a holy calm diffusing,
Love of peace and lonely musing
In hollow murmurs died away.
But, O how altered was its sprightly tone,
When Cheerfulness, a nymph of healthiest hue,
Her bow across her shoulder flung,
Her buskins gemmed with morning dew
Blew an inspiring air, that dale and thicket rung.
The hunter's call, to Faun and Dryad known!
The oak-crowned sisters, and their chaste-eyed queen.
Satyrs, and sylvan boys, were seen,
Peeping from forth their alleys green;
Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear;
And Sport leaped up, and seized his beechen qu
Last came Joy's ecstatic trial:
He, with viny crown, advancing,
First to the lively pipe his hand addressed;
But soon he saw the brisk awakening viol,
Whose sweet entrancing voice he loved the best
They would have thought, who heard the strain
They saw, in Tempé's vale, her native maids,
Amid the festal sounding shades,
To some unwearied minstrel dancing;
While, as his flying fingers kissed the strings,
Love framed with Mirth a gay fantastic round-
Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound;
And he, amid his frolic play,
As if he would the charming air repay,
Shook thousand odors from his dewy wings.
41. THE GREEK AND TURKMAN. Rev. George Croly.
Description of a night attack, by Constantine Palæologus, on a detached camp of Moham med II., during the siege of Constantinople.
THE Turkman lay beside the river;
The wind played loose through bow and quiver,
The charger on the bank fed free,
The shield hung glittering from the tree,
The trumpet, shawn, and atabal,
Lay screened from dew by cloak and pall,
For long and weary was the way
The hordes had marched that burning day.
Above them, on the sky of June,
Broad as a buckler glowed the moon,
Flooding with glory vale and hill.
In silver sprang the mountain rill;
The weeping shrub in silver bent;
A pile of silver stood the tent;
All soundless, sweet tranquillity;
All beauty, hill, brook, tent, and tree.
There came a sound 't was like the gush
When night-winds shake the rose's bush!
There came a sound. 't was like the tread
Of wolves along the valley's bed!
There came a sound-'t was like the flow
Of rivers swoln with melting snow!
There came a sound-'t was like the roar
Of Ocean on its winter shore!
"DEATH TO THE TURK!" up rose the yell-
On rolled the charge-a thunder peal
Savage and Greek, mad, bleeding, blind, -
And still, on flank, and front, and rear,
Raged, Constantine, thy thirsting spear!
Brassy and pale, a type of doom,-
Labored the moon through deepening gloom.
Down plunged her orb 't was pitchy night'
Now, Turkman, turn thy reins for flight!
On rushed their thousands in the dark!
But in their camp a ruddy spark
Like an uncertain meteor reeled,
Thy hand, brave king, that fire-brand wheeled!
Wild burst the burning element
"O'er man and courser, flood and tent!
And through the blaze the Greeks outsprang,
Like tigers, bloody, foot and fang!-
With dagger-stab, and falchion-sweep,
Delving the stunned and staggering heap,
Till lay the slave by chief and khan,
And all was gone that once was man!
42. THE CURSE OF CAIN.- Knox.
O, THE wrath of the Lord is a terrible thing!
Like the tempest that withers the blossoms of spring,
Like the thunder that bursts on the summer's domain,
It fell on the head of the homicide Cain.
And, lo! like a deer in the fright of the chase,
With a fire in his heart, and a brand on his face,
He speeds him afar to the desert of Nod,
A vagabond, smote by the vengeance of God!
All nature, to him, has been blasted and banned,
And the blood of a brother yet reeks on his hand;
And no vintage has grown, and no fountain has sprung,
For cheering his heart, or for cooling his tongue.
The groans of a father his slumber shall start,
And the tears of a mother shall pierce to his heart,
And the kiss of his children shall scorch him like flame,
When he thinks of the curse that hangs over his name.
And the wife of his bosom the faithful and fair
Can mix no sweet drop in his cup of despair;
For her tender caress, and her innocent breath,
But stir in his soul the hot embers of death.
And his offering may blaze unregarded by Heaven.
And his spirit may pray, yet remain unforgiven;
And his grave may be closed, yet no rest to him bring;
O, the wrath of the Lord is a terrible thing!
43. AMERICA, 1750.—Bishop Berkeley. Born, 1684; died, 1753.
THE Muse, disgusted at an age and clime
Barren of every glorious theme,
In distant lands now waits a better time,
Producing subjects worthy fame.
In happy climes, where from the genial sun,
And virgin earth, such scenes ensue,
The force of art by nature seems outdone,
And fancied beauties by the true:
In happy climes, the seat of innocence,
Where Nature guides, and Virtue rules,
Where men shall not impose, for truth and sense
The pedantry of courts and schools:
There shall be sung another golden age,
The rise of empire and of arts,
The good and great inspiring epic rage,
The wisest heads and noblest hearts.
Not such as Europe breeds in her decay,-
Such as she bred when fresh and young,
When heavenly flame did animate her clay,-
By future poets shall be sung.
Westward the course of empire takes its way
The four first acts already past,
A fifth shall close the drama with the day;
Time's noblest offspring is the last.
44. THE WORLD FOR SALE. — Rev. Ralph Hoyt.
THE world for sale! Hang out the sign;
Call every traveller here to me;
Who 'll buy this brave estate of mine.
And set this weary spirit free?
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