Must we but weep o'er days more blest?
Must we but blush ?-Our fathers bled.
Earth! render back from out thy breast
A remnant of our Spartan dead!
Of the three hundred grant but three,
To make a new Thermopyla!

Thomas Moore.

1779-1852. (History, p. 225.)

196. From 'LALLA ROOKH.'

"The Gift that is most dear to Heaven."

Cheer'd by this hope she bends her thither ;-
Still laughs the radiant eye of Heaven,
Nor have the golden bowers of Even
In the rich West begun to wither;-
When, o'er the vale of Balbec winging
Slowly, she sees a child at play,
Among the rosy wild-flowers singing,
As rosy and as wild as they ;
Chasing, with eager hands and eyes,
The beautiful blue damsel-flies,
That flutter'd round the jasmine stems,
Like winged flowers or flying gems :-
And, near the boy, who, tir'd with play,
Now nestling 'mid the roses lay,
She saw a wearied man dismount

From his hot steed, and on the brink
Of a small imaret's rustic fount
Impatient fiing him down to drink.
Then swift his haggard' brow he turn'd
To the fair child, who fearless sat,
Though never yet hath day-beam burn'd
Upon a brow more fierce than that,-
Sullenly fierce-a mixture dire,

Like thunder-clouds, of gloom and fire!

1. Haggard: this word is said to come from Ger. hager, lean; but the sb. haggard, a worthless, untrainable hawk, is

taken from hawk itself with the termination and suffixed, as in buzzard.

In which the Peri's eye could read
Dark tales of many a ruthless deed;
The ruin'd maid-the shrine profan'd-
Oaths broken-and the threshold stain'd
With blood of guests!-there written, all,
Black as the damning drops that fall
From the denouncing Angel's pen,
Ere Mercy weeps them out again!

Yet tranquil now that man of crime
(As if the balmy evening time
Soften'd his spirit) look'd and lay,
Watching the rosy infant's play:
Though still, whene'er his eye by chance
Fell on the boy's, its lurid glance

Met that unclouded, joyous gaze,
As torches, that have burnt all night
Through some impure and godless rite,
Encounter morning's glorious rays.

But hark! the vesper call to prayer,
As slow the orb of day-light sets,
Is rising sweetly on the air,

From Syria's thousand minarets!
The boy has started from the bed
Of flowers, where he had laid his head,
And down upon the fragrant sod

Kneels, with his forehead to the south,
Lisping the eternal name of God

From purity's own cherub mouth,
And looking, while his hands and eyes
Are lifted to the glowing skies,

Like a stray babe of Paradise,

Just lighted on that flowery plain,

And seeking for its home again!

Oh, 'twas a sight-that Heav'n-that Child

A scene, which might have well beguil'd

Ev'n haughty EBLIS 2 of a sigh

For glories lost and peace gone by!

2. Eblis, the prince of the evil spirits, the Mahometan Satan. SPECS. ENG. LIT.

U

And how felt he, the wretched Man
Reclining there-while memory ran

O'er many a year of guilt and strife,
Flew o'er the dark flood of his life,
Nor found one sunny resting-place,

Nor brought him back one branch of grace!
"There was a time," he said, in mild,
Heart-humbled tones-"thou blessed child!
When young and haply pure as thou,
I look'd and pray'd like thee-but now
He hung his head-each nobler aim

And hope and feeling, which had slept
From boyhood's hour, that instant came
Fresh o'er him, and he wept-he wept !

Blest tears of soul-felt penitence!

In whose benign, redeeming flow

Is felt the first, the only sense

Of guiltless joy that guilt can know,

[moon

"There's a drop," said the Peri, "that down from the

Falls through the withering airs of June

Upon Egypt's land,3 of so healing a power,
So balmy a virtue, that ev'n in the hour
That drop descends, contagion dies,
And health reanimates earth and skies!-
Oh, is it not thus, thou man of sin,

The precious tears of repentance fall?
Though foul thy fiery plagues within,

One heavenly drop hath dispell'd them all!"
And now--behold him kneeling there
By the child's side, in humble prayer,
While the same sunbeam shines upon
The guilty and the guiltless one,

And hymns of joy proclaim through Heaven
The Triumph of a soul Forgiven!

3. "The Nucta, or Miraculous Drop, which falls in Egypt precisely on St. John's day, in June, and is supposed to

have the effect of stopping the plague." AUTHOR'S NOTE.

197. THE TURF SHALL BE MY FRAGRANT SHRINE.

The turf shall be my fragrant shrine;
My temple, Lord! that arch of thine;
My censer's breath the mountain airs,
And silent thoughts my only prayers.

My choir shall be the moonlight waves,
When murmuring homeward to their caves,
Or when the stillness of the sea,
Even more than music, breathes of Thee!

I'll seek, by day, some glade unknown,
All light and silence, like thy Throne !
And the pale stars shall be, at night,
The only eyes that watch my rite.

Thy Heaven, on which 'tis bliss to look,
Shall be my pure and shining book,
Where I shall read, in words of flame,
The glories of thy wondrous name.

I'll read thy anger in the rack'
That clouds awhile the day-beam's track;
Thy mercy in the azure hue

Of sunny brightness breaking through!

There's nothing bright, above, below,
From flowers that bloom to stars that glow,
But in its light my soul can see
Some feature of thy Deity!

There's nothing dark, below, above,
But in its gloom I trace thy Love,
And meekly wait that moment, when
Thy touch shall turn all bright again!

1. Rack: see note 18, extract 51.

Percy Bysshe Shelley. 1792-1822. (History, p. 228.)

198. To A SKYLARK.

Hail to thee, blithe spirit!

Bird thou never wert,
That from heaven, or near it,

Pourest thy full heart

In profuse strains of unpremeditated art.

Higher still and higher,

From the earth thou springest

Like a cloud of fire;

The blue deep thou wingest,

And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest.

In the golden lightning

Of the sunken sun,

O'er which clouds are bright'ning,

Thou dost float and run,

Like an unbodied 2 joy whose race is just begun.

The pale purple even

Melts around thy flight;

Like a star of heaven,

In the broad day-light

Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight.

Keen are the arrows

Of that silver sphere,

Whose intense lamp narrows

In the white dawn clear,

Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there.

1. Bird: there is reason to think that this word was once limited to the young of the feathered tribe, and so may be referred to bear. Its O. E. and M. E. forms bridd, brid, bring it very near to brood; and Shakespeare uses the phrase "cuckoo's bird" for the young of the

cuckoo. The more general term was foul, O. E. fugel, Ger. vogel.

2. Unbodied: Mr. Craik thought it probable that the poet originally wrote embodied, and that the present reading is due to a misprint.