DERWENT-WATER AND SKIDDAW.
DEEP stillness lies upon this lovely lake.
The air is calm: the forest trees are still:
The river windeth without noise, and here
The fall of fountains comes not, nor the sound
Of the white cataract Lodore: The voice-
The mighty mountain voice-itself is dumb.
Only, far distant and scarce heard, the dash
Of waters, broken by some boatman's oar,
Disturbs the golden calm, monotony.
The earth seems quiet, like some docile thing
Obeying the blue beauty of the skies;
And the soft air, through which the tempest ran
So lately in its speed, rebels no more:
The clouds are gone which but this morning gloomed
Round the great Skiddaw; and he, wide revealed,
Outdurer of the storms, now sleeps secure
Beneath the watching of the holy moon.
But a few hours ago and sounds were heard
Through all the region: Rain and the white hail sang
Amongst the branches, and this placid lake
Teased into mutiny: its waves (these waves
That lie like shining silver motionless)
Then shamed their gentle natures, and rose up
Lashing their guardian banks, and, with wild cries
Complaining, called to all the echoes round,
And answered rudely the rude winds, which then
Cast discord in the waters, until they
Amongst themselves waged wild and glittering war.
Oh! could imagination now assume
The powers it lavished in the by-gone days
On Fauns and Naiads, or in later times
Village religion or wild fable flung
O'er sylphs and gnomes and fairies, fancies strange,
Here would I now compel to re-appear
Before me, here, upon the moon-lit grass,
Titania, blue-eyed queen, brightest and first
Of all the shapes which trod the emerald rings
At midnight, or beneath the stars drank merrily
The wild-rose dews, or framed their potent charms:
And here should princely Oberon, sad no more,
Be seen low whispering in his beauty's ear,
While round about their throne the fays should dance;
Others the while, tending that peerless pair,
Should fill with odorous juices cups of flowers.-
Here yet not so: from out thy watery home,
Deep sunk beneath all storms and billows, thou
Should'st not be torn :-Sleep in thy coral cave,
Lonely and unalarmed, for ever sleep,
White Galatea !—for thou wast indeed
The fairest among all the forms which left
Their haunts, the gentle air, or ocean wide,
River, or fount, or forest,-to bestow
High love on man ;-but, rather let me now
From these so witching fancies turn away,
Lest I, beguiled too far, forget the scene
Before me, bright as aught in fairy land.
Skiddaw! Eternal mountain, hast thou been
Rocked to thy slumber by the howling winds,
Or has the thunder or the lightnings blue
Scared thee to quiet?-To the sounding blast
Thou gavest answer, and when thou didst dash
The white hail in its puny rage aside,
Thou wast not dumb, nor to the rains when they
Ran trembling from thee:-me thou answerest not.
Art thou indignant then, or hear I not?
Or, like the double-visaged god who sate
Within the Roman temples, dost thou keep
High watch above the northern floods to warn
Lone ships from erring, while thy southern front
Is sealed in sleep?-Thy lofty head has long
Stood up an everlasting mark to all
Who wander: haply now some wretch, whose bark
Has drifted from its path since set of sun,
Beholds thee shine, and kneeling pours his soul
In thanks to heaven, or towards his cottage home
Shouts amidst tears, or laughter sad as tears.
-And shall I, while these things may be, complain?
Never in silence as in sound thou art
A thing of grandeur; and throughout the year
Thy high protecting presence (let not this
Be forgot ever) turns aside the winds
Which else might kill the flowers of this sweet vale. London Magazine.
THOU art looking on the face of night, my love!
Is not yon evening star bright, my love?
Methinks it is
A world of bliss
For spirits all softness and light, my love!
This earth is so chilled with care, my dear!
Would we might wing our flight there, my dear!
For love to blaze
With the cloudless rays
It would have in a world so fair, my dear!
But my wish to visit that star, dear love!
Is vain as my other hopes are, dear love!
For my heart's wild sigh
Breathes with thee like that planet afar, dear love!
TWINE not those roses red for me,-
Darker and sadder my wreath must be;
Mine is of flowers unkissed by the sun,
Flowers that died as the Spring begun.
The blighted leaf and the cankered stem
Are what should form my diadem.
Take that rose-it is nipt by the blast;
That lily-the blight has over it past;
That peach-bud-a worm has gnawed it away;
Those violets they were culled yesterday :
Bind them with leaves from the dark yew tree,
Then come and offer the wreath to me.
Let every flower be a flower of Spring,
But on each be a sign of withering;
Suited to me is the drooping wreath,
With colourless hues and scentless breath;
Seek ye not buds of brighter bloom,
Why should their beauty waste on the tomb?
I am too young for death, you say:
Fall not and fade not the green leaves in May ? Does not the rose in its light depart?
Needs there long life to break the heart?
I have felt the breath of the deadly power,My summons is come, and I know mine hour!
There came a voice to my sleeping ear,
With words of sorrow and words of fear,
Its sound was the roll of the mountain wave,
Its breath was damp as an opening grave;
My heart grew colder at every word,
For I knew 'twas the voice of death I heard!
It summoned me, and I wept to die,-
Oh, fair is life to the youthful eye!
Time may come with his shadowy wing,
But who can think on Autumn in Spring?
With so much of hope, and of light, and of bloom, Marvel ye that I shrunk from my doom?
My tears are past,-the grave will be
Like a home and a haven, welcome to me!
I have marked the fairest of hopes decay,
Have seen love pass like a cloud away,
Seen bloom and sweet feelings waste to a sigh,
Till my heart has sickened and wished to die.
Falling to earth like a shower of light,
Yon ash tree is losing its blossoms of white;
Ere its green berries are coloured with red,
I shall be numbered amid the dead.
The buds that are falling in dust will lie
A prey for the worms, and soon shall I !
Be my tomb in the green grass made,
There let no white tombstone be laid;
All my monument shall be
A lonely and bending cypress tree,
Drooping-just such as should lean above
One who lived and who died for love!
Literary Gazette.
'DE mortuis nil nisi bonum ;'
If I had virtues kindly own 'em-
As human nature still is frail,
Spread o'er my faults Oblivion's veil,
Remembering this command from heaven,
Forget, forgive, and be forgiven.
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