Yet not from Israel fled the friendly light,
Or dark to them, or cheerless came the night,
Still in their van, along that dreadful road,
And every pause between, as Miriam sang,
From tribe to tribe the martial thunder rang,
And loud and far their stormy chorus spread,—
Blazed broad and fierce the brandished torch of “Shout, Israel, for the Lord hath triumphed !"
Its meteor glare a tenfold lustre gave
On the long mirror of the rosy wave:
While its blest beams a sunlike heat supply,
Warm every cheek and dance in every eye-
To them alone-for Misraim's wizard train
Invoke for light their monster-gods in vain :
Clouds heaped on clouds their struggling sight con-
fine,
And tenfold darkness broods above their line.
Yet on they fare by reckless vengeance led,
And range unconscious through the ocean's bed.
Till midway now-that strange and fiery form
Showed his dread visage lightening through the
storm;
With withering splendour blasted all their might,
And brake their chariot-wheels, and marred their
coursers' flight.
SPOKEN IN THE THEATRE, OXFORD, ON LORD GREN-
VILLE'S INSTALLATION AS CHANCELLOR,
YE viewless guardians of these sacred shades,(4)
Dear dreams of early song, Aonian maids!—
And you, illustrious dead! whose spirits speak
In every flush that tints the student's cheek,
As, wearied with the world, he seeks again
The page of better times and greater men;
If with pure worship we your steps pursue,
And youth, and health, and rest forget for you,
(Whom most we serve, to whom our lamp burns
bright
Through the long toils of not ingrateful night,)
Yet, yet be present!-Let the worldly train
Mock our cheap joys, and hate our useless strain,
"Fly, Misraim, fly!"-The ravenous floods they Intent on freighted wealth, or proud to rear
And, fiercer than the floods, the Deity.
"Fly, Misraim, fly!”—From Edom's coral strand
Again the prophet stretched his dreadful wand:-
With one wild crash the thundering waters sweep,
And all is waves-a dark and lonely deep-
Yet o'er those lonely waves such murmurs past,
As mortal wailing swelled the nightly blast:
And strange and sad the whispering breezes bore
The groans of Egypt to Arabia's shore.
Oh! welcome came the morn, where Israel stood
In trustless wonder by th' avenging flood!
Oh! welcome came the cheerful morn, to show
The drifted wreck of Zoan's pride below;
The mangled limbs of men-the broken car—
A few sad relics of a nation's war:
Alas, how few!-Then, soft as Elim's well,(3)
The precious tears of new-born freedom fell.
And he, whose hardened heart alike had borne
The house of bondage and th' oppressor's scorn,
The stubborn slave, by hope's new beams subdued,
In faltering accents sobbed his gratitude-
Till kindling into warmer zeal, around
The virgin timbrel waked its silver sound:
And in fierce joy, no more by doubt supprest,
The struggling spirit throbbed in Miriam's breast.
She, with bare arms, and fixing on the sky,
The dark transparence of her lucid eye,
The fleece Iberian or the pampered steer ;-
Let sterner science with unwearied eye
Explore the circling spheres and map the sky;
His long-drawn mole let lordly commerce scan,
And of his iron arch the rainbow span:
Yet, while, in burning characters imprest,
The poet's lesson stamps the youthful breast
Bids the rapt boy o'er suffering virtue bleed,
Adore a brave or bless a gentle deed,
And in warm feeling from the storied page
Arise the saint, the hero, or the sage;
Such be our toil!-Nor doubt we to explore
The thorny maze of dialectic lore.
To climb the chariot of the gods, or scan
The secret workings of the soul of man;
Upborne aloft on Plato's eagle flight,
Or the slow pinion of the Stagyrite.
And those gray spoils of Herculanean pride,
If aught of yet untasted sweets they hide;-
If Padua's sage be there, or art have power
To wake Menander from his secret bower.
Such be our toil!-Nor vain the labour proves,
Which Oxford honours, and which Grenville
loves!
-On, eloquent and firm!-whose warning high
Rebuked the rising surge of anarchy,
When, like those brethren stars to seamen known,
In kindred splendour Pitt and Grenville shone;
Poured on the winds of heaven her wild sweet har- On in thy glorious course! not yet the wave mony.
"Where now," she sang, "the tall Egyptian spear?
"On's sunlike shield, and Zoan's chariot, where? "Above their ranks the whelming waters spread. "Shout, Israel, for the Lord has triumphed !"
Has ceased to lash the shore, nor storm forgot to
Go on! and oh, while adverse factions raise
To thy pure worth involuntary praise;
While Gambia's swarthy tribes thy mercies bless,
And from thy counsels date their happiness;
Say, (for thine Isis yet recalls with pride
Thy youthful triumphs by her leafy side,)
Say, hast thou scorned, mid pomp, and wealth,
The sober transports of a studious hour?—
No, statesman, no!-thy patriot fire was fed
From the warm embers of the mighty dead;
And thy strong spirit's patient grasp combined
The souls of ages in a single mind.
-By arts like these, amidst a world of foes,
Eye of the earth, th' Athenian glory rose ;-
Thus, last and best of Romans, Brutus shone;
Our Somers thus, and thus our Clarendon;
Such Cobham was; such, Grenville, long be thou,
Our boast before-our chief and champion now!
AN EVENING WALK IN BENGAL.
OUR task is done! on Gunga's breast(6)
The sun is sinking down to rest;
And moored beneath the tamarind bough,
Our bark has found its harbour now.
With furled sail and painted side,
Behold the tiny frigate ride.
Upon her deck, 'mid charcoal gleams,
The Moslems' savoury supper steams,
While all apart, beneath the wood,
The Hindoo cooks his simpler food.
Come walk with me the jungle through;
If yonder hunter told us true,
Far off, in desert dank and rude,
The tiger holds his solitude;
Nor (taught by secret charm to shun
The thunders of the English gun,)
EPITAPH ON A YOUNG NAVAL OFFI-A dreadful guest but rarely seen,
Returns to scare the village green.
DESIGNED FOR A TOMB IN A SEAPORT TOWN IN Come boldly on! no venomed snake
SAILOR! if vigour nerve thy frame,
If to high deeds thy soul is strung,
Revere this stone that gives to fame
The brave, the virtuous, and the young!—(5)
For manly beauty decked his form,
His bright eye beamed with mental power; Resistless as the winter storm,
Yet mild as summer's mildest shower.
In war's hoarse rage, in ocean's strife,
For skill, for force, for mercy known;
Still prompt to shield a comrade's life,
And greatly careless of his own.—
Yet youthful seaman, mourn not thou
The fate these artless lines recall;
No, Cambrian, no, be thine the vow,
Like him to live, like him to fall!—
But hast thou known a father's care,
Who sorrowing sent thee forth to sea;
Poured for thy weal th' unceasing prayer,
And thought the sleepless night on thee?
Has e'er thy tender fancy flown,
Can shelter in so cool a brake:
Child of the sun! he loves to lie
'Mid nature's embers parched and dry,
Where o'er some tower in ruin laid,
The peepul spreads its haunted shade,
Or round a tomb his scales to wreathe,
Fit warder in the gate of death!
Come on! yet pause! behold us now
Beneath the bamboo's arched bough,
Where gemming oft that sacred gloom,
Glows the geranium's scarlet bloom,
And winds our path through many a bower
Of fragrant tree and giant flower;
The ceiba's crimson pomp displayed
O'er the broad plaintain's humbler shade,
And dusk anana's prickly blade;
While o'er the brake, so wild and fair,
The betel waves his crest in air.
With pendent train and rushing wings,
Aloft the gorgeous peacock springs;
And he, the bird of hundred dyes,(7)
Whose plumes the dames of Ava prize.
So rich a shade, so green a sod,
Our English fairies never trod;
Yet who in Indian bower has stood,
But thought on England's "good green
When winds were strong and waves were high, And blessed beneath the palmy shade,
Where, listening to the tempest's moan,
Thy sisters heaved the anxious sigh?
Or, in the darkest hour of dread,
Mid war's wild din, and ocean's swell,
Hast mourned a hero brother dead,
And did that brother love thee well?
Then pity those whose sorrows flow
In vain o'er Shipley's empty grave!—
-Sailor, thou weep'st:-Indulge thy wo;
Such tears will not disgrace the brave!—
Her hazel and her hawthorn glade,
And breathed a prayer, (how oft in vain!)
To gaze upon her oaks again?
A truce to thought! the jackal's cry
Resounds like sylvan revelry;
And through the trees, yon failing ray
Will scantly serve to guide our way.
Yet, mark! as fade the upper skies,
Each thicket opes ten thousand eyes.
Before, beside us, and above,
The fire-fly lights his lamp of love,
Retreating, chasing, sinking, soaring,
The darkness of the copse exploring;
While to this cooler air confest,
The broad Dhatura bares her breast,
Of fragrant scent, and virgin white,
A pearl around the locks of night!
Still as we pass in softened hum,
Along the breezy valleys come
The village song, the horn, the drum.
Still as we pass, from bush and briar,
The shrill cigala strikes his lyre;
And, what is she whose liquid strain
Thrills through yon copse of sugar-cane?
I know that soul-entrancing swell!
It is, it must be,-Philomel!
Enough, enough, the rustling trees
Announce a shower upon the breeze,-
The flashes of the summer sky
Assume a deeper, ruddier dye;
Yon lamp that trembles on the stream,
From forth our cabin sheds its beam;
And we must early sleep to find
Betimes the morning's healthy wind.
But O! with thankful hearts confess,
Ev'n here there may be happiness;
And HE, the bounteous Sire, has given
His peace on earth, his hope of heaven!
LINES WRITTEN TO HIS WIFE,
WHILE ON A VISIT TO UPPER INDIA.
Ir thou wert by my side, my love!
How fast would evening fail
In green Bengala's palmy grove,
Listening the nightingale!
If thou, my love! wert by my side,
My babies at my knee,
How gaily would our pinnace glide
O'er Gunga's mimic sea!
I miss thee at the dawning gray,
When, on our deck reclined,
In careless ease my limbs I lay,
And woo the cooler wind.
I miss thee when by Gunga's stream
My twilight steps I guide,
But most beneath the lamp's pale beam,
I miss thee from my side.
I spread my books, my pencil try,
The lingering noon to cheer,
But miss thy kind approving eye
Thy meek attentive ear.
But when of morn and eve the star
Beholds me on my knee,
I feel, though thou art distant far,
Thy prayers ascend for me.
Then on! Then on! where duty leads,
My course be onward still,
On broad Hindostan's sultry meads,
O'er black Almorah's hill.
That course, nor Delhi's kingly gates,
Nor mild Malwah-detain,
For sweet the bliss us both awaits,
By yonder western main.
Thy towers, Bombay, gleam bright, they say,
Across the dark blue sea,
But never were hearts so light and gay,
As then shall meet in thee!
ONE morning in the month of May,
I wandered o'er the hill;
Though nature all around was gay,
My heart was heavy still.
Can God, I thought, the just, the great,
These meaner creatures bless,
And yet deny to man's estate
The boon of happiness?
Tell me, ye woods, ye smiling plains,
Ye blessed birds around,
In which of nature's wide domains
Can bliss for man be found.
The birds wild carolled over head,
The breeze around me blew,
And nature's awful chorus said-
No bliss for man she knew.
I questioned love, whose early ray,
So rosy bright appears,
And heard the timid genius say
His light was dimmed by tears.
I questioned friendship: Friendship sighed,
And thus her answer gave-
The few whom fortune never tried
Were withered in the grave!
I asked if vice could bliss bestow?
Vice boasted loud and well,
But fading from her withered brow,
The borrowed roses fell.
I sought of feeling, if her skill
Could sooth the wounded breast;
And found her mourning, faint and still,
For others' woes distressed!
I questioned virtue: virtue sighed,
No boon could she dispense-
Nor virtue was her name, she cried
But humble penitence.
I questioned death-the grisly shade
Relaxed his brow severeAnd "I am happiness," he said, "If Virtue guides thee here."
When fettered by a viewless chain, We turn and gaze, and turn again, Oh! death were mercy to the pain Of them that bid farewell!
THE MOONLIGHT MARCH.
I SEE them on their winding way,
About their ranks the moonbeams play;
Their lofty deeds and daring high
Blend with the notes of victory.
And waving arms, and banners bright,
Are glancing in the mellow light:
They're lost-and gone, the moon is past,
The wood's dark shade is o'er them cast;
And fainter, fainter, fainter still
The march is rising o'er the hill.
Again, again, the pealing drum,
The clashing horn-they come, they come;
Through rocky pass, o'er wooded steep
In long and glittering files they sweep.
And nearer, nearer, yet more near,
Their softened chorus meets the ear;
Forth, forth, and meet them on their way;
The trampling hoofs brook no delay;
With thrilling fife and pealing drum,
And clashing horn, they come, they come.
GOD that madest Earth and Heaven, Darkness and light!
Who the day for toil hast given,
For rest the night!
May thine angel guards defend us, Slumber sweet thy mercy send us, Holy dreams and hopes attend us, This livelong night!
TO LIEUTENANT-GENERAL, SIR
ROWLAND HILL, K. B.
HILL! whose high daring with renewed success
Hath cheered our tardy war, what time the cloud
Of expectation, dark and comfortless,
Hung on the mountains; and yon factious crowd
Blasphemed their country's valour, babbling loud!
Then was thine arm revealed, to whose young
might,
By Toulon's leaguered wall, the fiercest bowed
Whom Egypt honoured, and the dubious fight
Of sad Corunna's winter, and more bright
Douro, and Talavera's gory bays;
Wise, modest, brave, in danger foremost found.-
O still, young warrior, may thy toil-earned praise,
With England's love, and England's honour
Gild with delight thy Father's latter days!
And "Here Secunder (10) sleeps," she cried;-him to content himself with the composition of an"this is his rival's stone; other. Of this diffidence his friends have reason to complain, as it suppressed some elegant lines of his own on the same occasion.
And here the mighty chief reclines who reared the Median throne.(11)
Inquire of these, doth aught of all their ancient pomp remain,
Save late regret, and bitter tears for ever, and in vain?
Return, return, and in thy heart engraven keep my lore;
The lesser wealth, the lighter load,-small blame betides the poor."
Note 1, page 38, col. 2.
Siwah.
Oasis. Sennaar.-Meroe.
Note 2, page 38, col. 2.
Shangalla.
The black tribes whom Bruce considers as the aboriginal Nubians, are so called. For their gigantic stature, and their custom of ornamenting themselves and their houses with the spoils of the elephant, see the account he gives of the person and residence of one of their chiefs whom he visited on his departure from Ras el Feel.
The emerald, or whatever the ancients dignified by the name of smaragdus, is said to have been found in great quantities in the mountain now called Gebul Zumrud (the mount of emeralds.)
It is interesting to observe with what pleasure and minuteness Moses, amid the Arabian wilderness, enumerates the "twelve wells of water," and the "threescore and ten palm-trees," of Elim.
Ye viewless guardians of these sacred shades. These lines were spoken (as is the custom of the university on the installation of a new chancellor) by a young nobleman, whose diffidence induced
The brave, the virtuous, and the young. Captain Conway Shipley, third son to the dean of St. Asaph, perished in an attempt to cut out an enemy's vessel from the Tagus with the boats of his majesty's frigate La Nymphe, April 22, 1808, in the 26th year of his age, and after nearly sixteen years of actual service; distinguished by every quality both of heart and head which could adorn a man or an officer. Admiral Sir Charles Cotton, and the captains of his fleet, have since erected a monument to his memory in the neighbourhood of Fort St. Julian.
Note 7, page 40, col. 2.
On Gunga's breast.
These lines were written at a small village on the banks of the Ganges, which he was ascending in a pinnace, on his first visitation of his diocese, in August, 1824.
Note 8, page 40, col. 2.
The bird of hundred dyes.
"The Mucharunga-many coloured. I learned at Dacca, that while we were at peace with the Burmans, many traders used to go over all the tiful birds for the Golden Zennanah; at Ummeraeastern provinces of Bengal, buying up these beaupoora it was said that they were sometimes worth a gold mohur each."
Note 9, page 42, col. 2.
The land of Room.
The oriental name of the Turkish Empire.
Note 10, page 43, col..1.
Note 11, page 43, col. 1.
The mighty Chief who reared the Median throne.
The founder of the Median throne was KyKaoos, or Deiioces.
THE END OF HEBER'S POEMS.
|