Again a mother's sigh of pain she hears,And starts—till lo, the spell dissolves in tears!
Tears that too well the faithful grief reveal,
Which smiles, by day made duties, would conceal.
VI.
It was a noon of summer in its glow,
And all was life, but London's life, below;
As by the open casement half reclined
Calantha's languid form;—a gentle wind
Brought to her cheek a bloom unwonted there,
And stirr'd the light wave of the golden hair.
Hers was a beauty that made sad the eye,
Lovely in fading, like a twilight sky;
The shape so finely, delicately frail,
As form'd for climes unruffled by a gale;
The lustrous eye, through which looks forth the soul,
Bright and more brightly as it nears the goal;
The fever'd counterfeit of healthful bloom,
The rose so living yet so near the tomb;
The veil the Funeral Genius lends his bride,
When, fair as Love, he steals her to his side,
And leads her on till at the nuptial porch,
He murmurs, "Know me now!" and lowers the torch.
What made more sad the outward form's decay,
A soul of genius glimmer'd through the clay;
Oft through the languor of disease would break
That life of light Parnassian dreamers seek;
And music trembled on each aspen leaf
Of the boughs drooping o'er the fount of grief.
Genius has so much youth no care can kill;
Death seems unnatural when it sighs—"Be still."
That wealth, which Nature prodigally gave,
Shall Life but garner for its heir the Grave?
What noble hearts that treasure might have bless'd!
How large the realm that mind should have possess'd!
Love in the wife, and wisdom in the friend,
And earnest purpose for a generous end,
And glowing sympathy for thoughts of power
And playful fancy for the lighter hour;
All lost, all cavern'd in the sunless gloom
Of some dark memory, beetling o'er the tomb;—
Like bright-wing'd fairies, whom the hostile gnome
Has spell'd and dungeon'd in his rocky home,
The wanderer hears the solitary moan,
Nor dreams the fairy in the sullen stone.
Contrasting this worn frame and weary breast,
Fresh as a morn of April bloom'd the guest:
April has tears, and mists the morn array;
The mists foretell the sun—the tears the May.
Lo, as from care to care the soother glides,
How the home brightens where the heart presides!
Now hovering, bird-like, o'er the flowers—at times
Pausing to chant Calantha's favourite rhymes,
Or smooth the uneasy pillow with light hand;
Or watch the eye, forestalling the demand,
Complete in every heavenly art—above
All, save the genius of inventive love.
The window open'd on that breadth of green,
To half the pomp of elder days the scene.
Gaze to thy left—there the Plantagenet
Look'd on the lists for Norman knighthood set;[E] Bright issued forth, where yonder archway glooms, Banner and trump, and steed, and waves of plumes, As with light heart rides wanton Anne to brave Tudor's grim love, the purple and the grave. Gaze to the right, where now—neat, white, and low, The modest Palace looks like Brunswick Row;[F] There, echoed once the merriest orgies known, Since the frank Norman won grave Harold's throne; There, bloom'd the mulberry groves, beneath whose shade His easy loves the royal Rowley made; Where Villiers flaunted, and where Sedley sung, And wit's loose diamonds dropp'd from Wilmot's tongue! All at rest now—all dust!—wave flows on wave; But the sea dries not!—what to us the grave? It brings no real homily, we sigh, Pause for awhile and murmur, "All must die!" Then rush to pleasure, action, sin once more, Swell the loud tide, and fret unto the shore.
And o'er the altered scene Calantha's eye
Roves listless—yet Time's Great the passers by!
Along the road still fleet the men whose names
Live in the talk the moment's glory claims.
There, for the hot Pancratia of Debate
Pass the keen wrestlers for that palm—the State.
Now, "on his humble but his faithful steed,"
Sir Robert rides—he never rides at speed—
Careful his seat, and circumspect his gaze;
And still the cautious trot the cautious mind betrays.
Wise is thy heed!—how stout soe'er his back,
Thy weight has oft proved fatal to thy hack![G] Next, with loose rein and careless canter view Our man of men, the Prince of Waterloo; O'er the firm brow the hat as firmly press'd, The firm shape rigid in the button'd vest; Within—the iron which the fire has proved, And the close Sparta of a mind unmoved!
Not his the wealth to some large natures lent,
Divinely lavish, even where misspent,
That liberal sunshine of exuberant soul,
Thought, sense,
