^li 
 
 ^iDmRD-LITERTsprUI? 
 
 UC-NRLF 
 
 B 3 3m Tbb 
 
 f: ^<« 
 
 m. PKISONER GF ChILLON 
 
 AND OTHER FOEMS 
 
 BYRO 
 
 
 —jbt't "rrTTii T i ir iMM l u ii m n \ ■ h u b 
 
-'^ UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION 
 
 GIFT OF THE PUBLISHER 
 
 ^^. ^3 3 Received / ^ ^^^ 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 University of California. 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 Class 
 
 I 
 
Digitized by tine Internet Archive 
 
 in 2008 witii funding from 
 
 IVIicrosoft Corporation 
 
 http://www.arcliive.org/details/cliilloOOprisonerofbyroricli 
 
STANDARD LITERATURE SERIES 
 
 THE PRISONER OF CHILLON 
 
 WITH SEIiECTIONS FROM 
 
 CHILDE HAROLD AXD MAZEPPA 
 
 LORD BYRON 
 
 WITH INTRODUCTORY AND EXPLANATORY NOTES 
 
 r , . ',> T , 
 
 
 NEW YORK AND NEW ORLEANS 
 UNIVERSITY PUBLISHING COMPANY 
 
 1896 
 
COPYKIGHT, 1S96, BY 
 
 UNIVERSITY PUBLISHING COMPANY 
 
 ♦** 1752 
 
 
 , It cf< <CCIC ' ' c 
 
 Press of .r. .1. Little & Co. 
 Astor Place, New York 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 (George Gordon Xoel Byrox was born in London on January 22. 
 1788. JHis father was John Byron, a captain in the British army, and 
 nephew of Lord William Byron of Xewstead Abbey, Nottingham, Eng- 
 land. His mother was Catherine Gordon, daughter of George Gordon, a 
 gentleman of high family and considerable landed estate in Aberdeen- 
 shire. Scotland. Captain Byron was a man of disreputable character 
 and extravagant habits. He squandered nearly all iiis wife's means, and 
 when he died in 1792 there was but a small income left to support the 
 widow and her infant child, then living in the city of Aberdeen. \ 
 
 Lord William Byron died in 1798. -As he had no children;ji><§ pro- 
 perty .and title descended to his grandnephew, George, who thus at the 
 age of ten years became Lord Byron. The mother and son then removed 
 to Newstead, the ancient home of the Byrons. and soon afterwards the 
 young lord was sent to the famous school of Harrow, and subsequently 
 to Trinity College, Cambridge. To his mother's injudjcioiis indulgence 
 has been partly attributed the waywardness that marked his subsequent 
 career. 
 
 Lord Byron was not what would be called a good student. At Harrow, 
 as he tells us himself, he was "always cricketing, rebelling, fighting, 
 and in all manner of mischiefs." But though he neglected his class 
 studies, he was a great reader of books, particularly books of history, 
 biography, poetry, and fiction. Before he was fifteen years of age he 
 had read histories of all the principal countries of the world, lives of 
 most of the celebrated men of ancient and modern times, and nearly all 
 the British poets. To this early and extensive study of English writers, 
 as one of his biographers remarks, may be attributed that mastery over 
 his own language with which Lord Byron came equipped into the field 
 of literature, and which enabled him as fast as his youthful fancies 
 sprung up to clothe them in words worthy of their beauty. 
 I Byron began writing poetry at the age of twelve, and at the age of 
 nTiieteen he published a collection of his verses under the title, "Hours 
 of Idleness.") These youthful productions, not of very high merit, were 
 severely criticised by the "Edinburgh Review."' Byron replied in the 
 "English Bards and Scotch Reviewers," in which he fiercely attacked 
 
 221867 
 
4 INTRODrCTION. 
 
 iiol only llio oditors of llic " Review" bul many of the liest known liter- 
 jiry men of the country. Soon iiiter the- publication of this poem he left 
 Kni^land on a travelling tour, during which he visited Portugal and 
 Spain, Greece, Turkey, and Asia Minor. One of the events of the tour 
 was the famous swim across tiie Hellespont, from Scstos on the European 
 lo Abydos on the Asiatic side, a feat which liyrou himself thus mentions 
 in a letter to a frien<l in Kuglaud : 
 
 ''This morning [^lay 8, 1810] I swam from Sestos to Abydos. The 
 immediate distance is not above a mile, but the current renders it 
 hazardous. 1 attempted it a week ago, and failed, owing to the north 
 vvind and the wonderful rapidity of the tide, though I have been from 
 my childhood a strong swimmer. Hut tliis morning being calmer, I 
 succeeded, and crossed the 'broad Hellespont' in an hour and ten 
 linutes." 
 
 Shortly after his return to England he published the firj^t two cantos 
 of " Childe Harold," which he had written while abroad. KThc work was 
 received with universal applause, and Byron was at once recognized as 
 a poet of the first rank. "I woke one morning," says he in his memo- 
 randa, "and found myself famous.^ 
 
 Within the next two years he wrote "The Giaour," "The Bride of 
 Abydos," " The Corsair," and " Lr^ra/' brilliant poems, containing many 
 vivid pictures of scenes of beauty with which the author had become 
 familiar during his travels in the East. About this time (1815) the poet 
 married Miss Milbaiike, a lady of rank and fortune, daughter of Sir 
 ^^TTaTph Milbanke. The union was brief and unhappy. One year after 
 their marriage they separated, and Byron left England never to return. 
 
 The remainder of the poet's life was spent chiefly in Switzerland and 
 Italy, amid those beauties of nature and art which he describes so well 
 in his poems. His industry in literary work during these years (from 
 1816 to 1823) was remarkable. Besides completing " Childe Harold," he 
 produced a great number of poems, translations, and plays, including 
 " The Prisoner of Chillon," "Manfred," " Beppo," " Mazeppa," "The 
 Lament of Tasso," " Sardanapalus," '* The Vision of Judgment," 
 '•Heaven and Earth," " Cam," " Werner," "The Island," " Don Juan," 
 and several others. 
 
 / Byron was an ardent lover of liberty, and it was this passion which led 
 nim into the enterpi'ise that- cost liim his life. In 1828 he sailed to Greece 
 ^a4oin the jjatriots there who were at the time engaged in a struggle to 
 free their country from the oppressive rule of Turkey, to whicli it had 
 been subject since the fifteenth century, when the Turks, or Ottomans, 
 a warlike people of Asia, led by their King, or Sultan, Mohammed II., 
 
IXTRODUCTIOX. 5 
 
 besieged and captured Constantinople, conquered a great part of south- 
 eastern Europe, including the countries now known as Turkey and Greece. 
 The Greeks made many attempts to shake off the yoke of Turkey, 
 With the aid of Russia, France, and England they succeeded in 1828, 
 and since 1832 their country has been an independent kingdom. The 
 action of Lord Byron had much to do in arousing European and Amer- 
 ican sympathy in their behalf! He flung himself into the movement with 
 the enthusiasm of a generous^ nature, giving a large sum of money, as 
 well as his personal service, in aid of the cause of Greek independence. 
 But he did not live to witness its success. A severe cold, contracted 
 through exposure to rain, brought on an attack of fever and rheumatism, 
 of which he died at Missolonghi, Greece, on April 19, 1824, speaking in 
 his last moments of his wife and only child, a daughter whom he tenderly 
 loved. His body was conveyed to England, and interred in the family 
 
 . /<^ult in the church of Hucknall, near Xewstead.) 
 
 ^"-^yron was a man of hot and violent temper^^yhich was aggravated by 
 domestic troubles, as well as by physical infirmity, an accident at his 
 birth having injured one of his feet and caused lameness for life. The 
 effect on his mind and character of these and other unfavorable circum- 
 stances is manifest in much of his writing. Still more, however, are the 
 noble qualities of the man shown forth in his works — his affectionate 
 nature, his hatred of wrong, his love of rigJit and justice, and his sym- 
 pathy with the oppressed in every land. 
 
 ^^-O 
 
The Prisoner op Chillon . .7 
 
 Mazeppa 21 
 
 Childe Harold 45 
 
THE PRISOJsTER OF CHILLO:^. 
 
 A FABLE. 
 
 SOXXET ON CHILLOX. 
 
 Eternal Spirit of the cliainless Mind I 
 Brightest in dungeons, Liberty I thoa art, 
 For there thy habitation is the heart — 
 
 The heart which love of thee alone can bind ; 
 
 And when thy sons to fetters are consigned — ^ 
 To fetters, and the damp vault's dayless gloom, c 
 Their country conquers with their martyrdom, c_ 
 
 And Freedom's fame finds wings on every wind. ^ 
 
 Chillon I thy prison is a holy place, 
 
 And thy sad floor an altar — for 'twas trod, 
 
 Until his very steps have left a trace, 
 
 ^ Worn, as if thy cold pavement were a sod, 
 
 By Bonniyard I ' May none those marks efface ! 
 For they appeal from tyranny to God. 
 
 Byron wrote this poem in 1S16, at a small inn. in the village of Ouchy. near Lausanne, 
 a citv of Switzerland, on the shore of Lake Geneva (also called Lake Leman) The 
 ca«tle and fortress of Chillon. which was for a long time a state prison, is at the east 
 end of the lake It is situated on a rock which is almost entirely surrounded by deep 
 water and connected with the shore by a wooden bridge. The prisoners introduced in 
 the posm are fictitious persons, sugsrested to the imagination of the poet by the appear- 
 ance of the isolated castle, and no doubt by his reading of the suflferings to which many 
 people were subjected for their religious opinions in past times when the principle of 
 liberty of conscience was little understood or respected. 
 
 1. v^ 
 
 My hair is gray, but not with years, 
 
 Nor grew it white 
 
 In a single night. 
 As men's have grown from sudden fears : 
 
 1 FranQois de Bonnivard (born 1496) was the patriot defender of the Republic of Gen- 
 eva (Switzerland) against the Duke of Savoy, who imprisoned him for six years in the 
 Castle of Chillon, the last four in that subterranean vault which the genius of Byron has 
 made famous. j i o. » •» « » b'. *'* 
 
8 TUK PRISONEU OF CHILLON. 
 
 My linihs arc bowM, thougli not witli toil. 
 
 But rusted with a vile repose, 
 For they liave been a dungeoii^s spoil ; 
 
 And mine has been the fate of tliose 
 'I'o wlioni the goodly earth and air 
 Are bann'd, and barr'd — forbidden fare ; 
 But this was for my father's faith : 
 I sufl'er'd chains and courted death : 
 That father perish^ at the stake * 
 For tenets'^ he would not forsake ; 
 And for the same his lineal race 
 In darkness found a dwelling place. 
 AVe were seven — who now are one ; 
 
 Six in youth, and one in age, 
 Finished as they had begun, 
 
 Proud of Persecution's rage ; 
 One in fire, and two in field/ 
 Their belief with blood have seal'd ; 
 Dying as their father died. 
 For the God their foes denied : 
 Three were in a dungeon cast. 
 Of whom this wreck * is left the last. jicrf^ 
 
 II. OYYlA 
 
 Tiiere are seven pillars of Gothic mold * 
 In Chillon's dungeons deep and old ; 
 There are seven columns, massy and gray. 
 Dim with a dull imprison'd ray, 
 A sunbeam which hath lost its w^ay. 
 And through the crevice and the cleft 
 Of tlie thick wall is fallen and left, 
 
 ' tlip piece of wood 1o which a person condemned to dcalh by firo wap bound while 
 burning. 
 
 2 religions opinions. ' flic l)af Ue-field. 
 
 * Uic prisoner. ^ in llie rjothi^.stlyle'-with pointed arches. 
 
 c, t , t c 
 
THE PEISOXER OF CHILLOX. 
 
 Creeping o^er the floor so damp. 
 Like a marsh's meteor lamp : * 
 And in each pillar there is a ring, 
 
 And in each ring there is a chain ; 
 That iron is a cankering thing, 
 
 For in these limbs its teeth remain, 
 With marks that will not wear away. 
 Till I have done with th is new da y. 
 Which now is painfnl to these eyes, 
 Which have not seen the snn so rise 
 For years — I cannot count them o'er, 
 I lost their long and heayx-score, 
 When my last brother droop'd and died, 
 And I lay living by his side. 
 
 ' III. y>-^ 
 
 They chain'd us each to a column stone^ 
 And we were three — yet, each alone ; 
 We could not move a single pace. 
 We could not see eacli other's face, 
 But with that pale and livid light 
 That made us strano-ers in our sisfht : 
 And thus together, yet apart — 
 Fetter'd in hand, but joined in heart — 
 'Twas still some solace, in the deartli 
 Of the pure elements of earth. 
 To hearken to each other's speech. 
 And each turn comforter to each. 
 With some new hope, or legend old. 
 Or song heroically bold ; 
 But even these at length grew cold. 
 Our voices took a dreary tone. 
 An echo of the dungeon-stone, 
 
 1 the phosphonis that shines from a marsh, jjopularly called " will-o'-the-wisp." 
 
10 THK PRISONER OF CHILLON. 
 
 A gniliiig souiul— nut I'lill iuid free 
 As they of yore were wont to be : 
 It might be fancy — but to nie » 
 
 They never sounded like our own. 
 
 IV. ^ 
 
 I was tlie eldest of the three, 
 
 And to uphold and cheer the rest 
 \ ought to do — and did my best — 
 And each did well in his degree. 
 
 The youngest, whom my father loved. 
 Because our mother's brow was given 
 To him,' with eyes as blue as heaven. 
 For him my soul was sorely moved : 
 And truly might it be distrest 
 To see such bird in such a nest ; 
 For he was beautiful as day — 
 (When day \vas,beautiful to me 
 As tn voung eagles, being free) — 
 A polar day, which will not sqcY 
 A sunset till its summer's gone,V 
 
 Its sleepless summer of long light. 
 The snow-clad offs2:>ring of the sun : 
 
 And thus he Avas as pure and bright. 
 And in his natural spirit gay, 
 With tears for nought but others' ills, • 
 And then they flow'd like mountain rills, 
 ITnless he could assuaa^e the woe ' • ' 
 
 Which he abhorr'd to view below. 
 
 V. 
 
 / 
 
 The other was as pure of mind, 
 
 But formM to combat with his kind ; 
 
 ' he resembled his mother in face. 
 
 2 at the poles theeuu never sets during tlie summer months. 
 
THE PRISONER OF CHILLOX. 11 
 
 Strong in his frame, and of a mood 
 \Yhich 'gainst the world in war had stood/ 
 And perish'd in the foremost rank 
 
 AVith joy : — but not in chains to pine; 
 His spirit wither'd with tlieir cUmk, 
 
 I saw it silently decline — 
 
 And so ]3erchance in sooth did mine; 
 But yet I forced it on to cheer 
 Those relics of a home so dear. 
 He was a hunter of the hills, 
 
 Had followed there the deer and wolf: 
 
 To him this dungeon was a gulf. 
 And fetter'd feet the worst of ills. ^rL^ ' 
 
 Lake Leman lies by Chillon's walls : 
 A thousand feet in depth below 
 Its massy waters meet and flow; 
 Thus much the fathom -line was sent 
 Erom Chillon's snow-white battlement, 
 
 Which round about the wave enthralls 
 A double dungeon wall and wave 
 Have made — and like a livino- orrave. 
 Below the surface of the lake 
 The dark vault lies wherein we lay. 
 We heard it ripple night and day ; 
 Sounding o'er our heads it knock 'd ; 
 And I have felt the winter's spray 
 Wash through the bars when winds were high 
 And wanton^ in the happy sky. 
 
 And then the very rock hath rock'd, 
 
 And I have felt it shake, unshock'd, 
 Because I could have smiled to see 
 The death that would have set me free. 
 
 1 would gladly have stood. ^ blowing freely without conetraint. 
 
12 THE PRISONER OF CHILLON. 
 
 VI r. 
 
 I said my nearer brother pined, 
 I said his miglity heart declined, 
 lie loathed and put away his food; 
 It was not that *twas coarse and rude. 
 For we were used to hunter's fare. 
 And for the like liad little care; 
 The milk drawn from the mountain goat 
 Was changed for waiter from the moat. 
 Our bread was such as captives^ tears 
 Have moistened many a thousand years. 
 Since man first pent his fellow-men 
 Like brutes within an iron den: 
 But what were these to us or him? 
 These wasted not his heart or limb; 
 I^Iy brother's soul was of that mold 
 Which in a joalace had grown cold, 
 Had his free breathinsr been denied 
 The range of the steep mountain's side; 
 But why delay the truth? — he died. 
 I saw, and could not hold his head, 
 Kor reach his dying hand- — nor dead. 
 Though hard I strove, but strove in vain. 
 To rend and gnash my bonds in twain. 
 He died — and they unlocked his chain 
 And scoo23'd for him a shallow grave 
 Even from the cold earth of our cave. 
 I begg'd them, as a boon, to lay 
 His corse in dust whereon the day 
 Might shine — it was a foolish thought. 
 But then within my brain it wrought. 
 That even in death his freeborn breast 
 In such a dungeon could not rest. 
 I might have spared my Idle prayer — 
 They coldly laughed — and laid him there. 
 
THE PRISOXER OF CIIILLOX. 13 
 
 The flat and turfless eartli above 
 The being we so much did love ; 
 His empty chain above it leant 
 Such murders fitting monument! 
 
 vrii. .'^^-"^ 
 
 But he, the favorite and the flower. 
 
 Most cherish 'd since his natal hour/ 
 
 His mother's image in fair face. 
 
 The infant love of all his race. 
 
 His martyr'd father's dearest thought. 
 
 My latest care, for whom I sought 
 
 To hoard mv life, that his miorht be 
 
 Less wretched now, and one day free; 
 
 He, too, who yet had held untired 
 
 A spirit natural or inspired — 
 
 He, too, was struck, and day by day. 
 
 Was withei-^d on the stalk awav./ 
 
 Oh God I it is a fearful thing 
 
 To see the human soul take wingf 
 
 In any shape, in any mood: 
 
 I've seen it rushing forth in blood, 
 
 I've seen it on the breaking ocean 
 
 Strive with a swoln convulsive motion, 
 
 I've seen the sick and ghastly bed 
 
 Of Sin delirious with its dread: 
 
 But these were horrors — this was woe 
 
 Unmix'd with such — but sure and slow: 
 
 He faded, and so calm and meek. 
 
 So softly worn, so sweetly weak. 
 
 So tearless, yet so tender — kind. 
 
 And grieved for those he }elt behind; 
 
 "With all the while a cheek whose bloom 
 
 Was as a mockery of the tomb, 
 
 ^ hour of birth. 
 
14 THE PRISONER OF CHILLOX. 
 
 W liosL' lints as gently sunk iiwiiy 
 
 As a departing rainbow's ray — 
 
 An eye of jnost transparent light, 
 
 That almost made the dungeon briirht. 
 
 And not a word of murmur — not 
 
 A groan o'er his untimely lot, — 
 
 A little talk of better days, 
 
 A little hope my own to raise. 
 
 For I was sunk in silence — lost 
 
 In this last loss, of all the most; 
 
 And then the sighs he would suppress 
 
 Of fainting nature's feebleness. 
 
 More slowly drawn, grew less and less; 
 
 I listened, but I could not hear — 
 
 I caird, for I was wild with fear; ■ 
 
 I knew 'twas hopeless, but my dread 
 
 Would not be thus admonished; 
 
 I caird, and thought I heard a sound — 
 
 I burst my chain with one strong bound. 
 
 And rush'd to him :— I found him not, 
 
 / only stirr'd in this black spot, 
 
 /only lived — /only drew 
 
 The accursed breath of dungeon dew; 
 
 The last — the sole — the dearest link 
 
 Between me and the eternal brink, 
 
 AYhich bound me to my failing race, 
 
 AVas broken in this fatal place.' 
 
 One on the earth, and one beneath — 
 
 My brothers — botli had ceased to breathe. 
 
 I took that hand which lay so still, 
 
 Alas ! my own was full as chill; 
 
 I had not strength to stir, or strive, 
 
 But felt that I was still alive — 
 
 ' " The gentle decay and gradual extinction of the youngest life is the most tender and 
 beautiful passage in the poem.'"— Jff/ei/. 
 
THE PRISONER OF CHILLON. ' 15 
 
 A frautic feeling, when we know 
 That what we love shall ne'er be so. 
 
 I know^ not why 
 
 I could not die, 
 I had no earthly hope but faith, 
 And that forbade a -selfish death. 
 
 IX. <?v,.^.JC 
 
 "What next befell me then and there 
 I know noC well — I never knew. — 
 First came the loss of lio-ht and air. 
 
 And then of darkness too : 
 I had no thought, no feeling — none — 
 Among the stones I stood a stone. 
 And was. scarce conscious what I wist,* 
 As shrubless crags within the mist ; 
 For all was blank, and bleak, and gray. 
 It was not night — it was not day. 
 It was not even the dungeon-light. 
 So hateful to mv heavy sio;ht. 
 But vacancy absorbing space. 
 And fixedness — without a place: 
 There were no stars — no earth — no time — 
 ^0 check — no change — no good — no crime — 
 But silence, and a stirless breath 
 Which neither was of life nor death; 
 A sea of stas^nant idleness, 
 Blind, boundless, mute, and motionless I 
 
 X. 
 
 A light broke in upon my brain, — 
 
 It was the carol of a bird; 
 It ceased, and then it came again. 
 
 The sweetest song ear ever heard, 
 
 1 knew. 
 
 
16 TIIF-: PRTSOXER OF CIITLT.ON. 
 
 And iiiiiio WHS tliankfiil till my eyes 
 
 llaii over with the glad surprise, 
 
 And they that moment could not see 
 
 I was the mate of misery; 
 
 liut then by dull degrees came back 
 
 My senses to their wonted track, 
 
 1 saw the dungeon walls and lloor 
 
 Close slowly round me as before, 
 
 I saw the glimmer of the sun 
 
 Creeping as it before had done, 
 
 But through the crevice where it came 
 
 That bird was perch'd, as fond and tame. 
 
 And tamer than upon the tree; 
 A lovely bird, with azure wings, 
 And song that said a thousand things. 
 
 And seem'd to say them all for me ! 
 I never saw its like before, 
 I ne'er shall see its likeness more. 
 It seem'd, like me, to want a mate. 
 But was not half so desolate. 
 And it was come to love me Avhen 
 None lived to love me so again, 
 And cheerino: from mv dung-eon's brink. 
 Had brought me back to feel and think. 
 I know not if it late were free, 
 
 Or broke its cage to perch on mine. 
 But knowing well captivity, 
 
 S^veet bird ! I could not wish for thine ! 
 Or if it were, in winged guise, 
 A visitant from Parjidise; 
 For-^-lIeaven forgive that thought ! the while 
 AVhich made me both to weep and smile — 
 I sometimes deem'd tliat it might be 
 My brother's soul come down to me; 
 But then at last awav it ilew. 
 
THE PRISONER OF CHILLOX. 17 
 
 And then ^twas mortal — well I knew. 
 For be would iiever thus liave flown. 
 And left me twice so doubly lone, — 
 Lone — as tlie corse witbin its sliroud. 
 Lone — as a solitary cloud. 
 
 A single cloud on a sunny day, 
 AVhile all the rest of beaven is clear, 
 A frown upon tbe atmospbere. 
 That bath no business to appear 
 
 When skies are blue," and earth is gay. 
 
 XI. 
 
 A k ind of_ c]xa£ige came in my fate, 
 My keepers grew compassionate, 
 I know not what bad made tliem so, 
 They were inured to sights of woe, 
 But so it was : — my broken chain 
 With links unfastenM did remain. 
 And it was liberty to stride 
 Along my cell from side to side, 
 And up and down, and then atbwart. 
 And tread it over every part: 
 And round tbe pillars one by one, 
 \ Returning where my walk begun, 
 Avoiding only, as I trod. 
 My brotbers' graves without a sod; 
 For if I thought witb beedless tread 
 My step profaned tbeir lowly bed. 
 My breath came gaspingly and thick, 
 And my crushed heart fell blind and sick. 
 
 XII. 
 
 I made a footing in tbe wall, 
 
 It was not therefrom to escape, 
 For I had buried one and all. 
 
 Who loved me in a human shape; 
 2 
 
IB TliE PRISONER OF CHILLON. 
 
 Alul tlic whole cai-th woiilil Jiciifufortli be 
 
 A wider ])ri.so]i unto mo: 
 
 No child — no sire — no kin h;id I, 
 
 Ko partner in my misery; 
 
 I thonp:ht of this, iind I was o-lad 
 
 For thought of them had nuide me mad; 
 
 But I was curious to ascend 
 
 To my barrM windows, and to bend 
 
 Once more, upon the mountains high. 
 
 The quiet of a loving eye. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 I saw them — and they were the same. 
 They were not changed like me in frame; 
 I saw their thousand years of snow 
 On high — their wide, long lake below. 
 And the blue llhone ' in fullest flow: 
 I lieard the torrents leap and gusli 
 O'er channeird rock and broken bush; 
 I saw the white- wall'd distant town, 
 And whiter sails go skimming down; 
 And then there was a little isle,' 
 AVhich in my very face did smile. 
 
 The only one in view. 
 A small green isle, it seem'd no more. 
 Scarce broader than my dungeon floor. 
 But in it there were three tall trees. 
 And o'er it blew the mountain l)reeze. 
 And by it there were waters flowing, 
 And on it there were young flowers growing. 
 
 Of gentle breath and hue. 
 The fish swam by the castle wall, 
 And they seem'd joyous each and all: 
 
 ' Till" liver HlioiK! flows tlirouyh Lake Geneva. 
 
 2 There in a t^inall island between the entrances of tlie Rhone and Villeneuvc. a town at 
 the extremity of the lake. 
 
THE PRISONER OF CHILI.OX. 19 
 
 The eagle rode the rising blast, 
 Methought he never flew so fast. 
 As then to me he seem'd to fly. 
 And then new tears came in my eye. 
 And I felt troubled — and would fain 
 I had not left my recent chain. 
 And when I did descend again, 
 The darkness of my dim abode 
 Fell on me as a heavy load; 
 It was as is a new-dug grave,- 
 Closing o'er one we sought to save; 
 And yet my glance, too much oppress'd. 
 Had almost need of such a rest. 
 
 V,^ 
 
 It might be months, or years, or days, 
 
 I kept no count — I took no note, 
 I had no hope my eyes to raise 
 
 And clear them of their dreary mote; 
 At last men came to set me free, 
 
 I ask'd not why, and reck'd not where; 
 It was at length the same to me, 
 Fetter'd or fetterless to be — 
 
 I learn'd to love despair. 
 And thus when they appear'd at last. 
 And all my bonds aside were cast. 
 These heavy walls to me had grown 
 A hermitage — and all my own I 
 And half I felt as they were come 
 To tear me from a second home: 
 AVitli spiders I had friendship made. 
 And watch'd them in their sullen trade; 
 Had seen the mice by moonlight play. 
 And why should I feel less than thev ? 
 
20 THE PRISONER OF CHTLLON. 
 
 Wo wore all inmates of one place, 
 And 1, the monarch of each race, 
 Had power to kill— yet, strange to tell ! 
 In quiet we had learn'd to dwell: 
 My very chains and 1 ^rew friends. 
 So much a Jon^ communion tends 
 To make us what we are : — even I 
 Regain'd my freedom with a sigh. 
 
MAZEPPA. 
 
 This poem is founded on historical facts. Mazeppa was a native of Poland. In his 
 youth he became a page in the service of John Casimir, the king of that country. For an 
 bffence against a Polish count he was bound naked to the back of a wild horse, his head 
 turned tolts tail, and the animal was then sent olf, leaving the unfortunate Mazeppa to 
 his fate. He afterwards became a chief among the Cossacks, a semi-barbarous people of 
 southern Russia. He joined Charles XII., the famous King of Sweden, in his war with 
 Peter the Creat, Czar of Russia, and was present at the battle of Pultowa (Russia) in 1709, 
 iu which Charles was defeated. 
 
 On these facts the genius and imagination of Byron have constructed the thrilling 
 story represented in the poem as having been related by Mazeppa to King Charles, while 
 resting in a forest ou their retreat after the disastrous battle. 
 
 I. 
 
 'TwAS after dread Pultowa's day, 
 
 When fortune left the royal Swede, 
 Around a slaughtered army lay, 
 
 ISTo more to combat and to bleed. 
 The power and glory of the war. 
 
 Faithless as their vain votaries, men, 
 Had pass'd to the triumphant Czar, 
 
 And Moscow's ' avails were safe again, 
 Until a day more dark and drear, 
 And a more memorable year/ 
 Should give to slaughter and to shame 
 A mightier host and haughtier name ; '"* 
 A greater wreck, a deeper fall, 
 'A shock to one — a thunderbolt to all. 
 
 J Moscow was formerly the capital of Russia. 
 
 2 the year 1812, when Napoleon Bonaparte invaded Russia and entered Moscow with a 
 great army. He soon found, however, that he had conquered nothing but a heap of ashes, 
 the Russians having set fire to the city on the night of his arrival to force the invaders to 
 retire. On their retreat from the country, thousands of the French perished of cold and 
 hunger. Napoleon himself escaping only with much difficulty. 
 
 3 Napoleon and his army. 
 
22 MAZEPPA. 
 
 II. 
 
 Siicli was the hazard of tlie die ! ' 
 
 The wounded Charles was tauii^lit to fly 
 
 By day and night through field and flood, 
 
 Stain'd witli his own and subjects' blood; 
 
 For thousands fell that flight to aid: 
 
 And not a voice was heard t' upbraid 
 
 Ambition in his humbled hour. 
 
 When truth had naught to dread from power. 
 
 llis horse was slain, and Gieta^ gave 
 
 His own — and died the Ilussians' slave. 
 
 This too sinks after many a league 
 
 Of well-sustainM but vain fatigue; 
 
 And in the depths of forests, darkling 
 
 The watch-flres in the distance sparkling — 
 
 The beacons of surrounding foes — 
 A king must lay his limbs at length. 
 
 Are these the laurels and repose 
 For which the nations strain their strength ? 
 '^I'hey laid him by a savage tree. 
 In outworn nature's agony; 
 His wounds were stiff — his limbs were stark — 
 The heavy hour was chill and dark; 
 The fever in his blood forbade 
 A transient slumber's fitful aid : 
 And thus it was ; but yet tlirough all, 
 Kinglike the monarch bore his fall, 
 And made, in this extreme of ill, 
 His pangs the vassals^ of his will : 
 All silent and subdued were they, 
 As once the nations round him lay. 
 
 - eincnilar of dice, little cubes used in games of chance. War is here likened to a gam* 
 played with dice. 
 
 2 An ofticer of Charles XII. 
 
 3 slaves. 
 
MAZEPPA. 23 
 
 III. 
 
 A band of cliiefs I — alas I how few. 
 
 Since but the fleeting of a day 
 Had thinnM it ; but this wreck was true 
 
 And chivalrous : ' upon the clay 
 Each sate him down, all sad and mute, 
 
 Beside his monarch and his steed, 
 For danger levels man and brute. 
 
 And all are fellows in their need. 
 Among the rest, Mazeppa made 
 His pillow in an old oak's shade — 
 Himself as rough, and scarce less old, 
 The Ukraine's Hetman " calm and bold; 
 But first, outspent with tliis long course. 
 The Cossack prince rubb'd dow^n his horse, 
 And made for him a leafy bed. 
 
 And smooth'd his fetlocks and his mane. 
 
 And slack'd his girth, and stripp'd his rein. 
 And joy'd to see how well he fed; 
 For until now he had the dread 
 His wearied courser might refuse 
 To browse beneath the midnight dews: 
 But he was hardy as his lord, 
 And little cared for bed and board; 
 But spirited and docile too, 
 Whate'er was to be done, would do. 
 Shaggy and swift, and strong of limb, 
 All Tartar-like ^ he carried him; 
 Obey'd his voice, and came to call. 
 And knew him in the midst of all: 
 
 ' brave and loyal. 
 
 3 Mazeppa \\ as lietman, or commander-ni-chkf, of the Coppacks of Ukraine, a district 
 of southern Russia. 
 
 3 Tartary was the name given at one time to the countries of central Asia and eastern 
 Europe. The Tartars were famous as horsemen and hunters. 
 
24 MAZEPPA. 
 
 Though tliousands were around, — and Night, 
 Without a star, pursued her liight, — 
 That steed from sunset until (hiwn 
 His chief would follow like a fawn. 
 
 IV. 
 
 This done, Mazeppa spread his cloak. 
 And laid his lance beneath his oak, 
 Felt if his arms in order good 
 The long day^s march had well withstood — 
 If still the powder fill'd the pan. 
 
 And flints unloosened kept their lock ' — 
 His sabre's hilt and scabbard felt. 
 And whether they had chafed his belt — 
 And next the venerable man, 
 From out his haversack and can." 
 
 Prepared and spread his slender stock'* 
 And to the monarch and his men 
 The whole or portion offer'd then 
 With far less of inquietude 
 Than courtiers'* at a banquet would. 
 And Charles of this his slender share 
 AVitli smiles partook a moment there. 
 To force of cheer a greater show, 
 And seem above both wounds and woe; 
 And then he said — '' Or all our band, 
 Though firm of heart and strong of hand. 
 In skirmish, march, or forage, none 
 Can less have said or more have done 
 Than thee, Mazejopa! On the earth 
 So fit a pair had never birth, 
 
 ' Before the invention of the percussion cap, and cartridge, guns were fired by a sparlc 
 struck by a flint and steel attached to tlie lock of the weapon, the powder being placed in 
 u pan where it caught the spark. 
 
 ' soldier's bag and drinking can. ^ of eatables. 
 
 •• persons who attend the courts of kings. 
 
MAZEPPA. 25 
 
 Since Alexander's ' days till now. 
 
 As thy Bucephalus and thou: 
 
 All Scythia's ' fame to thine should yield 
 
 For pricking on o'er flood and field/^ 
 
 Mazeppa answer'd — •'•'111 betide' 
 
 The school wherein I learn'd to ride ! " 
 
 Quoth Charles — " Old Hetman, wherefore so. 
 
 Since thou hast learn'd the art so well?" 
 
 Mazeppa said — "'Twere long to tell; 
 
 And we have many a league to go. 
 
 With every now and then a blow. 
 
 And ten to one at least the foe, 
 
 Before our steeds may graze at ease. 
 
 Beyond the swift Borysthenes: ' 
 
 And, sire," your limbs have need of rest. 
 
 And I will be the sentinel 
 
 Of this your troop/'— '•' But I request/' 
 
 Said Sweden's monarch, ••thou wilt tell 
 
 This tale of thine, and I may reap. 
 
 Perchance, from this the boon of sleep; 
 
 For at this moment from my eyes 
 
 The hope of present slumber flies." 
 
 " Well, sire, with such a hope I'll track 
 Mv seventy years of memory back : 
 I think 'twas in my twentieth spring,-- 
 Av, 'twas, — when Casimir was king — 
 John Casimir,'— I was his page 
 Six summers in my earlier age: 
 
 1 Alexander the Great, a king of Macedou (north of Greece), and a celebrated con- 
 queror, born 356 B.C. He had a famous horse named Bucephalus. 
 
 2 Scythia, anciently the name of southern Russia. 
 
 3 may evil happen to. 
 
 * ancient name of the Dnieper ipron. nee-per), a river of Russia, flowing into the Black 
 
 Sea. 
 
 * a word of honor used in addre.'^sing kiuj^s. 
 s see Introductory Note. 
 
26 MAZEPPA. 
 
 A loariiod innimrch, faitli ! was lie. 
 Ami most unlike your majesty: 
 lie made no wars, and did not gain 
 Xew realms to lose them back again; 
 
 lie was the Polish Solomon/ 
 So sung his poets, all but one, 
 AVho, being unpension'd, made a satire, 
 And boasted that he could not flatter. 
 It was a court of jousts'* and mimes,^ 
 AVhere every courtier tried at rhymes; 
 Even I for once produced some verses, 
 And sign'd my odes ^ Desjiairing Tliyrsis/^ 
 There was a certain Palatine/ 
 
 A count of far and higli descent. 
 Rich as a salt '^ or silver mine : 
 And he was proud, ye may divine, 
 
 As if from heaven he had l)een sent: 
 He had such wealth in blood and ore 
 
 As few could match beneath the throne; 
 And he would gaze ujion his store, 
 And o'er his pedigree would pore. 
 Until by some confusion led, 
 AVliich almost look'd like want of head. 
 
 He thought their merits ^ were his own. 
 Ilis wife was not of his opinion ; 
 
 His junior she by thirty years. 
 Grew daily tired of his dominion; 
 
 ' moanintj that he was a wise prince like Solomon, King of Israel. 
 
 2 mock battles. 
 
 3 dramatic i)lays. 
 
 * name sometimes t,'iven l).v ancient poets to shepherds or herdsmen. 
 
 * count. 
 
 * tlu! wealth of Poland consiBted greatly of salt mines. 
 ' the meriLs of his ancestors. 
 
MAZEPPA. 27 
 
 Y. 
 
 '^ I was a goodly stripling then; 
 
 At seventy years I so may say, 
 That there were few, or ' boys or men, 
 
 Who. in my dawning time of day. 
 Of vassal or of knight's degree. 
 Could vie in vanities with me; 
 For I had strength, youth, gaiety, 
 A port,^ not like to this ye see, 
 But smooth, as all is rugged now; 
 
 For time, and care, and war have plow'd 
 My very soul from out my brow; 
 
 And thus I should be disavowed 
 By all my kind and kin could they 
 Compare my day and yesterday; 
 This change was wrought, too, long ere age 
 Had ta'en my features for his page: 
 AVith years, ye know, have not declined 
 My strength, my courage, or my mind. 
 Or at this hour I should not be 
 Telling old tales beneath a tree, 
 AVith starless skies my canopy. 
 
 But let me on. Theresa's form — 
 Methinks it glides before me now. 
 Between me and yon chestnut's bough. 
 
 The memory is so quick and warm 
 And yet I find no words to tell 
 The shape of her I loved so well. 
 She had the Asiatic eye. 
 
 Such as our Turkish neighborhood 
 
 Hath mino^led with our Polish blood. 
 Dark as above us is the sky; 
 But through it stole a tender light. 
 Like the first moonrise of midnight, 
 
 1 either. ' appearance and maimer. 
 
28 MAZEPPA. 
 
 Large, dark, and swininiing in tlie stream, 
 AVliich seenr'd to melt to its own beam; 
 All love, half langnor, and half fire, 
 Like saints that at the stake expire, 
 And lift their raptured looks on high. 
 As though it were a joy to die. 
 A brow like a midsummer lake. 
 
 Transparent with the sun therein, 
 AVhen Avaves no murmur dare to make. 
 
 And heaven beholds her face within. 
 A cheek and lip — but wjiy proceed ? 
 
 I loved her then — I love her still: 
 And such as I am, love indeed 
 
 In fierce extremes — in good and ill. 
 But still we love even in our rage 
 And haunted to our very age 
 AVith the vain shadow of the past, 
 As is Mazeppa to the last. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 • • • • , , 
 
 But one fair night, some lurking spies 
 
 Surprised and seized us both. 
 
 The Count Avas something more than wroth — 
 
 I was unarm 'd ; but if in steel. 
 
 All cap-a-pie ' from head to heel, 
 
 AVhat 'gainst their numbers could I do ? 
 
 'Twas near his castle, far away 
 
 From city or from succor near. 
 And almost on the break of day; 
 I did not think to see another, 
 
 Mv moments seemed reduced to few; 
 And with one prayer to Mary Mother,'^ 
 
 And it may be, a saint or two, 
 
 * head to foot. '^ the mother of Christ, to whoui prayers are offered hi some churches. 
 
MAZEPPA. 
 
 29 
 
 As I resign^ me to my fate, 
 They led me to the castle gate: 
 
 IX. 
 
 j^^^'^riiig forth the horse ! ' — the horse was brought, 
 In truth, he was a noble steed, 
 A Tartar of the Ukraine breed, 
 Who look'd as though the speed of thought 
 Were in his limbs ; but he was wild, 
 
 Wild as the wild deer, and untaught. 
 With spur and bridle undefiled — 
 
 'Twas but a day he had been caught; 
 And snorting, with erected mane. 
 And struggling fiercely, but in vain. 
 In the full foam of wrath and dread 
 To me the desert-born was led: 
 They bound me on, that menial throng: 
 Upon his back with many a thong: 
 Then loosed him with a sudden lash- 
 Away I — away I — and on we dash : 
 Torrents less rapid and less rash. 
 
 X. 
 
 '' Away !— away !— My breath was gone — 
 I saw not where he hurried on: 
 'Twas scarcely yet the break of day, 
 And on he foanrd — away !— away ! — 
 The last of human sounds which rose. 
 As I was darted from my foes, 
 Was the wild shout of savage laughter, 
 Which on the wind came roaring after 
 A moment from that rabble rout: 
 With sudden wrath I wrench'd my head. 
 And snapp'd the cord which to the mane 
 Had bound my neck in lieu of rein, 
 And, writhing half my form about, 
 
30 MAZEPPA. 
 
 lIowlM 1);ic'k my curse ; iKit 'midst the tread;, 
 The tliundcr of my courser's speed, 
 Percluuicc they did not liear or lieed. 
 It vexes me — for I would fain 
 ^- — Iliiye paid tlieir insult back again. 
 I paid it well in after days: 
 There is not of that castle-gate, 
 Its drawbridge ' and portcullis ^ weight. 
 Stone, bar, moat, bridge, or barrier left; 
 Nor of its fields a blade of grass. 
 
 Save what grows on a ridge of wall, 
 AVhere stood the hearth-stone of the hall;' 
 And many a time ye there might pass, 
 Xor dream that e'er that fortress was. 
 I saw its turrets in a blaze, 
 Their crackling battlements all cleft, 
 
 And the hot lead pour down like rain 
 From off the scorch'd and blackening roof. 
 Whose thickness was not vengeance proof. ^ 
 
 They little thought that day of jiain. 
 AYhen launch'd, as on the lightning's ilashp 
 They bade me to destruction dash. 
 
 That one day I should come again, 
 With twice "five thousand horse, to thank 
 
 The Count for his uncourteous ride. 
 They play'd me then a bitter prank, 
 AVhen, with the wild horse for my guide. 
 They bound me to his foaming fiank; 
 At length I playVl them one as frank — 
 For time at last sets all things even — 
 
 And if we do but watch the hour. 
 
 There never yet was human power 
 
 • a bridge at the entrance to a fortre!<(<. wliicli may be drawn uj) and let down at 
 pleasure. 
 
 -a gate hung uver the entrance to a I'lMlrcss. wliieli may he let down to keep out an 
 enemy. s t^utlieient defence against vengeance. 
 
MAZEPPA. 3 1 
 
 Which could evade, if unforgiven, 
 The patient search aud vigil ^ long 
 Of him who treasures up a wrong. 
 
 XI. 
 
 Lway, away, my steed and I, 
 Upon the pinions of the wind. 
 All human dwellings left behind; 
 AVe sped like meteors through the sky. 
 When with its crackling sound the night 
 Is checker'd with the northern light. 
 Town — village — none were on our track. 
 
 But a wild plain of far extent, 
 And bounded by a forest black; 
 
 And, save the scarce-seen battlement 
 On distant heights of some strong hold. 
 Against the Tartars built of old, 
 No trace of man. The year before 
 A Turkish army had marched o^er; 
 And where the Spahi^s ^ hoof hatli trod. 
 The verdure flies the bloody sod: 
 Tlie^^ky was dull, and dim, and gray. 
 And a low breeze crept moaning by — 
 I could have answer'd with a sigh — 
 But fast we fled, away, away. 
 And I could neither sigh nor pray; 
 And my cold sweat-drops fell like rain 
 Upon the courser's bristling mane; 
 But, snorting still with rage and fear. 
 He flew upon his far career: 
 At times I almost thought, indeed. 
 He must have slacken'd in his speed; 
 But no — my bound and slender frame 
 
 Was nothing to his angry might. 
 And merely like a spur became; 
 
 ^ watch. - Spahis, Turkish cavalry. 
 
32 MAZKPPA. 
 
 Each motion which T made to free 
 My swoln limhs from their agony 
 Tncreas'd his fury and afFriglit: 
 I tried my voice, — 'twas faint and low. 
 But yet he swerv'd as from a blow; 
 And, starting to each accent, sprang 
 As from a sudden trumpet's chmg; 
 Meantime my cords were wet with gore, 
 Which, oozing through my limbs, ran o'er; 
 And in my tongue the thirst became 
 A something fierier far tliau flame. 
 
 XII. 
 
 " We near'd the wild wood — "twaa so wide, 
 
 I saw no bounds on either side: 
 
 'Twas studded with old sturdy trees, 
 
 That bent not to the roughest breeze 
 
 Which howls down from Siberia's waste,' 
 
 And strips the forest in its haste, — 
 
 But these were few and far between, 
 
 Set thick with shrubs more young and green 
 
 Luxuriant with their annual leaves. 
 
 Ere strown by those autumnal eves 
 
 That nip the forest's foliage dead, 
 
 Discolor'd with a lifeless red, 
 
 Which stands thereon like stilfen'd gore 
 
 Upon the slain when battle's o'er. 
 
 And some long winter's night hath shed 
 
 Its frost o'er every tom bless head. 
 
 So cold and stark the raven's beak 
 
 May peck unpierced each frozen cheek; 
 
 'Twas a wnld Avaste of underwood. 
 
 And here and there a chestnut stood, 
 
 ' a vast Russian territory in north Asia. 
 
MAZEPPA. 33 
 
 The strong oak, and the hardy pine; 
 
 But far apart — and well it were. 
 Or else a different lot were mine — 
 
 The boughs gave way, and did not tear 
 My limbs ; and I found strength to bear 
 My wounds, already scarr'd with cold — 
 My bonds forbade to loose my hold. 
 We rustled through the leaves like wind. 
 Left shrubs, and trees, and wolves behind; 
 By night I heard them on the track. 
 Their troop came hard upon our back, 
 With their long gallop, which can tire 
 The hound's deep hate, and hu uteres fire; 
 Where'er we flew they followed on, 
 Xor left us with the morning sun; 
 Behind I saw them, scarce a rood. 
 At daybreak winding through the wood. 
 And through the night had heard their feet 
 Their stealing, rustling stejD repeat. 
 Oh I how I wish'd for spear or sword. 
 At least to die amidst the horde, ^ 
 And perish — if it must be so — 
 At bay/ destroying many a foe I 
 When first my courser's race begun, 
 I wish'd the goal already won; 
 But now I doubted strength and speed. 
 Vain doubt ! his swift and savage breed 
 Had nerved him like the mountain-roe: 
 Xor faster falls the blinding snow 
 Which whelms the peasant near the door 
 Whose threshold he shall cross no more, 
 Bewilder'd with the dazzling blast, 
 Th:in through the forest-paths he pass'd — 
 
 1 of wolves. 
 
 ' having no means of escape, and therefore compelled to face the enemy or pursuer, as 
 a stag at bay. 
 
34 . MAZKPPA. 
 
 Uiitired, untamed, and worse tlian wild; 
 All furious as a favor'd child 
 Balk'd of its wish ; or fiercer still — 
 A woman piqued — who has her will. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 ** The wood was pass'd ; 'twas more than noon. 
 
 But chill the air, although in June ; 
 
 Or it might be my veins ran cold — 
 
 Prolonged endurance tames the bold; 
 
 And I was then not what I seem, 
 
 But headlong as a wintry stream, 
 
 And wore my feelings out before 
 
 I well could count their causes o'er: 
 
 And what with fury, fear, and wrath, 
 
 The tortures which beset my path, 
 
 Cold, hunger, sorrow, shame, distress, 
 
 Thus bound in nature's nakedness; 
 
 Sprung from a race whose rising blood 
 
 AVhen stirr'd beyond its calmer mood. 
 
 And trodden hard upon, is like 
 
 The rattlesnake's, in act to strike. 
 
 What marvel if this worn-out trunk 
 
 Beneath its Avoes a moment sunk ? 
 
 The earth srave wav, the skies roll'd round. 
 
 I seem'd to sink upon the ground; 
 
 lUit err'd, for I was fastly bound. 
 
 My heart turn'd sick, my brain grew sore 
 
 And throbb'd awhile, then beat no more: 
 
 The skies spun like a mighty wdieel; 
 
 I saw the trees like drunkards reel, 
 
 And a slight flash sprang o'er my eyes. 
 
 Which saw no farther : he who dies 
 
 Can die no more than then I died. 
 
 O'ertortured by that ghastly ride. 
 
MAZEPPA. S5 
 
 I felt the blackness come and go. 
 
 And strove to wake ; but could not make 
 My senses climb up from below: 
 I felt as on a plank at sea, 
 AVhen all the waves that dash o'er thee, 
 At the same time upheave and whelm, 
 And hurl thee towards a desert realm. 
 My undulating life was as 
 The fancied lights that flitting pass 
 Our shut eyes in deep midnight, when 
 Fever begins upon the brain; 
 But soon it pass'd with little pain, 
 
 But a confusion worse than such; 
 
 I own that I should deem it much. 
 Dying, to feel the same again; 
 And yet I do suppose we must 
 Feel far more ere we turn to dust: 
 Xo matter ; I have bared my brow 
 Full in Death's face— before— and now. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 " My thoughts came back ; where was I ? Cold 
 And numb and giddy : pulse by pulse 
 
 Life reassumed its lingering hold, 
 
 And throb by throb,— till grown a pang 
 Which for a moment would convulse, 
 My blood reflow'd, though thick and chill : 
 
 My ear with uncouth noises rang. 
 My heart began once more to thrill, 
 
 My sight returned, though dim, alas I 
 
 And tiiicken'd, as it were, with glass. 
 
 Methought the dash of waves was nigh; 
 
 There was a gleam too of the sky. 
 
 Studded with stars ;— it is no dream; 
 
 The wild horse swims the wilder stream ! 
 
36 MAZEPPA. 
 
 Tlie briglif, broad river's giisliii)g tide 
 Sweeps, winding onward, far and wide. 
 And we are lialf-way, struggling o'er 
 To yon unknown and silent shore. 
 The waters broke my hollow trance. 
 And with a temporary strength 
 
 My stiffened limbs were rebaptized. 
 My courser's broad breast proudly braves. 
 And dashes off the ascending waves. 
 And onward we advance I 
 We reach the slippery shore at length, 
 
 A haven I but little prized. 
 For all behind was dark and drear, 
 And all before Avas night and fear. 
 How many hours of night or day 
 In those suspended pangs I lay, 
 I could not tell ; I scarcely knew^ 
 If this were human breath I drew. 
 
 XV. 
 
 '' With glossy skin, and dripping mane, 
 And reeling limbs, and reeking flank. 
 
 The wild steed's sinewy nerves still strain 
 Up the repelling bank. 
 
 We gain the top ; a boundless plain 
 
 Spreads through the shadow of the night. 
 And onward, onward, onward, seems, 
 Like precipices in our dreams, 
 
 To stretch beyond the sight; 
 
 And here and there a speck of white, 
 Or scatter'd spot of dusky green, 
 
 In masses broke into the lio-ht. 
 
 As rose the moon upon my right: 
 But nought distinctly seen 
 
 In the dim waste w^ould indicate 
 
 The omen of a cottage gate; 
 
MAZEPPA. 37 
 
 No twinkling taper from afar 
 Stood like a hospitable star; 
 Not even an ignis-fatuus ' rose 
 To make him merry with my woes: 
 
 That very cheat had' cheer'd me then: 
 Although detected, welcome still, 
 Eeminding me, through every ill. 
 
 Of the abodes of men. 
 
 XVI. 
 
 "Onward we went— but slack and slow; 
 
 His savage force at length o'erspent. 
 The drooping courser, faint and low. 
 
 All feebly foaming went. 
 A sickly infant had had power 
 To guide him forward in that hour; 
 
 But useless all to me : 
 His new-born tameness nought avaiFd — 
 My limbs were bound ; my force had faiFd, 
 
 Perchance, had they been free. 
 With feeble effort still I tried 
 To rend the bonds so starkly tied. 
 
 But still it was in vain; 
 My limbs were only wrung the more. 
 And soon the idle strife gave o'er. 
 
 Which but prolong^I their pain: 
 The dizzy race seemM almost done, 
 Although no goal was nearly won: 
 Some atreaks announced the coming sun — 
 
 How slow, alas ! he came ! 
 Methought that mist of dawning gray 
 Would never dapple into day; 
 How heavily it roll'd away — 
 
 Before tlje eastern flame 
 
 1 a light that sometimes appears in the night over marshy ground, said to be caused by 
 the decay of animal or vegetable matter— popularly called will-o'-the-wisp. 
 
 2 would have. 
 
38 MAZKPPA. 
 
 Rose crimson, and deposed tlie stars. 
 And call'd the radiance from their cars, 
 And fiird tlie earth, from his deep throne. 
 With lonely lustre, all his own. 
 
 XVII. 
 
 *^Up rose the sun : the mists were curl'd 
 Back from the solitary world 
 Which lay around — behind — before 
 What booted it ^ to traverse o'er 
 Plain, forest, river ? Man nor brute. 
 Nor dint of hoof, nor print of foot. 
 Lay in the wild luxuriant soil; 
 No sign of travel — none of toil. 
 The very air was mute; 
 And not an insect's shrill small horn. 
 Nor matin ^ bird's new voice was borne 
 From herb nor thicket. Many a werst,^ 
 Panting as if his heart would burst. 
 The wcarv brute still stafi'2:er'd on; 
 And still we were — or seem'd — alone. 
 \^*js^ At length, while reeling on our way, 
 Methought I heard a courser neigh, 
 From out yon tuft of blackening firs. 
 Is it the wind those branches stirs ? 
 No, no ! from out the forest prance 
 
 A trampling troop ; I see them come ! 
 In one vast squadron they advance I 
 
 I strove to cry — my lips were dumb. 
 The steeds rush on in plunging pride; 
 But Avhere are they the reins to guide ? 
 A thousand horse — and none to ride ! 
 
 1 what advantage was it ? 
 
 2 inoniiiig. 
 
 s a Russian measure of distance, somewhat less than three-quarters of a mile. 
 
MAZEPPA. 39 
 
 With flowing tail, and ^ying mane, 
 AVide nostrils — never stretched b}^ pain, 
 Mouths bloodless to the bit or rein, 
 And feet that iron never shod, 
 And flanks nnscarr'd by spar or rod, 
 A thousand horse, the wild, the free, 
 Like waves that follow o'er tlie sea,* 
 
 Came thickly thundering on. 
 As if our faint approach to meet; 
 The sight renerved my courser's feet, 
 A moment staggering, feebly fleet, 
 A moment, with a faint low neigh, 
 
 lie answered, and then fell; 
 With gasps and glazing eyes he lay. 
 
 And reeking limbs immovable, 
 His first and last career is done ! 
 On came the troop — they saw him stoop, 
 
 They saw me strangely bound along 
 
 His back with many a bloody thong: 
 They stop — they start — they snuff the air, 
 Gallop a moment here and there, 
 Approach, retire, wheel round and round. 
 Then plunging back with sudden bound, 
 Headed by one black mighty steed. 
 Who seem'd the patriarch of his breed. 
 
 Without a single speck or hair 
 Of white upon his shaggy hide; 
 They snort — they foam — neigh — swerve aside 
 And backward to the forest fly. 
 By instinct, from a human eye. 
 
 They left me there to my despair. 
 Linked to the dead and stiffening wretch 
 Whose lifeless limbs beneath me stretch. 
 Relieved from that unwonted weight, 
 
 1 it was a troop of wild horses. 
 
40 MAZEPPA. 
 
 From wlionce I could not extricate 
 Nor him nor me — and tliere we lay 
 
 M'lio dyini;- on the dead I 
 1 little deem'd another day 
 
 Would see my houseless, helpless head. 
 
 '* And there from morn till twilight bound, 
 
 I felt the heavy hours toil round. 
 
 With just enough of life to see 
 
 My last of suns go down on me, 
 
 In hopeless certainty of mind, 
 
 That makes us feel at length resigned 
 
 To that which our foreboding years 
 
 Present the worst and last of fears: 
 
 Inevitable — even a boon, 
 
 Xor more unkind for coming soon, 
 
 Yet shunn'd and dreaded with such care. 
 
 As if it only were a snare 
 
 That prudence might escape: 
 At times both wish'd for and implored, 
 At times sought with self -pointed sword, 
 Yet still a dark and hideous close 
 To even intolerable woes. 
 
 And w^elcome in no shape. 
 And, strange to say, the sons of pleasure. 
 They who have revell'd beyond measure 
 In beauty, wassail, wino, and treasure, 
 Die calm, and calmer, oft than he 
 AVhose heritage was misery: 
 For he who hath in turn run tlirough 
 All that was beautiful and new, 
 
 Hath nought to hope, and nought to leave; 
 And, save the future (which is view'd 
 Xot quite as men are base or good. 
 But as their nerves may be endued). 
 
MAZEPPA. 41 
 
 With nought perhajDS to grieve: 
 The wretch still hopes his woes must end. 
 And Death, whom he shoukl deem his friend. 
 Appears, to his distemper'd eyes. 
 Arrived to rob him of his prize. 
 The tree of his new Paradise. 
 To-morrow would have given him all, 
 Eepaid his pangs, repair d his fall; 
 To-morrow would have been the first 
 Of days no more deplored or curst. 
 But bright, and long, and beckoning years. 
 Seen dazzlino; throuo-h the mist of tears. 
 Guerdon of many a painful hour; 
 To-morrow would liave given him power 
 To rule, to shine, to smite, to save — 
 And must it dawn npon his grave ? 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 *•' The sun was sinkino- — still I lav 
 
 ChainM to the chill and stiffening steed; 
 I thought to mingle there our clay; 
 
 And my dim eyes of death had need, 
 
 Xo hope arose of being freed: 
 I cast my last looks uj) the sky. 
 
 And there between me and the sun 
 I saw the expecting raven fly, 
 "Who scarce would wait till both should die. 
 
 Ere his repast begun; 
 He flew, and perch'd, then flew once more. 
 And each time nearer than before; 
 I saw his wing through twilight flit. 
 And once so near me he alit, 
 
 I could have smote, but lackVl the strength; 
 But the slight motion of my hand, 
 And feeble scratching of the sand, 
 
42 MAZEPPA. 
 
 Tlie exerted throat's faint struggling noise 
 AVliicli scarce!}' conld be callM a voice, 
 
 'I''ogether scared him olT at length. 
 I know no more — my latest dream 
 
 Is something of a lovely star 
 
 AYhich iix\I my dull eyes from afar, 
 And went and came with wandering beam. 
 And of the cold^ dull, swimming, dense 
 
 Sensation of recurring sense, 
 And then subsiding back to death. 
 And then a^'ain a little breath, 
 A little thrill, a short suspense. 
 An icy sickness curdling o'er 
 My heart, and sparks that cross'd nn- brain, 
 A gasp, a throb, a start of pain, 
 A sigli, and nothing more. 
 
 "^ XTX. 
 
 '^ I woke — Where was I ? — Do I see 
 A human face look down on me ? 
 And doth a roof above me close ? 
 Do these limbs on a couch repose ? 
 Is this a chamber where I lie ? 
 And is it inortal yon bright eye 
 That watches me with gentle glance ? 
 
 I closed my own again once more, 
 As doubtful that my former trance 
 
 Could not as yet be o'er. 
 A slender girl, long hair'd, and tall. 
 Sate watching by the cottage wall; 
 The sparkle of her eye I caught, 
 Even with my first return of thought; 
 For ever and anon ' she threw 
 
 A ]irying, pitying glance on me 
 
 With her black eyes so wild and free: 
 
 • now and then. 
 
MAZEPPA. 48 
 
 I gazed, and gazed, until I kne\r 
 
 Xo vision it could be, — 
 But that I lived and was released 
 From adding to the vulture's feast: 
 And when the Cossack maid beheld 
 My heavy eyes at length unseal'd. 
 She smiled — and I essayed to speak, 
 
 But fail'd — and she approach'd, and made 
 
 With lip and finger signs that said, 
 I must not strive as vet to break 
 The silence, till my strength should be 
 Enough to leave my accents free; 
 And then her hand on mine she laid, 
 And smooth'd the pillow for my head. 
 And stole along on tiptoe tread. 
 
 And gently oped the door, and spake 
 In whispers — ne'er was voice so sweet ! 
 Even music follow'd her light feet; 
 
 But those she call'd were not awake. 
 And she went forth : but, ere she passed. 
 Another look on me she cast. 
 
 Another sign she made, to say, 
 That I had naught to fear, that all 
 Were near, at my command or call. 
 
 And she would not delay 
 Her due return : — while she was gone, 
 Methought I felt too much alone. 
 
 XX. 
 
 '•' She came with mother and with sire — 
 What need of more ? — I will not tire 
 With long recital of the rest. 
 Since I became the Cossack's guest. . • 
 
 They found me senseless on the plain — 
 They bore me to the nearest hut — 
 
44 
 
 MAZEPPA. 
 
 They brouglit mv into life again— 
 ^le — one day o'er their realm to reign ! 
 
 Thns the vain fool who strove to glut 
 His rage, refining on my pain, 
 
 Sent me forth to the wilderness, 
 Bonnd, naked, bleeding, and alone, 
 To })ass tlie desert to a throne, — 
 
 A\nuit mortal his own doom may guess ? 
 
 Let none despond, let none despair ! 
 To-mon-o\v the Borysthenes 
 May see our coursers gaze at ease 
 Upon liis Turkish bank, — and never 
 Had I such welcome for a river 
 
 As I shall yield when safely there. 
 Comrades, good night ! "—The Hetman threw 
 
 His length beneath the oak-tree shade, 
 
 AVith leafy couch already made, 
 A bed nor comfortless nor new 
 To him, who took his rest wiiene'er 
 The hour arrived, no matter where: 
 
 His eyes the hastening slumbers steep. 
 And if ye marvel Charles forgot 
 To thank his tale, lie wondered not, — 
 
 The king had been an hour asleep. 
 
CHILDE^ HAROLD. 
 
 This poem describee scenes and events in several parts of Europe, in which the poet 
 travelled — Portugal and Spain, (Greece and neighboring lands, Belgium, Germany and the 
 Rhine country. Switzerland and Italy, 
 
 It was thought by some that Childe Harold was meant to represent the author himself. 
 This, however, Byron denied. In the preface to the first and second cantos he says :— 
 
 " A fictitious character is introduced for the sake of giving some connection" to the 
 piece. It has been suggested to me by friends, that in this fictitious character, ' Childe 
 Harold,' I may incur the suspicion of having intended some real personage ; this I beg 
 leave to disclaim, Harold is the child of imagination. In some very trivial particulars, 
 and those merely local, there might be grounds for such a notion, but in the main points 
 none whatever."' 
 
 But while Childe Harold is an imaginary character, the spirit and sentiment of the 
 poem are the author's. Its beautiful pictures are presented to us as Byron saw them. He 
 tells us what he thought and how he felt in relation to all that came' under his observa- 
 tion, and he tells it in a way that all through interests and delights the reader. 
 
 CANTO -^ THE FIRST. 
 
 I. 
 
 Oh, thou, in Hellas ^ deemed of lieavenly birth. 
 Muse/ formed or fabled at the minstrel's will ! 
 Since shamed full oft by later lyres on earth, 
 Mine dares not call thee from thy sacred hill : ^ 
 Yet there I've wandered by thy vaunted rill ; ^ 
 Yes I sighed o'er Delphi's long-deserted shrine,^ 
 Where, save that feeble fountain,^ all is still ; 
 Nor mote® my shelP awake the weary Xine* 
 To grace so plain a tale — this lowly lay '" of mine. 
 
 * In former times this word was used as a prefix to the name of tlie eldest son until he 
 encceeded to the title of the family, 
 
 2 part or division of a long poem. 3 ancient name of Greece. 
 
 * In the ancient Greek mythology there were nine goddesses, who presided over poetry, 
 music, and the sciences. They were called the Nine Muses. The muse here referred to 
 is the goddess of poetry. 
 
 6 the hill or mount of Parnassus in Greece, on the top of which the Pluses were supposed 
 to hold their meetings. 
 
 6 the rill or fountain of Castalia, on the slope of Mount Parnassus. It was thought that 
 tliose who drank of its waters received the gift of poetry. 
 
 ' an altar or sacred place. Delphi (now Castri) was a town at the foot of Parnassus, 
 where there was a temple of Apollo, the god of music, poetry, and the fine arts. 
 
 * might. 
 
 ^ musical lnstrun>ent or lyre, the first, it is said, being made by strings drawn over a 
 tortoise-shell. i" soug. 
 
46 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 n. 
 AVlnloin ' ill Albion's' isle there dwelt a youth, 
 AVho ne' in virtue's ways did take deliglit ; 
 But spent his days in riot most uncouth, 
 And vexed witli mirth the drowsy ear of Night. 
 
 III. 
 Childe Harold was he hight ;' but whence his name 
 And lineage long, it suits me not to say ; 
 Suffice it, that perchance they were of fame. 
 And had been glorious in another day : 
 But one sad losel ' soils a name for aye," 
 However mis^htv in the olden time ; 
 Xor all that heralds ' rake from coffined clay, 
 Nor florid prose, nor honeyed lines of rhyme. 
 Can blazon evil deeds, or consecrate a crime. 
 
 IV. 
 Childe Harold basked him in the noontide snn. 
 Disporting there like any other fly, 
 Nor deemed before his little day was done 
 One blast might chill him into misery. 
 But long ere scarce a third of his passed by. 
 Worse than adversity the Childe befell ; 
 He felt the fullness of satiety : 
 Then loathed he in his native land to dwell. 
 Which seemed to him more lone than eremite's^ sad cell. 
 
 VII. 
 
 The Childe departed from his father's hall ; 
 It was a vast and venerable pile ; 
 
 > formerly. ^ Albion, ancient name of Great Britain. ^ jiot 
 
 4 called. 6 worthless person. * {pron. fl) ever. 
 
 ^ herald, an official who traces and draws up records of the founders or ancestors of 
 families. " hermit's. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 47 
 
 So old, it seemed only not to fall, 
 
 Yet strength was pillared in each massy aisle. 
 
 X. 
 
 Childe Harold had a mother — not forgot, 
 Thongh parting from that mother he did shun ; 
 A sister whom he loved, but saw her not 
 Before his weary pilgrimage begun : 
 If friends he had, he bade adieu to none. 
 Yet deem not thence his breast a breast of steel ; 
 Ye, who have known what 'tis to dote upon 
 A few dear objects, will in sadness feel 
 Such partings break the heart they fondly hope to heal. 
 • ••••• 
 
 XII. 
 
 The sails were filled, and the fair light winds blew 
 As glad to waft him from his native home ; 
 And fast the white rocks faded from his view. 
 And soon were lost in circumambient ' foam ; 
 And then, it may be, of his wish to roam 
 Kepented he, but in his bosom slept 
 The silent thought, nor from his lips did come 
 One word of wail, whilst others sate and wept. 
 And to the reckless gales unmanly moaning kept. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 But when the sun was sinking in the sea. 
 
 He seized his harp, which he at times could string, 
 
 And strike, albeit with untaught melody. 
 
 When deemed he no strange ear was listening : 
 
 And now his fingers o'er it he did fling, 
 
 x\nd tuned his farewell in the dim twilight, 
 
 While flew the vessel on her snowy wing, 
 
 * surroundinj'. 
 
48 childf: harold. 
 
 And Hooting sliores receded from his siglit, 
 Thus to the elements ' he poured his hist " CJood Night/' 
 
 Adieu, adieu I my native shore 
 
 Fades o'er the waters blue ; 
 The night-winds sigh, the brealcers roar. 
 
 And shrielvs the wiki sea-mew. 
 Yon sun tliat sets upon the sea 
 
 We follow in his flight ; 
 Farewell awhile to him and thee, 
 
 My Native Land — Good Night ! 
 
 A few short hours, and he will rise 
 
 To give the morrow birth ; 
 And I shall hail the main and skies. 
 
 But not my mother earth. 
 Deserted is my own good hall. 
 
 Its hearth is desolate ; 
 Wild weeds are gathering on the wall^ 
 
 My dog howls at the gate. 
 
 " Come hither, hither, my little page ; 
 
 Why dost thon weap and wail ? 
 Or dost thou dread the billow's rage. 
 
 Or tremble at the gale ? 
 But dash the tear-droji from thine eye. 
 
 Our ship is swift and strong; 
 Our fleetest falcon scarce can fly 
 
 More merrily along.*' 
 
 " Let winds be shrill, let waves roll high, 
 I fear not wave nor wind ; 
 Yet marvel not, Sir Childe, that I 
 Am sorrowful in mind. 
 
 1 here meaninjr the air and ocean. 
 
CB<ILDE HAROLD. 49 
 
 For 1 have from my father gone, 
 
 A mother whom I love, 
 And have no friend, save thee alone. 
 
 But thee — and One above. 
 
 " M}^ father blessed me fervently. 
 Yet did not much complain ; 
 But sorely will my mother sigh 
 Till I come back again/'' — 
 " Enough, enough, my little lad ! 
 Such tears become thine eye ; 
 If I thy guileless bosom had. 
 Mine own would not be drv/' 
 
 With thee, my bark, I'll swiftly go 
 
 Athwart the foaming brine ; 
 Nor care what land thou bear'st me to. 
 
 So not again to mine. 
 Welcome, welcome, ye dark blue waves ! 
 
 And when you fail my sight. 
 Welcome, ye deserts, and ye caves ! 
 
 My Native Land — Good Night ! 
 
 XIV. 
 
 On, on the vessel flies, the land is gone. 
 And winds are rude in Biscay's sleepless bay. 
 Four days are sped, but with the fifth, anon. 
 New shores descried make every bosom gay ; 
 And Ointra's ' mountain greets them on their way. 
 And Tagiis"" dashing onward to the deep. 
 His fabled golden tribute '''bent to pay ; 
 
 » Cintra, a town on the side of a mountain near Lisbon in Portugal. 
 
 2 a river that flows through Spain and Portugal into the Atlantic at Lisbon. 
 
 3 it w.as s:iid in ancient times that the sands of the Tagus produced gold and precious 
 Dtoues. 
 
 4 
 
50 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 And soon on board tlie Lnsian ' pilots leap. 
 And steer ^twixt fertile shores where yet few rustics roa}>. 
 
 x\i. 
 
 What beauties doth Lisboa^ first unfold ! 
 Her image floating on that noble tide, 
 AVhicli poets vainly pave with sands of gold. 
 But now whereon a thousand keels did ride 
 Of mighty strength, since Albion Avas allied. 
 And to the Lusians did her aid afford : ^ 
 A nation swoll'n with ignorance and pride," 
 Who lick, yet loathe, the hand that waves the sword. 
 To save them from the wrath of GauFs unsparing lord. 
 
 XVII. ' 
 
 But whoso entereth within this town. 
 That, sheening ^ far, celestial seems to be. 
 Disconsolate will wander up and down. 
 Mid many things unsightly to strange e'e ;* 
 For hut and palace show like filthily ; 
 The dingy denizens ^ are reared in dirt ; 
 Ne personage of high or mean degree 
 Doth care for cleanness of surtout or shirt, 
 Though shent ® with Egypt's plague, unkempt, un- 
 washed, unhurt. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 Poor, paltry slaves ! yet born midst noblest scenes — 
 Why, Nature, waste thy wonders on such men ? 
 
 1 Liinitaiiiji was the ancient name of Portiii^al. 
 
 " Portugnese name of Lis^bon. 
 
 ^in 1807 Napoleon Bonaparte seized Portugal. Thitfi caused the Peninsular War, in 
 which the English, Portuguese, and Spaniards fought against the French. 
 
 ^ the Lusians arc represented as ignorant and proud, fawning u]ion, while they loathe, 
 the hand of England, whose aid they receive to save them from the wrath of Napoleon, 
 the lord of France (Gaul). 
 
 s shining. * eye. ^inhabitants. * degraded. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 51 
 
 Lo ! Ciutra's glorious Eden ' intervenes 
 In variegated maze of mount and glen. 
 Ah me I what hand can pencil guide, or pen. 
 To follow half on which the eye dilates 
 Through views more dazzling unto mortal ken' 
 Than those whereof such things the bard relates. 
 Who to the awe-struck world unlocked Elysium's ' gates? 
 
 XIX. 
 
 The horrid crags, b}^ toppling * convent crowned, 
 The cork-trees hoar that clothe the shaggy steep. 
 The mountain moss by scorching skies imbrowned. 
 The sunken glen, whose sunless shrubs must weep. 
 The tender azure of the unruffled deep. 
 The orange tints that gild the greenest bough. 
 The torrents that from cliif to valley leap. 
 The vine on high, the willow branch below. 
 Mixed in one mighty scene, with varied beauty glow. 
 
 XXI. 
 
 And here and there, as up the crags you spring, 
 Mark many rude-carved crosses near the path ; 
 Yet deem not these devotion's offerino- — 
 These are memorials frail of murderous wrath ; 
 For wheresoever the shriekins^ victim hath 
 Poured forth his blood beneath the assassin's knife. 
 Some hand erects a cross of moldering lath ; 
 And grove and glen with thousand such are rife 
 Throughout this purple land, where law secures not life. 
 
 ' beautiful gardens around Cintra. 2 view. 
 
 3 Elysium was the Greelj paradise, or abode of the blessed dead. 
 * on the top of high rocks, as if in danger of falling over. 
 
 " in 1809, about the time at which the poet wrote, murders were very frequent in the 
 streets of Lisbon and its vicinity. 
 
52 CHTLDE HAHOLD. 
 
 XXX. 
 
 O'er vales tluit teem with fruits, romantic hills, 
 (Oh that such hills upheld a free-born race !) 
 AVhereon to ^aze the eye with joyaiice fills, 
 Childe Harold wends through many a pleasant place, 
 Though sluggards deem it but a foolish chase, 
 And marvel men should quit their easy chair, 
 'i'he toilsome way, and long, long league to trace. 
 Oh, there is sweetness in the mountain air 
 And life, that bloated Ease ' can never hope to share. 
 
 xxxr. 
 
 More bleak to view the hills at length recede. 
 And less luxuriant, smoother vales extend : 
 Immense horizon-bounded plains succeed ! 
 Far as the eye discerns, withouten'^ end, 
 Spain's realms appear, whereon her shepherds tend 
 Flocks, whose rich fleece right well the trader knows — 
 Now must the pastor's arms his lambs defend : 
 For Spain is compassed by unyielding foes,^ 
 And all must shield their all, or share Subjection's Avoes. 
 
 xxxvii. 
 
 Awake, ye sons of Spain I awake ! advance. 
 Lo I Chivalry," your ancient goddess, cries, 
 But wields not, as of old, her tliirsty lance, 
 Xor shakes her crimson plumage in the skies : 
 Kow on the smoke of blazing bolts ^ she flies, 
 And speaks in thunder through yon engine's r(5ar ! 
 In every peal she calls — '' Awake ! arise ! '' 
 
 ' ease is bore personified, or ima[,nncd as being a living person ; benco tbe capital letter. 
 Such figurative use of words is frequent tbrougbout the poem. 
 2 old form of without. 3 the French. 
 
 4 knighthood ; the gallantry and cnnrtosy of the knight-^ of thi- middle ages. 
 ^ artillerv ; cannon shots. 
 
CHILDE HAKOLD. 53 
 
 Say, is her voice more feeble than of yore, 
 When her war-song was heard on Andalusia's ^ shore ? 
 
 • ••••• 
 
 XLIII. 
 
 Albnera,' glorious field of grief ! 
 As o'er thy plain the Pilgrim pricked his steed, 
 Who could foresee thee, in a space so brief, 
 A scene where mingling foes should boast and bleed. 
 Peace to the perished ! may the warriors meed 
 And tears of triumph their reward prolong ! 
 Till others fall where other chieftains lead. 
 Thy name shall circle round the gaping throng. 
 And shine in worthless lays, the theme of transient song. 
 
 • ••••• 
 
 XLY. 
 
 Full swiftly Harold wends his lonely way 
 Where proud Sevilla^ triumphs unsubdued : 
 Yet is she free — the spoiler's wished-for prey ! 
 Soon, soon shall Conquest's fiery foot intrude. 
 Blackening her lovely domes with traces rude. 
 Inevitable hour ! 'Gainst fate to strive 
 Where Desolation plants her famished brood 
 Is vain, or Ilion,' Tyre,' might yet survive, 
 And Virtue vanquish all, and Murder ^ cease to thrive. 
 
 XL VI. 
 
 But all unconscious of the coming doom,'' 
 The feast, the song, the revel here abounds ; 
 
 1 a province in the south of Spain. 
 
 2 a village of Spain, where in 1811 a great battle was fought between the English, Span- 
 ish, and Portuguese forces and the French, in which the latter were defeated. 
 
 3 Seville, a famous and beautiful city of Spain. 
 
 4 another name of the ancient city of Troy, which was destroyed by the Greeks in the 
 famous Trojan war. ^ an ancient city of Phcenicia in Asia ]Minor. 
 
 « Murder, Virtue, Desolation, as well as War and Love in the following stanza, are all 
 personifications. 
 
 ' the taking and ravaging of Seville in ISIO by the French General Soult. 
 
54 CHILD!-: IIAK'JI.I). 
 
 Strange modes of merriment the liours consume, 
 Xor bleed tliese patriots with their country's wounds ; 
 Xor liere AVar's clarion, but Love's rebeck ' sounds ; 
 
 XLIX. 
 
 On yon long level plain, at distance crowned 
 AVith crags, whereon those Moorish ' turrets rest. 
 Wide scattered hoof-marks dint the wounded ground ; 
 And, scathed by fire, the greensward's darkened vest 
 Tells that the foe was Andalusia's guest : ' 
 Here was the camp, the watch-flame, and the host, 
 Here the brave peasant stormed the dragon's nest ; * 
 Still does he mark it Avith triumphant boast. 
 And points to yonder cliffs, which oft were won and lost. 
 
 L. 
 
 And whomsoc'er along the path you meet 
 Bears in his cap the badge of crimson hne,^ 
 Which tells you whom to shun and whom to greet. 
 Woe to the man that walks in public view 
 Without of loyalty this token true : 
 Sharp is the knife, and sudden is the stroke ; 
 And sorely would the Gallic^ foeman rue, 
 If subtle poniards, Avrapt beneath the cloak. 
 Could blunt the saber's edge, or clear the cannon's smoke. 
 
 LI. 
 
 At every turn Morena's " dusky height 
 Sustains aloft the battery's iron load ; 
 
 1 a kind of fiddle with two strings. 
 
 2 Sixain was invaded and coiuiuercd in the ei<^hth century by the Arabs, and hiter by 
 tlif Moors, who hins^ remained masters of the country. 
 
 3 in ISIO Andahisia (province of Spain) was seized and occupied by the French. 
 * tlie Spanish peasants fou-^dit bravely to drive out the French invaders. 
 
 •'■ the red cockade, bearing in its centre a likeness of the Spanish King Ferdinand VII. 
 e French. '' Morena, a mountain in the soiith of Spain. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 00 
 
 And, far as mortal eye can compass sight, 
 The mountain howitzer/ the broken road, 
 The bristling palisade, tlie fosse o'erflowed, 
 TMie stationed bands, the never- vacant watch. 
 The magazine in rocky durance stowed. 
 The bolstered steed beneath the shed of thatch. 
 The ball-piled pyramid," the ever-blazing match, 
 
 LTI. 
 
 Portend the deeds to come : but he ^ whose nod 
 
 Has tumbled feebler despots from their sway, 
 
 A moment pauseth ere he lifts the rod ; 
 
 A little moment deigneth to delay : 
 
 Soon will his legions sweep tlirough these their way ; 
 
 The West must own the Scourger' of the world. 
 
 Ah, Spain I how sad will be thy reckoning day, 
 
 AVhen soars GauFs Vulture/ witli his wings unfurled. 
 And thou shaltview thy sons in crowds to Hades* hurled, 
 
 Liir. 
 
 And must they fall — the young, the proud, the brave — 
 
 To swell one bloated chief's^ unwholesome reign ? 
 
 Xo step between submission and a grave ? 
 
 The rise of rapine and the fall of Spain ? 
 
 And doth the Power that man adores ordain 
 
 Their doom, nor heed the suppliant's appeal ? 
 
 Is all that desperate Valor acts in vain ? 
 
 And Counsel sage, and patriotic Zeal. 
 The veteran's skill, youth's fire, and manhood's heart of steel ? 
 
 LIV. 
 
 Is it for this the Spanish maid.' aroused. 
 Hangs on the willow her unstrung guitar, 
 
 1 a short cannon. 
 
 2 shot and shells in military forts are piled in heaps shaped like a pyramid. 
 
 3 Napoleon. 
 
 * the invisible abode of the souls of the dead; so called by the ancient Greeks. 
 
 ^ Augustina— knowTi as the Maid of Saragoza— a heroic young Spanish woman, who, at 
 the siege of Saragoza (North Spain) in 1809, worked with her countrymen on the bat- 
 teries, in defending the town against the French. 
 
56 CIIILDE HAROLD. 
 
 And. ;ill iiiisoxcd, llio a'lihico ' liiith espoused. 
 Sung the lond song, and dared tlic deed of war ? 
 And she, whom once tlie semblance of a scar 
 Appalled, an owlet's lariim'^ chilled Avith dread, 
 Now views the column-scattering bayonet jar. 
 The falchion flash, and o'er the yet warm dead 
 Stalks with Minerva's ^ step where Mars * might quake to tread. 
 
 LV. 
 
 Ye who shall marvel when you hear her tale. 
 Oh ! had you known her in her softer hour. 
 Marked her black eye that mocks her coal-black veil. 
 Heard her light, lively tones in Lady's bower. 
 Seen her long locks that foil the painter's power. 
 Tier fairy form, with more than female grace. 
 Scarce would you deem that Saragoza's tower 
 Beheld her smile in Danger's Gorgon ^ face. 
 
 Thin the closed ranks, and lead in Glory's fearful chase. 
 
 Lvr. 
 Her lover sinks — she sheds no ill-timed tear; 
 Her chief is slain — she fills his fatal post ; 
 Her fellows flee — she checks their base career ; 
 The foe retires — she heads the sallying host : 
 Who can appease like her a lover's ghost ? 
 AVho can avenge so well a leader's fall ? 
 What maid retrieve when man's flushed hope is lost ? 
 Who hang so fiercely on the flying Gaul, 
 
 Foiled by a woman's hand, before a battered wall ? 
 
 LVII. 
 
 Yet are Spain's maids no race of Amazons," 
 But formed for all the witching arts of love : 
 
 1 a short dagger. 2 alarm; a noise giving notice of danger. 
 
 3 Minerva, worshipped by the ancients as the goddess of wisdom and war. 
 
 ■* the god of war. 
 
 6 of frightful appearance; like the Gorgons, fal)led monsters so terrible to behold that 
 anyone who looked upon their faces was immediately turned into stone. 
 
 « a nation of female warriors, supposed, in ancient times, to have dwelt on the shores of 
 the Black Sea. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 5/ 
 
 Thougli tliu;? in arms they emulate her sons. 
 And in the horrid phalanx dare to move, 
 'Tis but the tender fierceness of the dove, 
 Pecking the hand that hovers o'er her mate : 
 In softness as in firmness far above 
 Remoter females,' famed for sickening prate ; 
 Her mind is nobler sure, her charms perchance as great. 
 
 LX. 
 
 thoii, Parnassus ! whom I now survey,' 
 Xot in tlie phrenzy of a dreamer's eye, 
 Not in the fabled landscape of a lay. 
 
 But soaring snow-clad through thy native sky. 
 In the wild pomp of mountain majesty ! 
 AVhat marvel if I thus essay to sing ? 
 The humblest of thy pilgrims passing by 
 Would gladly woo thine echoes with his string,^ 
 Though from thy heights no more one Muse will wave 
 her wing. 
 
 LXI. 
 
 Oft have I dreamed of Thee! whose glorious name 
 Wlio knows not, knows not man's divinest lore : * 
 And now I view thee, 'tis, alas, with shame 
 That I in feeblest accents must adore. 
 AVhen I recount thy worshipers of yore ^ 
 
 1 tremble, and can only bend the knee ; 
 Nor raise my voice, nor vainly dare to soar. 
 But gaze beneath thy cloudy canopy 
 
 In silent joy to think at last I look on thee ! 
 
 LXII. 
 
 Happier in this than mightiest bards have been, 
 Whose fate to distant homes confined their lot, 
 
 1 referrinsr to the ladies of England. 
 
 2 This part of the poem was written in Greece (see note 5, page 45). 
 
 3 his Ivre. * knowledge. ^ ancient times. 
 
58 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 Slijill I iininoved beliold the hallowed scene, 
 Wliicli others rave of, though they know it not ? 
 Tliongh here no more Apollo haunts his grot/ 
 And tliou, the Muses^ seat, art now their grave, 
 Some gentle spirit still pervades the spot, 
 Sighs in the gale, keeps silence in the cave. 
 And glides with glassy foot o'er yon melodious wave. 
 
 LXIII. 
 
 Of thee hereafter. — Even amidst my strain^ 
 I turned aside to pay my homage here ; 
 Forgot the land, the sons, the maids of Spain ; 
 Her fate, to every freeborn bosom dear ; 
 And hailed thee, not perchance without a tear. 
 Now to my theme — but from thy holy haunt 
 Let me some remnant, some memorial beai- ; 
 Yield me one leaf of Daphne's deathless plant/ 
 Nor let thy votary's hope be deemed an idle vaunt. 
 
 LXIV. 
 
 But ne'er didst thou, fair Mount, when Greece was 
 
 young, 
 See round thy giant base a brighter choir ; 
 Nor e'er did Delphi, when her priestess sung 
 The Pythian * hymn with more than mortal fire. 
 Behold a train more fitting to inspire 
 The song of love than Andalusia's maids, 
 Nurst in the glowing lap of soft desire : 
 Ah! that to these were given such peaceful shades 
 As Greece can still bestow, though Glory fly her glades. 
 
 LXV. 
 
 Fair is proud Seville ; let her country boast 
 
 Her strength, her wealth, her site of ancient days, 
 
 ' see note 6, pai^e 45. 2 poem; sonc;. 
 
 3 the laurel; Daphne, a beautiful nymph loved by Apollo, and changed into a laure! tree. 
 
 ■» Pythia, name given to the priestess who served in the temple of Apollo at Delphi. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 59 
 
 But Cadiz,' rising on the distant coast, 
 Calls forth a sweeter, though ignoble praise. 
 
 LXVIII. 
 
 The Sabbath comes,, a day of blessed rest ; 
 AVhat hallows it upon this Christian shore ? 
 Lo I it is sacred to a solemn feast : 
 Hark I heard you not the forest monarch's ' roar ? 
 Crashing the lance, he snuffs the spouting gore 
 Of man and steed, overthrown beneath his horn ; 
 The thronged arena shakes with shouts for more ; 
 Yells the mad crowd o'er entrails freshly torn. 
 Nor shrinks the female eye, nor e'en affects to mourn. 
 
 LXIX. 
 
 The seventh day this : the jubilee of man. 
 London I right well thou know'st the day of prayer : 
 Then thy spruce citizen, washed artisan, 
 And smug apprentice gulp their weekly air : 
 
 To Hampstead, Brentford, Harrow,' make repair : 
 
 LXX. 
 
 Some o'er thy Thamis ' row the ribboned fair, 
 Others along the safer turnpike fly. 
 Some Eichmond Hill ' ascend, some scud to Ware,' 
 And many to the steep of Highgate ' hie. 
 
 LXXI. 
 
 All have their fooleries ; not alike are thine, 
 Fair Cadiz, rising o'er the dark-blue sea ! 
 
 1 town on the southwestern coast of Spain. 
 
 2 fore«t monarch, the bull. The poet goes on to describe a Spanish bull-fight. 
 
 3 towns near London, England. * the river Thames, which flows through London. 
 6 new London. ® a suburb of London. 
 
<)() CIIILDE HAROLD. 
 
 Soon as tlie mtitin ' bi'll prochiiiiK'tli nine, 
 Tliy saint adorers count tlic rosary :' 
 
 llion to the crowded circus forth they fare : 
 Young, old, liigh, low, at once the same diversion sliare. 
 
 Lxxir. 
 The lists are oped, the spacious area cleared, 
 Thousands on thousands piled are seated round ; 
 Long ere the first loud trumpet's note is heard, 
 Ne vacant space for lated wight ' is found : 
 
 LXXIII. 
 
 Hushed is the din of tongues — on gallant steeds. 
 With milk-white crest, gold spur, and light-poised 
 
 lance, 
 Eour cavaliers prepare for venturous deeds. 
 And lowly bending to the lists advance ; 
 Rich are their scarfs, their chargers featly* prance : 
 If in the dangerous game they shine to-day, 
 Tlie crowd's loud shout, and ladies' lovely glance. 
 Best prize of better acts, they bear away. 
 And all that kings or chiefs e'er gain their toils repay. 
 
 LXXIV. 
 
 In costly sheen " and gaudy cloak arrayed. 
 
 But all afoot, the light-limbed Matadore ' 
 
 Stands in the center, eager to invade 
 
 The lord of lowing herds ; but not before 
 
 The irround, with cautious tread, is traversed o'er, 
 
 Lest aught unseen should lurk to thwart his speed : 
 
 Ilis arms a dart, he fights aloof, nor more 
 
 1 luoniiiif,'. - ii atvhvj; of beads for counting prayers. 
 
 3 a bilaUul person can find no scat. * neatly; dexterously. 
 
 i tplcauur. *^ tl'<^ "litii api)oinlea to kill the bull iu a bull-light. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 61 
 
 Can man achieve witlioiit the friendly steed — 
 Alas I too oft condemned for him to bear and bleed. 
 
 LXXV. 
 
 Thrice sounds the clarion ; lo ! the signal falls. 
 The den expands, and Expectation mute 
 Gapes round the silent circle's peopled walls. 
 Bounds with one lashing spring the mighty brute. 
 And wildly staring, spurns, with sounding foot. 
 The sand, nor blindly rushes on his foe : 
 Here, there, he points his threatening front, to suit 
 His first attack, wide waving to and fro 
 His angry tail ; red rolls his eye's dilated glow. 
 
 LXXYI. 
 
 Sudden he stops ; his eye is fixed : away, 
 Away, thou heedless boy ! prepare the spear ; 
 Now is thy time to perish, or display 
 The skill that yet may check his mad career. 
 With well-timed croupe ^ the nimble coursers veer ; 
 On foams the bull, but not unscathed he goes ; 
 Streams from his flank the crimson torrent clear 
 He flies, he wheels, distracted with his throes : 
 Dart follows dart ; lance, lance ; loud bellowings speak 
 his woes. 
 
 LXXVII. 
 
 Again he comes ; nor dart nor lance avail, 
 Nor the wild plunging of the tortured horse ; 
 Though man and man's avenging arms assail. 
 Vain are his weapons, vainer is his force. 
 One gallant steed is stretched a mangled corse ; 
 Another, hideous sight I unseamed appears, 
 His gory chest unveils life's panting source ; 
 Though death-struck, still his feeble frame he rears ; 
 Staggering, but stemruino- all. his lord unharmed he bears. 
 
 ' leap. 
 
62 CITILDE HAROT.D. 
 
 LXXVIII. 
 
 Foiled, bleeding, breatliless, furious to the last. 
 Full in the center stands the bull at bay, 
 ^Mid wounds, and clinging darts, and lances brast/ 
 And foes disabled in the brutal fra}^ : 
 And now the Matadores around him play, 
 Shake the red cloak, and poise the ready brand : 
 Once more through all he bursts his thundering way — 
 Yain rage ! the mantle quits the conynge^ hand. 
 Wraps his fierce eye — 'tis past — he sinks upon the sand. 
 
 LXXIX. 
 
 Where his vast neck just mingles with the spine. 
 Sheathed in his form the deadly weapon lies. 
 He stops — he starts — disdaining to decline. 
 Slowly he falls amidst triumphant cries. 
 Without a groan, without a struggle dies. 
 The decorated car appears — on high 
 The corse is piled — sweet sight for vulgar eyes ; 
 Four steeds that spurn the rein, as swift as shy, 
 Hurl the dark bull along, scarce seen in dashing by. 
 
 LXXX. 
 
 Such the ungentle sport that oft invites 
 The Spanish maid, and cheers the Spanish swain : 
 Nurtured in blood betimes, his heart delights 
 In vengeance, gloating on another's pain. 
 What private feuds the troubled village stain 
 Though now one phalanxed host should meet the foe/ 
 Enough, alas, in humble homes remain. 
 To meditate 'gainst friends the secret blow. 
 For some slight cause of wrath, Avhence life's warm 
 stream must flow. 
 
 •buret; brokeu. 2 tumiin}^. » the French. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 63 
 
 LXXXV. 
 
 Adieu, fair Cadiz I yea, a long adieu ! 
 Who may forget how well thy walls have stood ? 
 AVhen all were changing, thou alone wert true. 
 First to be free, and last to be subdued. 
 And if amidst a scene, a shock so rude, 
 Some native blood was seen thy streets to dye, 
 A traitor ' only fell beneath the feud : 
 Here all were noble, save nobility ;'' 
 None hugged a conqueror's chain save fallen Chivalry ! 
 
 LXXXVI. 
 
 Such be the sons of Spain, and strange her fate ! 
 Thev fight for freedom, who were never free ; 
 A kingless ' people for a nerveless state. 
 Her vassals combat when their chieftains flee. 
 True to the veriest slaves of Treachery ; 
 Fond of a land which gave them naught but life. 
 Pride points the path that leads to Liberty ; 
 Back to the struggle, baffled in the strife, 
 AVar, war is still the cry, •• War even to the knife !'"' 
 
 LXXXVII. 
 
 Ye, who would more of Spain and Spaniards know. 
 C4o, read whatever is writ of bloodiest strife : 
 Whatever keen Vengeance urged on foreign foe 
 Can act, is acting there against man's life : 
 From flashing scimitar to secret knife, 
 War moldeth there each weapon to his need — 
 So may he guard the sister and the wife. 
 So may he make each curst oppressor bleed. 
 So may such foes deserve the most remorseless deed I 
 
 « Solano, Governor of Cadiz, who was secretly in sympathy with the French, and was 
 killed as a traitor by the people of the town in 1809. 
 
 2 some of the Spanish nobility were in sympathy with the French. 
 
 3 the King of Spain, Charles IV., was compelled by Napoleon to resign the crown. 
 
 * the answer of the Spanish General Palafos. to the French when they asked him to 
 surrender Saragoza during the siege of that town iu 1808. 
 
()4 CHILD!-: HAROLD. 
 
 LXXXVIir, 
 
 I'Mows iliei'o :i tear of pity for tlio dead ? 
 Look o'vv tlic ravage of the reeking plain : 
 Look oil tlie hands witii female slanghter red ; 
 Then to the dogs resign the nnljuried slain, 
 Then to the vulture let each corse remain ; 
 Albeit unworthy of the prey-bird's maw, 
 Let their bleached bones, and blood's unbleaching stain. 
 Long mark the battle-field with hideous awe : 
 Thus only may our sons conceive the scenes we saw ! 
 
 LXXXIX. 
 
 Xor yet, alas, the dreadful work is done ; 
 Fresh legions ' pour adown the Pyrenees : ^ 
 It deepens still, the work is scarce begun, 
 Kor mortal eyes the distant end foresees. 
 FalFn nations gaze on Spain : if freed, she frees. 
 More than her fell ^ Pizarros * once enchained. 
 Strange retribution ! now Columbia's ease 
 Kepairs the wrongs that Quito's "" sons sustained. 
 While o'er the parent clime " prowls Murder unrestrained. 
 
 xc. 
 
 Not all the blood at Talavera shed, 
 
 Not all the marvels of Barossa's fight,® 
 
 Not Albuei"a° lavish of the dead. 
 
 Have Avon for Spain her well-asserted right. 
 
 ' of the Frcncli. ^ (1,^ monntaiiiH bctwcoii France and Spain. 3 cruel. 
 
 * referring to the Spaniard Pi/arro, who coniiuercd and pliinderctl I'oru iu the IGtli 
 century. 
 
 s Quito, in South America, concpiercd by the Spaniards. 
 
 * Spain. 
 
 ' a town of Spain, at which the Euglisli and Spaniards defeated the French in a ^r^'at, 
 battle, July 27 and 28, 1800. 
 
 *> at Baro(<fa, a viUage of Spain, a small number uf English defeated a Frencli army iu 
 Marcli, 1811. 
 
 ' sec note 1, page 53. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 65 
 
 When shall her Olive-Braiich be free from blight ? 
 When shall she breathe her from the blushing toil ? 
 How many a doubtful day shall sink in night, 
 Ere the Frank ' robber turn him froiu his spoil, 
 And Freedom's stranger-tree grow native of the soil ? 
 
 XCIII. 
 
 Here is one fytte ' of Harold's pilgrimage. 
 Ye who of him may further seek to know. 
 Shall find some tidings in a future page, 
 If he that rhymeth now may scribble more. 
 Is this too much ? Stern critic, say not so ; 
 Patience I and yo shall hear what he beheld 
 In other lands, where he was doomed to go : 
 Lands that contain the monuments of Eld,' 
 Ere Greece and Grecian arts by barbarous hands were 
 quelled. 
 
 CANTO THE SECOND. 
 
 I. 
 
 Come, blue-eyed maid of heaven I *— but thou, alas, 
 Didst never yet one mortal song inspire — 
 Goddess of Wisdom I here ' thy temple was. 
 And is, despite of war and wasting fire, 
 And years, that bade thy worship to expire ; 
 But worse than steel, and flame, and ages slow. 
 Is the drear scepter and dominion dire 
 Of men who never felt the sacred glow 
 That thoughts of thee and thine on polished breasts be- 
 stow. 
 
 ' French. * canto. ' olden limes; antiquity. 
 
 * Palla.«, goddess of wisdom, named Minerva hy the Romans. 
 
 * at Alhen?, of wliicii Pallas wa.s tlie r)atron <^;oddess. 
 
66 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 Ancient of days ! iiugnst Atliena I' where, 
 Where are thy men of might, thy grand in soul ? 
 Gone — glimmering tlirongh the dream of things tiiat 
 
 were : 
 First in the nice that led to Glory's goal, 
 Tliey won, and passed away — is this the whole ? 
 A school-boy's tale, the wonder of an hour I 
 Tlie warrior's weapon and the sophist's ' stole ' 
 x\re sought in vain, and o'er eacli moldering tower. 
 Dim with the mist of years, gray flits the shade of power. 
 
 X. 
 
 Here let me sit upon this massy stone. 
 The marble column's yet unshaken base ! 
 Here, son of Saturn,* was thy fav'rite throne ! ' 
 Mightiest of many such! Hence let me trace 
 The latent grandeur of thy dwelling-place. 
 It may not be : nor even can Fancy's eye 
 Eestore what time hath labored to deface. 
 Yet these proud pillars claim no passing sigh ; 
 Unmoved the Moslem" sits, the light Greek carols by.' 
 
 XI. 
 
 But who, of all the plunderers of yon fane 
 On hio:h, where Pallas linfijered, loath to flee 
 The latest relic of her ancient reign — 
 The last, the Avorst, dull spoiler, Avho was he ? 
 
 > Atlioiis, capital of Greece. " sophists, public teachers iu ancient Grcici'. 
 
 3 a loose dress rcacliing to the feet. 
 < king of the gods. Jupiter was liis son and successor. 
 6 there was a niagiiilicent temple of Jujjiter in Athens. 
 * l)eiiever in the religion of Mohanmicd. 
 
 ' meaning that the Mns-lnn and Creek inhahilants of Athens pas.s by the ruins of the 
 ancient lompli-.>5 and moiniuu-nt,'^ of the cily without iuterest or apitreciatiou. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 67 
 
 Blush, Caledonia I * such thy son " could be ! 
 Enofland I I iov no child he was of thine : 
 Thy free-born men should spare what once was free ; 
 Yet they could violate each saddening shrine, 
 And bear these altars o^er the long reluctant brine/ 
 
 XT. 
 
 Cold is the heart, fair Greece, that looks on thee, 
 Xor feels as lovers o'er the dust they loved ; 
 Dull is the eye that will not weep to see 
 Thy walls defaced, thy moldering shrines removed 
 By British hands, which it had best behoved 
 To guard those relics ne'er to be restored. 
 Curst be the hour when from their isle they roved, 
 And once again thy hapless bosom gored. 
 And snatched thy shrinking Gods to northern climes 
 abhorred ! 
 
 XVI. 
 
 But where is Harold ? shall I then forget 
 To urge the gloomy wanderer o'er the wave ? 
 Little recked he of all that men regret ; 
 Xo loved one now in feisfned lament could rave ; 
 No friend the parting hand extended gave. 
 Ere the cold stranger passed to other climes. 
 Hard is his heart whom charms may not enslave ; 
 But Harold felt not as in other times, 
 And left without a sigh the land of war and crimes. 
 
 XVII. 
 
 He that has sailed upon the dark blue sea. 
 Has viewed at times, I ween, a full fair sight ; 
 
 1 ancient name of Scotland. 
 
 2 the Earl of Elgin, a Scotch nobleman, who carried away from the temple of Minerva 
 in Athens a number of ancient sculptures, now in tlie British Museum, London, and 
 known as the Elgin Marbles. 
 
 3 the ocean — as if long unwilling to bear away from Greece the relics of her ancient 
 grandeur. 
 
68 CIITI.DE HAROLD. 
 
 When the i'rcsli l)reeze is fjiir as breeze may be. 
 The wiiite sails set, the gallant frigate tight. 
 Masts, spires, and strand retiring to the right. 
 The glorious main expanding o'er the bow. 
 The convoy spread like wild swans in their flight. 
 The dullest sailer wearing' bravely now. 
 So gayly curl the waves before each dashing prow. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 And oh, the little warlike world within ! 
 The well-reeved ^ guns, the netted canopy/ 
 The hoarse command, the busy humming din. 
 When, at a word, the tops are manned on high : 
 Hark to the Boatswain's call, the cheering cry, 
 AVhile through the seaman's hand the tackle glides 
 Or school-boy Midshipman that, standing by, 
 Strains his shrill pipe, as good or ill betides. 
 And well the docile crew that skillful urchin guides. 
 
 XIX. 
 
 White is the glassy deck, without a stain, 
 Where on the watch the staid Lieutenant walks : 
 Look on that part which sacred doth remain 
 For the lone chieftain,'' who majestic stalks. 
 Silent and feared by all : not oft he talks 
 With aught beneath him, if he would preserve 
 That strict restraint, which broken, ever balks 
 Conquest and Fame : but Britons rarely swerve 
 From law, however stern, which tends their strength to 
 nerve. 
 
 XX. 
 
 Blow ! swiftly blow, tliou keel-compelling gale ! 
 Till the broad sun withdraws his lessening ray; 
 
 1 enduring. 2 fastened. 
 
 3 net covering to prevent blocks or splinters from falling on deck. •• the captain. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 69 
 
 Then must the pennant-bearer slacken sail. 
 That lagging barks may make their lazy way. 
 Ah ! grievance sore,, and listless dull delay. 
 To Avaste on sluggish hulks the sweetest breeze ! 
 AVhat leagues are lost before the dawn of day. 
 Thus loitering pensive on the willing seas. 
 The flapping sails hauled down to halt for logs like these ! 
 
 xxr. 
 
 The moon is up ; by Heaven, a lovely eve ! 
 Long streams of light o^er dancing waves expand ! 
 Now lads on shore may sigh, and maids believe : 
 Such be our fate wlien we return to land ! 
 Meantime some rude Arion^s ^ restless hand 
 AVakes the brisk harmony that sailors love : 
 A circle there of merry listeners stand. 
 Or to some well-known measure^ featly move. 
 Thoughtless, as if on shore they still were free to rove. 
 
 xxir. 
 
 Through Calpe's ^ straits survey the steepy shore ; 
 Europe and Afric, on each other gaze ! 
 Lands of the dark-eyed Maid and dusky Moor,^ 
 Alike beheld beneath pale Hecate's blaze : ° 
 How softly on the Spanish shore she *^ plays, 
 Disclosing rock, and slo23e, and forest brown. 
 Distinct, though darkening witli her waning phase ; 
 But Mauritania's ' giant shadows frown. 
 From mountain-cliff to coast descendino; somber down. 
 
 XXIII. 
 
 'Tis night, when Meditation bids us feel 
 
 AVe once have loved, tliough love is at an end : 
 
 1 Arion, a famous musician of ancient Greece. 2 tune. 
 3 Calpe, ancient name of Gibraltar. 
 
 * Spain on one side of the strait and Morocco on the other. 
 
 s the light of the moon. Hecate was one of the moon-goddesses of the ancients. 
 
 * the moon. '' Mauritania, Eoman name of Morocco. 
 
70 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 The lic;irt, lone mourner of its baffled zeal, 
 Tlioni^h friendless now, will dream it had a friend. 
 AVho with the Aveight of years would "wish to bend, 
 AVhen Youth itself survives young Love and Joy ? 
 Alas ! when mingling souls forget to blend, 
 Death hath but little left him to destroy ! 
 Ah, happy years ! once more who would not be a boy ? 
 
 XXV. 
 
 To sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell,' 
 To slowly trace the forest's shady scene. 
 Where things that own not man's dominion dwell. 
 And mortal foot hath ne'er or rarely been ; 
 To climb the trackless mountain all unseen. 
 With the wild flock that never needs a fold ; 
 Alone o'er steeps and foaming falls to lean : 
 This is not solitude ; 'tis but to hold 
 Converse with Nature's charms, and view her stores un- 
 rolled. 
 
 XXVI. 
 
 But midst the crowd, the hum, the shock of men. 
 To hear, to see, to feel, and to possess. 
 And roam along, the world's tired denizen. 
 With none who bless us, none whom we can bless ; 
 Minions of splendor shrinking from distress ! 
 None that, with kindred consciousness endued, 
 If we were not, would seem to smile the less 
 Of all that flattered, followed, sought, and sued : 
 This is to be alone ; this, this is solitude ! 
 
 XXXYII. 
 
 Dear Nature is the kindest mother still ; 
 Though always changing, in her aspect mild : 
 
 J a 8tonv hill. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 71 
 
 From her bare bosom let me take my fill. 
 Her never-weaned, though not her favored child. 
 Oh! she is fairest in her features wild, 
 Where nothing polished dares pollute her path : 
 To me by day or night she ever smiled. 
 Though I have marked her when none other hath. 
 And sought her more and more, and loved her best in 
 wrath. 
 
 XXXVIII. 
 
 Land of Albania I ' where Iskander "" rose ; 
 Theme of the young, and beacon of the wise. 
 And he his namesake,^ whose oft-baffled foes, 
 Slirunk from his deeds of chivalrous emprise :* 
 Land of Albania I let me bend mine eyes 
 On thee, thou rugged nurse of savage men ! 
 The cross descends,^ thy minarets^ arise. 
 And the pale crescent ' sparkles in the glen, 
 Throudi manv a cvpress strove within each citv's ken. 
 
 « 
 
 XXXIX. 
 
 Childe Harold sailed, and passed the barren spot 
 Where sad Penelope o'erlooked the wave ; ' 
 
 1 country north of Greece, bordering the Adriatic Sea. 
 
 2 Alexander (Turkish form, Iskander) the Great, famous conqueror, who lived three 
 centuries before Christ. He was king of Macedonia, part of which was in Albania. 
 
 3 Scanderbeg, or Iskander; called also Lord or Prince Alexander, a famous patriot chief 
 of Albania in the 15th century. 
 
 ♦ enterprise. 
 
 s referring to the suppression of Christianity in Albania, by the Turks, after the death of 
 Scanderbeg. 
 
 6 turrets on Mohammedan mosques. " Minarets arise "■— meaning the establishment of 
 the Mohammedan (Turkish) religion. 
 
 ^ quarter-moon : the emblem on the Turkish national flag. 
 
 s Thiaki, one of the Ionian Islands, west of Greece, anciently called Ithaca, of which 
 the famous Ulysses was king. During his absence at the siege of Troy, and his subse- 
 quent wanderings, his wife Penelope watched and waited for him with affectionate 
 devotion. 
 
72 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 Alul onward viewed tlio inoinit, not yet forgot. 
 The lover's refuge, and the Jjesbian's grave.' 
 Park Sappho ! could not verse immortal save 
 That breast inibned with such immortal fire ? 
 Could she not live who life eternal gave ? 
 If life eternal may await the lyre, 
 That only Heaven to Avhicli Earth's children may aspire. 
 
 XL. 
 
 ^Twas on a Grecian autumn's gentle eve, 
 Childe Harold hailed Lencadia's Cape afar ; 
 A spot he longed to see, nor cared to leave : 
 Oft did lie mark the scenes of vanished war, 
 Actium,'' Lepanto,^ fatal Trafalgar :^ 
 Mark them nnmoved, for he would not delight 
 (Born beneath some remote inglorious star) 
 In themes of bloody fray, or gallant fight, 
 But loathed the bravo's trade, and laughed at martial 
 wight. ' 
 
 XLTI 
 
 Morn dawms ; and with it stern Albania's hills. 
 Dark Suli's rocks," and Pindus" inland peak, 
 
 1 a rock on Santa Maura (anciently called Leucadia), one of the Ionian Islands. From 
 this rock, it is said, the Greek poetess Sappho (born in the Island of Lesbos, on the coast 
 of Asia Minor) cast herself into the sea, in a lit of grief and despair at the neglect of a 
 man she loved. 
 
 2 a town and cape (now called Azio) on the west coast of Greece, near which a sea- 
 battle took place in 31 b.c, between the fleets of Octavius (afterwards the Emperor 
 Augustus) and Mark Antony, two opposing leaders in the Roman civil war that followed 
 the death of Julius Cnesar. 
 
 3 a town on the coast of the Gulf of Corinth, Greece, near which the fleets of Spain and 
 several Italian states defeated the Turks in a great battle on October 7, 1571. 
 
 4 a cape on the south coast of Spain, off which, on October 21, 1805, the British 
 Admiral Nelson gained a great victory over the French and Spanish fleets. Nelson him- 
 self was killed in this battle. 
 
 * person. 
 
 * mountains in Albania. 
 
 ' a mountain chain between Euirus and Thessaly, north of Greece. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. ^^ 
 
 Robed half in mist, bedewed with snowy rills, 
 Arraved m many a dun and purple streak. 
 Arise ; and as the clouds along them break, 
 Disclose the dwelling of the mountaineer ; 
 Here roams the wolf, the eagle whets his beak. 
 Birds, beasts of prey, and wilder men appear. 
 And gathering storms around convulse the closing year. 
 
 XLIII. 
 
 Xow Harold felt himself at length alone, ^ 
 And bade to Christian tongues' a long adieu : 
 :N'ow he adventured on a shore unknown, 
 Which all admire, but many dread to view : 
 His breast was armed Against fate, his wants were few : 
 Peril he sought not, but ne'er shrank to meet : 
 The scene was savage, but the scene was new ; 
 This made the ceaseless toil of travel sweet ; 
 Beat back keen winter's blast, and welcomed summer's 
 heat. 
 
 XLVI. 
 
 From the dark barriers of that rugged clime. 
 E'en to the center of Illyria's ' vales, 
 Childe Harold passed o'er many a mount sublime. 
 Through lands scarce noticed in historic tales : 
 Yet in^famed Attica' such lovely dales 
 Are rarelv seen ; nor can fair Tempo ' boast 
 A charn/they know not ; loved Parnassus ' fails, 
 Thoucrh classic ground. ° and consecrated most, 
 To match some spots that lurk within this lowering coast. 
 
 : Christian langiaages : meaning Christian people, as he was about to travel in countries 
 inhabited bv Mohammedans. ^ . . e 
 
 2 Illvria. country north of Albania, bordering the Adriatic Sea. 
 
 3 ancient name of the district of Greece in which Athens is situated. 
 
 4 a beautiful valley of Thessaly, a district of ancient Greece. 
 
 ctrnTonSf occurred great events described in the ancient classics, i. .., cele- 
 brated Greek and Latin authors. 
 
<4 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 xLvrr. 
 
 lie passed l)loak Piiulus, Aflierusiji's lake/ 
 And left the primal city'' of the land, 
 And onwards did his further journey take 
 To greet Albania's chief/ whose dread command 
 Is lawless law ; for with a bloody hand 
 lie sways a nation, turbulent and bold ; 
 Yet here and there some daring mountain-band 
 Disdain his power, and from their rocky hold 
 Hurl their defiance far^ nor yield, unless to gold." 
 
 LII. 
 
 No city's towers pollute the lovely view ; 
 Unseen is Yanina, though not remote. 
 Veiled by the screen of hills : here men are few. 
 Scanty the hamlet, rare the lonely cot ; 
 But, peering down each precipice, the goat 
 Browseth : and, pensive o'er his scattered flock. 
 The little shepherd in his white capote^ 
 Doth lean his boyish form along the rock. 
 Or in his cave awaits the tempest's short-lived* shock. 
 
 LITI. 
 
 Oh ! where, Dodona,^ is thine aged grove. 
 Prophetic fount, and oracle divine ? 
 "What valley echoed the response of Jove V 
 What trace remaineth of the Thunderer's ® shrine ? 
 
 1 a lake of Epinip, northwest of Greece. 
 
 2 Yanina, chief city of Albania. 
 
 3 the celebrated Ali Pacha, governor of the country. 
 
 * the Castle of Suli was held for eighteen years against 30,000 Albanians, but was at last 
 taken by bribery. 
 
 * cape ; cloak. 
 
 « an ancient city of Epirus where there were a famous temple of Jupiter, and an oak 
 tree, from the boughs of which the god delivered oracles, or prophecies, to those who came 
 to consult him. 
 
 ' another name of Jupiter. 
 
 8 as god of the heavens, Jupiter was called the Thunderer. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. <C» 
 
 All, all forgotten— and shall man repine 
 That his frail bonds to fleeting life are broke ? 
 Cease, fool I the fate of gods may well be thine : 
 Wonldst thou survive the marble or the oak, 
 When nations, tongues, and words must sink beneath 
 the stroke ? 
 
 LIV. 
 
 Epirus' bounds recede, and mountains fail ; 
 
 Tired of upgazing still, the wearied eye 
 
 Reposes gladly on as smooth a vale 
 
 As ever Spring yclad in grassy dye : 
 
 Ev'n on a plain no humble beauties lie, 
 . Where some bold* river breaks the long expanse. 
 
 And woods along the banks are waving high. 
 
 Whose shadows in the glassy waters dance, 
 Or with the moonbeam sleep in Midnight's solemn trance. 
 
 LV. 
 
 The sun had sunk behind vast Tomerit,' 
 The Laos ' wide and fierce came roaring by ; 
 The shades of wonted night were gathering yet. 
 When, down the steep banks winding wearily 
 Childe Harold saw, like meteors in the sky. 
 The glittering minarets of Tepalen,' 
 Whose walls' overlook the stream ; and drawing nigh, 
 He heard the busy hum of warrior-men 
 Swelling the breeze that sighed along the lengthening 
 glen. 
 
 LYI. 
 
 He passed the sacred Haram's ' silent tower. 
 And underneath the wide o'erarching gate 
 
 1 a mountain.of Epirus; anciently called Tomarus. 
 
 2 a river of Albania. 
 
 3 the country palace of Ali Pacha. . „ , ^ ,u 
 
 4 haram. apartments occupied by the females in dwelling-houses m Turkey and other 
 
 countries of the East. 
 
76 CHTLDE HAROLD. 
 
 Surveyed the (Iwelliug of lliis chief of power/ 
 Wliere all around ])roclaiined his high estate. 
 Amidst no common pomj) tlie despot sate, 
 AVhile busy preparation shook tlie court ; 
 Shives, eunuchs,'' soldiers, guests, and santons' wait 
 A\'ithin, a ])alace, and without, a fort, 
 Here men of every clime appear to make resort. 
 
 LVir. 
 
 Richly caparisoned, a ready row 
 Of armed horse, and many a warlike store. 
 Circled the wide-extending court below ; 
 Above, strange groups adorned the corridor ; 
 And oft-times through the area^s echoing door. 
 Some high-capped Tartar * spurred his steed away ; 
 The Turk, the Greek, the Albanian and the Moor, 
 Here mingled in their many-hued array, 
 AVhile the deep war-drum's sound announced the close of 
 day. 
 
 LYIII. 
 
 The wild Albanian kirtled ^ to his knee, 
 AVith shawl-girt head and ornamented gun. 
 And gold-embroidered garments, fair to see : 
 The crimson-scarfed men of Macedon ; ® 
 The Delhi' with his cap of terror on. 
 And crooked glaive ; the lively, sup2:>le Greek ; 
 
 The bearded Turk, that rarely deigns to speak. 
 Master of all around, too potent to be meek, 
 
 1 AH Pacha. 2 guards or attendants of the Haram. 
 
 3 religious Turks, roganicd by the people as saints. 
 
 * native of Tartary, a country of Asia ; formerly applied also to a native of southwest- 
 ern Kussia, bordering Turkey. s kirtle, a gown ; a mantle. 
 8 Macedonia, country east of Albania. ' horseman. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 77 
 
 LIX. 
 
 Are mixed conspicuous ; ' some recline in groups. 
 Scanning the motley scene that varies round ; 
 There some grave Moslem' to devotion stoops, 
 And some that smoke, and some that play are fonnd ; 
 Here the Albanian proudly treads the ground : 
 Half-wliispering there the Greek is heard to prate ; 
 Hark I from the mosque the nightly solemn sound, 
 The muezzin's' call doth shake the minaret, 
 *' There is no god but God I— to prayer— lo I God is 
 great ! " 
 
 LX. 
 
 Just at this season Ramazani's fast ' 
 Through the long day its penance did maintain. 
 But when the lingering twilight hoar was past, 
 Eevel and feast assumed the rule again : 
 Now all was bustle, and the menial train 
 Prepared and spread the plenteous board within ; 
 The vacant gallery now seemed made in vain, 
 But from the chambers came the mingling din. 
 As page and slave anon ' were passing out and in. 
 
 1 Byron, in a letter to his mother, after his visit to Ali Paclia, thus describes the scene at 
 
 the palace : 
 
 " The Albanians in their dresses (the most magnificent in the world, consistmg of along 
 white kilt. <^old-worked cloak, crimson velvet gold-laced jacket and waistcoat, silver- 
 mounted pistols and daggers) ; the Tartars with their high caps : the Turks in their vast 
 pelisses and turbans ; the soldiers and black slaves with the horses, the former m groups, 
 in an immense large open gallery in front of the palace, the latter placed in a kind of 
 cloister below it : two hundred steeds ready caparisoned to move in a moment : couriers 
 entering or passing out with despatches ; the kettle-drums beating : boys calling the hour 
 from the minaret of the mosque ;-altogether, with the singular appearance of the build- 
 ing itself, formed a new and delightful spectacle to a stranger."" 
 
 2 Mussulman ; iMohammedan. 
 
 3 The muezzin, or chanter, calls the people to prayer from the minaret of the mosque. 
 He cries out in a loud voice such words as. "There is no god but God : Mohammed id 
 God's prophet : come to prayer : God is great." The Mohammedans pray five times a day. 
 
 4 Ramazan. or Ramadan, the ninth month of the Mohammedan year, is the Turkish 
 Lent, or fasting season. In this month strict fast is kept during the daytime, but at night 
 feasting and amusements are carried on. 
 
 6 frequently. 
 
78 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 LXTT. 
 
 In niarble-paved pavilion, wliore a spring 
 Of living water from the center rose, 
 AVliose bubbling did a genial freshness fling. 
 And soft voluptuous couclies breathed repose, 
 Ali reclined, a man of war and woes : 
 Yet in his lineaments ye can not trace, 
 "While Gentleness her milder radiance throws 
 Along that aged venerable face, 
 The deeds that lurk beneath, and stain him with disgrace/ 
 • •..., 
 
 LXIV. 
 
 Mid many things most new to ear and eye. 
 The pilgrim rested here his weary feet, 
 And gazed around on Moslem luxury. 
 Till quickly wearied with that si^acious seat 
 Of Wealth and Wantonness,' the choice retreat 
 Of sated Grandeur from the city's noise. 
 And were it humbler, it in sooth were sweet ; 
 But Peace abhorreth artificial joys, 
 And Pleasure, leagued with Pomp, the zest of both de- 
 stroys. 
 
 LXV. 
 
 Fierce are Albani^s children, yet they lack 
 Not virtues, were those virtues more mature. 
 Where is the foe that ever saw their back P'' 
 Who can so well the toil of war endure ? 
 Their native fastnesses not more secure 
 Than they in doubtful time of troublous need : 
 Their wrath how deadly I but their friendship sure, 
 When Gratitude or Valor bids them bleed. 
 Unshaken rushing on wherever their chief may lead. 
 
 ' Ali Pacha wae a ferocious and cruel man, though he did much good in Albania bysiip- 
 pressiug bands of robbers, constructing roads, and maintaining order and justice. 
 ' meaning that they never ran away in a fight, through fear of the foe. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 79 
 
 Lxvr. 
 Childe Harold saw them in their chieftain's tower, 
 Thronging to war in splendor and success ; 
 « And after viewed them, when, within their power, 
 Himself awhile the victim of distress ; 
 That saddening hour when bad men hotlier press : 
 But these did shelter him beneath their roof, 
 When less barbarians would have cheered him less, 
 ' And fellow-countrymen have stood aloof — 
 In aught that tries tlie heart how few withstand the proof I 
 
 LXYII. 
 
 It chanced that adverse winds once drove his bark 
 Full on the coast of Suli's shaggy shore,' 
 When all around was desolate and dark ; 
 To land was perilous, to sojourn more ; 
 Yet for a while the mariners forebore, 
 Dubious to trust where treachery might lurk : 
 At length they ventured forth, though doubting sore 
 That those who loathe alike the Frank ' and Turk 
 Might once again renew their ancient butcher-work. 
 
 LXVIII. 
 
 Vain fear I the Suliotes stretched the welcome hand, 
 Led them o'er rocks and past the dangerous swamp, 
 Kinder than polished slaves, though not so bland, 
 And piled the hearth, and wrung their garments damp. 
 And filled the bowl, and trimmed the cheerful lamp. 
 And spread the fare : though homely, all they had : 
 Such conduct bears Philanthropy's rare stamp — 
 To rest the weary and to soothe the sad. 
 Doth lesson ' happier men, and shame at least the bad. 
 
 1 the coast of Epirus. 
 
 i the French. AH Pacha, in his war against the Suliotes was aided by the French 
 hence the Suliotes hated the Frank as well as the Turk. 
 3 here a verb, meaning to teach. 
 
80 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 LXIX. 
 1l came tu pass, that wlieii he did address 
 Himself to quit at lengtli this mountain hmd. 
 Combined marauders lialf-way barred egress, 
 And wasted far and near with glaive and brand ; 
 And th-erefore did he taive a trusty band 
 To traverse Acarnania^s ' forest wide. 
 In war well seasoned, and with labors tanned. 
 Till he did greet white Achelous'" tide. 
 And from his further bank ^Etolia's ^ wolds espied. 
 
 LXX. 
 
 Where lone Utraikey* f-orms its circling cove. 
 And weary waves retire to gleam at rest. 
 How brown the foliage of the green hilFs grove, 
 Nodding at midnight o'er the calm bay's breast, 
 - As winds come whispering lightly from the west, 
 Kissing, not ruffling, the blue deep's serene : 
 Here Harold was received a welcome guest ; 
 Nor did lie pass unmoved the gentle scene. 
 For many a joy could lie from night's soft presence glean. 
 
 LXXl. 
 
 On the smooth shore the night-fires brightly blazed. 
 The feast was done, the red wine circling fast. 
 And he that unawares had there ygazed 
 AVith gaping wonderment had stared aghast ; 
 For ere night's midmost, stillest hour was past, 
 The native revels of the troop began ; 
 Each palikar '" his saber from him cast, 
 
 1 Acarnania, a mountainous district in tlic northwest of (Jrcece, bordering the Ionian Sea, 
 
 2 a river of Acarnania, now called Ayi)n)i)olanio, i. e., White River, from the cream color 
 of its waters. 
 
 3 .Etolia, a district of North Greece, lying east of Acaniania. 
 
 * a small place situated in one of the bays of the Gulf of Arta, on the northwest coast of 
 Greece, between Epirus and Acarnania. 
 
 * soldier ; properly, a lad. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 81 
 
 And bounding hand in hand^, man linked to man. 
 Yelling their uncouth dirge, long danced the kirtled clan. 
 
 LXXII. 
 
 Childe Harold at a little distance stood, 
 And viewed, but not displeased, the revelrie, 
 IS'or hated harmless mirth, however rude : 
 In sooth, it was no vulgar sight to see 
 Their barbarous, yet their not indecent glee : 
 And as the flames along their faces gleamed. 
 Their gestures nimble, dark eyes flashing free. 
 The long wild locks that to their girdles streamed. 
 While thus in concert they this lay half sung, half 
 screamed : 
 
 Tambourgi I ' Tambourgi I thy ^larum afar i 
 
 Gives hope to the valiant, and promise of war ; 
 All the sons of the mountains arise at the note, 
 Chimariot, Illyrian, and dark Suliote I ^ 
 
 Oh I who is more brave than a dark Suliote, 
 
 In his snowy camese ^ and his shaggy capote ? 
 
 To the wolf and the vulture he leaves his Avild flock, 
 
 And descends to the plain like the stream from the rock. 
 
 Shall the sons of Chimari, who never forgive 
 The fault of a friend, bid an enemy live ? 
 Let those guns so unerring such vengeance forego ? 
 What mark is so fair as the breast of a foe ? 
 
 ]\[acedonia sends forth her invincible race ; 
 For a time they abandon the cave and the chase : 
 But those scarves of blood-red shall be redder, before 
 The saber is sheathed and the battle is o^er. 
 
 1 drummer ; one who beats the drum. 
 
 2 belonging to Chimari, Ulyria, and Suli. districts of Albania. 
 
 3 garment covering the body. 
 
 6 
 
82 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 Tlien the pirates of Parga ' that dwell by the waves, 
 And teach the pale Franks what it is to be slaves, 
 Sliall leave on tlie beach the long galley and oar, 
 And track to his covert the captive on shore. 
 
 I ask not the plcasnre that riches supply, 
 
 ^[y saber shall win what the feeble must buy : 
 
 Shall win the young bride with her long flowing hair. 
 
 And many a maid from her mother shall tear. 
 
 I love the fair face of the maid in her youth ; 
 Her caresses shall lull me, her music shall soothe : 
 Let her bring from her chamber the many-toned lyre, 
 And sing us a song on the fall of her sire. 
 
 Remember the moment when Previsa^ fell. 
 The shrieks of the conquered, the conqueror^s yell; 
 The roofs that we fired, and the plunder we shared. 
 The wealthy we slaughter'd. the lovely we spared. 
 
 I talk not of mercy, I talk not of fear ; 
 He neither must know who would serve the Vizier ; ^ 
 Since the days of our prophet the crescent ne'er saw 
 A chief ever glorious like Ali Pashaw.* 
 
 Selictar I^ unsheath then our chief's scimitar : 
 Tambourgi ! thy 'larum gives jjromise of war. 
 Ye mountains that see us descend to the shore. 
 Shall view us as victors, or view us no more ! 
 
 LXXIII. 
 
 Fair Greece ! sad relic of departed worth ! 
 Immortal, thougli no more ; " though fallen, great ! 
 
 1 a sea-coast town of Epinis. 
 
 2 a (?ea-C()a8t town of Epiriis, taken bj- the Albanians from the French. 
 
 ' meaning Ali Pacha. Vizier, chief minister of a Turlcish or other Eastern sovereign. 
 Ali Pacha was so called, being niler of Albania under the authoritj' of the Sultan (king) 
 of Turkey. * spelled Pacha, Pasha, or Pashaw ; means governor or viceroy 
 
 ^ sword-bearer. ^ though i(s ancieni glory has departed. 
 
CHILDE HAROI.D. 83 
 
 Who now shall lead thy scattered children forth. 
 And long accustomed bondage uncreate ? 
 Not such thy sons who whilome did await. 
 The hopeless warriors of a willing doom. 
 In bleak Thermopylae's ' sepulchral strait — 
 Oh, who that gallant spirit shall resume, 
 Leap from Eurotas' ' banks, and call thee from the tomb? 
 
 LXXV. 
 
 In all save form alone, how changed ! ^ and who 
 That marks the fire still sparkling in each eye. 
 Who but would deem their bosoms burned anew 
 With thy unquenched beam, lost Liberty ! * 
 And many dream wdthal the hour is nigh 
 That gives them back their fathers' heritage : 
 For foreign arms and aid they fondly sigh, 
 Nor solely dare encounter hostile rage. 
 Or tear their name defiled from Slavery^s mournful page. 
 
 LXXYI. 
 
 Hereditary bondsmen ! know" ye not 
 Who would be free themselves must strike the blow ? 
 By their right arms the conquest must be wrought I 
 Will Gaul ' or Muscovite ' redress ye ? Ko ! 
 True, they may lay your proud despoilers ' low, 
 
 1 ThermopyliB, a narrow mountain pass between Thessaly and Locris (north Greece), 
 Here, in 480 B.C., took place the famous battle in which Leonidas, King of Sparta (a coun- 
 try of Greece), resisted the advance of the Persian King Xerxes, who had come with 
 u great army to invade the country. Leonidas and his little band, numbering only 
 Three hundred, fought until they were all killed but one man, who carried the news to 
 Sparta. 
 
 '^ a river of Sparta. t 
 
 * meaning the modern Greeks. 
 
 * At the time that Byron wrote. Greece wag under the oppressive rule of Turkey, She 
 bjcame an independent kingdom in 1829. 
 
 ^ Frenchman. 
 
 " Russian. Muscovy was formerly the name of RuesJu. 
 
 7 the Turks. 
 
84 CHILDK HAROLD. 
 
 Hut not for yon will Freedom's altars flame. 
 SJiadc'S of the Helots I ' trinniph o'er yonr foe : 
 (i recce I change thy lords, thy state is still the same : 
 Thy glorious day is o'er, but not thy years of shame. 
 
 LXXXIII. 
 
 This must he feel, the true-born son of Greece, 
 
 If Greece one true-born patriot still can boast : 
 
 Xot such as prate of war, but skulk in peace, 
 
 The bondsman's peace, who sighs for all he lost. 
 
 Yet with smooth smile his tyrant can accost. 
 
 And wield the slavish sickle, not the sword : 
 
 Ah, Greece ! they love thee least who owe thee most — 
 
 Their birth, their blood, and that sublime record 
 
 Of hero sires, who shame thy now degenerate horde !^ 
 
 LXXXV. 
 
 And yet how lovely in thine age of woe, 
 Land of lost gods and godlike men, art thou ! 
 Thy vales of evergreen, thy hills of snow,^ 
 Proclaim thee Nature's varied favorite now ; • 
 Thy fanes, thy temples, to thy surface bow. 
 Commingling slowly with heroic earth. 
 Broke by the share of every rustic plough ; 
 So perish monuments of mortal birth. 
 So perish all in turn, save well-recorded Worth ; 
 
 LXXXVI. 
 
 Save wdiere some solitary column mourns 
 Above its prostrate brethren of the cave ; * 
 
 > the population of ancient Sparta was divided into four classes, one of which was 
 formed of serfs or slaves, who were called Uelots. 
 
 2 referring to the native people of Greece, who, by submitting to Turkish rule, dishonored 
 the memory of their great ancestors. 
 
 3 on some of the mountains of Greece the snow is never entirely melted. 
 
 * the cave or quarries of Mount Pentelicus, in Attica, where the marble was obtained 
 for the magnificent temples and monuments of Athens. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 85 
 
 Save where Tritonia's ' airy shrine adorns 
 Colonna's cliff/ and gleams along the wave ; 
 Save o'er some warrior's half-forgotten grave. 
 Where the gray stones and unmolested grass 
 Ao"es. but not oblivion, feeblv brave, 
 While strangers only not regardless pass. 
 Lingering like me, perchance, to gaze, and sigh '-Alas \" 
 
 LXXXVII. 
 
 Yet are thy skies as blue, thy crags as wild ; 
 Sweet are thy groves, and verdant are thy fields. 
 Thine olives ripe as when Minerva smiled, 
 And still his honey'd wealth Hymettus ' yields ; 
 There the blithe bee his fragrant fortress bailds. 
 The free-born wanderer of thy mountain air ; 
 Apollo still thy long, long summer gilds, 
 Still in his beam Mendeli's* marbles glare ; 
 Art, Glory, Freedom fail, but Xature still is fair. 
 
 LXXXVIII. 
 
 "Where'er we tread 'tis haunted, holy ground ; 
 Xo earth of thine is lost in vulgar mold. 
 But one vast realm of wonder spreads around. 
 And all the Muse's tales seem truly told. 
 Till the sense aches with gazing to behold 
 The scenes our earliest dreams have dwelt upon : 
 Each hill and dale, each deepening glen and wold. 
 Defies the power which crushed thy temples gone : 
 Age shakes Athena's tower, but spares gray Marathon/ 
 
 1 Tritonia was another name of Pallas :Minerva. the goddess of wisdom. 
 
 2 Cape Colonna, in the south of Attica, where there was a temple of Pallas, which could 
 be seen from a great distance at sea. 
 
 8 a mountain of Attica, celebrated for the excellent honey found there. 
 * Mendeli, the modern name of Mount Pentelicus. (See note 4, page 84.) 
 » a plain on the east coast of Attica, twenty miles from Athens, famous as the place 
 where, in 490 B.C., an Athenian army of 10,000 men, under Miltiades, defeated a Persian 
 army of over 100,000 under Datis and Artaphernes, the generals of Darius, King of Persia. 
 
86 CHILDE HAKOLD. 
 
 XC. 
 
 What sacred trophy marks the hallow'd ground, 
 Recording Freedom^s smile and Asia's tear ? 
 The rifled urn, the violated mound,' 
 The dust thy courser's hoof, rude stranger! spurns around. 
 
 xci. 
 Yet to the remnants of thy splendor past 
 Shall pilgrims, pensive, but unwearied, throng: 
 Long shall the voyager, with th' Ionian blast. 
 Hail the bright clime of battle and of song ; 
 Long shall thine annals and immortal tongue 
 Fill with thy fame the youth of many a shore : 
 Boast of the aged ! lesson of the young ! 
 AVhich sages venerate and bards adore. 
 As Pallas and the Muse unveil their awful lore. 
 
 XCII. 
 
 The parted bosom clings to wonted home, 
 If aught that's kindred cheer the welcome hearth ; 
 He that is lonely, hither^ let him roam. 
 And gaze complacent on congenial earth. 
 Greece is no lightsome land of social mirth ; 
 But he whom Sadness sootheth may abide. 
 And scarce regret the region of his birth. 
 When wandering slow by Delphi's sacred side. 
 Or gazing o'er the plains where Greek and Persian died. 
 
 xciir. 
 
 Let such approach this consecrated land. 
 And pass in peace along the magic waste ; 
 But sj)are its relics — let no busy hand 
 Deface the scenes, already how defaced ! 
 Not for such purpose were these altars placed. 
 
 ' on the field of Marathon, covering the graves of the Greeks who fell in the battle. 
 2 to Greece. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 87 
 
 Eevere the remnants nations once revered ; 
 So may our country's name ' be undisgraced, 
 So mayst thou prosper where thy youth was rear'd, 
 By every honest joy of love and life endear'd ! 
 
 CANTO THE THIRD. 
 
 I. 
 
 Is thy face like thy mother's, my fair child ! 
 Ada I sole daughter of my house and heart P"" 
 AVhen last I saw thy young blue eyes they smiled. 
 And then we parted,— not as now we part, 
 
 But with a hope. — 
 
 Awaking wnth a start, 
 
 The waters heave around me ; and on high 
 
 The winds lift up their voices : I depart, 
 
 Whither I know not ; but the hour's gone by, 
 
 When Albion's lessening shores could grieve or glad 
 
 mine eyes. 
 
 II. 
 
 Once more upon the waters ! yet once more ! 
 And the waves bound beneath me as a steed 
 That knows his rider. Welcome to their roar 1 
 Swift be their guidance, wheresoe'er it lead I 
 Though the strain'd mast should quiver as a reed. 
 And the rent canvas fluttering strew the gale, 
 Still must I on ; for I am as a weed. 
 Flung from the rock, on Ocean's foam, to sail 
 Where'er the surge may sweep, the tempest's breath 
 prevail. 
 
 1 England's. ' Byron'3 own danghter and only child, Ada. 
 
88 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 TV. 
 Since my young days of passion — joy, or pain, 
 Perchance my lieart and liarp have lost a string. 
 And both may jar : it may be, that in vain 
 I would, essay as I have sung to sing. 
 Yet, though a dreary strain, to this I cling. 
 So that it Avean me from tlie weary dream 
 Of selfish grief or ghidness — so it fling 
 Forgetfulness around me — it shall seem 
 To me, though to none else, a not ungrateful theme. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Long-absent Harold reappears at last ; 
 He of the breast which fain no more would feel. 
 Wrung with the wounds which kill not, but ne'er heal ; 
 Yet Time, who changes all, had alter'd him 
 In soul and aspect as in age : years steal 
 Fire from the mind as vigor from the limb ; 
 And life's enchanted cup but sparkles near the brim. 
 
 X. 
 
 Secure in guarded coldness, he had mix'd 
 Again in fancied safety with his kind. 
 And deemed his spirit now so firmly fix'd 
 And sheathed with an invulnerable mind. 
 That, if no joy, no sorrow lurk'd behind ; 
 And he, as one, might 'midst the many stand 
 Unheeded, searching through the crowd to find 
 Fit speculation ; such as in strange land 
 He found in wonder-works of God and Nature's hand. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 Where rose the mountains, there to him were friends ; 
 Where roU'd the ocean, thereon was his home ; 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 89 
 
 Where a blue sky. and glowing clime, extends. 
 He had the passion and the power to roam ; 
 The desert, forest, cavern, breakers foam, 
 AVere unto him companionship ; they spake 
 A mutual language, clearer than the tome 
 Of his land's tongue/ which he would oft forsake 
 For nature's pages glass'd by sunbeams on the lake. 
 
 XYI. 
 
 Self-exiled Harold wanders forth again, 
 With naught of hope left, but with less of gloom. 
 The very knowledge that he lived in vain. 
 That all was over on this side the tomb. 
 Had made Despair a smilingness assume, 
 Which, though 'twere wild, — as on the plunder'd wreck 
 When mariners would madly meet their doom 
 With draughts intemperate on the sinking deck — 
 Did yet inspire a cheer, which he forbore to check. 
 
 XYII. 
 
 Stop I — for thy tread is on an Empire's dust ! ' 
 An Earthquake's spoil is sepulchred below I 
 Is the spot mark'd with no colossal bust ? 
 Nor column trophied for triumphal show ? 
 None ; but the moral's truth tells simpler so, 
 As the ground was before, thus let it be ; — 
 How that red rain ' hath made the harvest grow I 
 And is this all the world has gain'd by thee. 
 Thou first and last of fields I king-making Victory ? 
 
 1 the English language. 
 
 2 the field of Waterloo in Belgium, where, on June 18. 1815, was fought the great battle 
 in which the French, under Napoleon Bonaparte, were defeated by the British and Prus- 
 sians under Wellineton and Bliicher. By this defeat Napoleon lost the French Empire be 
 had established, and soon afterwards he was sent a prisoner to the island of St. Helena, 
 where he died in 18"21. 
 
 3 of blood shed in the battle. 
 
90 * CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 And Harold stands upon this placo of skulls. 
 The irrave of P'rance, the deadly Waterloo ! 
 IIow in an hour the power which gave annuls 
 Its gifts, transferring fame as fleeting too ! 
 In *' pride of 2:)lace'' ' here last the eagle' flew, 
 Then tore with bloody talon the rent plain. 
 Pierced by the shaft of banded nations through ; 
 Ambition's life and labors all were vain ; 
 He wears the shattered links of the world's broken chain.' 
 
 XXI. 
 
 There was a sound of revelry bv night,* 
 And Belgium^s capital had gather'd then 
 Her Beanty and her Chivalry,^ and bright 
 The lamps shone ©""er fair women and brave men ; 
 A thousand hearts beat happily ; and when 
 Music arose with its voluptuous swell, 
 Soft eyes look'd love to eyes which spake again. 
 And all went merry as a marriage-bell : 
 But hush ! hark ! a deej) sound strikes like a rising knell ! 
 
 XXII. 
 
 Did 3^e not hear it ? No ; 'twas but the wind 
 
 Or the car rattling o'er the stony street ; 
 
 On with the dance ! let joy be unconflned ; 
 
 No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure meet 
 
 To chase the glowing Hours with flying feet — 
 
 ' III tlio old-time t*i)ort of falconn^— hunting wild fowl by means of hawks— the phrase, 
 " pride of place " meant the highest pitch or point of flight. 
 
 2 Napoleon. 
 
 3 the chain with which Napoleon by his numerous conquests had bound nearly the 
 whole of Europe, was broken by his defeat at Waterloo, and he himself wore the " shat- 
 tered links " in his imprisonment at St. Helena. 
 
 * On the night before the battle of Waterloo, Wellington, the British general, and his 
 officers were present at a ball in Brussels, the capital of Belgium. The battle-field is 
 within twelve miles of that city. 
 
 ^gallant men and fair ladies. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 91 
 
 But hark I — that heavy sound breaks in once more, 
 As if the clouds its echo would repeat ; 
 And nearer, clearer, deadlier than before I 
 Arm ! arm I it is — it is — the cannon's opening roar I 
 
 XXIIl. 
 
 Within a windowed niche of that high hall ' 
 Sate Brunswick's fated chieftain ; ^ he did hear 
 That sound the first amidst the festival, 
 And caught its tone with Death's prophetic ear ; 
 And when they smiled because he deemed it near. 
 His heart more truly knew that peal too well 
 AVhich stretched his father on a bloody bier/ 
 And roused the vengeance blood alone could quell : 
 He rushed into the field, and, foremost fighting, fell. 
 
 XXIV. 
 
 Ah I then and there was hurrying to and fro. 
 And gathering tears, and tremblings of distress, 
 And cheeks all pale, which but an hour ago 
 Blushed at the praise of their own loveliness ; 
 And there were sudden partings, such as press 
 The life from out young hearts, and choking sighs • 
 AVhich ne'er might be repeated : who would guess 
 If ever more should meet those mutual eyes, 
 Since upon night so sweet such awful morn could rise ! 
 
 XXV. 
 
 And there was mounting in hot haste : the steed. 
 The mustering squadron, and the clattering car, 
 Went pouring forward with impetuous speed, 
 
 ' *n which the ball was given. 
 
 2 the Duke of Brunswick. 
 
 '' the Duke of Brunswick's father was fatally wounded at tlie battle of Jena (Germany), 
 October 14, 1806, in which the Prussians under the Prince of Hohenlohe were defeated by 
 the French under Napoleon. 
 
92 CIllLDE HAROLD. 
 
 And swiftly forming in tlie ranks of war ; 
 And the deep tlumder 2)eal on peal afar ; 
 And near, the beat of tlie alarming drum 
 Housed up the soldier ere the morning star ; 
 "While thronged tlie citizens witli terror dumb, 
 Or whispering, with white lips — ''The foe ! they coir.e ! 
 they come ! '^ 
 
 XXVI. 
 
 And wild and high the '' Cameron's gathering'' * rose, 
 The war-note of Lochiel," which Albyn's ^ hills 
 Iltive heard, and heard, too, have her Saxon foes : * 
 How in the noon of night that pibroch'^ thrills 
 Savage and shrill ! But with the breath which fills 
 Their mountain-pipe, so fill the mountaineers 
 With the fierce native darins; which instills 
 The stirring memory of a thousand years. 
 And Evan's, Donald's ^ fame rings in each clansman^'s ^ 
 ears. 
 
 *■ XXVII. 
 
 And Ardennes ** Avaves above them her green leaves. 
 Dewy with ISi^ature's tear-drops, as they pass. 
 Grieving, if aught inanimate e'er grieves. 
 Over the unreturning brave, — alas I 
 Ere evening to be trodden like the grass 
 
 1 one of tlie tunes of the Cameron Highlanders, the name given to the 79th regiment of 
 infantrj' in the British army, so called from the name of the officer who raised the corps. 
 
 2 The Camerons of Lochiel (Scotland) were famed in Scottish history for their valor and 
 achievements in war. 
 
 3 Albj'n, ancient name of the Scottish Highlands (north part of Scotland). 
 
 * in the wars of former times between the Scotch and the English (Saxons). 
 
 5 a sort of wild music performed on the Scottish bagpipe. 
 
 8 Sir Evan Cameron and his descendant Donald were distinguished chiefs of the Cam- 
 erons of Lochiel. 
 
 ' The clans of the Scottish Highlands in fcjriuer times were tribes or Families of the 
 same name united under a chieftain, by whom they were led in war. Each clan was 
 designated by the common name, :is the clan Cameron, the clan Stuart. 
 
 8 a range of hills, many of them covered with forests of oak and beech, extending 
 through parts of Belgium and northeast France. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 93 
 
 AVliich now beneath them, but above shall grow 
 In its next verduve, when this fiery mass 
 Of living valor, rolling on the foe. 
 And burning with high hope, shall molder cold and low. 
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 Last noon beheld them full of lusty life. 
 Last eve in Beauty's circle proudly gay, 
 The midnight brought the signal-sound of strife, 
 The morn the marslialing in arms,— the day 
 Battle's magnificently stern array 1 
 Tlie thunder-clouds close o'er it, which when rent 
 The earth is covered thick with other clay, 
 Which her own clay shall cover, heaped and pent, 
 Eider and horse,— friend, foe,— in one red burial blent!^' 
 
 XX XVI. 
 
 There sunk the greatest, nor the worst of men,'' 
 AYhose spirit antithetically ' mixt. 
 One moment of the mightiest, and again 
 On little objects with like firmness fixt ; 
 Extreme in all things ! hadst thou' been betwixt. 
 Thy throne had still been thine, or never been ; 
 For daring made thy rise as fall : thou seek'st 
 Even now to reassume the imperial mien. 
 And shake again the world, the Thunderer of the scene! 
 
 XXXVII. 
 
 Conqueror and captive of the earth art thou 1* 
 She trembles at thee still, and thy wild name 
 
 1 Tho fore.Toir,cr stanzas, describing the eve and morning of Waterloo, are much admired 
 bv readers of Bvron. One of the ablest of British critics has observed that " there cnn 
 be no more remarkable proof of the greatness of Lord BjTon's genius than the sp 
 and interest he has contrived to communicate to his picture of the oft-drawn and diftcult 
 scene of the breaking up from Brussels before the great battle." 
 
 2 Napoleon. ' in contrast or opposition. 
 4 :<..jo\eon is still referred to in this and the following stanza. 
 
94 CHILDE JIAi;(>Ll). 
 
 "Was ne'er more bruited in men's minds than now 
 Tliat tlioii art nothing, save the jest of Fame, 
 AVlio vv'ooed thee once, tliy vassal, and became 
 Tlie flatterer of thy fierceness, till thou wert 
 A god unto th3'self ; nor loss the same 
 To the astounded kingdoms all inert, 
 "Who doomed tlioo for a time ^vhato'or thou didst assert. 
 
 XXXVIII. 
 
 Oh, more or loss than man — in hig4i or low. 
 Battling witli nations, flying from the field ; 
 Now making monarchs^ necks thy footstool, now 
 More than thy meanest soldier taught to yield : 
 An empire thou couldst crush, command, rebuild. 
 But govern not thy pettiest passion, nor. 
 However deeply in men's spirits skilled. 
 Look through thine own, nor curb the lust of war, 
 Nor learn that tempted Fate will leave the loftiest star. 
 
 XLV. 
 
 He who ascends to mountain-tops, shall find 
 The loftiest peaks most wrapt in clouds and snow ; 
 He who surpasses or subdues mankind. 
 Must look doAvn on the hate of those below. 
 Though high above the sun of glory glow. 
 And far beneath the earth and ocean spread. 
 Round him are icy rocks, and loudly blow 
 Contending tempests on his naked head. 
 And thus reward the toils which to those summits led. 
 
 XLVI. 
 
 Away with these ; true Wisdom's world will be 
 "Within its own creation, or in thine. 
 Maternal Nature ! for who teems like thee. 
 Thus on the banks of thy majestic Rhine ? * 
 
 * the great river of Germany. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 95 
 
 There Harold gazes on a work divine, 
 A blending of all beauties ; streams and dells, 
 Fruit, foliage, crag, wood, corn-field, mountain, vine. 
 And chiefless castles ' breathing stern farewells 
 From gray but leafy walls, where Ruin greenly dwells. 
 
 LI. 
 
 A thousand battles ^ have assailed thy banks. 
 But these and half their fame have passed away. 
 And Slaughter heaped on high its weltering ranks : 
 Their very graves are gone, and what are they ? 
 Thy tide washed down the blood of yesterday. 
 And all was stainless, and on thy clear stream 
 Glassed w^ith its dancing light the sunny ray ; 
 But O'er the blackened memory's blighting dream 
 Thy waves would vainly roll, all sweeping as tliey seem. 
 
 LII. 
 
 Thus Harold inly said, and passed along. 
 Yet not insensibly to all which here 
 Awoke the jocund birds to early song 
 In glens which might have made even exile dear : 
 Though on his brow were graven lines austere. 
 And tranquil sternness which had ta'en the place 
 Of feelings fierier far but less severe, 
 Joy was not always absent from his face. 
 But o^er it in such scenes would steal with transient 
 trace. 
 
 LIII. 
 
 Nor was all love shut from him, though his da3^s 
 Of passion had consumed themselves to dust. 
 It is in vain that we would coldly gaze 
 On such as smile upon us ; the heart must 
 
 1 The number of castles and cities along the coarse of the Rhine on both sides is very 
 great, and their situations are remarkably beautiful. Many of the castles are in ruins. 
 
 2 many great battles have been fought ou or near the banks of the Rhine. 
 
96 CHILDK HAROLD. 
 
 Leap kindl}' l)ack to kindness, thougli disgust 
 Hatli weaned it from jdl worldlings ; thus he felt, 
 For there was soft remembrance, and sweet trust 
 In one fond breast, to which his own would melt, 
 And in its tenderer hour on that his bosom dwelt. 
 
 LV. 
 
 That love Avas pure, and, far above disguise. 
 Had stood the test of mortal enmities 
 Still undivided, and cemented more 
 By peril, dreaded most in female eyes ; 
 But this was firm, and from a foreign shore 
 Well to tliat heart might his these absent greetings pour I 
 
 The castled crasf of Drachenfels * 
 Frowns o'er tiie wide and winding Rhine, 
 AVhose breast of waters broadly swells 
 Between the banks which bear the vine, 
 And hills all rich with blossomed trees, 
 And fields which promise corn and wine. 
 And scattered cities crowning these. 
 Whose far white walls along them shine, 
 Have strewM a scene, which I should see 
 With double joy wert thou Avitli me ! 
 
 And peasant girls, with dee]:) blue eyes. 
 And hands which offer early flowers. 
 Walk smiling o'er tliis paradise ; 
 Above, the frequent feudal towers ^ 
 
 ' The castle of Drachenfels stands on the highest summit of the " Sevan Mountains " 
 over the Rhine banks. It is in ruins, and some strange stories are connected with it. 
 
 2 the towers or castles of the great land-holders under the feudal sj^stem of former 
 times. In those times the tenant or occupier of the land was bound to serve his superior 
 lord — a duke or a king— in his wars, hence the word feudal, from feud, which means a 
 quarrel. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 07 
 
 Through green leaves lift their walls of gray, 
 And many a rock which deeply lowers. 
 And noble arch in proud decay, 
 Look o'er this vale of vintage-bowers : 
 But one thing want these banks of Rhine, — 
 Thy gentle hand to clasp in mine ! 
 
 I send the lilies given to me ; 
 Though long before thy hand they touch, 
 I know that they must withered be. 
 But yet reject them not as such ; 
 For I have cherishM them as dear. 
 Because they yet may meet thine eye. 
 And guide thy soul to mine even here, 
 When thou behold'st them drooping nigh. 
 And know'st them gathered by the Rhine, 
 And offered from my heart to thine ! 
 
 The river noblv foams and flows, 
 
 The charm of this enchanted ground. 
 
 And all its thousand turns disclose 
 
 Some fresher beauty varying round ; 
 
 The hauofhtiest breast its wish misfht bound 
 
 Through life to dwell delighted here; 
 
 Kor could on earth a spot be found 
 
 To Xature and to me so dear. 
 
 Could thy dear eyes in following mine 
 
 Still sweeten more these banks of Rhine ! 
 
 LYI. 
 
 By Coblentz,' on a rise of gentle ground, 
 There is a small and simple pyramid, 
 Crowning the summit of the verdant mound ; 
 Beneath its base are heroes^ ashes hid, 
 
 ' a town of Rhenish Prussia, un the left bank of the Rhine. 
 
 7 
 
98 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 Our enemy's,' — but let not that forbid 
 Honor to Marceau ! ' o^er whose early tomb 
 Tears, big tears, gushed from the rough soldier's lid, 
 Lamenting and yet envying such a doom, 
 Falling for France, whose rights he battled to resume. 
 
 LVII. 
 
 Brief, brave, and glorious was his young career, — 
 His mourners were two hosts, his friends and foes; 
 And fitly may the stranger lingering here 
 Pray for his gallant spirit's bright repose ; 
 For he was Freedom's champion, one of those. 
 The few in number, Avho had not o'erstept 
 The charter to chastise which she ^ bestows 
 On such as wield her weapons ; he had kept 
 The whiteness of his soul, and thus men o'er him wept. 
 
 LVIII. 
 
 Here Ehrenbreitstein,* with her shattered wall 
 Black with the miner's blast, upon her height 
 Yet shows of what she w^as, when shell and ball 
 Rebounding idly on her strength did light ; 
 A tower of victory ! from whence the flight 
 Of baffled foes was watched along the plain ; 
 But Peace destroyed what War could never blight,* 
 And laid those proud roofs bare to Summer's rain — 
 On which the iron shower for years had poured in vain. 
 
 ' England's. 
 
 2 a young French general killed at the battle of Altenkirchen (Prussia), September 16, 
 1796. 
 
 3 Freedom. 
 
 * a town and fortress of Rhenish Prussia, on the right bank of the Rhine, opposite 
 Coblentz. The fortress, built on the summit of a precipitous rock 490 feet high, is 
 one of the strongest in Europe. 
 
 *the French took Ehreubreitstein in 1799, after a siege of fourteen months. Peace 
 being made in 1801, they left the fort, but before their departure they blew up the works. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 99 
 
 LIX. 
 
 Adieu to thee, fair Rhine I How long delighted, 
 The stranger fain would linger on his way I 
 Thine is a scene alike where souls united 
 Or lonely Contemplation thus might stray ; 
 And could the ceaseless vultures ' cease to prey 
 On self-condemning bosoms, it were here, 
 Where Nature, nor too somber nor too gay, 
 Wild but not rude, awful yet not austere. 
 Is to the mellow Earth as Autumn to the vear. 
 
 LXII. 
 
 But these '^ recede. Above me are the Alps,^ 
 The palaces of Nature, whose vast walls 
 Have pinnacled in clouds their snowy scalps. 
 And throned Eternity in icy halls* 
 Of cold sublimity, where forms and falls 
 The avalanche — the thunder-bolt of snow ! 
 All that expands the spirit, yet appalls. 
 Gather around these summits, as to show 
 How Earth may pierce to Heaven, yet leave vain man 
 below. 
 
 LXIII. 
 
 But ere these matchless heights I dare to scan. 
 There is a spot should not be passed in vain, — 
 Morat I '" the proud, the patriot field I where man 
 May gaze on ghastly trophies of the slain, 
 
 1 birds which feed on dead bodies. The word is here ueed figuratively for thoughts 
 which torment the mind. 
 
 2 the beauties of the Rhine. 
 
 3 the highest mountain range of Europe— between Switzerland and Italy, and extending 
 into the adjacent countries. 
 
 * referring to the perpetual snow and the glaciers on the top of the Alps. 
 
 * a town of Switzerland, where, in a great battle on June 22, 1476, the Swiss defeated 
 Charles the Bold, Dulce of Burgundy (France), who had come with a great army to con- 
 quer their country. 
 
IDO CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 \()r bliisli for those wlio conquered on tluit plain ; 
 Here Biirgiuuly bequeathed his tombless host, 
 A bony lieap/ through ages to remain, 
 Tlieniselves their monument; — tlie Stygian coast "^ 
 Unsepulchred tliey roamed, and shrieked each wander- 
 ing ghost. 
 
 LXIV. 
 
 While Waterloo with Cannae^s carnage ^ vies, 
 Morat and Marathon twin names shall stand ; 
 They were true Glory^s stainless victories, 
 Won by the unambitious heart and hand 
 Of a proud, brotherly, and civic band. 
 All unbought champions in no princely cause 
 Or vice-entailed Corruption ; they no land 
 Doomed to bewail the blasphemy of laws 
 Making kings' rights divine, by some Draconic * clause. 
 
 LXVIII. 
 
 Lake Leman ^ woos me with its crystal face. 
 The mirror where the stars and mountains view 
 The stillness of their aspect in each trace 
 Its clear depth yields of their far height and hue : 
 There is too much of man here, to look through 
 With a fit mind the might which I behold ; 
 But soon in me shall Loneliness renew 
 
 ' the bones of the French killed at the battle of Morat remained for ages after, heaped 
 in a pyramid on the field. 
 
 2 the regions beyond the Styx, a fabled river over which the ancients believed the spirits 
 or shades of men passed after death. The spirits of nnburied bodies were obliged to 
 wander on the bank of the river— the Stygian coast— for a Imndred years bef(i:e being 
 carried over. 
 
 3 referring to the battle of Cannu'. (a town of Italy), 210 B.C., in which the famous Car- 
 thaginian general, Hannibal, defeated the Romans. 
 
 * extremely severe, like the laws of Draco (an ancient Authenian lawmaker), which 
 made death the punishment of every crime, great or small. 
 6 in Switzerland— also called Lake Geneva. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 101 
 
 Thouglits hid, but not less cherislied than of old, 
 Ere mingling with the herd ' had penned me in their 
 fofd. 
 
 LXXI. 
 
 Is it not better, then, to be alone. 
 And love Eartli only for it&^arthly sake ? 
 By the blue rushing of the arrowy Rhone,^ 
 Or the pure bosom of its nursing lake. 
 Which feeds it as a mother who doth make 
 A fair but froward infant her own car^ 
 Kissing its cries away as these awake ; — 
 Is it not better thus our lives to wear, 
 Than join the crushing crowd, doomed to inflict or bear ? 
 
 LXXV. 
 
 Are not the mountains, waves, and skies a part 
 Of me and of my soul, as I of them ? 
 Is not the love of these deep in my heart 
 With a pure passion ? should I not contemn 
 All objects, if compared with these ? and stem 
 A tide of suffering, rather than forego 
 Such feelings for the hard and worldly phlegm 
 Of those whose eyes are only turned below. 
 Gazing upon the ground, with thoughts which dare not 
 glow ? 
 
 LXXYI. 
 
 But this is not my theme ; and I return 
 To that which is immediate, and require 
 Those who find contemplation in the urn. 
 To look on One ' whose dust was once all fire, 
 
 1 society 
 
 2 a areat'river of Switzerland and France ; it flows through the Lake of Geneva. 
 
 3 Rousseau (pron., Roo-so\ a celebrated French writer and philosopher, born ni (ieneva, 
 1712. 
 
 
Uri CHILDE HAKULD. 
 
 A native of the land whei-e I res2)ire 
 The clear air for a while — a passing guest, 
 Where he became a being — whose desire 
 Was to be glorious ; ^twas a foolish quest, 
 The which to gain and keep he sacrificed all rest. 
 
 LXXVII. 
 
 Here the self-torturing sophist/ wild Rousseau, 
 The apostle of affliction, he who threw 
 Enchantment over passion^ and from woe 
 Wrung overwhelming eloquence, first drew 
 The breath which made him wretched ; yet he knew 
 How to make madness beautiful, and cast 
 O^er erring deeds and thoughts a heavenly hue" 
 Of words, like sunbeams, dazzling as they past 
 The eyes, which o'er them shed tears feelingly and fast. 
 
 LXXXV. 
 
 Clear, placid Leman ! thy contrasted lake. 
 With the wild world I dwelt in, is a thing 
 Which warns me, with its stillness, to forsake 
 Earth's troubled waters for a purer spring. 
 This quiet sail is as a noiseless wing 
 To waft me from distraction ; once I loved 
 Torn ocean's roar, but thy soft murmuring 
 Sounds sweet as if a sister's voice reproved. 
 That I with stern delights should e'er have been so 
 moved. 
 
 LXXXYI. 
 
 It is the hush of night, and all between 
 Thy margin and. the mountains, dusk, yet clear. 
 Mellow'd and mingling, yet distinctly seen. 
 Save darkened Jura,^ whose capt heights appear 
 
 • The sophists in ancient Greece were teachers of eloquence, philosophy, and politics. 
 'a range of mountaine extending through parts of Switzerland, France, and Germany. 
 
Q 
 
 CHILDE HAROLD. 10 
 
 Precipitously steep : and drawing near, 
 There breathes a living fragrance from the shore, 
 Of flowers yet fresh with childhood ; on the ear 
 Drops the light drip of the suspended oar, 
 Or chirps the grasshopper one good-night carol more ; 
 
 LXXXTII. 
 
 He is an evening reveler, who makes 
 His life an infancy, and sings his fill : 
 At intervals, some bird from out the brakes 
 Starts into voice a moment, then is still. 
 There seems a floating whisper on the hill. 
 But that is fancy, for the starlight dews 
 All silently their tears of love instill, 
 Weeping themselves away, till they infuse 
 Deep into Nature's breast the spirit of her hues.' 
 
 LXXXVIII. . 
 
 Ye stars I which are the poetry of heaven, 
 If in your briglit leaves we would read the fate 
 Of men and empires — 'tis to be forgiven, 
 That in our aspirations to be great, 
 Our destinies o'erleap their mortal state. 
 And claim a kindred with you ; for ye are 
 A beauty and a mystery, and create 
 In us such love and reverence from afar, 
 That fortune, fame, power, life, have named themselves 
 a star. 
 
 LXXXIX. 
 
 All heaven and earth are still— though not in sleep, 
 But breathless, as we grow when feeling most ; 
 And silent, as we stand in thoughts too deep : 
 All heaven and earth are still : From the high host 
 
 1 Durincr his star iu Switzerland Byron resided in the village of Coliguy, within view of 
 Geneva. Every evening he had a sail on the lake, and to the feelings thus created we 
 owe these delightful stanzas. 
 
104 CniLDE HAROLD. 
 
 Of stars, to the lulled lake and mountain-coast. 
 All is concentred in a life intense, 
 AVhere not a beam, nor air, nor leaf is lost. 
 But hath a part of being, and a sense 
 Of that which is of all Creator and defence. 
 
 • ••••• 
 
 XCII. 
 
 The sky is changed I — and such a change I Oh night, 
 And storm, and darkness, ye are wondrous strong. 
 Yet lovely in your strength, as is the light 
 Of a dark eye in woman ! Far along, 
 From joeak to peak, the rattling crags among, 
 Leaps the live thunder ! ' Not from one lone cloud. 
 But every mountain now hath found a tongue ; 
 And Jura answers, through her misty shroud, 
 Back to the joyous Alps, who call to her aloud ! 
 
 XCIII. 
 
 And this is in the night : — Most glorious night ! 
 Thou wert not sent for slumber ! let me be 
 A sharer in thy fierce and far delight — 
 A portion of the temj^est and of thee ! 
 How the lit lake shines, a phosphoric sea,'* 
 And the big rain comes dancing to the earth ! 
 And noAV again ^tis black, — and now, the glee 
 Of the loud hills shakes with its mountain mirth. 
 As if they did rejoice o^er a young earthquake's birth. 
 
 • ••••• X 
 
 XCVIII. 
 
 The morn is up again, the dewy morn. 
 With breath all incense, and with cheek all bloom, 
 Laughing the clouds away with playful scorn, 
 And living as if earth contained no tomb, — 
 
 > referring to a great thunder-Btorm which occurred on the night of Jnne 13, 1816. 
 ' shining like phosphorus, a substance that gives forth a luminous vai)()r. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 105 
 
 And glowing into day : we may resume 
 The march of our existence : and thus I, 
 Still on thy shores, fair Leman I may find room 
 And food for meditation, nor pass by 
 Much, that may give us pause, if pondered fittingly. 
 
 c. 
 
 Clarens ! ' by heavenly feet thy paths are trod— 
 Undying Love\ who here ascends a throne 
 To which the steps are mountains ; where the god ' 
 Is a pervading life and light — so shown 
 Not on those summits solely, nor alone 
 In the still cave and forest ; o'er the flower 
 His eye is sparkling, and his breath hath blown. 
 His soft and summer breath, whose tender power 
 Passes the strens^th of storms in their most desolate hour 
 
 cv. 
 Lausanne ! and Ferney I ' ye have been the abodes 
 Of names ' which unto you bequeathed a name ; 
 Mortals, who sought and found, by dangerous roads, 
 A path to perpetuity of fame : 
 They were gigantic minds, and their steep aim 
 Was, Titan-like,' on daring doubts to pile 
 Thoughts ' which should call down thunder, and the 
 flame 
 
 1 a village near Lake Geneva. ' of love. 
 
 s Lausanne and Ferney are towns of Switzerland. 
 
 * referring to Gibbon and Voltaire. Gibbon was author of the celebrated book, " The 
 Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire."' He resided for many years at Lausanne, and 
 wrote a great part of his book there. Voltaire was a famous French writer. He spent 
 the last twenty years of his life at Ferney. 
 
 » The Titans were powerful giants, or gods, of ancient Greek fable. They made war 
 upon Jupiter, king of the gods, and in order to reach his palace, on the top of Mount 
 Olympus (.Greece), they piled mountain upon mountain, from which, however, they were 
 hurled down by the thunderbolts of Jui)iter. 
 •referrincr to the infidel teaching of some of the writings of Voltaire and Gibbon. 
 
10(3 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 or Heaven, again assailed, if Heaven the while 
 Oil man and man's research could deign do more than 
 smile. 
 
 CYI. 
 
 The one ' was fire and fickleness, a child 
 Most mutable in wishes, but in mind 
 A wit as various — gay, grave, sage, or wild, — 
 Historian, bard, philosopher combined : 
 He multiplied himself among mankind. 
 The Proteus' of their talents : But his own 
 Breathed most in ridicule, — which, as the wind. 
 Blew where it listed, laying all things prone, — 
 Now to overthrow a fool, and now to shake a throne. 
 
 CVII. 
 
 The other,' deej) and slow, exhausting thought, 
 And hiving wisdom with each studious year. 
 In meditation dwelt, with learnins; wrouofht. 
 And shaj^ed his weapon with an edge severe. 
 
 cix. 
 
 But let me quit man^s works, again to read 
 His Maker^s, spread around me, and suspend 
 This page, which from my reveries I feed, 
 Until it seems prolonging without end. 
 The clouds above me to the white Alps tend. 
 And I must pierce them, and survey whatever 
 May be permitted, as my steps I bend 
 To their most great and growing region, wliere 
 The earth to her embrace compels the powers of air. 
 
 ' Voltaire. 
 
 2 a eea-god, according to the ancients, who had power to change himself instautaneously 
 into different forms. 
 ^Gibbon. 
 
CHILDE HARULD. 107 
 
 ex. 
 
 Italia ! ' too, Italia ! looking on thee 
 Full flashes on the soul the light of ages, 
 Since the fierce Carthaginian ' almost won thee. 
 To the last halo of the chiefs and sages 
 Who glorify thy consecrated pages : 
 Thou wert the throne and grave of empires ; ' still. 
 The fount at which the panting mind assuages 
 Her thirst of knowledge, quaffing there her fill, 
 Flows from the eternal source of Rome's imperial hill. 
 
 CXI. 
 
 Thus far have I proceeded in a theme 
 Renewed with no kind auspices : — to feel 
 We are not what we have been, and to deem 
 We are not what we should be, — and to steel 
 The heart against itself : and to conceal. 
 With a proud caution, love or hate, or aught,— 
 Passion or feeling, purpose, grief, or zeal.— 
 Which is the tyrant spirit of our thought, 
 Is a stern task of soul :— Xo matter,— it is taught. 
 
 CXII. 
 
 And for these words, thus woven into song, 
 It may be that they are a harmless wile, — 
 The coloring of the scenes which fleet along. 
 Which I would seize, in passing, to beguile 
 Mv breast, or that of others, for a while. 
 Fame is the thirst of youth — but I am not 
 So young as to regard men's frown or smile 
 As loss or guerdon of a glorious lot : 
 I stood and stand alone— remembered or forgot. 
 
 1 Italy. 
 
 2 Hannibal, the famous general of Carthage (North Africa^ who. in 218 B.C., marching 
 with a great army from Spain, crossed the Alps into Italy, and defeated the Romans in 
 several battles. 
 
 3 referring to the many conquests and vast power of the ancient Romans. 
 
108 CHILDE HAROLD. I 
 
 CXV. 
 
 My daiigliier ! with thy name this song begun — 
 My daughter! witli thy name thus mucli shall end. 
 I see thee not, I hear thee not, — but none 
 Can be so wrapt in thee ; thou art the friend 
 To whom the shadows of far years extend : 
 Albeit my brow thou never shouldst behold. 
 My voice shall with thy future visions blend, 
 And reach into thy heart, — when mine is cold — ■ 
 A token and a tone, even from thy father's mold. 
 
 CANTO THE FOURTH. 
 I. 
 
 I STOOD in Venice,' on the Bridge of Sighs ;* 
 A palace and a prison on each hand : 
 I saw from out the wave her structures rise 
 As from the stroke of the enchanter's wand ; 
 A thousand years their cloudy wings expand 
 Around me, and a dying Glory smiles 
 O'er the far times when many a subject land 
 Looked to the winged Lion's ^ marble piles, 
 Where Venice sate in state, throned on her hundred isles! 
 
 II. 
 She looks a sea Cybele,* fresh from ocean. 
 Rising with her tiara of proud towers 
 
 > a beautiful city of Italy, built on a cluster of small islands at the northwest point of 
 the Adriatic Sea. Most of the streets are canals, on which passengers are conveyed in 
 light boats called gondolas. 
 
 2 in former times, when Venice was a great and powerful republic, the governor or presi- 
 dent was called the Doge. The communication between the ancient palace of the Doges 
 and the prisons of Venice is by a gloomy bridge, or covered gallery, over which prisoners 
 condemned to death were led to be executed, hence the bridge is known as the Bridge of 
 Sighs. 
 
 3 The Lion of St. Mark was the standard or national emblem of the Venetian Republic, 
 St. Mark being the patron saint, and the figure of a lion being among the decorations of 
 St. Mark's Cathedral (Venice), one of the most beautiful churches in the world. 
 
 * {pron. sib'e-lee) the mother of Jupiter and many of the other gotls. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 109 
 
 At airy distance, with majestic motion, 
 A ruler of the waters and their powers ; 
 And such she was ; her daughters had their dowers 
 From spoils of nations, and the exhaustless East 
 Poured in her lap all gems in sparkling showers." 
 In purple was she robed, and of her feast 
 Monarchs partook and deemed their dignity increased. 
 
 III. 
 In Venice, Tasso's echoes ' are no more, 
 And silent rows the songless gondolier; 
 Her palaces are crumbling to the shore. 
 And music meets not always now the ear ; 
 These days are gone — but beauty still is here. 
 States fall, arts fade— but Nature doth not die, 
 Xor yet forget how Venice once was dear. 
 The pleasant ^olace of all festivity. 
 The revel of the earth, the mask ' of Italy ! 
 
 IV. 
 
 But unto us she hath a spell beyond 
 
 Her name in story, and her long array 
 
 Of mighty shadows, whose dim forms despond 
 
 Above the dogeless city's vanished sway ; 
 
 Ours is a trophy which will not decay 
 
 With the Rialto ;' Shylock ' and the Moor,' 
 
 And Pierre,'' can not be swept or woru away — 
 
 » referring to the extensive trade and commerce at one time carried ou by Venice with 
 eastern countries -Syria, Egypt, India, etc. 
 
 2 Tasso was a great Italian poet (bora 1544). From one of his poems, " Jerusalem De- 
 livered,"' parts of the song of the gondoliers (Venetian boat rowers) were taken. 
 
 3 a festive entertainment ; meaning here the chief place of pleasure ia Italy. 
 
 4 name of one of the numerous bridges in Venice. 
 
 5 the Jew in Shakespeare's play, '' The Merchant of Venice,^' in which the Rialto is also 
 mentioned. 
 
 "the principal character in Shakespeare's play of "Othello,"" the scene of which is 
 partly in Venice. 
 
 7 a character represented as a patriot in the play of "Venice Preserved,' written by 
 Thomas Otway, an Euglii^h dramatic poet of the seventeenth century. 
 
110 CHILDE HAROLa 
 
 The keystones of the arch I though all were o'er, 
 For lis repeopled were the solitary shore. 
 
 V. 
 
 The beings of the mind are not of clay ; 
 Essentially immortal, they create 
 And multiply in us a brighter ray 
 And more beloved existence : that which Fate 
 Prohibits to dull life, in this our state 
 Of mortal bondage, by these spirits supplied, 
 First exiles, then replaces what we hate ; 
 Watering the heart whose early flowers have died, 
 And with a fresher growth replenishing the void. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Such is the refuge of our youth and age. 
 The first from Hope, the last from Vacancy ; 
 And this worn feeling peoples many a page. 
 And, may be, that which grows beneath mine eye. 
 Yet there are things whose strong realitv 
 Outshines our fairy-land ; in shape and hues 
 More beautiful than our fantastic sky. 
 And the strange constellations which the Muse 
 O'er her wild universe is skillful to diffuse : 
 
 VII. 
 
 I saw or dreamed of such, — but let them go— 
 They came like truth, and disappeared like dreams ; 
 And whatsoe^'er they were — are now but so ; 
 I could replace them if I would : still teems 
 My mind with many a form which aptly seems 
 Such as I sought for, and at moments found ; 
 Let these too go — for waking Reason deems 
 Such overweening phantasies unsound. 
 And other voices speak, and other sights surround. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. Ill 
 
 XT. 
 
 The spouseless Adriatic mourns her lord : 
 And, annual marriage now no more renewed,' 
 The Bucentaur lies rotting unrestored, 
 Neglected garment of her widowhood I 
 St. Mark vet sees his lion* where he stood 
 Stand, but in mockery of his withered power, 
 Over the proud place where an Emperor sued ; ' 
 And monarchs gazed and envied in the hour 
 When Venice was a queen with an unequaled dower. 
 
 XYIII. 
 
 I loved her from my boyhood ; she to me 
 Was as a fairy city of the heart. 
 Rising like water-columns from the sea. 
 Of joy the sojourn, and of wealth the mart. 
 And Otway, Radcliffe, Schiller, Shakespeare's* art. 
 Had stamped her image in me, and even so. 
 Although I found her thus, we did not part. 
 Perchance even dearer in her day of woe. 
 Than when she was a boast, a marvel^ and a show, 
 
 XXV. 
 
 But my soul wanders : I demand it back 
 To meditate amongst decay, and stand 
 
 ' in former times there used to be in Venice every year, on Ascension Thursday (fortieth 
 day after Easter), a grand water-procession, formed of a number of the citizens, in gondo- 
 las, headed by the Doge in a vessel called the Bucentaur, which was kept specially for 
 the purpose. When the procession reached the mouth of one of the channels opening 
 into the sea, the Doge " married the Adriatic," by dropping a ring into the water, at the 
 same time repeating the words, " We wed thee with this ring in token of our true and 
 perpetual sovereiguty." 
 
 2 See note .3, page 108- 
 
 3 Frederick I., Emperor of Germany from 1152 to 1190, who was excommunicated by 
 Pope Alexander III., with whom he had a quarrel for many years. In 1177 Frederick sub- 
 mitted to Alexander, and appeared before him in St. Mark's Cathedral, Venice, where 
 the excommunication was removed. 
 
 * names of authors who wrote about Venice. 
 
112 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 A I'll ill iiiiiidst ruiiLS ; there to track 
 
 Fiill'ii states and buried greatness^ o'er a land 
 
 Which was the mightiest in its old command. 
 
 And is the loveliest, and must ever be 
 
 The master-mold of Nature's heavenly hand, 
 
 AVherein were cast the heroic and tlie free, 
 
 The beautiful, the brave — the lords of earth and sea. 
 
 y 
 
 XXVI. 
 
 The commonwealth of kings, the men of Rome ! 
 And even since, and now, fair Italy ! 
 Thou art the garden of the world, the home 
 Of all Art yields, and Nature can decree ; 
 Even in thy desert, what is like to thee ? 
 Thy very weeds are beautiful, thy Avaste 
 More rich than other climes' fertility; 
 Thy wreck a glory, and thy ruin graced 
 With an immaculate charm which can not be defaced. 
 
 XXVII. 
 
 The moon is up, and yet it is not night — 
 Sunset divides the sky with her — a sea 
 Of glory streams along the Alpine height 
 Of blue Friuli's ' mountains ; Heaven is free 
 From clouds, but of all the colors seems to be — 
 Melted to one vast Iris* of the West, 
 Where the Day joins the past Eternity ; 
 While, on the other hand, meek Dian's crest ^ 
 Floats through the azure air — an island of the blest ! 
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 A single star is at her side, and reigns 
 
 With her o'er half the lovely heaven ; but still 
 
 ■ Friuli, a district in North Italy. 
 
 2 the goddess supposed to have been the representative of the rainbow. 
 
 3 the moon. Dian or Diana was the goddess of the moon. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 113 
 
 Yon sunny sea heaves brightly, and remains 
 Rolled o'er the peak of the far Rhsetian hill/ 
 As Day and Xiglit contending were, until 
 ISTature reclaimed her order : — gently flows 
 The deep-dyed Brenta/ where their hues instill 
 The odorous purple of a new-born rose, 
 Which streams upon her stream, and glassed within it 
 glows, 
 
 XXIX. 
 
 Filled with the face of heaven, which, from afar. 
 
 Comes down upon the waters ; all its hues. 
 
 From the rich sunset to the rising star. 
 
 Their magical variety diffuse : 
 
 And now they change ; a paler shadow strews 
 
 Its mantle o'er the mountains ; parting day 
 
 Dies like the dolphin, whom each pang imbues 
 
 With a new color as it gasps away," 
 
 The last still loveliest, till — 'tis gone — and all is gray. 
 
 XXXY. 
 
 Ferrara ! * in thy wide and grass-grown streets, 
 AVhose symmetry was not for solitude. 
 There seems as 'twere a curse upon the seats 
 Of former sovereigns, and the antique brood 
 Of Este," which for many an age made good 
 Its strength within thy walls, and was of yore 
 Patron or tyrant, as the clianging mood 
 
 ' Rhaetia, the ancient name of a district nortli of Italy, including part of the Alps. 
 
 2 a river in the north of Italy flowing into the Gulf of Venice. 
 
 3 The dolphin is a large fish celebrated for its changes of color when dying. 
 * a city in the north of Italy. 
 
 6 an old and powerful family of Italy, which, in the thirteenth century, obtained posses- 
 sion of Ferrara. 
 
 8 
 
114 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 Of petty 2)owor impelled, of those ' who wore 
 The wreath which Dante's ^ brow alone had worn before. 
 
 XXXVI. 
 
 And Tasso is their glory and their shame. 
 Hark to his strain I and then survey his cell ! 
 And see how dearly earned Torqnato^s ^ fame. 
 And where Alfonso^ bade his poet dwell. 
 The miserable despot could not quell 
 The insulted mind he sought to quench, and blend 
 AVith the surrounding maniacs, in the hell 
 Where he had plunged it. Glory without end 
 Scattered the clouds away — and on that name " attend 
 
 XXXVII. 
 
 The tears and praises of all time, while thine 
 Would rot in its oblivion — in the sink 
 Of worthless dust, which from thy boasted line 
 Is shaken into nothing ; but the link 
 Thou formest in his fortunes bids us think 
 Of thy poor malice, naming thee with scorn — 
 Alfonso ! how thy ducal pageants shrink 
 From thee I if in another station born. 
 Scarce fit to be the slave of him thou mad'st to mourn. 
 
 XXXIX. 
 
 Peace to Torquato^s injured shade ! 'twas his 
 In life and death to be the mark where Wronof 
 
 1 poets and literary men, who were much patronized by the Este family. 
 
 2 Dante, the greatest of Italian poets, was born in Florence in 1;CG5. His chief work is 
 the " Divina Commedia '' (Divine Comedy), describing a vision in which the poet is ecu- 
 ducted through Hell and Purgatory, and then through Heaven, where he beholds God. 
 
 3 Torquato Tasso, the Italian poet. 
 
 * Alfonso, Duke of Ferrara, who put the poet Tasso in prison, with the purpose, it is 
 said, of keeping him under restraint while suffering from insanity. 
 
 * Tasso. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 115 
 
 Aimed with her j^oisoned arrows — but to miss. 
 Oh, victor unsurpassed in modern song I 
 Each year brings forth its millions : but how long 
 The tide of generations shall roll on. 
 And. not the whole combined and countless throng 
 Compose a mind like thine ? Though all in one 
 Condensed their scattered rays, they would not form a sun. 
 
 XL. 
 
 Great as thou art, yet paralleled by those 
 Thy countrymen, before thee born to shine. 
 The bards of Hell and Chivalry : ^ first rose 
 The Tuscan father's " comedy divine ; 
 Then, not unequal to tlie Florentine, ^ 
 The Southern Scott,* the minstrel who called forth 
 A new creation Avith his magic line. 
 And, like the Ariosto of the Xorth, 
 Sang ladye-love and war, romance and knightly worth. 
 
 XLYIII. 
 
 But Arno ^ wins us to the fair white walls. 
 
 Where the Etrurian Athens " claims and keeps 
 
 A softer feeling for her fairy halls. 
 
 Girt by her theater of hills, she reaps 
 
 Her corn, and wine, and oil, and Plenty leaps 
 
 To laughing life, with her redundant horn." 
 
 Along the banks where smiling Arno sweeps, 
 
 1 Dante and Ariosto. The latter was born at Reggio in 1474. 
 
 2 Dante is so called, the place of his birth (Florence) being in the province of Tuscany. 
 s Dante. 
 
 * Ariosto is here meant. He is called " the Southern Scott *' because his great poem, 
 "Orlando Furioso," treats of "ladye-love and war,'' like some of those of the famous 
 Scottish poet f Scott), and in the second next line the latter is referred to as the " Ariosto 
 of the North.'' 
 
 * a river of Tuscany (central Italy) flowing into the Mediterranean. 
 
 * Florence (on the Arno), situated in the district anciently named Etruria, and in 
 former times almost as celebrated as Athens for works of art and learning. 
 
 ' Ceres, the goddess of Agriculture, was represented as bearing in her hand a " horn of 
 plenty." pouring its abundant contents of fruits and flowers on the ground. 
 
116 CITILDE HAROLD. 
 
 Was modern Luxury of Commerce born, 
 And buried Learning rose, redeemed to a new morn. 
 
 XLIX. 
 
 There, too, the Goddess loves in stone,' and fills 
 The air around with beauty ; we inhale 
 The ambrosial^ aspect, which, beheld, instills 
 Part of its immortality; the veil 
 Of heaven is half undrawn ; within the pale 
 Vie stand, and in that form and face behold 
 "What Mind can make, when Nature's self would fail ; 
 And to the fond idolaters of old 
 Envy the innate flash which such a soul could mold : 
 
 LIV. 
 
 In Santa Croce's ^ holy precincts lie 
 Ashes which make it holier, dust which is 
 E'en in itself an immortality. 
 
 Though there were nothing save the past, and this 
 The particle of those sublimities 
 Which have relapsed to chaos : — here repose 
 Angelo's,* Alfieri's * bones, and his. 
 The starry Galileo,^ with his woes ; 
 Here Machiavelli's^ earth returned to whence it rose. 
 
 LV. 
 
 These are four minds, which, like the elements. 
 Might furnish forth creation : — Italy ! 
 
 ' referring to the statue of the goddess Venus in Florence, famed for its artistic excel- 
 lence and beauty, and known as the Venus de Medici, from having been preserved for a 
 time in the palace of the Medici family in Rome. The statue is the work of Cleomenes, 
 an Athenian sculptor of the second century before Christ. 
 
 2 aclj., from ambrosia, the food of the gods, which rendered those who partook of it 
 immortal. 
 
 ' Santa Croce, the Cathedral of Florence. 
 
 ■• Michael Augelo, one of Italy's greatest sculptors and painters, born 1474. 
 
 * Count AUieri, Italian dranuUic poet, born 1749. 
 
 • Galileo (Jalilci, famous astronomer, born at Pisa (north Italy), 1564 ; imprisoned iu 
 Rome for teaching the revolution of tlie earth round the; sun. 
 
 ^ Nicholas Machiavelli, statesman and writer, born in Florence, 1409. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 117 
 
 Time, which hath wronged thee with ten thousand rents 
 Of thine imperial garment, shall deny, 
 And hath denied, to every other sky, 
 Spirits which soar from ruin : — thy decay 
 Is still impregnate with divinity, 
 Which gilds it with revivifying ray ; 
 Such as the great of yore, Canova ' is to-day. 
 
 LYI. 
 
 But where repose the all Etruscan three — 
 Dante, and Petrarch,' and, scarce less than they, 
 The Bard of Prose, creative spirit ! he 
 Of the Hundred Tales of love '—where did they lay 
 Their bones, distinguished from our common clay 
 In death as life ? Are they resolved to dust, 
 And have their country's marbles nought to say ? 
 Could not her quarries furnish forth one bust ? 
 Did they not to her breast their filial earth entrust ? 
 
 LYII. 
 
 Ungrateful Florence I Dante sleeps afar,* 
 Like Scipio,' buried by the upbraiding shore ; 
 Thy factions, in their worse than civil war. 
 Proscribed the bard ' whose name for evermore 
 Their children's children would in vain adore 
 With the remorse of ages : and the crown 
 Which Petrarch's laureate brow supremely wore,' 
 
 1 Antonio Canova, a great sculptor, born in north Italy 1757, died 1822. 
 
 2 celebrated Italian poet, born at Arezzo, 1304. 
 
 sreferrins to the "Decameron," a book of one hundred stories, written by Boccaccio 
 {pron. bok'kat'cho), who was born in Paris, in 1313, of Italian parentas^e. Dante, 
 Petrarch, and Boccaccio are called "Etruscan," because their families belonged to the 
 district of Etruria. the inhabitants of which were called Etruscans. 
 
 * buried at R-ivenna, central Italy. 
 
 spublius Cornelius Scipio. a famous general of ancient Rome, born 2:37 B.C. ; buried, 
 it is said, near the sea-shore at Liternum, Campania, south Italy. 
 
 < referring to the banishment of Dante from Florence by one of the factions at the time 
 in control of the city. 
 
 T Petrarch was crowned with a poet's laurel wreath in the Capitol at Rome in 1341. 
 
118 CHII.DK HAROLD. 
 
 Upon .1 far and forsign soil had grown. 
 His life, his fame, his grave/ though rifled — not thine own. 
 
 LVIII. 
 
 Boccaccio to liis parent earth bequeathed 
 His dust, — and lies it not her Great among, 
 AVith many a sweet and solemn requiem breathed 
 O'er him who formed the Tuscan's siren' tonofue ? 
 That music in itself, whose sounds are song, 
 The poetry of speech ? No ; — even his tomb 
 Uptorn, must bear the hy£ena bigot's wrong/ 
 No more amidst tlie meaner dead find room, 
 Nor claim a passing sigh, because it told for whom ! 
 
 Lxxvin. 
 Rome I my country ! city of the soul ! 
 The orphans of the heart most turn to thee, 
 Lone mother of dead empires I and control 
 In their shut breasts their petty misery. 
 What are our woes and sufferance ? Come and see 
 The cypress, hear the owl, and plod your way 
 O'er steps of broken thrones and temples. Ye ! 
 Whose agonies are evils of a day — 
 A world is at our feet as fragile as our clay.* 
 
 LXXIX. 
 
 The Niobe ^ of nations ! there she stands, 
 Cliildless and crownless in her voiceless woe ; 
 
 ' at Arqua, in north Italy. 
 
 2 musical, the language of Tuscany being remarkable for its sweetness and softness. 
 
 3 Boccaccio was buried in-a church in CertaJdo (central Italy), from which his remains 
 were afterwards ejected by persons who disliked some of his writings. 
 
 •* In a letter from Rome, shortly after his arrival in the city, Byron AVrote : " I have 
 been some days in Rome the Wonderful. I am delighted with Rome. As a \\hole — 
 ancient and modem— it beats Greece, Constantinople, everything— at least that I have 
 ever seen.''' 
 
 ^ Niobe, wife of Amphion, an ancient Greek king. She had twelve children, of whom 
 she was so proud that she despised Latona, who had only two— the god Apollo and the 
 goddess Diana. To punish her pride the two deities killed all her children, at which she 
 was struck dumb with grief ; and the other gods, pitying her distress, changed her into 
 stone. 
 
CHILDK HAROLD. H^ 
 
 An empty urn within her withered hands. 
 Whose holy dust was scattered long ago ; 
 The Scipios' ' tomb contains no ashes now ; 
 The very sepulchers lie tenantless 
 Of their heroic dwellers : dost thou flow, 
 Old Tiber I' through a marble wilderness ? 
 Rise, with thy yellow waves, and mantle her distress ! 
 
 LXXX. 
 
 The Goth,' the Christian, Time, AYar, Flood, and Fire, 
 Have dealt upon the seven-hilled city's^ pride : 
 She saw her glories star by star expire. 
 And up the steep barbarian monarchs ride, 
 Where the car ' climbed the Capitol ; far and wide 
 Temple and tower went down, nor left a site ;— 
 Chaos of ruins I who shall trace the void. 
 O'er the dim fragments cast a lunar light. 
 And say, '' Here was, or is," where all is doubly night ? 
 
 LXXXI. 
 
 The double night of ages, and of her, 
 Night's daughter. Ignorance, hath wrapt, and wrap 
 Alfround us ; we but feel our way to err : 
 The ocean hath its chart, the stars their map ; 
 And Knowledge spreads them on her ample lap ; 
 But Rome is as the desert, where we steer 
 Stumbling o'er recollections : now we clap 
 Our hands, and cry, - Eureka ! " ' it is clear- 
 When but some false mirage of ruin rises near. 
 
 their kinc-. Alaric. and captured and pillaged Rome. 
 
 chariot drawn by four horses. 
 « Greek word for " I bave found it." 
 
120 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 LXXXII. 
 
 Alas ! the lofty city ! jiiul alas ! 
 The trebly hundred triumphs ! and the day 
 When Brutus ' made the dagger's edge surpass 
 The conqueror's sword in bearing fame away ! 
 Alas for Tully's ' voice, and Virgil's^ lay, 
 And Livy's * pictured page ! But these shall be 
 Her resurrection ; all beside — decay. 
 Alas for Earth, for never shall we see 
 That brightness in her eye she bore when Rome was free ! 
 
 • ••••• 
 
 CXXVIII. 
 
 Arches on arches ! as it were that Rome, 
 Collecting the chief trophies of her line, 
 AVould build up all her triumphs in one dome. 
 Her Coliseum ^ stands ; the moonbeams shine 
 As ^twere its natural torches, for divine 
 Should be the light which streams here, to illume 
 This long exijlored but still exhaustless mine 
 Of contemplation ; and the azure gloom 
 Of an Italian night, where the deep skies assume 
 
 cxxix. 
 
 Hues which have words, and speak to ye of heaven. 
 Floats o'er this vast and wondrous monument, 
 And shadows forth its glory. There is given 
 Unto the things of earth, which Time hath bent, 
 A spirit's feeling, and where he hath leant 
 His hand, but broke his scythe, there is a power 
 And magic in the ruined battlement, 
 
 1 Marcus Junius Brutus, who killed Julius Caesar, 44 b.c. 
 
 2 Tully, Marcus Tullius Cicero, the greatest orator of ancient Rome, bom 106 B.C. 
 8 Virgil, the greatest of Roman poets, born 70 b.c. 
 
 * Livy, the greatest of Roman historians, born 01 b.c. 
 
 6 a vast theatre in Rome, covering five acres of ground, and capable of containing eighty- 
 seven thousand persons, finished by the Emperor Titus in 80 a.d. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 121 
 
 For which the palace of the present hour 
 Must yield its pomp^ and wait till ages are its dower. 
 
 cxxxix. 
 
 And here the buzz of eager nations ran. 
 In murmured pity, or loud-roared applause, 
 As man was slaughtered by his fellow-man/ 
 And wherefore slaughtered ? wherefore, but because 
 Such were the bloody Circus^ genial laws. 
 And the imperial pleasure.'' Wherefore not ? 
 What matters where we fall to fill the maws 
 Of worms — on battle-plains or listed spot ? 
 Both are but theatres where the chief actors rot. 
 
 CXL. 
 
 I see before me the Gladiator lie : 
 He leans upon his hand — his manly brow 
 Consents to death, but conquers agony, 
 And his drooped head sinks gradually low — 
 And through his side the last drops, ebbing slow 
 From the red gash, fall heavy, one by one, 
 Like the first of a thunder-shower ; and now 
 The arena ^ swims around him — he is gone. 
 Ere ceased the inhuman shout which hailed the wretch 
 who won. 
 
 CXLI. 
 
 He heard it, but he heeded not — his eyes 
 W^ere with his heart, and that was far away ; 
 
 ' In the Coliseum gladiators fought with one another or with wild beasts fof the 
 amusement of the spectators. The gladiators were generally slaves, bought or captured 
 in war, and trained for this purpose. They were compelled to fight to death, and if any 
 showed cowardice he was killed. The Emperor Trajan gave a show of one hundred and 
 twenty-three days, in which two thousand men fought with one another arid with wild 
 beasts for the entertainment of seventy thousand Romans. 
 
 ' at the pleasure of the emperor and citizens. 
 
 •the open space in the centre, where the performance took place, »o called from being 
 covered with sand, the Latin word for which is arena. 
 
122 ClIILDK ilAROl.l). 
 
 Ho recked nol of the life he lost nor prize. 
 But where his rude hut by the Danube ' lay, 
 There were his yoking barbarians "^ all at play, 
 lliere was their Dacian ^ mother — he, their sire. 
 Butchered to make a Roman holiday — 
 All this rushed with his blood — Shall he expire. 
 And unavenged ? — Arise I ye Goths, and glut your ire I 
 
 CXLII. 
 
 But here, where Murder breathed her bloody steam ; 
 And. here, where buzzing nations choked the ways. 
 And roared and murmured like a mountain stream 
 Dashing or winding as its torrent strays ; 
 Here, where the Eoman million's blame or praise 
 Was death or life, the playthings of a crowd. 
 My voice sounds much — and fall the stars' faint rays 
 On the arena void — seats crushed, walls bowed — 
 And galleries where my steps seem echoes strangely 
 loud. 
 
 CXLIII. 
 
 A ruin — yet what ruin ! from its mass 
 Wall, palaces, half-cities, have been reared ; 
 Yet oft the 'enormous skeleton ye pass. 
 And marvel where the spoil could have appeared. 
 Hath it indeed been plundered, or but cleared ? 
 Alas I developed, opens the decay. 
 When the colossal fabric's form is neared ; 
 It will not bear the brightness of the day, 
 Which streams too much on all years, man, have reft 
 away. 
 
 CXLIV. 
 
 But when the rising moon begins to climb 
 Its topmost arch, and gently pauses there ; 
 
 > river of central Europe. ' his children. 
 
 3 Dacia, a country of central Europe, conquered by the Emperor Trajan. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 123 
 
 When tlie stars twinkle tliroug-h the loops of time, 
 And the low night-breeze waves along the air, 
 The garland forest, Avhich the gray walls wear. 
 Like laurels on the bald first Csesar's head ; ^ 
 When the light shines serene, but doth not glare. 
 Then in this magic circle raise the dead : 
 Heroes have trod this s^^ot — 'tis on their dust ye tread. 
 
 CXLY. 
 
 '' While stands the Coliseum, Rome shall stand ; 
 When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall ; 
 And when Rome falls — the World. ''^ From our own lane] 
 Thus spake the pilgrims o'er this mighty wall 
 In Saxon times, which we are wont to call 
 Ancient ; and these three mortal things are still 
 On their foundations, and unaltered all ; 
 Rome and her Ruin past Redemption's skill, 
 The World, the same wide den — of thieves, or what ye will 
 
 CXLVI. 
 
 Simple, erect, severe, austere, sublime — 
 Shrine of all saints and temple of all gods, 
 From Jove to Jesus — spared and blest by time ; 
 Looking tranquillity, while falls or nods 
 Arch, empire, each thing round thee, and man plods 
 His way through thorns to ashes — glorious dome I 
 Shalt thou not last ? — Time's scythe and tyrants' rods 
 Shiver upon thee — sanctuary and home 
 Of art and piety — Pantheon I ^ — pride of Rome I 
 
 1 Julius Caesar, being bald, wore a laurel wreath on his head when he appeared in the 
 Roman Senate. 
 
 2 these words, used by Anglo-Saxon pilgrims who visited Rome in the end of the sev- 
 enth century, are quoted from Gibbon's '• Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,'' and 
 are taken as a proof '^at at that time the Coliseum was entire. 
 
 « a magnificent teu.ple dedicated to all the gods, erected in 27 B.C., and the only ancient 
 Roman edifice that remains entirely preserved. It is lighted by one aperture in the centre 
 of the dome. It has been made the receptacle of busts of distinguished men of modem 
 times. 
 
124 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 CXLVII. 
 
 Relic of nobler (lays, and noblest arts ! 
 Despoiled yet perfect, with tliy circle spreads 
 A lioliness appealing to all hearts — 
 To art a model ; and to him who treads 
 Rome for the sake of ages, Glory sheds 
 Her light through thy sole aperture ; to those 
 Who worship, here are altars for their beads ; 
 And they who feel for genius may repose 
 Their eyes on honored forms, whose busts around them 
 close. 
 
 CLIII. 
 
 But lo ! the dome — tlie vast and wondrous dome,* 
 To which Diana's marvel ^ was a cell — 
 Christ's mighty shrine above his martyr's ^ tomb ! 
 I have beheld the Ephesian's miracle ^ — 
 Its columns strew the wilderness, and dwell 
 The hyaena and the jackal in their shade ; 
 I have beheld Sophia's bright roofs ■* swell 
 Their glittering mass i' the sun, and have surveyed 
 Its sanctuary the while the usurping Moslem prayed ; 
 
 CLIV. 
 
 But thou, of temples old, or altars new, 
 Standest alone — with nothing like to thee — 
 Worthiest of God, the holy and the true, 
 Since Zion's ^ desolation, when that He " 
 
 ' the dome of St. Peter's, the largest and most magnificent church in the world. 
 ^ tile temple of tlie goddess Diana at Ephesus (Asia Minor), one of the seven wonders 
 of the world in ancient times. 
 
 * the Apostle St. Peter, said to have been martyred in Rome. 
 
 * St. Sopliia, in Constantinople (Turkey), formerly a Christian church, now a Moslem 
 or Mohammedan mosque. 
 
 ^ Zion, meaning the temple of Jerusalem. • God. 
 
CHILPE HAROLD. 125 
 
 Forsook His former city, what could be, 
 Of earthly structures, in His honor piled. 
 Of a sublimer asjiect ? Majesty, 
 Power, Glory, Strength, and Beauty, all are aisled 
 In this eternal ark of worship undefiled. 
 
 • • • • • • 
 
 CLXXV. 
 
 But I forget. — M}' Pilgrim's shrine is won 
 And he ' and I must part, — so let it be, — 
 His task and mine alike are nearly done ; 
 Yet once more let us look upon the sea : 
 The midland ocean '^ breaks on him and me, 
 
 . And from the Alban Mount ^ we now behold 
 Our friend of youth, that Ocean, which when we 
 Beheld it last by Calpe's rock * unfold 
 
 Those waves, we followed on till the dark Euxine '" rolled. 
 
 • • • • • • 
 
 CLXXVIII. 
 
 There is a pleasure in the pathless woods. 
 There is a rapture on the lonely shore. 
 There is society where none intrudes. 
 By the deep Sea, and music in its roar ! 
 I love not Man the less, but Nature more, 
 "From these our interviews, in which I steal 
 From all I may be, or have been before. 
 To mingle with the Universe, and feel 
 What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal. 
 
 CLXXIX. 
 
 Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean — roll ! 
 Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain; 
 Man marks the earth with ruin — his control 
 Stops with the shore ; upon the watery plain 
 
 1 Childe Harold. 2 the Mediterranean Sea. 
 
 8 Bome miles south of Rome. * Gibraltar. * the Black Sea. 
 
126 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 The wrecks are all thy deed — nor dotli remain 
 A shadow of man's ravage, save liis own, 
 Wlien for a moment, like a drop of rain, 
 He sinks into thy dei:>ths witli buljbling groan, 
 AVithout a grave, unknelled,' uncoffined, and unknown. 
 
 CLXXX. 
 
 His steps are not upon thy paths — tliy fields 
 Are not a spoil for liim. — thou dost arise 
 And shake him from thee ; the vile strength he wields 
 For earth's destruction thou dost all despise. 
 Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies. 
 And send'st him, shivering in thy playful spray 
 And howling, to his gods, where haply lies 
 His petty hope in some near 23ort or bay, 
 And dashest him again to earth : — there let him lay. 
 
 CLXXXI. 
 
 The armaments which thunder-strike the walls 
 Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake. 
 And monarchs tremble in their capitals. 
 The oak leviathans," whose huge ribs make 
 Their clay creator^ the vain title take 
 Of lord of thee," and arbiter of war ; 
 These are thy toys, and, as the snowy flake, 
 They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar 
 Alike the Armada's' pride, or spoils of Trafalgar." 
 
 CLXXXII. 
 
 Thy shores ^ are empires, changed in all save thee — 
 Assyria, Greece, Eome, Carthage, what are they ? 
 
 1 without sound of funeral bell. 
 
 2 great ships. The leviathan is mentioned in Scripture as a large sea animal. 
 ' man. * the ocean. 
 
 6 Armada is the name given to the great fleet with which the Spaniards attempted to 
 invade England in 1588. 
 « See note 4, page 72. ^ of the Mediterranean. 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 127 
 
 Thy waters washed them power while they were free 
 And many a tyrant since : their shores obey 
 The stranger, slave, or savage ; their decay 
 Has dried np realms to deserts : not so thon. 
 Unchangeable save to thy wild wave's play— 
 Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow — 
 Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now. 
 
 CLXXXIII. 
 
 Thou glorious mirror,' where the Almighty's form 
 Glasses itself in tempests ; in all time, 
 Calm or convulsed— in breeze, or gale, or storm, 
 Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime 
 Dark-heaving ; — boundless, endless, and sublime — 
 The image of Eternity — the throne 
 Of the Invisible, even from out thy slime 
 The monsters of the deep are made ; each zone 
 Obeys thee : thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, alone. 
 
 CLXXXIV. 
 
 And I have loved thee. Ocean ! and my joy 
 Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be 
 Borne like thy bubbles, onward : from a boy 
 I wanton'd with thy breakers — they to me 
 Were a delight ; and if the freshening sea 
 Made them a terror — 'twas a pleasing fear. 
 For I was as it were a child of thee, 
 And trusted to thy billows far and near, 
 And laid my hand upon thy mane ' — as I do here. 
 
 CLXXXV. 
 
 My task is done — my song hath ceased — my theme 
 Has died into an echo ; it is fit 
 The spell should break of this protracted dream. 
 The torch shall be extinguished which hath lit 
 
 » the ocean. '^ foamy crest of the waves. 
 
128 CHILDE HAKOLD. 
 
 My midnight lamp — and what is writ, is writ — 
 A\ Ould it were wortliier ! but I am not now 
 That whicli 1 have been — and my visions flit 
 Less palpably before me — and the glow 
 AVhich in my spirit dwelt is fluttering, faint, and low. 
 
 CLXXXVI. 
 
 Farewell ! a word that must be, and hath been — 
 A sound which makes us linger ; — yet, — farewell ! 
 Ye, who have traced the Pilgrim to the scene 
 Which is his last, if in your memories dwell 
 A thought which once was his, if on ye swell 
 A single recollection, not in vain 
 He wore his sandal-shoon ' and scallop-shell ;'^ 
 Farewell ! with him alone may rest the pain. 
 If such there were — with you, the moral of his strain. 
 
 ' shoes formed of soles fastened to the feet ; they were worn by pilgrims. 
 2 a kind of shell found on the coast of Palestine, and worn by pilgrims lo show that 
 they had visited the Holy Land. 
 
• standard * Eiterature « Series * 
 
 Works of standard authors for supplementary reading in 
 schools — complete selections or abridgments — with introduc- 
 tions and explanator}' notes. Single numbers, 64 to 128 pages, 
 stiff paper sides i2}i cents, cloth 20 cents ; double numbers, 160 
 to 224 pages, stiff paper sides 20 cents, cloth 30 cents. 
 
 CONTENTS OF THE FIRST TWENTY-FOUR (24) NUM- 
 BERS, ARRANGED BY COUNTRIES AND AUTHORS 
 
 Starred numbers are doubi,e. All the works are complete, or 
 contain complete selections, except those marked " abr. " 
 
 flmerican Jlutbors 
 
 COOPER— The Spy, Xo. i, single (abr.), 128 pp. *The Pilot, No. 2 
 
 (abr.), 181 pp. "^The Deerslayer, No. 8 (abr.), 160 pp. 
 
 DANA, R. H., Jr. — "Two Years Before the Mast, No. 19 (abr.), 173 pp. 
 
 HAWTHORNE — Twice-Told Tales, No. 15, single, complete selec-^" 
 tions, 128 pp.: The Village Uncle, The Ambitious Guest, Mr. Higgin- 
 botham's Catastrophe, A Rill from the Town Pump, The Great 
 Carbuncle, David Swan, Dr. Heidegger's Experiment, Peter Gold- 
 thwaite's Treasure, The Threefold Destiny-, Old Esther Dudley. 
 
 A "Wonder-Book, for Girls and Boys, No. 16, single, complete 
 selections, 121 pp. : The Golden Touch, The Paradise of Children, The 
 Three Golden Apples, The ^Miraculous Pitcher. 
 
 The Snow-Image and other Twice-Told Tales, No, 20, single, 
 complete selections, 121 pp. : The Snow-Image, The Great Stone Face, 
 Little Daffydowndilly, The Vision of the Fountain, The Seven Vaga- 
 bonds, Little Annie's Ramble, The Prophetic Pictures. 
 
 IRVING — The Alhambra, No. 4, single, complete selections, 128 pp.: 
 Palace of the Alhambra; Alhamar, the Founder of the Alhambra; 
 Yusef Abul Hagig, the Finisher of the Alhambra; Panorama from the 
 Tower of Comares; Legend of the Moor's Legacy; Legend of the Rose 
 of the Alhambra; The Governor and the Notary; Governor Manco 
 and the Soldier; Legend of Two Discreet Statues; Legend of Don 
 Munio Sancho de Hinojosa; The Legend of the Enchanted Soldier. 
 
 The Sketch-Book, No. 17, single, complete selections, 121 pp.: 
 The Author's Account of Himself, The Broken Heart, The Spectre 
 Bridegroom, Rural Life in England, The Angler, John Bull, The 
 Christmas Dinner, Stratford-on-Avon. 
 
 Knickerbocker Stories, No. 23, single, complete selections, 140 
 pp.: I. Broek, or the Dutch Paradise; IL From Knickerbocker's New 
 York, (a) New Amsterdam under Van Twiller, (b) How William the 
 Testv Defended the Citv, (c) Peter Stuvvesant's Vovage up the Hudson; 
 in. Wolfert's Roost; IV. The Storm' Ship; V. Rip Van Winkle; VI. 
 A Legend of Sleepy Hollow. 
 
Standard « Citcrature « Series 
 
 KENNEDY, J. P.—" Horse-Shoe Robinson, a Tale of the Revolution, 
 
 No. lo (abr. ), 192 p]). 
 
 LONGFELLOW— Evangeline, a Tale of Acadie, No. 21, single, com- 
 plete, 102 pp. 
 
 engllsb nmm 
 
 BULWER-LYTTON—* Harold, the Last of the Saxon Kings, No. 12 
 (abr.), 160 pp. 
 
 BYRON— The Prisoner of Chillon and Other Poems, No. 11, single, 
 complete selections, 128 pp.: The Prisoner of Chillon, Mazeppa, 
 Childe Harold. 
 
 DICKENS— Christmas Stories, No. 5, single (abr.), 142 pp.: A Christ- 
 mas Carol, The Cricket on the Hearth, The Child's Dream of a Star. 
 
 Little Nell (from Old Curiosity Shop), No. 22, single (abr.), 123 pp. 
 
 Paul Dombey (from Dombey and Son), No. 14, single (abr.), 128 pp. 
 
 SCOTT— * Ivanhoe, No. 24 (abr.), 180 pp. *Kenilworth, No. 7 (abr.), 
 164 pp. *Lady of the Lake, No. 9, complete, 192 pp. Rob Roy, No. 3, 
 single (abr.), 130 pp. 
 
 SWIFT — Gulliver^s Travels, Voyages to LiHiput and Brobdingnag, 
 No. 13, single (abr.), 128 pp. 
 
 TENNYSON— Enoch Arden and Other Poems, No. 6, single, com^ 
 plete selections, no pp.: Enoch Arden; The Coming of Arthur; 
 The Passing of Arthur; Columbus; The May Queen; New Year's Eve; 
 Conclusion; Dora; The Charge of the Light Brigade; The Defence of 
 Lucknow; Lady Clare; Break, Break, Break; The Brook; Bugle Song; 
 Widow and Child; The Days That Are No More; I Envy Not; Oh, 
 Yet We Trust; Ring Out, Wild Bells; Crossing the Bar (Tennyson's 
 last poem). 
 
 f rencb flutbors 
 
 HUGO, VICTOR— "Ninety-Three, No. 18 (abr.), 157 pp. 
 
 Grading. — For History Classes: Spy, Pilot, Deerslayer, Horse-Shoe 
 Robinson, Knickerbocker vStories, Harold, Kenilworth, Rob Roy, 
 Ivanhoe, Ninety-Three, Alhambra. Geography: Two Years Before the 
 Mast. English Literature : Evangeline, Lady of the Lake, Enoch Arden, 
 Prisoner of Chillon, Sketch-Book. Lower Grammar Grades : Christmas 
 Stories, Little Nell, Paul Dombey, Gulliver's Travels, Twice-Told 
 Tales. Primary Grades : Wonder-Book, Snow-Image. 
 
 numbers 25 10 40 
 
 Each with Introduction and Notes. Starred numbers, double. 
 25. ROBINSON CRUSOE. Defoe. Illustrated. For Young Readers. 
 ^26. POEMS OF KNIGHTLY ADVENTURE. Tennyson, Arnold, 
 Macaulay, Lowell. Pour Complete Selections. 
 
standard « Eiterature * Scries 
 
 *27. THE WATER WITCH. Cooper. With Map. 
 
 28. TALES OF A GRANDFATHER. Scott. Complete Selections. 
 
 *29. THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS. Cooper. With Map. 
 
 30. THE PILGRIM'S PROGRESS. Bunyan. For Young Readers. 
 
 *3I. BLACK BEAUTY. Sewell. Complete. 
 
 *32. THE YEMASSEE. Cooper. With Map. 
 
 "33. WESTWARD HO I Kingsley. With Map. 
 
 *34, 'ROUND THE WORLD IN EIGHTY DAYS. Verne. 
 
 35. SWISS FAMILY ROBINSON. Wyss. Illustrated. 
 
 *36. THE CHILDHOOD OF DAVID COPPERFIELD. Dickens. 
 
 *37. THE SONG OF HIAWATHA. Longfellow. Complete. 
 
 ^38. THE LAST DAYS OF POMPEU. Bulwer-Lytton. 
 
 39. FAIRY TALES. Second School Year. Selected Tales. 
 
 *40. THE LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL. Scott. Complete. 
 
 WHAT PROMINENT EDUCATORS SAY 
 
 W. T. Harris, CotJimissioner of Edtication, Washington, D. C: "I have 
 examined very carefully one of the abridgments from Walter Scott, and I 
 would not have believed the essentials of the story could have been retained 
 with so severe an abridgment. But the story thus abridged has kept its 
 interest and all of the chief threads of the plot. I am very glad that the 
 great novels of Walter Scott are in course of publication by your house in 
 such a form that school children, and older persons as yet unfamiliar with 
 Walter Scott, may find an easy introduction. To read Walter Scott's novels 
 is a large part of a liberal education, but his discourses on the histor}' of the 
 times and his disquisitions on motives render his stories too hard for the 
 person of merely elementary education. But if one can interest himself in 
 the plot, and skip these learned passages, he may, on a second reading, be 
 able to grasp the whole novel. Hence I look to such abridgments as you 
 have made for a great extension of Walter Scott's usefulness." 
 
 William H. Max-well, Superintendent of Ptihlic Insiriiction, New York 
 City : "I take great pleasure in commending to those who are seeking for 
 good reading in the schools, the Standard Literature Series. The editors of 
 the series have struck out a new line in the preparation of literature for 
 schools. They have taken great works of fiction and poetry, and so edited 
 them as to omit what is beyond the comprehension, or what would weary 
 the attention, of children in the higher grades of elementarv schools." 
 
Stdtidara « Citcraturc « Series 
 
 Walter B. Gunnison, Principal Erasmus Hall High School, Brooklyn^ 
 N. V. "I have watched with much interest the issues of the new Standard 
 Literature Series, and have examined them all with care, I regard them as 
 a distinct addition to the school literature of our country. The selections 
 are admirable— the annotations clear and comprehensive, and the form con- 
 venient and artistic." 
 
 A. E. Winship, Editor "■Journal of Edtication," Bostoji, Mass. " I 
 desire to acknowledge, after many days, the volumes ' Kenilworth ' and 
 ' Harold,' in the Standard Literature Series. I am much pleased with these 
 books. It is a great service which you are rendering the schools. Our 
 children must read all the British-American classics which have any bearing 
 upon history, and, with all that is absolutely required of them in this day, 
 they cannot do what they must do. There is a conflict of ' oughts.' You 
 make it possible, here, for the child to get all he needs of each of all the 
 books he must read. It is a great service. I admire the appreciation of the 
 editors of their text. 
 
 C. B. Gilbert, Superiyitendent of Schools, Newark, N.J. " The 
 Standard Literature Series bids fair to prove a most valuable addition to 
 literature available for use in schools. The books are well selected, carefully 
 edited, and supplied with valuable notes and maps. ' Harold, the Last of 
 the Saxon Kings,' may serve as a type. For classes in English history it 
 will prove invaluable, giving, as it does in the language of a master, a most 
 vivid picture of early England; its struggles and its people. The Introduc- 
 tion paves the way for what is to follow. The portions omitted can be 
 spared, and the notes are just enough to clear up difficult passages, but not 
 enough to be burdensome." 
 
 R. E. Denfeld, Stiperintendent of Schools, Duluth, Minn. " I have 
 carefully read many of the numbers of the Standard Literature Series and do 
 not hesitate to say that they are exceptionally well edited. One in partic- 
 ular I have in mind which was so carefully condensed as to make it of 
 convenient size for a school reading book, and yet no part of the essentially 
 connected matter was omitted." 
 
 Henry R. Sanford, Institute Conductor for New York State, Penn 
 
 Van, N. V. " Vou are doing a good thing in thus giving to the public 
 
 cheap editions of standard literature." 
 
 Correspondence is invited. Special discounts to schools and dealers. Address 
 
 University « PublisDiiid • Company 
 
 New York : 43-45-47 East Tenth St. 
 Boston : 352 Washington St. New Orleans : 714-716 Canal St. 
 
....,,rT:,T»OTT<V OF CALIFOK' 
 
 14 DAY USE 
 
 RETURN TO DESK FROM WHICH BORROWED 
 
 LOAN DEPT. 
 
 This book is due on the last date stamped below, or 
 on the date to which renewed. 
 
 Renewed books are subject to immediate recall. 
 
 -tree — 
 
 LI B RARV 
 
 ;mrr^ 
 
 w 
 
 ^^ 
 
 fv. 
 
 NHNi^'^ 
 
 
 DEC 2'63-^^^ 
 
 ^l^ 
 
 ji^v* 
 
 £iiv£ 
 
 o 
 
 7 ' 67 * • — 
 
 UOA^^ 
 
 TjeP^ 
 
 x 
 
 LD 21A-50m-4,'59 
 (A1724sl0)476B 
 
 General Library 
 
 University of California 
 
 Berkeley 
 
/ 
 
 \