A

Ah no!

Awhile he paused. As a poor hunted stag
A moment shudders on the fearful brink
Of a swift stream the cruel hounds press on
With deafening yell, the arrows glance and

He plunges in so Orpheus, seized and torn
By the sharp fangs of an insatiate grief,
Mænad-like waved his lyre in the bright air,
And wildly shrieked "Where she is, it is
dark!"

And then he struck from forth the strings a sound

Of deep and fearful melody. Alas!

In times long past, when fair Eurydice

With her bright eyes sat listening by his side,
He gently sang of high and heavenly themes.
As in a brook, fretted with little waves,
By the light airs of spring—each ripplet makes
A many-sided mirror for the sun,

While it flows musically through green banks,

Ceaseless and pauseless, ever clear and fresh,
So flowed his song, reflecting the deep joy
And tender love that fed those sweetest notes,
The heavenly offspring of ambrosial food.
But that is past. Returning from drear Hell,
He chose a lonely seat of unhewn stone,
Blackened with lichens, on a herbless plain.
Then from the deep and overflowing spring
Of his eternal ever-moving grief

There rose to Heaven a sound of angry song. 'Tis as a mighty cataract that parts

Two sister rocks with waters swift and strong,

And casts itself with horrid roar and din
Adown a steep; from a perennial source
It ever flows and falls, and breaks the air
With loud and fierce, but most harmonious

roar,

And as it falls casts up a vapourous spray
Which the sun clothes in hues of Iris light.
Thus the tempestuous torrent of his grief
Is clothed in sweetest sounds and varying
words

Of

poesy. Unlike all human works,

It never slackens, and through every change Wisdom and beauty and the power divine Of mighty poesy together dwell,

Mingling in sweet accord. As I have seen

A fierce south blast tear through the darkened

sky,

Driving along a rack of wingèd clouds,

Which may not pause, but ever hurry on,
As their wild shepherd wills them, while the

stars,

Twinkling and dim, peep from between the plumes.

Anon the sky is cleared, and the high dome Of serene Heaven, starred with fiery flowers, Shuts in the shaken earth; or the still moon Swiftly, yet gracefully, begins her walk, Rising all bright behind the eastern hills.

Of

I talk of moon, and wind, and stars, and not but would I echo his high song, song; Nature must lend me words ne'er used before, Or I must borrow from her perfect works, To picture forth his perfect attributes. He does no longer sit upon his throne

Of rock upon a desert herbless plain,
For the evergreen and knotted ilexes,
And cypresses that seldom wave their boughs,
And sea-green olives with their grateful fruit,
And elms dragging along the twisted vines,
Which drop their berries as they follow fast,
And blackthorn bushes with their infant race
Of blushing rose blooms; beeches, to lovers
dear,

And weeping willow-trees; all swift or slow,
As their huge boughs or lighter dress permit,
Have circled in his throne, and Earth herself
Has sent from her maternal breast a growth
Of starlike flowers and herbs of odour sweet,
To pave the temple that his poesy

Has framed, while near his feet grim lions couch,

And kids, fearless from love, creep near his lair.
Even the blind worms seem to feel the sound.
The birds are silent, hanging down their heads,
Perched on the lowest branches of the tree;
Not even the nightingale intrudes a note
In rivalry, but all entranced she listens.

Fragment of a Satire on

Satire

F gibbets, axes, confiscations, chains,
And racks of subtle torture, if the

pains

Of shame, of fiery Hell's tempes

tuous wave,

Seen through the caverns of the shadowy grave, Hurling the damned into the murky air

While the meek blest sit smiling; if Despair And Hate, the rapid bloodhounds with which Terror

Hunts through the world the homeless steps

of Error,

Are the true secrets of the commonweal

To make men wise and just;

And not the sophisms of revenge and fear,

Bloodier than is revenge