Lapas attēli
PDF
ePub
[merged small][ocr errors]

HAMPDEN, PYM, CROMWELL, his Daughter, and young SIR HARRY VANE.

HAMPDEN

England, farewell! Thou, who hast been my cradle, Shalt never be my dungeon or my grave!

I held what I inherited in thee

As pawn for that inheritance of freedom

Which thou hast sold for thy despoiler's smile. How can I call thee England, or my country? Does the wind hold?

VANE

The vanes sit steady Upon the Abbey towers. The silver lightnings Of the evening star, spite of the city's smoke, Tell that the north wind reigns in the upper air. Mark too that fleet of fleecy-winged clouds Sailing athwart St. Margaret's.

HAMPDEN

Hail, fleet herald

Of tempest! that rude pilot who shall guide
Hearts free as his, to realms as pure as thee,
Beyond the shot of tyranny,

Beyond the webs of that swoln spider

[ocr errors]

Beyond the curses, calumnies, and [lies ?]

Of atheist priests!

And thou

Fair star, whose beam lies on the wide Atlantic,

Athwart its zones of tempest and of calm,
Bright as the path to a beloved home,

11 fleet, Rossetti || flock, Mrs. Shelley, 1824.

Oh, light us to the isles of the evening land!
Like floating Edens cradled in the glimmer
Of sunset, through the distant mist of years
Touched by departing hope, they gleam! lone re-
gions,

Where power's poor dupes and victims yet have

never

Propitiated the savage fear of kings

With purest blood of noblest hearts; whose dew
Is yet unstained with tears of those who wake
To weep each day the wrongs on which it dawns;
Whose sacred silent air owns yet no echo
Of formal blasphemies; nor impious rites
Wrest man's free worship, from the God who loves,
To the poor worm who envies us his love!

Receive, thou young

of Paradise,

These exiles from the old and sinful world!

This glorious clime, this firmament, whose lights
Dart mitigated influence through their veil
Of pale blue atmosphere; whose tears keep green
The pavement of this moist all-feeding earth;
This vaporous horizon, whose dim round
Is bastioned by the circumfluous sea,
Repelling invasion from the sacred towers,
Presses upon me like a dungeon's grate,
A low dark roof, a damp and narrow wall.
The boundless universe

Becomes a cell too narrow for the soul

25 Tinged, Mrs. Shelley, 1824.

34 Towards the worm, Mrs. Shelley, 1824.
38 their, Rossetti || the, Mrs. Shelley, 1824.
45 wall, Rossetti || vault, Mrs. Shelley, 1824.

46 boundless, Rossetti || mighty, Mrs. Shelley, 1824.

That owns no master; while the loathliest ward
Of this wide prison, England, is a nest

Of cradling peace built on the mountain tops,
To which the eagle spirits of the free,

Which range through heaven and earth, and scorn the storm

Of time, and gaze upon the light of truth,
Return to brood on thoughts that cannot die
And cannot be repelled.

Like eaglets floating in the heaven of time,
They soar above their quarry, and shall stoop
Through palaces and temples thunderproof.

SCENE V

ARCHY

I'll go live under the ivy that overgrows the terrace, and count the tears shed on its old [roots?] as the [wind?] plays the song of

“A widow bird sate mourning
Upon a wintry bough."

(Sings)

Heigho! the lark and the owl!

One flies the morning, and one lulls the night; Only the nightingale, poor fond soul,

Sings like the fool through darkness and light.

48 no, Mrs. Shelley, 1824 || a, Rossetti.

ward, Rossetti || spot, Mrs. Shelley, 1824.

50 cradled, Mrs. Shelley, 1824.

54, 55:

Return to brood over the [ ] thoughts
That cannot die, and may not be repelled.

7 lulls flies, Forman conj.

Mrs. Shelley, 1824.

"A widow bird sate mourning for her love

Upon a wintry bough ;

The frozen wind crept on above,

The freezing stream below.

There was no leaf upon the forest bare,

No flower upon the ground,

And little motion in the air

Except the mill-wheel's sound."

FRAGMENTS OF AN UNFINISHED DRAMA

[An Enchantress, living in one of the islands of the Indian Archipelago, saves the life of a Pirate, a man of savage but noble nature. She becomes enamoured of him; and he, inconstant to his mortal love, for a while returns her passion: but at length, recalling the memory of her whom he left, and who laments his loss, he escapes from the enchanted island, and returns to his lady. His mode of life makes him again go to sea, and the Enchantress seizes the opportunity to bring him, by a spirit-brewed tempest, back to her island.]

Scene-Before the Cavern of the Indian Enchantress. The ENCHANTRESS comes forth.

ENCHANTRESS

He came like a dream in the dawn of life,
He fled like a shadow before its noon;
He is gone, and my peace is turned to strife,
And I wander and wane like the weary moon.
O sweet Echo, wake,

And for my sake

Make answer the while my

heart shall break!

But my heart has a music which Echo's lips,

Though tender and true, yet can answer not, And the shadow that moves in the soul's eclipse Can return not the kiss by his now forgot;

Fragments of an Unfinished Drama. Published, 1-69, 100-120, by Mrs. Shelley, 1824, 127-238, by Garnett (The Magic Plant), 1862, and the whole, revised and augmented, by Rossetti, 1870. Dated, 1821-22.

« iepriekšējāTurpināt »