[333] “It is long since we have read any thing more beautiful than the following poem by Mrs Hemans.”—Blackwood’s Magazine. Jan. 1826.

[“It would be wearisomely superfluous to enumerate the long series of lyrics which she now poured forth with increasing earnestness and rapidity, and without which none of the lighter periodicals of the day made its appearance. One or two, however, must be mentioned, as certain to survive so long as the short poem shall be popular in England. ‘The Treasures of the Deep,’ ‘The Hour of Death,’ ‘The Graves of a Household,’ ‘The Cross in the Wilderness,’ are all admirable. With these, too, may be mentioned those poems in which a short descriptive recitative (to borrow a word from the opera) introduces a lyrical burst of passion or regret, or lamentation. This form of composition became so especially popular in America, that hardly a poet has arisen, since the influence of Mrs Hemans’ genius made itself felt on the other side of the Atlantic, who has not attempted something of a similar subject and construction. ‘The Hebrew Mother’ has been followed by an infinite number of sketches from Scripture: this lyric, too, should be particularised as having made friends for its authoress among those of the ancient faith in England. Among the last strangers who visited her, eager to thank her for the pleasure her writings had afforded them, were a Jewish gentleman and lady, who entreated to be admitted by the author of the ‘Hebrew Mother.’”—Chorley’s Memorials of Mrs Hemans, p. 114-15.

“Her ‘Voice of Spring,’ her ‘Hour of Death,’ her ‘Treasures of the Deep,’ her ‘Graves of a Household,’ her ‘England’s Dead,’ her ‘Trumpet,’ her ‘Hebrew Mother,’ and a host of similar pieces—these are the undying lays, the lumps of pure gold. We do not think thus with reference to Mrs Hemans’ lyrics only; it strikes us that nearly all our present poets must depend for future fame on their shorter pieces.”—Literary Magnet, 1826.]

THE WRECK.

All night the booming minute-gun
Had peal’d along the deep,
And mournfully the rising sun
Look’d o’er the tide-worn steep.
A bark from India’s coral strand,
Before the raging blast,
Had vail’d her topsails to the sand,
And bow’d her noble mast.
The queenly ship!—brave hearts had striven,
And true ones died with her!
We saw her mighty cable riven,
Like floating gossamer.
We saw her proud flag struck that morn—
A star once o’er the seas,—
Her anchor gone, her deck uptorn,
And sadder things than these!
We saw her treasures cast away,
The rocks with pearls were sown;
And, strangely sad, the ruby’s ray
Flash’d out o’er fretted stone.
And gold was strewn the wet sands o’er,
Like ashes by a breeze;
And gorgeous robes—but oh! that shore
Had sadder things than these!
We saw the strong man still and low,
A crush’d reed thrown aside;
Yet, by that rigid lip and brow,
Not without strife he died.
And near him on the sea-weed lay—
Till then we had not wept—
But well our gushing hearts might say,
That there a mother slept!
For her pale arms a babe had press’d
With such a wreathing grasp,
Billows had dash’d o’er that fond breast,
Yet not undone the clasp.
Her very tresses had been flung
To wrap the fair child’s form,
Where still their wet long streamers hung
All tangled by the storm.
And beautiful, midst that wild scene,
Gleam’d up the boy’s dead face,
Like slumber’s, trustingly serene,
In melancholy grace.
Deep in her bosom lay his head,
With half-shut violet-eye—
He had known little of her dread,
Naught of her agony!
O human love! whose yearning heart,
Through all things vainly true,
So stamps upon thy mortal part
Its passionate adieu—
Surely thou hast another lot:
There is some home for thee,
Where thou shalt rest, remembering not
The moaning of the sea!

THE TRUMPET.[334]

The trumpet’s voice hath roused the land—
Light up the beacon pyre!
A hundred hills have seen the brand,
And waved the sign of fire.
A hundred banners to the breeze
Their gorgeous folds have cast—
And, hark! was that the sound of seas?
A king to war went past.
The chief is arming in his hall,
The peasant by his hearth;
The mourner hears the thrilling call,
And rises from the earth.
The mother on her first-born son
Looks with a boding eye—
They come not back, though all be won,
Whose young hearts leap so high.
The bard hath ceased his song, and bound
The falchion to his side;
E’en, for the marriage altar crown’d,
The lover quits his bride.
And all this haste, and change, and fear,
By earthly clarion spread!—
How will it be when kingdoms hear
The blast that wakes the dead?

[334] “We cannot refrain quoting another poem by the same distinguished writer. It has something sublime.”—Blackwood’s Magazine, Jan. 1826.

EVENING PRAYER, AT A GIRLS’ SCHOOL.

“Now in thy youth, beseech of Him
Who giveth, upbraiding not,
That His light in thy heart become not dim,
And his love be unforgot;
And thy God, in the darkest of days, will be
Greenness, and beauty, and strength to thee.”
Bernard Barton.
Hush! ’tis a holy hour. The quiet room
Seems like a temple, while yon soft lamp sheds
A faint and starry radiance, through the gloom
And the sweet stillness, down on fair young heads,
With all their clustering locks, untouch’d by care,
And bow’d, as flowers are bow’d with night, in prayer.
Gaze on—’tis lovely! Childhood’s lip and cheek,
Mantling beneath its earnest brow of thought!
Gaze—yet what seest thou in those fair, and meek,
And fragile things, as but for sunshine wrought?—
Thou seest what grief must nurture for the sky,
What death must fashion for eternity!
O joyous creatures! that will sink to rest
Lightly, when those pure orisons are done
As birds with slumber’s honey-dew opprest,
Midst the dim folded leaves, at set of sun—
Lift up your hearts! though yet no sorrow lies
Dark in the summer-heaven of those clear eyes.
Though fresh within your breasts th’ untroubled springs
Of hope make melody where’er ye tread,
And o’er your sleep bright shadows, from the wings
Of spirits visiting but youth, be spread;
Yet in those flute-like voices, mingling low,
Is woman’s tenderness—how soon her woe!
Her lot is on you—silent tears to weep,
And patient smiles to wear through suffering’s hour,
And sumless riches, from affection’s deep,
To pour on broken reeds—a wasted shower!
And to make idols, and to find them clay,
And to bewail that worship. Therefore pray!
Her lot is on you—to be found untired,
Watching the stars out by the bed of pain,
With a pale cheek, and yet a brow inspired,
And a true heart of hope, though hope be vain;
Meekly to bear with wrong, to cheer decay,
And, oh! to love through all things. Therefore pray!
And take the thought of this calm vesper time,
With its low murmuring sounds and silvery light,
On through the dark days fading from their prime,
As a sweet dew to keep your souls from blight!
Earth will forsake—Oh! happy to have given
Th’ unbroken heart’s first fragrance unto heaven.

THE HOUR OF DEATH.

“Il est dans la Nature d’aimer à se livrer à l’idée même qu’on redoute.”—Corinne.

Leaves have their time to fall,
And flowers to wither at the north wind’s breath,
And stars to set—but all,
Thou hast all seasons for thine own, O Death!
Day is for mortal care,
Eve, for glad meetings round the joyous hearth,
Night, for the dreams of sleep, the voice of prayer—
But all for thee, thou mightiest of the earth.
The banquet hath its hour—
Its feverish hour, of mirth, and song, and wine;
There comes a day for grief’s o’erwhelming power,
A time for softer tears—but all are thine.
Youth and the opening rose
May look like things too glorious for decay,
And smile at thee—but thou art not of those
That wait the ripen’d bloom to seize their prey.
Leaves have their time to fall,
And flowers to wither at the north wind’s breath,
And stars to set—but all,
Thou hast all seasons for thine own, O Death!
We know when moons shall wane,
When summer birds from far shall cross the sea,
When autumn’s hue shall tinge the golden grain—
But who shall teach us when to look for thee!
Is it when spring’s first gale
Comes forth to whisper where the violets lie?
Is it when roses in our paths grow pale?—
They have one season—all are ours to die!
Thou art where billows foam,
Thou art where music melts upon the air;
Thou art around us in our peaceful home,
And the world calls us forth—and thou art there.
Thou art where friend meets friend,
Beneath the shadow of the elm to rest—
Thou art where foe meets foe, and trumpets rend
The skies, and swords beat down the princely crest.
Leaves have their time to fall,
And flowers to wither at the north wind’s breath,
And stars to set—but all—
Thou hast all seasons for thine own, O Death!

THE LOST PLEIAD.

“Like the lost Pleiad seen no more below.”—Byron.

And is there glory from the heavens departed?
O void unmark’d!—thy sisters of the sky
Still hold their place on high,
Though from its rank thine orb so long hath started,
Thou, that no more art seen of mortal eye!
Hath the night lost a gem, the regal night?
She wears her crown of old magnificence,
Though thou art exiled thence—
No desert seems to part those urns of light,
Midst the far depths of purple gloom intense.
They rise in joy, the starry myriads burning—
The shepherd greets them on his mountains free;
And from the silvery sea
To them the sailor’s wakeful eye is turning—
Unchanged they rise, they have not mourn’d for thee.
Couldst thou be shaken from thy radiant place,
Even as a dew-drop from the myrtle spray,
Swept by the wind away?
Wert thou not peopled by some glorious race,
And was there power to smite them with decay?
Why, who shall talk of thrones, of sceptres riven?
Bow’d be our hearts to think on what we are,
When from its height afar
A world sinks thus—and yon majestic heaven
Shines not the less for that one vanish’d star!

THE CLIFFS OF DOVER.

“The inviolate Island of the sage and free.”—Byron.

Rocks of my country! let the cloud
Your crested heights array,
And rise ye like a fortress proud
Above the surge and spray!
My spirit greets you as ye stand,
Breasting the billow’s foam:
Oh! thus for ever guard the land,
The sever’d land of home!
I have left rich blue skies behind,
Lighting up classic shrines,
And music in the southern wind,
And sunshine on the vines.
The breathings of the myrtle flowers
Have floated o’er my way;
The pilgrim’s voice, at vesper hours,
Hath soothed me with its lay.
The isles of Greece, the hills of Spain,
The purple heavens of Rome—
Yes, all are glorious,—yet again
I bless thee, land of home!
For thine the Sabbath peace, my land!
And thine the guarded hearth;
And thine the dead—the noble band,
That make thee holy earth.
Their voices meet me in thy breeze,
Their steps are on thy plains;
Their names, by old majestic trees,
Are whisper’d round thy fanes.
Their blood hath mingled with the tide
Of thine exulting sea;
Oh, be it still a joy, a pride,
To live and die for thee!

THE GRAVES OF MARTYRS.

The kings of old have shrine and tomb
In many a minster’s haughty gloom;
And green, along the ocean side,
The mounds arise where heroes died;
But show me, on thy flowery breast,
Earth! where thy nameless martyrs rest!
The thousands that, uncheer’d by praise,
Have made one offering of their days;
For Truth, for Heaven, for Freedom’s sake,
Resign’d the bitter cup to take;
And silently, in fearless faith,
Bowing their noble souls to death.
Where sleep they, Earth? By no proud stone
Their narrow couch of rest is known;
The still sad glory of their name
Hallows no fountain unto Fame;
No—not a tree the record bears
Of their deep thoughts and lonely prayers.
Yet haply all around lie strew’d
The ashes of that multitude:
It may be that each day we tread
Where thus devoted hearts have bled;
And the young flowers our children sow,
Take root in holy dust below.
Oh, that the many-rustling leaves,
Which round our homes the summer weaves,
Or that the streams, in whose glad voice
Our own familiar paths rejoice,
Might whisper through the starry sky,
To tell where those blest slumberers lie!
Would not our inmost hearts be still’d,
With knowledge of their presence fill’d,
And by its breathings taught to prize
The meekness of self-sacrifice?
—But the old woods and sounding waves
Are silent of those hidden graves.
Yet what if no light footstep there
In pilgrim-love and awe repair,
So let it be! Like him, whose clay
Deep buried by his Maker lay,
They sleep in secret,—but their sod,
Unknown to man, is mark’d of God!

THE HOUR OF PRAYER.

“Pregar, pregar, pregar,
Ch’ altro ponno i mortali al pianger nati?”   Alfieri.
Child, amidst the flowers at play,
While the red light fades away;
Mother, with thine earnest eye
Ever following silently;
Father, by the breeze of eve
Call’d thy harvest-work to leave—
Pray: ere yet the dark hours be,
Lift the heart and bend the knee!
Traveller, in the stranger’s land,
Far from thine own household band;
Mourner, haunted by the tone
Of a voice from this world gone;
Captive, in whose narrow cell
Sunshine hath not leave to dwell;
Sailor on the darkening sea—
Lift the heart and bend the knee!
Warrior, that from battle won
Breathest now at set of sun;
Woman, o’er the lowly slain
Weeping on his burial-plain;
Ye that triumph, ye that sigh,
Kindred by one holy tie,
Heaven’s first star alike ye see—
Lift the heart and bend the knee!

THE VOICE OF HOME TO THE PRODIGAL.

“Von Baumen, aus Wellen, aus Mauern,
Wie ruft es dir freundlich und lind;
Was hast du zu wandern, zu trauern?
Komm’ spielen, du freundliches Kind!”
La Motte Fouque.
Oh! when wilt thou return
To thy spirit’s early loves?
To the freshness of the morn,
To the stillness of the groves?
The summer birds are calling
Thy household porch around,
And the merry waters falling
With sweet laughter in their sound.
And a thousand bright-vein’d flowers,
From their banks of moss and fern,
Breathe of the sunny hours—
But when wilt thou return?
Oh! thou hast wander’d long
From thy home without a guide;
And thy native woodland song
In thine alter’d heart hath died.
Thou hast flung the wealth away,
And the glory of thy spring;
And to thee the leaves’ light play
Is a long-forgotten thing.
But when wilt thou return?—
Sweet dews may freshen soon
The flower, within whose urn
Too fiercely gazed the noon.
O’er the image of the sky,
Which the lake’s clear bosom wore,
Darkly may shadows lie—
But not for evermore.
Give back thy heart again
To the freedom of the woods,
To the birds’ triumphant strain,
To the mountain solitudes!
But when wilt thou return?
Along thine own pure air
There are young sweet voices borne—
Oh! should not thine be there?
Still at thy father’s board
There is kept a place for thee;
And, by thy smile restored,
Joy round the hearth shall be.
Still hath thy mother’s eye,
Thy coming step to greet,
A look of days gone by,
Tender and gravely sweet.
Still, when the prayer is said,
For thee kind bosoms yearn,
For thee fond tears are shed—
Oh! when wilt thou return?

THE WAKENING.

How many thousands are wakening now!
Some to the songs from the forest bough,
To the rustling of leaves at the lattice pane,
To the chiming fall of the early rain.
And some, far out on the deep mid-sea,
To the dash of the waves in their foaming glee,
As they break into spray on the ship’s tall side,
That holds through the tumult her path of pride.
And some—oh, well may their hearts rejoice!—
To the gentle sound of a mother’s voice:
Long shall they yearn for that kindly tone,
When from the board and the hearth ’tis gone.
And some, in the camp, to the bugle’s breath,
And the tramp of the steed on the echoing heath,
And the sudden roar of the hostile gun,
Which tells that a field must ere night be won.
And some, in the gloomy convict cell,
To the dull deep note of the warning bell,
As it heavily calls them forth to die,
When the bright sun mounts in the laughing sky.
And some to the peal of the hunter’s horn,
And some to the din from the city borne,
And some to the rolling of torrent floods,
Far midst old mountains and solemn woods.
So are we roused on this checker’d earth:
Each unto light hath a daily birth;
Though fearful or joyous, though sad or sweet,
Are the voices which first our upspringing meet.
But one must the sound be, and one the call,
Which from the dust shall awaken us all:
One!—but to sever’d and distant dooms,
How shall the sleepers arise from the tombs?

THE BREEZE FROM SHORE.

[“Poetry reveals to us the loveliness of nature, brings back the freshness of youthful feeling, revives the relish of simple pleasures, keeps unquenched the enthusiasm which warmed the spring-time of our being, refines youthful love, strengthens our interest in human nature, by vivid delineations of its tenderest and loftiest feelings; and, through the brightness of its prophetic visions, helps faith to lay hold on the future life.”—Channing.]

Joy is upon the lonely seas,
When Indian forests pour
Forth, to the billow and the breeze,
Their odours from the shore;
Joy, when the soft air’s fanning sigh
Bears on the breath of Araby.
Oh! welcome are the winds that tell
A wanderer of the deep
Where, far away, the jasmines dwell,
And where the myrrh-trees weep!
Blest on the sounding surge and foam
Are tidings of the citron’s home!
The sailor at the helm they meet,
And hope his bosom stirs,
Upspringing, midst the waves, to greet
The fair earth’s messengers,
That woo him, from the moaning main,
Back to her glorious bowers again.
They woo him, whispering lovely tales
Of many a flowering glade,
And fount’s bright gleam, in island vales
Of golden-fruited shade:
Across his lone ship’s wake they bring
A vision and a glow of spring.
And, O ye masters of the lay!
Come not even thus your songs
That meet us on life’s weary way,
Amidst her toiling throngs?
Yes! o’er the spirit thus they bear
A current of celestial air.
Their power is from the brighter clime
That in our birth hath part;
Their tones are of the world, which time
Sears not within the heart:
They tell us of the living light
In its green places ever bright.
They call us, with a voice divine,
Back to our early love,—
Our vows of youth at many a shrine,
Whence far and fast we rove.
Welcome high thought and holy strain
That make us Truth’s and Heaven’s again!

THE DYING IMPROVISATORE.[335]

“My heart shall be pour’d over thee—and break.”
Prophecy of Dante.
The spirit of my land,
It visits me once more!—though I must die
Far from the myrtles which thy breeze hath fann’d,
My own bright Italy!
It is, it is thy breath,
Which stirs my soul e’en yet, as wavering flame
Is shaken by the wind,—in life and death
Still trembling, yet the same!
Oh! that love’s quenchless power
Might waft my voice to fill thy summer sky,
And through thy groves its dying music shower,
Italy! Italy!
The nightingale is there,
The sunbeam’s glow, the citron flower’s perfume,
The south wind’s whisper in the scented air—
It will not pierce the tomb!
Never, oh! never more,
On thy Rome’s purple heaven mine eye shall dwell,
Or watch the bright waves melt along thy shore—
My Italy! farewell!
Alas!—thy hills among
Had I but left a memory of my name,
Of love and grief one deep, true, fervent song,
Unto immortal fame!
But like a lute’s brief tone,
Like a rose-odour on the breezes cast,
Like a swift flush of dayspring, seen and gone,
So hath my spirit pass’d—
Pouring itself away
As a wild bird amidst the foliage turns
That which within him triumphs, beats, or burns,
Into a fleeting lay;
That swells, and floats, and dies,
Leaving no echo to the summer woods
Of the rich breathings and impassion’d sighs
Which thrill’d their solitudes.
Yet, yet remember me!
Friends! that upon its murmurs oft have hung,
When from my bosom, joyously and free,
The fiery fountain sprung.
Under the dark rich blue
Of midnight heavens, and on the star-lit sea,
And when woods kindle into spring’s first hue,
Sweet friends! remember me!
And in the marble halls,
Where life’s full glow the dreams of beauty wear,
And poet-thoughts embodied light the walls,
Let me be with you there!
Fain would I bind, for you,
My memory with all glorious things to dwell!
Fain bid all lovely sounds my name renew—
Sweet friends! bright land! farewell!

[335] Sestini, the Roman Improvisatore, when on his deathbed at Paris, is said to have poured forth a Farewell to Italy, in his most impassioned poetry.

MUSIC OF YESTERDAY.

“O! mein Geist, ich fuhle es in mir, strebt nach etwas Ueberirdischem, das keinem Menschen gegonnt ist.”—Tieck

The chord, the harp’s full chord is hush’d,
The voice hath died away,
Whence music, like sweet waters, gush’d
But yesterday.
Th’ awakening note, the breeze-like swell.
The full o’ersweeping tone,
The sounds that sigh’d “Farewell, farewell!”
Are gone—all gone!
The love, whose fervent spirit pass’d
With the rich measure’s flow;
The grief, to which it sank at last—
Where are they now?
They are with the scents by summer’s breath
Borne from a rose now shed:
With the words from lips long seal’d in death—
For ever fled.
The sea-shell of its native deep
A moaning thrill retains;
But earth and air no record keep
Of parted strains.
And all the memories, all the dreams,
They woke in floating by;
The tender thoughts, th’ Elysian gleams—
Could these too die?
They died! As on the water’s breast
The ripple melts away,
When the breeze that stirr’d it sinks to rest—
So perish’d they!
Mysterious in their sudden birth,
And mournful in their close,
Passing, and finding not on earth
Aim or repose.
Whence were they?—like the breath of flowers
Why thus to come and go?
A long, long journey must be ours
Ere this we know!

THE FORSAKEN HEARTH.

“Was mir fehlt?—Mir fehlt ja alles,
Bin so ganz verlassen hier!”
Tyrolese Melody.
The Hearth, the Hearth is desolate! the fire is quench’d and gone
That into happy children’s eyes once brightly laughing shone;
The place where mirth and music met is hush’d through day and night.
Oh! for one kind, one sunny face, of all that there made light!
But scatter’d are those pleasant smiles afar by mount and shore,
Like gleaming waters from one spring dispersed to meet no more.
Those kindred eyes reflect not now each other’s joy or mirth,
Unbound is that sweet wreath of home—alas! the lonely hearth!
The voices that have mingled here now speak another tongue,
Or breathe, perchance, to alien ears the songs their mother sung.
Sad, strangely sad, in stranger lands, must sound each household tone:
The hearth, the hearth is desolate! the bright fire quench’d and gone!
But are they speaking, singing yet, as in their days of glee?
Those voices, are they lovely still, still sweet on earth or sea?
Oh! some are hush’d, and some are changed, and never shall one strain
Blend their fraternal cadences triumphantly again.
And of the hearts that here were link’d by long-remember’d years,
Alas! the brother knows not now when fall the sister’s tears!
One haply revels at the feast, while one may droop alone:
For broken is the household chain, the bright fire quench’d and gone!
Not so—’tis not a broken chain: thy memory binds them still,
Thou holy hearth of other days! though silent now and chill.
The smiles, the tears, the rites, beheld by thine attesting stone,
Have yet a living power to mark thy children for thine own.
The father’s voice, the mother’s prayer, though call’d from earth away,
With music rising from the dead, their spirits yet shall sway;
And by the past, and by the grave, the parted yet are one,
Though the loved hearth be desolate, the bright fire quench’d and gone!

THE DREAMER.

“There is no such thing as forgetting, possible to the mind; a thousand accidents may, and will, interpose a veil between our present consciousness and the secret inscription on the mind; but alike, whether veiled or unveiled, the inscription remains for ever.”

English Opium-Eater.

“Thou hast been call’d, O sleep! the friend of woe,
But ’tis the happy who have call’d thee so.” Southey.
Peace to thy dreams! thou art slumbering now—
The moonlight’s calm is upon thy brow;
All the deep love that o’erflows thy breast
Lies midst the hush of thy heart at rest—
Like the scent of a flower in its folded bell,
When eve through the woodlands hath sigh’d farewell.
Peace! The sad memories that through the day
With a weight on thy lonely bosom lay,
The sudden thoughts of the changed and dead,
That bow’d thee as winds bow the willow’s head,
The yearnings for faces and voices gone—
All are forgotten! Sleep on, sleep on!
Are they forgotten? It is not so!
Slumber divides not the heart from its woe.
E’en now o’er thine aspect swift changes pass,
Like lights and shades over wavy grass:
Tremblest thou, Dreamer? O love and grief!
Ye have storms that shake e’en the closed-up leaf!
On thy parted lips there’s a quivering thrill,
As on a lyre ere its chords are still;
On the long silk lashes that fringe thine eye,
There’s a large tear gathering heavily—
A rain from the clouds of thy spirit press’d:
Sorrowful Dreamer! this is not rest!
It is Thought at work amidst buried hours—
It is Love keeping vigil o’er perish’d flowers.
—Oh, we bear within us mysterious things!
Of Memory and Anguish, unfathom’d springs;
And Passion—those gulfs of the heart to fill
With bitter waves, which it ne’er may still.
Well might we pause ere we gave them sway,
Flinging the peace of our couch away!
Well might we look on our souls in fear—
They find no fount of oblivion here!
They forget not, the mantle of sleep beneath—
How know we if under the wings of death?

THE WINGS OF THE DOVE.