Part 497 (1/2)

We ever shun the caverns black, And revel in the glowing day; 'Tis we who light the world's dark track, With our life's clear and magic ray.

Spring's joyful harbingers are we, And her inspiring streams we swell; And so the house of death we flee, For life alone must round us dwell.

Without us is no perfect bliss, When man is glad, we, too, attend, And when a monarch wors.h.i.+pped is, To him our majesty attend.

X.

What is the thing esteemed by few?

The monarch's hand it decks with pride, Yet it is made to injure too, And to the sword is most allied.

No blood it sheds, yet many a wound Inflicts,--gives wealth, yet takes from none; Has vanquished e'en the earth's wide round, And makes life's current smoothly run.

The greatest kingdoms it has framed, The oldest cities reared from dust, Yet war's fierce torch has ne'er inflamed; Happy are they who in it trust!

XI.

I live within a dwelling of stone, There buried in slumber I dally; Yet, armed with a weapon of iron alone, The foe to encounter I sally.

At first I'm invisible, feeble, and mean, And o'er me thy breath has dominion; I'm easily drowned in a raindrop e'en, Yet in victory waxes my pinion.

When my sister, all-powerful, gives me her hand, To the terrible lord of the world I expand.

XII.

Upon a disk my course I trace, There restlessly forever flit; Small is the circuit I embrace, Two hands suffice to cover it.

Yet ere that field I traverse, I Full many a thousand mile must go, E'en though with tempest-speed I fly, Swifter than arrow from a bow.

XIII.

A bird it is, whose rapid motion With eagle's flight divides the air; A fish it is, and parts the ocean, That bore a greater monster ne'er; An elephant it is, whose rider On his broad back a tower has put: 'Tis like the reptile base, the spider, Whenever it extends its foot; And when, with iron tooth projecting, It seeks its own life-blood to drain, On footing firm, itself erecting, It braves the raging hurricane.

THE VIRTUE OF WOMAN.

Man of virtue has need;-into life with boldness he plunges, Entering with fortune more sure into the hazardous strife; But to woman one virtue suffices; it is ever s.h.i.+ning Lovingly forth to the heart; so let it s.h.i.+ne to the eye!

THE WALK.

Hail to thee, mountain beloved, with thy glittering purple-dyed summit!

Hail to thee also, fair sun, looking so lovingly on!

Thee, too, I hail, thou smiling plain, and ye murmuring lindens, Ay, and the chorus so glad, cradled on yonder high boughs; Thee, too, peaceably azure, in infinite measure extending Round the dusky-hued mount, over the forest so green,-- Round about me, who now from my chamber's confinement escaping, And from vain frivolous talk, gladly seek refuge with thee.

Through me to quicken me runs the balsamic stream of thy breezes, While the energetical light freshens the gaze as it thirsts.

Bright o'er the blooming meadow the changeable colors are gleaming, But the strife, full of charms, in its own grace melts away Freely the plain receives me,--with carpet far away reaching, Over its friendly green wanders the pathway along.

Round me is humming the busy bee, and with pinion uncertain Hovers the b.u.t.terfly gay over the trefoil's red flower.

Fiercely the darts of the sun fall on me,--the zephyr is silent, Only the song of the lark echoes athwart the clear air.

Now from the neighboring copse comes a roar, and the tops of the alders Bend low down,--in the wind dances the silvery gra.s.s; Night ambrosial circles me round; in the coolness so fragrant Greets me a beauteous roof, formed by the beeches' sweet shade.

In the depths of the wood the landscape suddenly leaves me And a serpentine path guides up my footsteps on high.

Only by stealth can the light through the leafy trellis of branches Sparingly pierce, and the blue smilingly peeps through the boughs, But in a moment the veil is rent, and the opening forest Suddenly gives back the day's glittering brightness to me!

Boundlessly seems the distance before my gaze to be stretching, And in a purple-tinged hill terminates sweetly the world.

Deep at the foot of the mountain, that under me falls away steeply, Wanders the greenish-hued stream, looking like gla.s.s as it flows.

Endlessly under me see I the ether, and endlessly o'er Giddily look I above, shudderingly look I below, But between the infinite height and the infinite hollow Safely the wanderer moves over a well-guarded path.

Smilingly past me are flying the banks all teeming with riches, And the valley so bright boasts of its industry glad.

See how yonder hedgerows that sever the farmer's possessions Have by Demeter been worked into the tapestried plain!

Kindly decree of the law, of the Deity mortal-sustaining, Since from the brazen world love vanished forever away.

But in freer windings the measured pastures are traversed (Now swallowed up in the wood, now climbing up to the hills) By a glimmering streak, the highway that knits lands together; Over the smooth-flowing stream, quietly glide on the rafts.