Part 29 (1/2)

Our beautiful bowers are all laid waste; The fir is felled that our names once bore; Our rows of roses, by urchins' haste, Are destroyed where they leap the barrier o'er.

The fount is walled in where, at noonday pride, She so gayly drank, from the wood descending; In her fairy hand was transformed the tide, And it turned to pearls through her fingers wending

The wild, rugged path is paved with spars, Where erst in the sand her footsteps were traced, When so small were the prints that the surface mars, That they seemed _to smile_ ere by mine effaced.

The bank on the side of the road, day by day, Where of old she awaited my loved approach, Is now become the traveller's way To avoid the track of the thundering coach.

Here the forest contracts, there the mead extends, Of all that was ours, there is little left-- Like the ashes that wildly are whisked by winds, Of all souvenirs is the place bereft.

Do we live no more--is our hour then gone?

Will it give back naught to our hungry cry?

The breeze answers my call with a mocking tone, The house that was mine makes no reply.

True! others shall pa.s.s, as we have pa.s.sed, As we have come, so others shall meet, And the dream that our mind had sketched in haste, Shall others continue, but never complete.

For none upon earth can achieve his scheme, The best as the worst are futile here: We awake at the selfsame point cf the dream-- All is here begun, and finished elsewhere.

Yes! others shall come in the bloom of the heart, To enjoy in this pure and happy retreat, All that nature to timid love can impart Of solemn repose and communion sweet.

In _our_ fields, in _our_ paths, shall strangers stray, In _thy_ wood, my dearest, new lovers go lost, And other fair forms in the stream shall play Which of old thy delicate feet have crossed.

_Author of ”Critical Essays.”_

SWEET MEMORY OF LOVE.

_(”Toutes les pa.s.sions s'eloignent avec l'age.”)_

[x.x.xIV. ii., October, 183-.]

As life wanes on, the pa.s.sions slow depart, One with his grinning mask, one with his steel; Like to a strolling troupe of Thespian art, Whose pace decreases, winding past the hill.

But naught can Love's all charming power efface, That light, our misty tracks suspended o'er, In joy thou'rt ours, more dear thy tearful grace, The young may curse thee, but the old adore.

But when the weight of years bow down the head, And man feels all his energies decline, His projects gone, himself tomb'd with the dead, Where virtues lie, nor more illusions s.h.i.+ne, When all our lofty thoughts dispersed and o'er, We count within our hearts so near congealed, Each grief that's past, each dream, exhausted ore!

As counting dead upon the battle-field.

As one who walks by the lamp's flickering blaze, Far from the hum of men, the joys of earth-- Our mind arrives at last by tortuous ways, At that drear gulf where but despair has birth.

E'en there, amid the darkness of that night, When all seems closing round in empty air, Is seen through thickening gloom one trembling light!

'Tis Love's sweet memory that lingers there!

_Author of ”Critical Essays.”_

THE MARBLE FAUN.

_(”Il semblait grelotter.”)_