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The pair were servants of his eye
In their immortality;

They moved about in open sight,
To and fro, for his delight.

He knew the rocks which angels haunt

On the mountains visitant;

He hath kenn'd them taking wing:
And the caves where faeries sing
He hath enter'd; and been told
By voices how men lived of old.
Among the heavens his eye can see
Face of thing that is to be;
And, if men report him right,
He could whisper words of might.
Now another day is come,
Fitter hope, and nobler doom;
He hath thrown aside his crook,
And hath buried deep his book;
Armour rusting in his halls
On the blood of Clifford calls;

6 Quell the Scot,' exclaims the lance:
'Bear me to the heart of France,'
Is the longing of the shield;

Tell thy name, thou trembling field;
Field of death, where'er thou be,
Groan thou with our victory!
Happy day, and mighty hour,

When our shepherd, in his power,

Mail'd and horsed, with lance and sword,

To his ancestors restored

Like a reappearing star,

Like a glory from afar,

First shall head the flock of war!"

Alas! the fervent harper did not know
That for a tranquil soul the lay was framed,
Who, long compell'd in humble walks to go,
Was soften'd into feeling, sooth'd, and tamed.

Love had he found in huts where poor men lie;
His daily teachers had been woods and rills,
The silence that is in the starry sky,
The sleep that is among the lonely hills.

In him the savage virtue of the race,
Revenge, and all ferocious thoughts, were dead:
Nor did he change; but kept in lofty place
The wisdom which adversity had bred.

Glad were the vales, and every cottage hearth;
The shepherd-lord was honour'd more and more;
And, ages after he was laid in earth,

"The good Lord Clifford" was the name he bore.

THOMAS CAMPBELL. 1777.

FROM "THE PLEASURES OF HOPE."

AT summer eve, when Heaven's ethereal bow Spans with bright arch the glittering hills below, Why to yon mountain turns the musing eye, Whose sunbright summit mingles with the sky? Why do those cliffs of shadowy tint appear More sweet than all the landscape smiling near? 'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view, And robes the mountain in its azure hue. Thus, with delight, we linger to survey The promised joys of life's unmeasured way; Thus, from afar, each dim-discover'd scene More pleasing seems than all the past hath been; And every form that Fancy can repair From dark oblivion, glows divinely there.

What potent spirit guides the raptured eye
To pierce the shades of dim futurity?

Can Wisdom lend, with all her heavenly power,
The pledge of Joy's anticipated hour?

Ah, no! she darkly sees the fate of man,
Her dim horizon bounded to a span;

Or, if she hold an image to the view,
'Tis Nature pictured too severely true.

With thee, sweet Hope! resides the heavenly light
That pours remotest rapture on the sight:
Thine is the charm of Life's bewilder'd way,
That calls each slumbering passion into play.
Waked by thy touch, I see the sister band,
On tiptoe watching, start at thy command,
And fly where'er thy mandate bids them steer,
To Pleasure's path, or Glory's bright career.

Primeval Hope, the Aönian muses say,
When man and Nature mourn'd their first decay;
When every form of death, and every wo,
Shot from malignant stars to earth below;
When Murder bared her arm, and rampant War
Yoked the red dragons of her iron car;
When Peace and Mercy, banish'd from the plain,
Sprung on the viewless winds to Heaven again;
All, all forsook the friendless, guilty mind,
But Hope, the charmer, linger'd still behind.

Thus, while Elijah's burning wheels prepare From Carmel's heights to sweep the fields of air, The prophet's mantle, ere his flight began, Dropp'd on the world-a sacred gift to man.

Auspicious Hope! in thy sweet garden grow Wreaths for each toil, a charm for every wo; Won by their sweets, in Nature's languid hour, The way worn pilgrim seeks thy summer bow'r; There, as the wild bee murmurs on the wing, What peaceful dreams thy handmaid spirits bring! What viewless forms th' Eolian organ play,

And sweep the furrow'd lines of anxious thought away!

Angel of life! thy glittering wings explore

Earth's loneliest bounds, and ocean's wildest shore.

Lo! to the wintry winds the pilot yields
His bark, careering o'er unfathom'd fields;
Now on Atlantic waves he rides afar,
Where Andes, giant of the western star,
With meteor-standard to the winds unfurl'd,

Looks from his throne of clouds o'er half the world!

Now far he sweeps, where scarce a summer

smiles

On Behring's rocks, or Greenland's naked isles:
Cold on his midnight watch the breezes blow,
From wastes that slumber in eternal snow;
And waft, across the wave's tumultuous roar,
The wolf's long howl from Oonalaska's shore.

Poor child of danger, nursling of the storm,
Sad are the woes that wreck thy manly form!
Rocks, waves, and winds the shatter'd bark delay;
Thy heart is sad, thy home is far away.

But Hope can here her moonlight vigils keep, And sing to charm the spirit of the deep: Swift as yon streamer lights the starry pole, Her visions warm the watchman's pensive soul; His native hills, that rise in happier climes, The grot, that heard his song of other times, His cottage home, his bark of slender sail, His glassy lake, and broomwood-blossom'd vale, Rush on his thought; he sweeps before the wind, Treads the loved shore he sigh'd to leave behind; Meets at each step a friend's familiar face, And flies at last to Helen's long embrace; Wipes from her cheek the rapture speaking tear, And clasps, with many a sigh, his children dear! While, long neglected, but at length caress'd, His faithful dog salutes the smiling guest; Points to the master's eyes, where'er they roam, His wistful face, and whines a welcome home.

Friend of the brave! in peril's darkest hour, Intrepid virtue looks to thee for power;

To thee the heart its trembling homage yields,
On stormy floods and carnage-cover'd fields,
When front to front the banner'd hosts combine,
Halt ere they close, and form the dreadful line.
When all is still on death's devoted soil,
The march-worn soldier mingles for the toil;
As rings his glittering tube, he lifts on high
The dauntless brow and spirit-speaking eye,
Hails in his heart the triumph yet to come,
And hears thy stormy music in the drum !

*

Propitious power! when rankling cares annoy
The sacred home of Hymenean joy;
When doom'd to poverty's sequester'd dell,
The wedded pair of love and virtue dwell,
Unpitied by the world, unknown to fame,

Their woes, their wishes, and their hearts the same;
Oh, there, prophetic Hope! thy smile bestow,
And chase the pangs that worth should never know;
There, as the parent deals his scanty store
To friendless babes, and weeps to give no more,
Tell that his manly race shall yet assuage
Their father's wrongs, and shield his latter age.
What though for him no Hybla sweets distil,
Nor bloomy vines wave purple on the hill;
Tell that, when silent years have pass'd away,
That when his eyes grow dim, his tresses gray,
These busy hands a lovelier cot shall build,
And deck with fairer flowers his little field,
And call from Heaven propitious dews to breathe
Arcadian beauty on the barren heath;

Tell that, while Love's spontaneous smile endears
The days of peace, the sabbath of his years,
Health shall prolong to many a festive hour
The social pleasures of his humble bower.

Lo! at the couch where infant beauty sleeps,
Her silent watch the mournful mother keeps;
She, while the lovely babe unconscious lies,
Smiles on her slumbering child with pensive eyes,

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