THESE verses were written for a Benefit at the Dublin Theatre, and were spoken by Miss Smith, with a degree of success which they owed solely to her admirable manner of reciting them. I wrote them in haste, and it very rarely happens that poetry, which has cost but little labour to the writer, is productive of any great pleasure to the reader. Under this impression, I should not have published them, if they had not found their way into some of the newspapers, with such an addition of errors to their own original stock that I thought it but fair to limit their responsibility to those faults alone which really belong to them. With respect to the title which I have invented for this Poem, I feel even more than the scruples of the Emperor Tiberius, when he humbly asked pardon of the Roman Senate for using "the outlandish term Monopoly.". But the truth is, having written the Poem with the sole view of serving a Benefit, I thought that an unintelligible word of this kind would not be without its attraction for the multitude; with whom, "If 'tis not sense, at least 'tis Greek." To some of my readers, however, it may not be superfluous to say, that by "Melologue" I mean that mixture of recitation and music which is frequently adopted in the performance of Collins's Ode on the Passions, and of which the most striking example I can 1emember is the prophetic speech of Joad, in the Athalie of Racine. T. M. INTRODUCTORY MUSIC-Haydn. There breathes the language, known and felt That language of the soul is felt and known : From those meridian plains Where oft, of old, on some high tower, The soft Peruvian poured his midnight strains, And called his distant love (with such sweet power Not worlds could keep her from his arms away*) Where, beneath a sunless sky, The Lapland lover bids his reindeer fly, Of vernal Phoebus burned upon his brow. Is still resistless, still the same! And faithful as the mighty sea, To the pale star that o'er its realm presides, Of human passion rise and fall for thee! GREEK AIR. LIST! 'tis a Grecian maid that sings, When every arm was Freedom's shield, FLOURISH OF TRUMPET. HARK! 'tis the sound that charms Oh! many a mother folds her arms A certain Spaniard, one night late, met an Indian woman in the streets of Cozco, and would have taken her to his home, but she cried "For God's sake, sir, let me go; for that pipe which you hear in yonder tower calls me with great passion, and I cannot refuse the summons; for love constrains me to go, that I may be his wife and he my husband."-Garcilasso de la Vega, in Sir Paul Rycaut's translation. See! from his native hills afar, As if 'twere like his mountain rill, O Music! here, even here, Amid this thoughtless wild career, Thy soul-felt charm asserts its wondrous power. There is an air which oft among the rocks Of his own lovèd land, at evening hour, Is heard when shepherds homeward pipe their flocks: With tenderest thoughts-would bring around his knees With speaking tears that ask him why And the stern eyes, that looked for blood before, Now melting mournful lose themselves in tears! SWISS AIR. BUT wake the trumpet's blast again, O War! when Truth thy arm employs, Than the blest sound of fetters breaking, From Slavery's slumber, breathes to Liberty! SPANISH AIR. HARK! from Spain, indignant Spain, By Saragossa's ruined streets, By brave Gerona's deathful story, That while one Spaniard's life-blood beats, That blood shall stain the Conqueror's glory! But ah! if vain the patriot's zeal, If neither valour's force nor wisdom's light Can break or melt that blood-cemented seal Which shuts so close the book of Europe's rightWhat song shall then in sadness tell Of broken pride, of prospects shaded; Of buried hopes, remembered well, Of ardour quenched and honour faded? What muse shall mourn the breathless brave, In sweetest dirge at memory's shrine? What harp shall sigh o'er Freedom's grave? O Erin! thine! "The day is thine, the night also is thine: thou hast prepared the light and Thou hast set all the borders of the earth: thou hast made summer the sun. and winter."-Psalm lxxiv. 16, 17. I. THOU art, O God! the life and light Are but reflections caught from Thee. II. When day, with farewell beam, delays Through golden vistas into heaven; Those hues that make the sun's decline III. When night, with wings of starry gloom, * I have heard that this air is by the late Mrs. Sheridan. It is sung to the Leautiful old words, "I do confess thou'rt smooth and fair." |