The Poems of Felicia Hemans
adopted of the Kansas--the shooter with the rifle--no, with the long
bow--is, I blush to say it, neither more nor less than an impostor; no
better than Psalmanazar; no, no better than Carraboo herself. After
this, what are we to believe again? Are there any Loo Choo Islands?
Was there ever any Robinson Crusoe? Is there any Rammohun Roy? All
one’s faith and trust is shaken to its foundations. No one here
sympathises with me properly on this annoying occasion; but you, I
think, will know how to feel, who have been quite as much devoted to
that vile John Dunn as myself.”--_Memoir_, pp. 95-6.]
Is not thy heart far off amidst the woods,
Where the red Indian lays his father’s dust,
And, by the rushing of the torrent floods,
To the Great Spirit bows in silent trust?
Doth not thy soul o’ersweep the foaming main,
To pour itself upon the wilds again?
They are gone forth, the desert’s warrior race,
By stormy lakes to track the elk and roe;
But where art thou, the swift one in the chase,
With thy free footstep and unfailing bow?
Their singing shafts have reach’d the panther’s lair,
And where art thou?--thine arrows are not there.
They rest beside their streams--the spoil is won--
They hang their spears upon the cypress bough;
The night-fires blaze, the hunter’s work is done--
They hear the tales of old--but where art thou?
The night-fires blaze beneath the giant pine,
And there a place is fill’d that once was thine.
For thou art mingling with the city’s throng,
And thou hast thrown thine Indian bow aside;
Child of the forests! thou art borne along,
E’en as ourselves, by life’s tempestuous tide.
But will this be? and canst thou _here_ find rest?
Thou hadst thy nurture on the desert’s breast.
Comes not the sound of torrents to thine ear
From the savannah land, the land of streams?
Hear’st thou not murmurs which none else may hear?
Is not the forest’s shadow on thy dreams?
They call--wild voices call thee o’er the main,
Back to thy free and boundless woods again.
Hear them not! hear them not!--thou canst not find
In the far wilderness what once was thine!
Thou hast quaff’d knowledge from the founts of mind,
And gather’d loftier aims and hopes divine.
Thou know’st the soaring thought, the immortal strain--
Seek not the deserts and the woods again!
STANZAS TO THE MEMORY OF * * *
In the full tide of melody and mirth,
While joy’s bright spirit beams from every eye,
Forget not him, whose soul, though fled from earth,
Seems yet to speak in strains that cannot die.
Forget him not, for many a festal hour,
Charm’d by those strains, for us has lightly flown:
And memory’s visions, mingling with their power,
Wake the heart’s thrill at each familiar tone.
Blest be the harmonist, whose well-known lays
Revive life’s morning dreams, when youth is fled,
And, fraught with images of other days,
Recall the loved, the absent, and the dead.
His the dear art whose spells awhile renew
Hope’s first illusions in their tenderest bloom--
Oh! what were life, unless such moments threw
Bright gleams, “like angel visits,” o’er its gloom?
THE VAUDOIS VALLEYS.
Yes! thou hast met the sun’s last smile
From the haunted hills of Rome;
By many a bright Ægean isle
Thou hast seen the billows foam.
From the silence of the Pyramid,
Thou hast watch’d the solemn flow
Of the Nile, that with its waters hid
The ancient realm below.
Thy heart hath burn’d, as shepherds sung
Some wild and warlike strain,
Where the Moorish horn once proudly rung
Through the pealing hills of Spain.
And o’er the lonely Grecian streams
Thou hast heard the laurels moan,
With a sound yet murmuring in thy dreams
Of the glory that is gone.
But go thou to the pastoral vales
Of the Alpine mountains old,
If thou wouldst hear immortal tales
By the wind’s deep whispers told!
Go, if thou lovest the soil to tread
Where man hath nobly striven,
And life, like incense, hath been shed,
An offering unto heaven.
For o’er the snows, and round the pines,
Hath swept a noble flood;
The nurture of the peasant’s vines
Hath been the martyr’s blood!
A spirit, stronger than the sword,
And loftier than despair,
Through all the heroic region pour’d,
Breathes in the generous air.
A memory clings to every steep
Of long-enduring faith,
And the sounding streams glad record keep
Of courage unto death.
Ask of the peasant _where_ his sires
For truth and freedom bled?
Ask, where were lit the torturing fires,
Where lay the holy dead!
And he will tell thee, all around,
On fount, and turf, and stone,
Far as the chamois’ foot can bound,
Their ashes have been sown!
Go, when the Sabbath-bell is heard[324]
Up through the wilds to float,
When the dark old woods and caves are stirr’d
To gladness by the note;
When forth, along their thousand rills,
The mountain people come,
Join thou their worship on those hills
Of glorious martyrdom.
And while the song of praise ascends,
And while the torrent’s voice,
Like the swell of many an organ, blends,
Then let thy soul rejoice.
Rejoice, that human hearts, through scorn,
Through shame, through death, made strong,
Before the rocks and heavens have borne
Witness of God so long!
[324] See Gilly’s _Researches among the Mountains of Piedmont_, for an
interesting account of a Sabbath-day among the upper regions of the
Vaudois. The inhabitants of these Protestant valleys, who, like the
Swiss, repair with their flocks and herds to the summit of the hills
during the summer, are followed thither by their pastors, and at that
season of the year assemble on that sacred day to worship in the open
air.
SONG OF THE SPANISH WANDERER.
Pilgrim! oh say, hath thy cheek been fann’d
By the sweet winds of my sunny land?
Know’st thou the sound of its mountain pines?
And hast thou rested beneath its vines?
Hast thou heard the music still wandering by,
A thing of the breezes, in Spain’s blue sky,
Floating away o’er hill and heath,
With the myrtle’s whisper, the citron’s breath?
Then say, are there fairer vales than those
Where the warbling of fountains for ever flows?
Are there brighter flowers than mine own, which wave
O’er Moorish ruin and Christian grave?
O sunshine and song! they are lying far
By the streams that look to the western star;
My heart is fainting to hear once more
The water-voices of that sweet shore.
Many were they that have died for thee,
And brave, my Spain! though thou art not free;
But I call them blest--they have rent _their_ chain--
They sleep in thy valleys, my sunny Spain!
THE CONTADINA.
WRITTEN FOR A PICTURE.
Not for the myrtle, and not for the vine,
Though its grape, like a gem, be the sunbeam’s shrine;
And not for the rich blue heaven that showers
Joy on thy spirit, like light on the flowers;
And not for the scent of the citron trees--
Fair peasant! I call thee not blest for _these_.
Not for the beauty spread over thy brow,
Though round thee a gleam, as of spring, it throw;
And not for the lustre that laughs from thine eye,
Like a dark stream’s flash to the sunny sky,
Though the south in its riches naught lovelier sees--
Fair peasant! I call thee not blest for _these_.
But for those breathing and loving things--
For the boy’s fond arm that around thee clings,
For the smiling cheek on thy lap that glows,
In the peace of a trusting child’s repose--
For the hearts whose home is thy gentle breast,
Oh! richly I call thee, and deeply blest!
TROUBADOUR SONG.
The warrior cross’d the ocean’s foam
For the stormy fields of war;
The maid was left in a smiling home
And a sunny land afar.
_His_ voice was heard where javelin showers
Pour’d on the steel-clad line;
_Her_ step was midst the summer flowers,
Her seat beneath the vine.
His shield was cleft, his lance was riven,
And the red blood stain’d his crest;
While she--the gentlest wind of heaven
Might scarcely fan her breast!
Yet a thousand arrows pass’d him by,
And again he cross’d the seas;
But she had died as roses die
That perish with a breeze--
As roses die, when the blast is come
For all things bright and fair:
There was death within the smiling home--
How had death found her there?
THE TREASURES OF THE DEEP.[325]
What hidest thou in thy treasure caves and cells,
Thou hollow-sounding and mysterious main?--
Pale glistening pearls, and rainbow-colour’d shells
Bright things which gleam unreck’d of, and in vain.
Keep, keep thy riches, melancholy sea!
We ask not such from thee.
Yet more, the depths have more! What wealth untold,
Far down, and shining through their stillness lies!
Thou hast the starry gems, the burning gold,
Won from ten thousand royal Argosies.--
Sweep o’er thy spoils, thou wild and wrathful main!
Earth claims not _these_ again.
Yet more, the depths have more! Thy waves have roll’d
Above the cities of a world gone by!
Sand hath fill’d up the palaces of old,
Sea-weed o’ergrown the halls of revelry.--
Dash o’er them, ocean! in thy scornful play:
Man yields them to decay.
Yet more! the billows and the depths have more!
High hearts and brave are gather’d to thy breast!
They hear not now the booming waters roar,
The battle-thunders will not break their rest.--
Keep thy red gold and gems, thou stormy grave!
Give back the true and brave!
Give back the lost and lovely!--those for whom
The place was kept at board and hearth so long,
The prayer went up through midnight’s breathless gloom,
And the vain yearning woke midst festal song!
Hold fast thy buried isles, thy towers o’erthrown--
But all is not thine own.
To thee the love of woman hath gone down,
Dark flow thy tides o’er manhood’s noble head,
O’er youth’s bright locks, and beauty’s flowery crown:
Yet must thou hear a voice--Restore the dead!
Earth shall reclaim her precious things from thee!--
Restore the dead, thou sea!
[325] Originally introduced in the “Forest Sanctuary.”
[“The only public mention that I have made of Mrs Hemans,” says
Mr Montgomery of Sheffield, in a letter regarding her, with which
we have been favoured by that excellent man and distinguished
poet, “was in a series of lectures on the principal British Poets,
delivered at the Royal Institution from ten to twelve years ago. In
one of these, having to notice very briefly the ‘Female Poets,’ I
said, ‘Mrs Hemans, in many of her lyrics, has struck out a new and
attractive style of mingling the picturesque and the sentimental with
such grace and beauty that, in her best pieces, she is better than
almost any poet of either sex in that sprightly, yet pathetic vein,
which she has exercised.’ I gave ‘The Treasures of the Deep’ as an
example; and, indeed, I know nothing in our language--of the kind and
the character I mean--comparable with it, either in conception or