The Poems of Felicia Hemans
venerable father of Körner, who, with the mother, survived the “Lyre,
Sword, and Flower,” here commemorated, may not be uninteresting to the
German reader:--
“Wohllaut tont aus der Ferne von freundlichen Luften getragen,
Schmeichelt mit lindernder Kraft sich in der Trauernden Ohr, Starkt den
erhebenden Glauben an solcher seelen Verwandschaft, Die zum Tempel die
brust nur fur das Wurdige weihn.
Aus dem Lande zu dem sich stets der gefeyerte Jungling Hingezogen
gefuhlt, wird ihm ein glazender Lohn. Heil dem Brittischen Volke, wenn
ihm das Deutsche nicht fremd ist! Uber Lander und Meer reichen sich
beyde die Hand.” Theodor Körner’s Vater.
THE DEATH-DAY OF KÖRNER.[356]
A song for the death-day of the brave--
A song of pride!
The youth went down to a hero’s grave,
With the sword, his bride.[357]
He went, with his noble heart unworn,
And pure, and high--
An eagle stooping from clouds of morn,
Only to die.
He went with the lyre, whose lofty tone
Beneath his hand
Had thrill’d to the name of his God alone
And his fatherland.
And with all his glorious feelings yet
In their first glow,
Like a southern stream that no frost hath met
To chain its flow.
A song for the death-day of the brave--
A song of pride!
For him that went to a hero’s grave,
With the sword, his bride.
He hath left a voice in his trumpet lays
To turn the flight,
And a guiding spirit for after days,
Like a watch-fire’s light.
And a grief in his father’s soul to rest,
Midst all high thought;
And a memory unto his mother’s breast,
With healing fraught.
And a name and fame above the blight
Of earthly breath,
Beautiful--beautiful and bright,
In life and death!
A song for the death-day of the brave--
A song of pride!
For him that went to a hero’s grave,
With the sword, his bride!
[356] On reading part of a letter from Körner’s father, addressed to
Mr Richardson, the translator of his works, in which he speaks of “The
Death-day of his son.”
[357] See _The Sword Song_, composed on the morning of his death.
[As the great German writers at this time, and ever afterwards,
exerted a great influence over the mind of Mrs Hemans, it may please
the reader to know, on the authority of her sister, the degrees
of estimation in which she held some of these. We quote from the
_Memoir_, p. 54-8.
“She in general preferred the writings of Schiller to those of
Goethe, and could for ever find fresh beauties in _Wallenstein_,
with which she was equally familiar in its eloquent original, and in
Coleridge’s magnificent translation, or, as it may truly be called,
transfusion. Those most conversant with her literary tastes, will
remember her almost actual relation-like love for the characters of
Max and Thekla, whom, like many other ‘beings of the mind,’ she had
learned to consider as friends; and her constant quotations of certain
passages from this noble tragedy, which peculiarly accorded with her
own views and feelings. In the _Stimmen der Völker in Lieder_ of
Herder, she found a rich store of thoughts and suggestions; and it
was this work which inspired her with the idea of her own ‘Lays of
Many Lands,’ most of which appeared originally in the _New Monthly
Magazine_, then edited by Mr Campbell. She also took great delight
in the dreamy beauties of Novalis and Tieck, and in what has been
gracefully characterised by Mr Chorley, as the ‘moonlight tenderness’
of Oehlenschläger. Of the works of the latter, her especial favourite
was _Coreggio_; and of Tieck, _Sternbald’s Wanderungen_, which she
often made her out-of-doors companion. It was always an especial mark
of her love for a book, and of her considering it true to nature, and
to the best wisdom of the heart,[358] when she promoted it to the list
of those with which she would ‘take sweet counsel’ amidst the woods
and fields.
“But, amongst all these names of power, none awakened a more lively
interest in her mind, than that of the noble-hearted Körner, the young
soldier-bard, who, in the words of Professor Bouterwek, ‘would have
become a distinguished tragic poet, had he not met with the still
more glorious fate of falling on the field of battle, while fighting
for the deliverance of Germany.’ The stirring events of his life, the
heroism of his early death, and the beautiful tie which subsisted
between him and his only sister, whose fate was so touchingly bound
up with his own, formed a romance of real life which could not fail
to excite feelings of the warmest enthusiasm in a bosom so ready as
hers to respond to all things high and holy. The lyric of ‘The Grave
of Körner,’ is, perhaps, one of the most impressive Mrs Hemans ever
wrote. Her whole heart was in a subject which so peculiarly combined
the two strains dearest to her nature, the chivalrous and the tender.
‘They were but two--and when that spirit pass’d,
Woe to the one, the last!’
“That mournful echo--‘They were but two,’ was, by some indefinable
association, connected in her mind with another and far differing
brother and sister, called into existence by the magic pen of Sir
Walter Scott. The affecting ejaculation, ‘There are but two of us!’
so often repeated by the hapless Clara Mowbray in _St Ronan’s Well_,
was frequently quoted by Mrs Hemans as an instance of the deepest
pathos. The lyric in question was, it is believed, one of the first
tributes which appeared in England to the memory of the author of
‘The Lyre and Sword,’ though his name has since become ‘familiar in
our ears as household words.’ A translation of the ‘Life of Körner,’
with selections from his poems, &c., was published in 1827, by G. F.
Richardson, Esq., whose politeness in presenting a copy of the work to
Mrs Hemans, inscribed with a dedicatory sonnet, led to an interchange
of letters with that gentleman, and was further the means of procuring
for her the high gratification of a direct message, full of the most
feeling acknowledgment, from the venerable father of the hero, who
afterwards addressed to her a poetical tribute from _Theodor Körner’s
Father_ [see p. 425.] Her pleasure in receiving this genuine offering
was thus expressed to Mr Richardson, who had been the medium through
which it reached her. ‘_Theodor Körner’s Vater!_’--it is, indeed, a
title beautifully expressing all the holy pride which the memory of
_die treuen Todten_[359] must inspire; and awakening every good and
high feeling to its sound. I shall prize the lines as a relic. Will
you be kind enough to assure M. Körner, with my grateful respects, of
the value which will be attached to them, a value so greatly enhanced
by their being in his own hand. They are very beautiful, I think, in
their somewhat antique and _treuherzig_[360] simplicity, and worthy to
have proceeded from _Theodor Körner’s Vater_.
“The following almost literal translation of these lines is given by
W. B. Chorley, Esq., in his interesting little volume, ‘The Lyre and
Sword,’ published in 1834:--
‘Gently a voice from afar is borne to the ear of the mourner;
Mildly it soundeth, yet strong, grief in his bosom to soothe;
Strong in the soul-cheering faith, that hearts have a share in his
sorrow,
In whose depths all things holy and noble are shrined.
From that land once dearly beloved by our brave one, the fallen,
Mourning blent with bright fame--cometh a wreath for his urn.
Hail to thee, England the free! thou see’st in the German no
stranger.
Over the earth and the seas, join’d be both lands, heart and hand!’
“There was nothing which delighted Mrs Hemans more in German
literature, than the cordial feeling of brotherhood, so conspicuous
amongst its most eminent authors, and their freedom from all the
petty rivalries and manœuvres on which she herself looked down with
as much of wonder as of contempt. In a letter, in which she speaks
of the bitterness, and jealousy, and strife, pervading the tone of
many of our own Reviews, she adds, turning to a brighter picture
with a feeling of relief, like that of one emerging from the heated
atmosphere of a city to breathe the fresh air of the mountains:--‘How
very different seems the spirit of literary men in Germany! I am
just reading a work of Tieck’s, which is dedicated to Schlegel; and
I am delighted with the beautiful simplicity of these words in the
dedication:--_Es war eine schöne Zeit meines Lebens, als ich dich und
deinen Bruder Friedrich zuerst kennen lernte’; eine noch schönere
als wir und Novalis für Kunst und Wissenschaft vereinigt lebten, und
uns in mannigfaltigen Bestrebungen begegneten. Jetzt hat uns das
Schicksal schon seit vielen Jahren getrennt. Ich kann nur in Geist
und in der Erinnerung mit dir leben._[361] ‘Is not that union of
bright minds, _für Kunst und Wissenschaft_, a picture on which it is
delightful to repose?’”]
[358] “One of our poets says, with equal truth and beauty, ‘The heart
is wise.’ We should be not only happier but better if we attended more
to its dictates.”--Ethel Churchill, by L. E. L. vol. i. p. 234.
[359] The faithful dead.
[360] True-hearted.
[361] “That was a bright era in my life when I first learned to know
you and your brother Frederick; a still brighter, when we and Novalis
lived united for art and knowledge, and emulated one another in various
competitions. Fate has since, for many years, divided us. I can now
live with you only in spirit and in memory.”
AN HOUR OF ROMANCE.
“I come
To this sweet place for quiet. Every tree
And bush, and fragrant flower, and hilly path,
And thymy mound that flings unto the winds
Its morning incense, is my friend.”--Barry Cornwall.
There were thick leaves above me and around,
And low sweet sighs like those of childhood’s sleep,
Amidst their dimness, and a fitful sound
As of soft showers on water; dark and deep
Lay the oak shadows o’er the turf, so still
They seem’d but pictured glooms; a hidden rill
Made music, such as haunts us in a dream,
Under the fern-tufts; and a tender gleam
Of soft green light, as by the glow-worm shed,
Came pouring through the woven beech-boughs down,
And steep’d the magic page wherein I read
Of royal chivalry and old renown,
A tale of Palestine.[362] Meanwhile the bee
Swept past me with a tone of summer hours--
A drowsy bugle, wafting thoughts of flowers,
Blue skies, and amber sunshine: brightly free,
On filmy wings, the purple dragon-fly
Shot glancing like a fairy javelin by;
And a sweet voice of sorrow told the dell
Where sat the lone wood-pigeon.
But ere long,
All sense of these things faded, as the spell
Breathing from that high gorgeous tale grew strong
On my chain’d soul. ’Twas not the leaves I heard:--
A Syrian wind the lion-banner stirr’d,
Through its proud floating folds. ’Twas not the brook
Singing in secret through its grassy glen;--
A wild shrill trumpet of the Saracen
Peal’d from the desert’s lonely heart, and shook
The burning air. Like clouds when winds are high,
O’er glittering sands flew steeds of Araby,
And tents rose up, and sudden lance and spear
Flash’d where a fountain’s diamond wave lay clear,
Shadow’d by graceful palm-trees. Then the shout
Of merry England’s joy swell’d freely out,
Sent through an Eastern heaven, whose glorious hue
Made shields dark mirrors to its depths of blue: