The Poetical Works of Hemans, Heber, and Pollok

Say, (for thine Isis yet recalls with pride
Thy youthful triumphs by her leafy side,)
Say, hast thou scorned, mid pomp, and wealth,
and power,

The sober transports of a studious hour?—
No, statesman, no!-thy patriot fire was fed
From the warm embers of the mighty dead;
And thy strong spirit's patient grasp combined
The souls of ages in a single mind.
-By arts like these, amidst a world of foes,
Eye of the earth, th' Athenian glory rose ;—
Thus, last and best of Romans, Brutus shone;
Our Somers thus, and thus our Clarendon;
Such Cobham was; such, Grenville, long be thou,
Our boast before-our chief and champion now!

EPITAPH ON A YOUNG NAVAL OFFI

CER,

AN EVENING WALK IN BENGAL.
OUR task is done! on Gunga's breast(6)
The sun is sinking down to rest;
And moored beneath the tamarind bough,
Our bark has found its harbour now.
With furled sail and painted side,
Behold the tiny frigate ride.
Upon her deck, 'mid charcoal gleams,
The Moslems' savoury supper steams,
While all apart, beneath the wood,
The Hindoo cooks his simpler food.
Come walk with me the jungle through;
If yonder hunter told us true,
Far off, in desert dank and rude,
The tiger holds his solitude;
Nor (taught by secret charm to shun
The thunders of the English gun,)
A dreadful guest but rarely seen,
Returns to scare the village green.

DESIGNED FOR A TOMB IN A SEAPORT TOWN IN Come boldly on! no venomed snake

NORTH WALES.

SAILOR! if vigour nerve thy frame,
If to high deeds thy soul is strung,

Revere this stone that gives to fame

The brave, the virtuous, and the young!—(5)

For manly beauty decked his form,

His bright eye beamed with mental power; Resistless as the winter storm,

Yet mild as summer's mildest shower.

In war's hoarse rage, in ocean's strife,
For skill, for force, for mercy known;
Still prompt to shield a comrade's life,
And greatly careless of his own.—
Yet youthful seaman, mourn not thou
The fate these artless lines recall;
No, Cambrian, no, be thine the vow,
Like him to live, like him to fall!—
But hast thou known a father's care,

Who sorrowing sent thee forth to sea;
Poured for thy weal th' unceasing prayer,
And thought the sleepless night on thee?

Has e'er thy tender fancy flown,

Can shelter in so cool a brake:
Child of the sun! he loves to lie
'Mid nature's embers parched and dry,
Where o'er some tower in ruin laid,
The peepul spreads its haunted shade,
Or round a tomb his scales to wreathe,
Fit warder in the gate of death!
Come on! yet pause! behold us now
Beneath the bamboo's arched bough,
Where gemming oft that sacred gloom,
Glows the geranium's scarlet bloom,
And winds our path through many a bower
Of fragrant tree and giant flower;
The ceiba's crimson pomp displayed
O'er the broad plaintain's humbler shade,
And dusk anana's prickly blade;
While o'er the brake, so wild and fair,
The betel waves his crest in air.
With pendent train and rushing wings,
Aloft the gorgeous peacock springs;
And he, the bird of hundred dyes,(7)
Whose plumes the dames of Ava prize.
So rich a shade, so green a sod,
Our English fairies never trod;
Yet who in Indian bower has stood,

But thought on England's "good green wood?'

When winds were strong and waves were high, And blessed beneath the palmy shade,

Where, listening to the tempest's moan,

Thy sisters heaved the anxious sigh?

Or, in the darkest hour of dread,

Mid war's wild din, and ocean's swell, Hast mourned a hero brother dead,

And did that brother love thee well?

Then pity those whose sorrows flow

In vain o'er Shipley's empty grave!-Sailor, thou weep'st:-Indulge thy wo; Such tears will not disgrace the brave!—

Her hazel and her hawthorn glade,

And breathed a prayer, (how oft in vain!)
To gaze upon her oaks again?

A truce to thought! the jackal's cry
Resounds like sylvan revelry;
And through the trees, yon failing ray
Will scantly serve to guide our way.
Yet, mark! as fade the upper skies,
Each thicket opes ten thousand eyes.
Before, beside us, and above,
The fire-fly lights his lamp of love,

Retreating, chasing, sinking, soaring, The darkness of the copse exploring; While to this cooler air confest, The broad Dhatura bares her breast, Of fragrant scent, and virgin white, A pearl around the locks of night! Still as we pass in softened hum, Along the breezy valleys come The village song, the horn, the drum. Still as we pass, from bush and briar, The shrill cigala strikes his lyre; And, what is she whose liquid strain Thrills through yon copse of sugar-cane? I know that soul-entrancing swell! It is, it must be,-Philomel!

Enough, enough, the rustling trees Announce a shower upon the breeze,— The flashes of the summer sky Assume a deeper, ruddier dye; Yon lamp that trembles on the stream, From forth our cabin sheds its beam; And we must early sleep to find Betimes the morning's healthy wind. But O! with thankful hearts confess, Ev'n here there may be happiness; And HE, the bounteous Sire, has given His peace on earth, his hope of heaven!

LINES WRITTEN TO HIS WIFE,

WHILE ON A VISIT TO UPPER India.

If thou wert by my side, my love!
How fast would evening fail
In green Bengala's palmy grove,

Listening the nightingale!

If thou, my love! wert by my side,
My babies at my knee,
How gaily would our pinnace glide
O'er Gunga's mimic sea!

I miss thee at the dawning gray,
When, on our deck reclined,
In careless ease my limbs I lay,
And woo the cooler wind.

I miss thee when by Gunga's stream
My twilight steps I guide,

But most beneath the lamp's pale beam,

I miss thee from my side.

I spread my books, my pencil try,
The lingering noon to cheer,
But miss thy kind approving eye
Thy meek attentive ear.

But when of morn and eve the star
Beholds me on my knee,

I feel, though thou art distant far,
Thy prayers ascend for me.

Then on! Then on! where duty leads,

My course be onward still,
On broad Hindostan's sultry meads,
O'er black Almorah's hill.

That course, nor Delhi's kingly gates,
Nor mild Malwah detain,

For sweet the bliss us both awaits,
By yonder western main.

Thy towers, Bombay, gleam bright, they say,
Across the dark blue sea,

But never were hearts so light and gay,
As then shall meet in thee!

HAPPINESS.

ONE morning in the month of May,
I wandered o'er the hill;
Though nature all around was gay,
My heart was heavy still.

Can God, I thought, the just, the great,
These meaner creatures bless,
And yet deny to man's estate

The boon of happiness?

Tell me, ye woods, ye smiling plains,
Ye blessed birds around,

In which of nature's wide domains
Can bliss for man be found.

The birds wild carolled over head,
The breeze around me blew,
And nature's awful chorus said-
No bliss for man she knew.

I questioned love, whose early ray,
So rosy bright appears,
And heard the timid genius say
His light was dimmed by tears.

I questioned friendship: Friendship sighed,
And thus her answer gave-
The few whom fortune never tried
Were withered in the grave!

I asked if vice could bliss bestow?
Vice boasted loud and well,
But fading from her withered brow,
The borrowed roses fell.

I sought of feeling, if her skill

Could sooth the wounded breast;
And found her mourning, faint and still,
For others' woes distressed!

I questioned virtue: virtue sighed,
No boon could she dispense-
Nor virtue was her name, she cried
But humble penitence.

I questioned death-the grisly shade

Relaxed his brow severe

And "I am happiness," he said, "If Virtue guides thee here."

When fettered by a viewless chain, We turn and gaze, and turn again, Oh! death were mercy to the pain Of them that bid farewell!

THE MOONLIGHT MARCH.

I SEE them on their winding way,
About their ranks the moonbeams play;
Their lofty deeds and daring high
Blend with the notes of victory.
And waving arms, and banners bright,
Are glancing in the mellow light:
They're lost-and gone, the moon is past,
The wood's dark shade is o'er them cast;
And fainter, fainter, fainter still
The march is rising o'er the hill.

Again, again, the pealing drum,

The clashing horn-they come, they come;
Through rocky pass, o'er wooded steep
In long and glittering files they sweep.
And nearer, nearer, yet more near,
Their softened chorus meets the ear;
Forth, forth, and meet them on their way;
The trampling hoofs brook no delay;
With thrilling fife and pealing drum,
And clashing horn, they come, they come.

LINES.

REFLECTED on the lake I love

To see the stars of evening glow; So tranquil in the heavens above, So restless in the wave below.

Thus heavenly hope is all serene,

But earthly hope, how bright so e'er, Still fluctuates o'er this changing scene, As false and fleeting as 'tis fair.

FAREWELL.

WHEN eyes are beaming

What never tongue might tell,

When tears are streaming

From their crystal cell;

When hands are linked that dread to part,

And heart is met by throbbing heart,

Oh! bitter, bitter is the smar

Of them that bid farewell!

When hope is chidden

That fain of bliss would tell, And love forbidden

In the breast to dwell;

VESPERS.

GOD that madest Earth and Heaven, Darkness and light!

Who the day for toil hast given,

For rest the night!

May thine angel guards defend us, Slumber sweet thy mercy send us, Holy dreams and hopes attend us, This livelong night!

TO LIEUTENANT-GENERAL, SIR ROWLAND HILL, K. B.

HILL! whose high daring with renewed success Hath cheered our tardy war, what time the cloud Of expectation, dark and comfortless,

Hung on the mountains; and yon factious crowd Blasphemed their country's valour, babbling loud! Then was thine arm revealed, to whose young might,

By Toulon's leaguered wall, the fiercest bowed Whom Egypt honoured, and the dubious fight Of sad Corunna's winter, and more bright Douro, and Talavera's gory bays;

Wise, modest, brave, in danger foremost found.-O still, young warrior, may thy toil-earned praise, With England's love, and England's honour

crowned,

Gild with delight thy Father's latter days!

IMITATION OF AN ODE BY KOOD. RUT, IN HINDOOSTANEE. AMBITION's voice was in mine ear, she whispered yesterday,

"How goodly is the land of Room,(9) how wide the Russian sway!

How blest to conquer either realm, and dwell

through life to come,

Lulled by the harp's melodious string, cheered by the northern drum!"

But Wisdom heard; "O youth," she said, “in

passion's fetter tied,

O come and see a sight with me shall cure thee of

thy pride!"

She led me to a lonely dell, a sad and shady

ground,

Where many an ancient sepulchre gleamed in the moonshine round.

And "Here Secunder (10) sleeps," she cried ;-him to content himself with the composition of an"this is his rival's stone; other. Of this diffidence his friends have reason

And here the mighty chief reclines who reared the to complain, as it suppressed some elegant lines Median throne.(11) of his own on the same occasion.

Inquire of these, doth aught of all their ancient

pomp remain,

Save late regret, and bitter tears for ever, and in vain?

Return, return, and in thy heart engraven keep my lore;

The lesser wealth, the lighter load,-small blame betides the poor."

NOTES.

Note 1, page 38, col. 2.

Siwah.

Oasis. Sennaar.-Meroe.

Note 2, page 38, col. 2.
Shangalla.

The black tribes whom Bruce considers as the aboriginal Nubians, are so called. For their gigantic stature, and their custom of ornamenting themselves and their houses with the spoils of the elephant, see the account he gives of the person and residence of one of their chiefs whom he visited on his departure from Ras el Feel.

Note 3, page 38, col. 2.

Emeralds.

The emerald, or whatever the ancients dignified by the name of smaragdus, is said to have been found in great quantities in the mountain now called Gebul Zumrud (the mount of emeralds.)

Note 4, page 39, col. 1.

Elim's well.

It is interesting to observe with what pleasure and minuteness Moses, amid the Arabian wilderness, enumerates the "twelve wells of water," and the "threescore and ten palm-trees," of Elim.

Note 5, page 39, col. 2.

Ye viewless guardians of these sacred shades. These lines were spoken (as is the custom of the university on the installation of a new chancellor) by a young nobleman, whose diffidence induced

Note 6, page 40, col. 1.

The brave, the virtuous, and the young. Captain Conway Shipley, third son to the dean of St. Asaph, perished in an attempt to cut out an enemy's vessel from the Tagus with the boats of his majesty's frigate La Nymphe, April 22, 1808, in the 26th year of his age, and after nearly sixteen years of actual service; distinguished by every quality both of heart and head which could adorn a man or an officer. Admiral Sir Charles Cotton, and the captains of his fleet, have since erected a monument to his memory in the neighbourhood of Fort St. Julian.

Note 7, page 40, col. 2.

On Gunga's breast.

These lines were written at a small village on the banks of the Ganges, which he was ascending in a pinnace, on his first visitation of his diocese, in August, 1824.

Note 8, page 40, col. 2.

The bird of hundred dyes.

"The Mucharunga-many coloured. I learned at Dacca, that while we were at peace with the Burmans, many traders used to go over all the tiful birds for the Golden Zennanah; at Ummeraeastern provinces of Bengal, buying up these beaupoora it was said that they were sometimes worth a gold mohur each."

Note 9, page 42, col. 2.
The land of Room.

The oriental name of the Turkish Empire.
Note 10, page 43, col. 1.
Secunder.

Alexander the Great.

Note 11, page 43, col. 1.

The mighty Chief who reared the Median throne.

The founder of the Median throne was KyKaoos, or Deiioces.

THE END OF HEBER'S POEMS.

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