OF

The following Poem is intended to describe the mental conflicts, as well as outward sufferings, of a Spaniard, who, flying from the religious persecutions of his own country in the 16th century, takes refuge with his child in a North American forest. The story is supposed to be related by himself amidst the wilderness which has afforded him an asylum.

I.

THE Voices of my home!-I hear them still! They have been with me through the dreamy night

The blessed household voices, wont to fill
My heart's clear depths with unalloy'd delight!
I hear them still, unchang'd:-though some from

earth

Are music parted, and the tones of mirthWild, silvery tones, that rang through days more bright!

Have died in others,-yet to me they come, Singing of boyhood back-the voices of my home!

II.

They call me through this hush of woods, reposing

In the gray stillness of the summer morn,
They wander by when heavy flowers are closing,
And thoughts grow deep, and winds and stars
are born;

E'en as a fount's remember'd gushings burst
On the parch'd traveller in his hour of thirst,
E'en thus they haunt me with sweet sounds, till

worn

Remorse, a Tragedy.

By quenchless longings, to my soul I say— Oh! for the dove's swift wings, that I might flee away,

III.

And find mine ark !—yet whither ?—I must bear
A yearning heart within me to the grave.
I am of those o'er whom a breath of air-
Just darkening in its course the lake's bright
wave,

And sighing through the feathery canes(1)— hath power

To call up shadows, in the silent hour, From the dim past, as from a wizard's cave! So must it be !-These skies above me spread, Are they my own soft skies?-Ye rest not here, my dead!

IV.

Ye far amidst the southern flowers lie sleeping,
Your graves all smiling in the sunshine clear,
Save one!-a blue, lone, distant main is sweeping
High o'er one gentle head-ye rest not here!—
'Tis not the olive, with a whisper swaying,
Not thy low ripplings, glassy water, playing
Through my own chesnut groves, which fill
mine ear;

But the faint echoes in my breast that dwell, for their birth-place moan, as moans the ocean-shell.(2)

And

V.

Peace!-I will dash these fond regrets to earth, Ev'n as an eagle shakes the cumbering rain

Music and mirth were hush'd the hills among, While to the city's gates each hamlet pour'd its throng.

XIV.

Silence upon the mountains!-But within
The city's gates a rush—a press-a swell
Of multitudes their torrent way to win;
And heavy boomings of a dull deep bell,

A dead pause following each-like that which parts

The dash of billows, holding breathless hearts Fast in the hush of fear-knell after knell; And sounds of thickening steps, like thunderrain,

That plashes on the roof of some vast echoing fane!

XV.

What pageant's hour approach'd!-The sullen gate

Of a strong ancient prison-house was thrown Back to the day. And who, in mournful state, Came forth, led slowly o'er its threshold-stone? They that had learn'd, in cells of secret gloom, How sunshine is forgotten!-They, to whom The very features of mankind were grown Things that bewilder'd!-O'er their dazzled sight,

They lifted their wan hands, and cower'd before the light!

XVI.

To this man brings his brother!-Some were there,

Who with their desolation had entwined

XVIII.

It might be that amidst the countless throng, There swelled some heart with Pity's weight oppressed,

For the wide stream of human love is strong And woman, on whose fond and faithful breast Childhood is reared, and at whose knee the sigh Of its first prayer is breathed, she, too, was nigh. But life is dear, and the free footstep blessed, And home a sunny place, where each may fill Some eye with glistening smiles,-and therefore all were still

XIX.

All still-youth, courage, strength!-a winter laid,

A chain of palsy, cast on might and mind! Still, as at noon a southern forest's shade, They stood, those breathless masses of mankind; Still, as a frozen torrent!-but the wave Soon leaps to foaming freedom-they, the brave, Endured-they saw the martyr's place assigned That numbs each human pulse?-they saw, and In the red flames-whence is the withering spell thought it well.

XX.

And I, too, thought it well! That very morn From a far land I came, yet round me clung The spirit of my own. No hand had torn With a strong grasp away the veil which hung Between mine eyes and truth. I gazed, I saw, Dimly, as through a glass. In silent awe

I watched the fearful rites; and if there sprung One rebel feeling from its deep founts up,

Fast round their bosoms, even as warriors bind The breast-plate on for fight: but brow and cheek Seemed theirs a torturing panoply to speak! And there were some, from whom the very mind Had been wrung out: they smiled-oh! startling smile

Whence man's high soul is fled!-where doth it sleep the while?

XVII.

But onward moved the melancholy train, For their false creeds in fiery pangs to die.

This was the solemn sacrifice of SpainHeaven's offering from the land of chivalry!

cup.

XXI.

But I was wakened as the dreamers waken Whom the shrill trumpet and the shriek of dread Rouse up at midnight, when their walls are taken,

And they must battle till their blood is shed

On their own threshold-floor. A path for light Through my torn breast was shattered by the might

Of the swift thunder-stroke-and Freedom's tread

Came in through ruins, late, yet not in vain,

moved

Oh! how unlike all others!-the beloved,

The free, the proud, the beautiful! whose eye Grew fixed before them, while a people's breath Was hushed, and its one soul bound in the thought of death!

XXII.

Still darkly, slowly, as a sullen mass

Of cloud, o'ersweeping, without wind, the sky,
Dream-like I saw the sad procession pass,
And marked its victims with a tearless eye.

They moved before me but as pictures, wrought Each to reveal some secret of man's thought, On the sharp edge of sad mortality, Till in his place came one-oh! could it be? -My friend, my heart's first friend!—and did I gaze on thee?

XXIII.

On thee! with whom in boyhood I had played, At the grape-gatherings, by my native streams; And to whose eye my youthful soul had laid Bare, as to Heaven's, its glowing world of dreams; And by whose side 'midst warriors I had stood, And in whose helm was brought-oh! earned with blood!

The fresh wave to my lips, when tropic beams Smote on my fevered brow!-Ay, years had passed,

Severing our paths, brave friend!-and thus we met at last!

XXIV.

I see it still-the lofty mien thou borest-
On thy pale forehead sat a sense of power!
The very look that once thou brightly worest
Cheering me onward through a fearful hour,
When we were girt by Indian bow and spear,
'Midst the white Andes-e'en as mountain deer,
Hemmed in our camp-but through the javelin
shower

We rent our way, a tempest of despair! -And thou hadst thou but died with thy true brethren there!

XXV.

I call the fond wish back-for thou hast perished More nobly far, my Alvar!-making known The might of truth;(4) and be thy memory cherished

With theirs, the thousands, that around her throne

Have poured their lives out smiling, in that doom Finding a triumph, if denied a tomb!

-Ay, with their ashes hath the wind been sown, And with the wind their spirit shall be spread, Filling man's heart and home with records of the dead.

XXVI.

Thou Searcher of the Soul! in whose dread sight Not the bold guilt alone, that mocks the skies, But the scarce-owned, unwhispered thought of night,

As a thing written with the sunbeam lies; Thou know'st-whose eye through shade and depth can see,

That this man's crime was but to worship thee,

Like those that made their hearts thy sacrifice, The called of yore; wont by the Saviour's side, On the dim Olive-Mount to pray at eventide.

XXVII.

For the strong spirit will at times awake,
Piercing the mists that wrap her clay-abode;
And, born of thee, she may not always take
Earth's accents for the oracles of God;
And e'en for this-O dust, whose mask is power!
Reed, that would be a scourge thy little hour!
Spark, whereon yet the mighty hath not trod,
And therefore thou destroyest!-where were
flown

Our hope, if man were left to man's decree alone?

XXVIII.

But this I felt not yet. I could but gaze

On him, my friend; while that swift moment threw

A sudden freshness back on vanished days, Like water-drops on some dim picture's hue; Calling the proud time up, when first I stood Where banners floated, and my heart's quick blood

Sprang to a torrent as the clarion blew,

And he-his sword was like a brother's worn, That watches through the field his mother's youngest born.

XXIX.

But a lance met me in that day's career, Senseless I lay amidst th' o'ersweeping fight, Wakening at last-how full, how strangely clear, That scene on memory flashed!—the shivery light,

Moonlight, on broken shields-the plain of slaughter,

The fountain-side-the low sweet sound of wa

ter

XXX.

Till, in that rush of visions, I became
As one that by the bands of slumber wound,
Lies with a powerless, but all-thrilling frame,
Intense in consciousness of sight and sound,
Yet buried in a wildering dream which brings
Loved faces round him, girt with fearful things!
Troubled e'en thus I stood, but chained and

bound