MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. ELYSIUM, "In the Elysium of the ancients, we find none but heroes and persons who had either been fortunate or distinguished on earth; the children, and apparently the slaves and lower classes, that is to say, Poverty, Misfortune, and Innocence, were banished to the infernal regions."-CHATEAUBRIAND, Génie de Christianisme, FAIR wert thou, in the dreams Of elder time, thou land of glorious flowers, Where, as they pass'd, bright hours Left no faint sense of parting, such as clings Fair wert thou, with the light On thy blue hills and sleepy waters cast, Along the mountains !-but thy golden day And ever, through thy shades, To summer's breezy sigh! And young leaves trembling to the wind's light breath, And the transparent sky Rang as a dome, all thrilling to the strain And dim remembrances, that still draw birth And who, with silent tread, Moved o'er the plains of waving Asphodel? Of those majestic hymn-notes, and inhale They of the sword, whose praise, With the bright wine at nations' feasts, went round! On the morn's wing had sent their mighty sound, Their echoes midst the mountains !—and become They of the daring thought! Daring and powerful, yet to dust allied; Whose flight thro' stars, and seas, and depths had sought And left the world their high mysterious dreams, But they, of whose abode Midst her green valleys earth retain'd no trace, In some sweet home;-thou hadst no wreaths for these, The peasant, at his door Might sink to die, when vintage-feasts were spread, Thou wert for nobler dead! He heard the bounding steps which round him fell, The slave, whose very tears Were a forbidden luxury, and whose breast He might not be thy guest! No gentle breathings from thy distant sky Calm, on its leaf-strewn bier, Unlike a gift of nature to decay, Too rose-like still, too beautiful, too dear, E'en so to pass away, With its bright smile!—Elysium! what wert thou, Thou hadst no home, green land! Like the spring's wakening!-But that light was past- Not where thy soft winds play'd, Fade, with the amaranth-plain, the myrtle-grove, For the most loved are they, Of whom Fame speaks not with her clarion-voice Around their steps !-till silently they die, And the world knows not then, Not then, nor ever, what pure thoughts are fled! But not with thee might aught save Glory dwell—- 40 GREEK SONGS. I. THE STORM OF DELPHI.* FAR through the Delphian shades And the started eagle rush'd on high, Banners, with deep-red gold And a fitful glance from the bright spear-head That in arms the Persian came. He came, with starry gems With starry gems, at whose heart the day But a gloom fell o'er their way, A moan, yet not like the wind's low swell, Or a warrior's dying sigh! * See the account cited from Herodotus, in Mitford's "Greece." |