OH! who hath trod thy consecrated clime,
Fair land of Phidias! theme of lofty strains!
And traced each scene that, midst the wrecks
of time,

The print of Glory's parting step retains;
Nor for awhile, in high-wrought dreams, forgot,
Musing on years gone by in brightness there,
The hopes, the fears, the sorrows of his lot,
The hues his fate hath worn, or yet may wear;
As when, from mountain-heights, his ardent eye
Of sea and heaven hath track'd the blue infinity?

II.

Is there who views with cold unalter'd mien,
His frozen heart with proud indifference fraught,
Each sacred haunt, each unforgotten scene,
Where Freedom triumph'd, or where Wisdom
taught?

Souls that too deeply feel! oh, envy not
The sullen calm your fate hath never known:
Through the dull twilight of that wintery lot
Genius ne'er pierced, nor Fancy's sunbeam shone,
Nor those high thoughts that, hailing Glory's
trace,

Glow with the generous flames of every age and race.

III.

But blest the wanderer whose enthusiast mind
Each muse of ancient days hath deep imbued
With lofty lore, and all his thoughts refined
In the calm school of silent solitude;
Pour'd on his ear,
midst groves and glens retired,
The mighty strains of each illustrious clime,
All that hath lived, while empires have expired,
To float for ever on the winds of time;
And on his soul indelibly portray'd

Fair visionary forms, to fill each classic shade.

IV.

Is not this mind, to meaner thoughts unknown,
A sanctuary of beauty and of light?
There he may dwell in regions all his own,
A world of dreams, where all is pure and bright.

THOMSON'S Liberty.

For him the scenes of old renown possess Romantic charms, all veil'd from other eyes; There every form of nature's loveliness Wakes in his breast a thousand sympathies; As music's voice, in some lone mountain dell, From rocks and caves around calls forth each echo's swell.

V.

For him Italia's brilliant skies illume

The bard's lone haunts, the warrior's combatplains,

And the wild rose yet lives to breath and bloom Round Doric Pæstum's solitary fanes.1

But most, fair Greece! on thy majestic shore He feels the fervours of his spirit rise; Thou birth-place of the Muse! whose voice of yore Breathed in thy groves immortal harmonies; And lingers still around the well-known coast, Murmuring a wild farewell to fame and freedom lost.

VI.

By seas that flow in brightness as they lave Thy rocks, th' enthusiast rapt in thought may stray,

While roves his eye o'er that deserted wave,
Once the proud scene of battle's dread array.
-O ye blue waters! ye, of old that bore
The free, the conquering, hymn'd by choral
strains,

How sleep ye now around the silent shore,
The lonely realm of ruins and of chains!
How are the mighty vanish'd in their pride!
E'en as their barks have left no traces on your tide.

VII.

Hush'd are the Paans whose exulting tone Swell'd o'er that tide 2-the sons of battle sleep

1 "The Pæstan rose, from its peculiar fragrance and the singularity of blowing twice a-year, is often mentioned by the classic poets. The wild rose, which now shoots up among the ruins, is of the small single damask kind, with a very high perfume; as a farmer assured me on the spot, it flowers both in spring and autumn."-SWINBURNE's Travels in the Two Sicilies.

2 In the naval engagements of the Greeks, "it was usual

The wind's wild sigh, the halcyon's voice alone Blend with the plaintive murmur of the deep. Yet when those waves have caught the splendid hues

Of morn's rich firmament, serenely bright, Or setting suns the lovely shore suffuse With all their purple mellowness of light, Oh! who could view the scene, so calmly fair, Nor dream that peace, and joy, and liberty were there?

VIII.

Where soft the sunbeams play, the zephyrs blow, "Tis hard to deem that misery can be nigh; Where the clear heavens in blue transparence glow,

Life should be calm and cloudless as the sky; -Yet o'er the low, dark dwellings of the dead, Verdure and flowers in summer-bloom may smile, And ivy-boughs their graceful drapery spread In green luxuriance o'er the ruin'd pile; And mantling woodbine veil the wither'd tree;And thus it is, fair land! forsaken Greece, with thee.

IX.

For all the loveliness, and light, and bloom That yet are thine, surviving many a storm, Are but as heaven's warm radiance on the tomb, The rose's blush that masks the canker-worm. And thou art desolate-thy morn hath pass'd! So dazzling in the splendour of its sway, That the dark shades the night hath o'er thee cast Throw tenfold gloom around thy deep decay. Once proud in freedom, still in ruin fair, Thy fate hath been unmatch'd-in glory and despair.

X.

For thee, lost land! the hero's blood hath flow'd, The high in soul have brightly lived and died; For thee the light of soaring genius glow'd O'er the fair arts it form'd and glorified. Thine were the minds whose energies sublime So distanced ages in their lightning-race, The task they left the sons of later time Was but to follow their illumined trace. -Now, bow'd to earth, thy children, to be free, Must break each link that binds their filial hearts to thee.

for the soldiers before the fight to sing a pæan, or hymn, to Mars, and after the fight another to Apollo."-See POTTER'S Antiquities of Greece, vol. ii. p. 155.

XI.

Lo! to the scenes of fiction's wildest tales, Her own bright East, thy son, Morea! flies,1 To seek repose midst rich, romantic vales, Whose incense mounts to Asia's vivid skies. There shall he rest?-Alas! his hopes in vain Guide to the sun-clad regions of the palm: Peace dwells not now on oriental plain, Though earth is fruitfulness, and air is balm; And the sad wanderer finds but lawless foes, Where patriarchs reign'd of old in pastoral repose

XII.

Where Syria's mountains rise, or Yemen's groves,
Or Tigris rolls his genii-haunted wave,
Life to his eye, as wearily it roves,
Wears but two forms-the tyrant and the slave!
There the fierce Arab leads his daring horde
Where sweeps the sand-storm o'er the burning
wild;

There stern Oppression waves the wasting sword O'er plains that smile as ancient Eden smiled; And the vale's bosom, and the desert's gloom, Yield to the injured there no shelter save the tomb.

XIII.

But thou, fair world! whose fresh unsullied charms

Welcomed Columbus from the western wave, Wilt thou receive the wanderer to thine arms,2 The lost descendant of the immortal brave? Amidst the wild magnificence of shades That o'er thy floods their twilight-grandeur cast, In the green depth of thine untrodden glades Shall he not rear his bower of peace at last? Yes! thou hast many a lone, majestic scene, Shrined in primeval woods, where despot ne'er hath been.

XIV.

There by some lake, whose blue expansive breast
Bright from afar, an inland ocean, gleams,
Girt with vast solitudes, profusely dress'd
In tints like those that float o'er poet's dreams;

1 The emigration of the natives of the Morea to different parts of Asia is thus mentioned by Châteaubriand in his Itinéraire de Paris à Jérusalem—“ Parvenu au dernier degré du malheur, le Moraïte s'arrache de son pays, et va chercher en Asie un sort moins rigoureux. Vain espoir! il retrouve des cadis et des pachas jusques dans les sables du Jourdain et dans les déserts de Palmyre."

2 In the same work, Châteaubriand also relates his having met with several Greek emigrants who had established themselves in the woods of Florida.

Or where some flood from pine-clad mountain pours

Its might of waters, glittering in their foam, Midst the rich verdure of its wooded shores, The exiled Greek hath fix'd his sylvan home: So deeply lone, that round the wild retreat Scarce have the paths been trod by Indian huntsman's feet.

XV.

The forests are around him in their pride,
The green savannas, and the mighty waves;
And isles of flowers, bright-floating o'er the tide,1
That images the fairy worlds it laves,

And stillness, and luxuriance. O'er his head
The ancient cedars wave their peopled bowers,
On high the palms their graceful foliage spread,
Cinctured with roses the magnolia towers;
And from those green arcades a thousand tones
Wake with each breeze, whose voice through Na-
ture's temple moans.

XVI.

And there, no traces left by brighter days
For glory lost may wake a sigh of grief;
Some grassy mound, perchance, may meet his
gaze,

The lone memorial of an Indian chief.

There man not yet hath mark'd the boundless plain

With marble records of his fame and power; The forest is his everlasting fane,

The palm his monument, the rock his tower: Th' eternal torrent and the giant tree Remind him but that they, like him, are wildly

free.

XVII.

But doth the exile's heart serenely there

In sunshine dwell?-Ah! when was exile blest? When did bright scenes, clear heavens, or summer air,

Chase from his soul the fever of unrest?
-There is a heart-sick weariness of mood,
That like slow poison wastes the vital glow,
And shrines itself in mental solitude,.
An uncomplaining and a nameless woe.

1 "La grâce est toujours unie à la magnificence dans les scènes de la nature: et tandis que le courant du milieu entraine vers la mer les cadavres des pins et des chênes, on voit sur les deux courants latéraux, remonter, le long des rivages des îles flottantes de Pistia et de Nénuphar, dont les roses jaunes s'élèvent comme de petits papillons."-Description of the Banks of the Mississippi, CHATEAUBRIAND'S Atala.

That coldly smiles midst pleasure's brightest ray, As the chill glacier's peak reflects the flush of day.

XVIII.

Such grief is theirs, who, fix'd on foreign shore,
Sigh for the spirit of their native gales,
As pines the seaman, midst the ocean's roar,
For the green earth, with all its woods and vales.
Thus feels thy child, whose memory dwells
with thee,

Loved Greece! all sunk and blighted as thou art Though thought and step in western wilds be free, Yet thine are still the daydreams of his heart: The deserts spread between, the billows foam, Thou, distant and in chains, are yet his spirit's home.

XIX.

In vain for him the gay liannes entwine,
Or the green fire-fly sparkles through the brakes,
Or summer-winds waft odours from the pine,
As eve's last blush is dying on the lakes.
Through thy fair vales his fancy roves the while,
Or breathes the freshness of Citharon's height,
Or dreams how softly Athens' towers would smile,
Or Sunium's ruins, in the fading light;

On Corinth's cliff what sunset hues may sleep, Or, at that placid hour, how calm th' Egean deep!

XX.

What scenes, what sunbeams, are to him like thine?

(The all of thine no tyrant could destroy !) E'en to the stranger's roving eye, they shine Soft as a vision of remember'd joy. And he who comes, the pilgrim of a day. A passing wanderer o'er each Attic hill, Sighs as his footsteps turn from thy decay, To laughing climes, where all is splendour still; And views with fond regret thy lessening shore, As he would watch a star that sets to rise no more.

XXI.

Realm of sad beauty! thou art as a shrine That Fancy visits with Devotion's zeal, To catch high thoughts and impulses divine, And all the glow of soul enthusiasts feel Amidst the tombs of heroes-for the brave Whose dust, so many an age, hath been thy soil. Foremost in honour's phalanx, died to save The land redeem'd and hallow'd by their toil; And there is language in thy lightest gale, That o'er the plains they won seems murmuring yet their tale.

XXIII.

And he, whose heart is weary of the strife Of meaner spirits, and whose mental gaze Would shun the dull cold littleness of life, Awhile to dwell amidst sublimer days, Must turn to thee, whose every valley teems With proud remembrances that cannot die. Thy glens are peopled with inspiring dreams, Thy winds, the voice of oracles gone by; And midst thy laurel shades the wanderer hears The sound of mighty names, the hymns of vanish'd years.

XXIII.

Through that deep solitude be his to stray,
By Faun and Oread loved in ages past,
Where clear Peneus winds his rapid way
Though the cleft heights, in antique grandeur
vast.

Romantic Tempe ! thou art yet the same-
Wild, as when sung by bards of elder time :1
Years, that have changed thy river's classic
name,2

Have left thee still in savage pomp sublime; And from thine Alpine clefts and marble caves, In living lustre still break forth the fountain waves.

XXIV.

Beneath thy mountain battlements and towers, Where the rich arbute's coral berries glow,3

1 "Looking generally at the narrowness and abruptness of this mountain-channel, (Tempe,) and contrasting it with the course of the Peneus through the plains of Thessaly, the imagination instantly recurs to the tradition that these plains were once covered with water, for which some convulsion of nature had subsequently opened this narrow passage. The term vale, in our language, is usually employed to describe scenery in which the predominant features are breadth, beauty, and repose. The reader has already perceived that the term is wholly inapplicable to the scenery at this spot, and that the phrase, vale of Tempe, is one that depends on poetic fiction. The real character of Tempe, though it perhaps be less beautiful, yet possesses more of magnificence than is implied in the epithet given to it.

To those who have visited St Vincent's rocks, below Bristol, I cannot convey a more sufficient idea of Tempe, than by saying that its scenery resembles, though on a much larger scale, that of the former place. The Peneus, indeed, as it flows through the valley, is not greatly wider than the Avon; and the channel between the cliffs is equally contracted in its dimensions: but these cliffs themselves are much loftier and more precipitous, and project their vast masses of rock with still more extraordinary abruptness over the hollow beneath."-HOLLAND's Travels in Albania, &c. 2 The modern name of the Peneus is Salympria. "Towards the lower part of Tempe, these cliffs are peaked in a very singular manner, and form projecting angles on the

Or midst th' exuberance of thy forest bowers,
Casting deep shadows o'er the current's flow,
Oft shall the pilgrim pause, in lone recess,
As rock and stream some glancing light have
caught,

And gaze, till Nature's mighty forms impress
His soul with deep sublimity of thought;
And linger oft, recalling many a tale,
That breeze, and wave, and wood seem whisper-
ing through thy dale.

XXV.

He, thought-entranced, may wander where of old From Delphi's chasm the mystic vapour rose, And trembling nations heard their doom foretold By the dread spirit throned midst rocks and

snows.

Though its rich fanes be blended with the dust, And silence now the hallow'd haunt possess, Still is the scene of ancient rites august, Magnificent in mountain loneliness; Still inspiration hovers o'er the ground, Where Greece her councils held, her Pythian victors crown'd.

XXVI.

Or let his steps the rude gray cliffs explore Of that wild pass, once dyed with Spartan blood, When by the waves that break on Eta's shore, The few, the fearless, the devoted, stood! Or rove where, shadowing Mantinea's plain, Bloom the wild laurels o'er the warlike dead,5 Or lone Platea's ruins yet remain To mark the battle-field of ages fled : Still o'er such scenes presides a sacred power, Though Fiction's gods have fled from fountain, grot, and bower.

vast perpendicular faces of rock which they present towards the chasm; where the surface renders it possible, the summits and ledges of the rocks are for the most part covered with small wood, chiefly oak, with the arbutus and other shrubs. On the banks of the river, wherever there is a small interval between the water and the cliffs, it is covered by the rich and widely spreading foliage of the plane, the oak, and other forest trees, which in these situations have attained a remarkable size, and in various places extend their shadow far over the channel of the stream. The rocks

on each side of the vale of Tempe are evidently the same; what may be called, I believe, a coarse bluish-gray marble, with veins and portions of the rock in which the marble is of finer quality."-HOLLAND'S Travels in Albania, &c.

The Amphictyonic Council was convened in spring and autumn at Delphi or Thermopylæ, and presided at the Pythian games which were celebrated at Delphi every fifth year.

"This spot, (the field of Mantinea,) on which so many brave men were laid to rest, is now covered with rosemary and laurels."-POUQUEVILLE's Travels in the Morca.

XXVII.

Oh! still unblamed may fancy fondly deem That, lingering yet, benignant genii dwell Where mortal worth has hallow'd grove or

stream,

To sway the heart with some ennobling spell; For mightiest minds have felt their blest control In the wood's murmur, in the zephyr's sigh, And these are dreams that lend a voice and soul, And a high power, to Nature's majesty ! And who can rove o'er Grecian shores, nor feel, Soft o'er his inmost heart, their secret magic steal?

XXVIII.

Yet many a sad reality is there,

That Fancy's bright illusions cannot veil.
Pure laughs the light, and balmy breathes the air,
But Slavery's mien will tell its bitter tale;
And there, not Peace, but Desolation, throws
Delusive quiet o'er full many a scene-
Deep as the brooding torpor of repose

That follows where the earthquake's track hath been;

Or solemn calm on Ocean's breast that lies, When sinks the storm, and death has hush'd the seamen's cries.

XXIX.

Hast thou beheld some sovereign spirit, hurl'd By Fate's rude tempest from its radiant sphere, Doom'd to resign the homage of a world, For Pity's deepest sigh and saddest tear? Oh! hast thou watch'd the awful wreck of mind That weareth still a glory in decay? Seen all that dazzles and delights mankindThought, science, genius-to the storm a prey; And o'er the blasted tree, the wither'd ground, Despair's wild nightshade spread, and darkly flourish round?

XXX.

So mayst thou gaze, in sad and awe-struck thought,

On the deep fall of that yet lovely clime: Such there the ruin Time and Fate have wrought, So changed the bright, the splendid, the sublime. There the proud monuments of Valour's name, The mighty works Ambition piled on high, The rich remains by Art bequeath'd to FameGrace, beauty, grandeur, strength,and symmetry, Blend in decay; while all that yet is fair Seems only spared to tell how much hath perish'd there!

XXXI

There, while around lie mingling in the dust The column's graceful shaft, with weeds o'er

grown,

The mouldering torso, the forgotten bust. The warrior's urn, the altar's mossy stoneAmidst the loneliness of shatter'd fanes, Still matchless monuments of other yearsO'er cypress groves or solitary plains, Its eastern form the minaret proudly rears: As on some captive city's ruin'd wall The victor's banner waves, exulting o'er its fall.

XXXII.

Still, where that column of the mosque aspires, Landmark of slavery, towering o'er the waste, There science droops, the Muses hush their lyres And o'er the blooms of fancy and of taste Spreads the chill blight;-as in that orient isle Where the dark upas taints the gale around,1 Within its precincts not a flower may smile, Nor dew nor sunshine fertilise the ground; Nor wild birds' music float on zephyr's breath, But all is silence round, and solitude, and death.

XXXIII.

Far other influence pour'd the Crescent's light O'er conquer'd realms, in ages pass'd away; Full and alone it beam'd, intensely bright, While distant climes in midnight darkness lay. Then rose th' Alhambra, with its founts and shades,

Fair marble halls, alcoves, and orange bowers: Its sculptured lions, richly wrought arcades, Aërial pillars, and enchanted towers; Light, splendid, wild, as some Arabian tale Would picture fairy domes that fleet before the gale.

XXXIV.

Then foster'd genius lent each caliph's throne Lustre barbaric pomp could ne'er attain`;

1 For the accounts of the upas or poison tree of Java, now generally believed to be fabulous, or greatly exaggerated, set the notes to DARWIN'S Botanic Garden.

2 The court most to be admired of the Alhambra is that called the court of the Lions; it is ornamented with sixty elegant pillars of an architecture which bears not the least resemblance to any of the known orders, and might be called the Arabian order. But its principal ornament, and that from which it took its name, is an alabaster cup, six feet in diameter, supported by twelve lions, which is said to have been made in imitation of the Brazen Sea of Solomon's temple."-BURGOANNE'S Travels in Spain.

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