If I had been an unconnected man, I, from the moment, should have formed some plan Never to leave sweet Venice: for to me I watched him, and seldom went away, After many years, And many changes, I returned: the name Of Venice, and its aspect, was the same; But Maddalo was travelling, far away, Among the mountains of Armenia. His dog was dead: his child had now become Her coming made him better; and they stayed "Why, her heart must have been tough; How did it end?" "And was not this enough? They met, they parted." "Child, is there no more!" "Something within that interval which bore The stamp of why they parted, how they met ;Yet, if thine aged eyes disdain to wet Those wrinkled cheeks with youth's remembered As yon mute marble where their corpses lie." All happened-but the cold world shall not know. THE WOODMAN AND THE NIGHTINGALE. A WOODMAN, whose rough heart was out of tune (I think such hearts yet never came to good), Hated to hear, under the stars or moon, One nightingale in an interfluous wood Or as the moonlight fills the open sky Like clouds above the flower from which they rose, Of evening till the star of dawn may fail, Heard her within their slumbers, the abyss Of the circumfluous waters,-every sphere And every beast stretched in its rugged cave, Which is its cradle-ever from below Of one serene and unapproached star, Itself how low, how high, beyond all height Was awed into delight, and by the charm Of sound, shook forth the dull oblivion And so this man returned with axe and saw With jagged leaves,-and from the forest tops 1 MISERY.-A FRAGMENT. COME, be happy !-sit near me, Come, be happy !-sit near me : Misery! we have known each other, "Tis an evil lot, and yet If love can live when pleasure dies, Come, be happy !-lie thee down There our tent shall be the willow, Ha! thy frozen pulses flutter Thou art murmuring-thou art weeping- While my burning heart lies sleeping? Kiss me ;-oh! thy lips are cold; Hasten to the bridal bed- Clasp me, till our hearts be grown We may dream in that long sleep, Thou mayest dream of her with me. Let us laugh, and make our mirth, All the wide world, beside us STANZAS, WRITTEN IN DEJECTION, NEAR NAPLES. THE sun is warm, the sky is clear, The waves are dancing fast and bright, Blue isles and snowy mountains wear The purple noon's transparent light : The breath of the moist air is light, Around its unexpanded buds ; Like many a voice of one delight, The winds, the birds, the ocean floods, The City's voice itself is soft like Solitude's. I see the Deep's untrampled floor With green and purple sea-weeds strown; I see the waves upon the shore, Like light dissolved in star-showers, thrown: I sit upon the sands alone, The lightning of the noon-tide ocean Is flashing round me, and a tone Arises from its measured motion, How sweet! did any heart now share in my emotion. Alas! I have nor hope nor health, The sage in meditation found, Smiling they live, and call life pleasure; To me that cup has been dealt in another measure. Yet now despair itself is mild, Even as the winds and waters are ; I could lie down like a tired child, My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea Breathe o'er my dying brain its last monotony. Some might lament that I were cold, They might lament-for I am one Will linger, though enjoyed, like joy in memory [yet. December, 1818. MAZENGHI.* He housed himself. There is a point of strand Through muddy weeds, the shallow sullen sea. O! FOSTER-NURSE of man's abandoned glory Was drawn from the dim world to welcome thee. And thou in painting didst transcribe all taught Yes; and on Pisa's marble walls the twine The sweetest flowers are ever frail and rare, No record of his crime remains in story, From the blind crowd he made secure and free For when by sound of trumpet was declared Amid the mountains, like a hunted beast, And in the roofless huts of vast morasses, This fragment refers to an event, told in Sismondi's Histoire des Republiques Italiennes, which occurred during the war when Florence finally subdued Pisa, and reduced it to a province. The opening stanzas are addressed to the conquering city.-M. S. NOTE ON THE POEMS OF 1818. BY THE EDITOR. ROSALIND AND HELEN was begun at Marlow, and thrown aside-till I found it; and, at my request, it was completed. Shelley had no care for any of his poems that did not emanate from the depths of his mind, and develop some high or abstruse truth. When he does touch on human life and the human heart, no pictures can be more faithful, more delicate, more subtle, or more pathetic. He never mentioned Love, but he shed a grace, borrowed from his own nature, that scarcely any other poet has bestowed, on that passion. When he spoke of it as the law of life, which inasmuch as we rebel against, we err and injure ourselves and others, he promulgated that which he considered an irrefragable truth. In his eyes it was the essence of our being, and all woe and pain arose from the war made against it by selfishness, or insensibility, or mistake. By reverting in his mind to this first principle, he discovered the source of many emotions, and could disclose the secret of all hearts, and his delineations of passion and emotion touch the finest chords of our nature. Rosalind and Helen was finished during the summer of 1818, while we were at the Baths of Lucca. Thence Shelley visited Venice, and circumstances rendering it eligible that we should remain a few weeks in the neighbourhood of that city, he accepted the offer of Lord Byron, who lent him the use of a villa he rented near Este; and he sent for his family from Lucca to join him. I Capuccini was a villa built on the site of a Capuchin convent, demolished when the French suppressed religious houses; it was situated on the very over-hanging brow of a low hill at the foot of a range of higher ones. The house was cheerful and pleasant; a vine-trellised walk, a Pergola, as it is called in Italian, led from the hall door to a summer-house at the end of the garden, which Shelley made his study, and in which he began the Prometheus; and here also, as he mentions in a letter, he wrote Julian and Maddalo; a slight ravine, with a road in its depth, divided the garden from the hill, on which stood the ruins of the ancient castle of Este, whose dark massive wall gave forth an echo, and from whose ruined crevices, owls and bats flitted forth at night, as the crescent moon sunk behind the black and heavy battlements. We looked from the garden over the wide plain of Lombardy, bounded to the west by the far Apennines, while to the east, the horizon was lost in misty distance. After the picturesque but limited view of mountain, ravine, and chesnut wood at the Baths of Lucca, there was something infinitely gratifying to the eye in the wide range of prospect commanded by our new abode. Our first misfortune, of the kind from which we soon suffered even more severely, happened here. Our little girl, an infant in whose small features I fancied that I traced great resemblance to her father, showed symptoms of suffering from the heat of the climate. Teething increased her illness and danger. We were at Este, and when we became alarmed, hastened to Venice for the best advice. When we arrived at Fusina, we found that we had forgotten our passport, and the soldiers on duty attempted to prevent our crossing the laguna; but they could not resist Shelley's impetuosity at such a moment. We had scarcely arrived at Venice, before life fled from the little sufferer, and we returned to Este to weep her loss. After a few weeks spent in this retreat, which were interspersed by visits to Venice, we proceeded southward. We often hear of persons disappointed by a first visit to Italy. This was not Shelley's case -the aspect of its nature, its sunny sky, its majestic storms; of the luxuriant vegetation of the country, and the noble marble-built cities, enchanted him. The sight of the works of art were full enjoyment and wonder; he had not studied pictures or statues before, he now did so with the eye of taste, that referred not to the rules of schools, but to those of nature and truth. The first entrance to Rome opened to him a scene of remains of antique grandeur that far surpassed his expectations; and the unspeakable beauty of Naples and its environs added to the impression he received of the transcendant and glorious beauty of Italy. As I have said, he wrote long letters during the first year of our residence in this country, and these, when published, |