That roar, the prowling lion's Here I am,

How fearful to the desert wide!

That bleat, how tender! of the dam
Calling a straggler to her side.

Shout, cuckoo !

- let the vernal soul

Go with thee to the frozen zone;

Toll from thy loftiest perch, lone bell-bird, toll

At the still hour to Mercy dear,

Mercy from her twilight throne

Listening to nun's faint throb of holy fear,
To sailor's prayer breathed from a darkening sea,
Or widow's cottage-lullaby.

From rocky steep and rock-bestudded meadows
Flung back, and, in the sky's blue caves, reborn,
On with your pastime! till the church-tower bells
A greeting give of measured glee;

And milder echoes from their cells
Repeat the bridal symphony.

Then, or far earlier, let us rove
Where mists are breaking up or gone,
And from aloft look down into a cove

Besprinkled with a careless choir,
Happy milkmaids, one by one
Scattering a ditty each to her desire,
A liquid concert matchless by nice Art,
A stream as if from one full heart.

IV.

Blest be the song that brightens

The blind man's gloom, exalts the veteran's mirth; Unscorned the peasant's whistling breath, that

lightens

His duteous toil of furrowing the green earth.
For the tired slave, Song lifts the languid oar,
And bids it aptly fall, with chime

That beautifies the fairest shore,
And mitigates the harshest clime.

Yon pilgrims see, in lagging file

They move; but soon the appointed way

A choral Ave Marie shall beguile,

And to their hope the distant shrine

Glisten with a livelier ray:

Nor friendless he, the prisoner of the mine,

Who from the well-spring of his own clear breast Can draw, and sing his griefs to rest.

When civic renovation

V.

Dawns on a kingdom, and for needful haste
Best eloquence avails not, Inspiration
Mounts with a tune, that travels like a blast
Piping through cave and battlemented tower;
Then starts the sluggard, pleased to meet
That voice of Freedom, in its power
Of promises, shrill, wild, and sweet!
Who, from a martial pageant, spreads
Incitements of the battle-day,

Thrilling the unweaponed crowd with plumeless

heads?

Even She whose Lydian airs inspire

Peaceful striving, gentle play

Of timid hope and innocent desire

Shot from the dancing Graces, as they move
Fanned by the plausive wings of Love.

VI.

How oft along thy mazes,

Regent of sound, have dangerous Passions trod ! O Thou, through whom the temple rings with

praises,

And blackening clouds in thunder speak of God, Betray not by the cozenage of sense

Thy votaries, wooingly resigned

To a voluptuous influence

That taints the purer, better mind;

But lead sick Fancy to a harp

That hath in noble tasks been tried;

And, if the virtuous feel a pang too sharp,
Soothe it into patience, stay

The uplifted arm of Suicide;

And let some mood of thine in firm array

Knit every thought the impending issue needs,

Ere martyr burns, or patriot bleeds!

VII.

As Conscience, to the centre

Of being, smites with irresistible pain,

So shall a solemn cadence, if it enter

The mouldy vaults of the dull idiot's brain,
Transmute him to a wretch from quiet hurled,—
Convulsed as by a jarring din;

And then aghast, as at the world
Of reason partially let in

By concords winding with a sway
Terrible for sense and soul !

Or, awed, he weeps, struggling to quell dismay.
Point not these mysteries to an Art

Lodged above the starry pole,

-

Pure modulations flowing from the heart

Of Divine Love, where Wisdom, Beauty, Truth, With Order dwell, in endless youth?

Oblivion may not cover

VIII.

All treasures hoarded by the miser, Time.
Orphean Insight! truth's undaunted lover,

To the first leagues of tutored passion climb,
Where Music deigned within this grosser sphere
Her subtle essence to enfold,

And voice and shell drew forth a tear
Softer than Nature's self could mould.
Yet strenuous was the infant Age:
Art, daring because souls could feel,
Stirred nowhere but an urgent equipage
Of wrapt imagination sped her march
Through the realms of woe and weal:
Hell to the lyre bowed low; the upper arch

Rejoiced that clamorous spell and magic verse
Her wan disasters could disperse.

IX.

The GIFT to King Amphion

That walled a city with its melody

Was for belief no dream: thy skill, Arion!

Could humanize the creatures of the sea,
Where men were monsters. A last grace he craves,
Leave for one chant; the dulcet sound
Steals from the deck o'er willing waves,
And listening dolphins gather round.
Self-cast, as with a desperate course,
'Mid that strange audience, he bestrides
A proud One docile as a managed horse;
And singing, while the accordant hand
Sweeps his harp, the Master rides;

So shall he touch at length a friendly strand,
And he, with his preserver, shine star-bright
In memory, through silent night.

X.

The pipe of Pan, to shepherds

Couched in the shadow of Manalian pines,

Was passing sweet; the eyeballs of the leopards,

That in high triumph drew the Lord of vines,

How did they sparkle to the cymbal's clang!

While Fauns and Satyrs beat the ground

In cadence, and Silenus swang

This way and that, with wild-flowers crowned.