by Lord Byron
Volscens must soon appease his comrade’s ghost;
Steel, flashing, pours on steel, foe crowds on foe;
Rage nerves his arm, fate gleams in every blow;
In vain beneath unnumber’d wounds he bleeds,
Nor wounds, nor death, distracted Nisus heeds;
In viewless circles wheel’d, his falchion flies,
Nor quits the hero’s grasp till Volscens dies;
Deep in his throat its end the weapon found,
The tyrant’s soul fled groaning through the wound.
Thus Nisus all his fond affection proved —
Dying, revenged the fate of him he loved;
Then on his bosom sought his wonted place,
And death was heavenly in his friend’s embrace!
Celestia pair! if aught my verse can claim,
Wafted on Time’s broad pinion, yours is fame!
Ages on ages shall your fate admire,
No future day shall see your names expire,
While stands the Capitol, immortal dome!
And vanquish’d millions hail their empress, Rome !
TRANSLATION FROM THE MEDEA OF EURIPIDES
When fierce conflicting urge
The breast where love is wont to glow,
What mind can stem the stormy surge
Which rolls the tide of human woe?
The hope of praise, the dread of shame,
Can rouse the tortured breast no more;
The wild desire, the guilty flame,
Absorbs each wish it felt before.
But if affection gently thrills
The soul by purer dreams possest,
The pleasing balm of mortal ills
In love can soothe the aching breast:
If thus thou comest in disguise,
Fair Venus! from thy native heaven,
What heart unfeeling would despise
The sweetest boon the gods have given?
But never from thy golden bow
May I beneath the shaft expire!
Whose creeping venom, sure and slow,
Awakes an all-consuming fire:
Ye racking doubts! ye jealous fears!
With others wage internal war;
Repentance, source of future tears,
From me be ever distant far!
May no distracting thoughts destroy
The holy calm of sacred love!
May all the hours be wing’d with joy,
Which hover faithful hearts above!
Fair Venus, on thy myrtle shrine
May I with some fair lover sigh,
Whose heart may mingle pure with mine –
With me to live, with me to die!
My native soil! beloved before,
Now dearer as my peaceful home,
Ne’er may I quit thy rocky shore,
A hapless banish’d wretch to roam!
This very day, this very hour,
May I resign this fleeting breath;
Nor quit my silent humble bower,
A doom to me far worse than death.
Have I not heard the exile’s sigh?
And seen the exile’s silent tear,
Through distant climes condemn’d to fly,
A pensive, weary wanderer here?
Ah, hapless dame! no sire bewails,
No friend thy wretched fate deplores,
No kindred voice with rapture hails
Thy steps within a stranger’s doors.
Perish the fiend whose iron heart,
To fair affection’s truth unknown,
Bids her he fondly loved depart,
Unpitied, helpless, and alone;
Who ne’er unlocks with silver key
The milder treasures of his soul,-
May such a friend be far from me,
And ocean’s storms between us roll!
THOUGHTS SUGGESTED BY A COLLEGE EXAMINATION
High in the midst, surrounded by his peers,
MAGNUS his ample front sublime up rears:
Placed on his chair of state, he seems a god.
While Sophs and Freshmen tremble at his nod.
As all around sit wrapt in speechless gloom,
His voice in thunder shakes the sounding dome;
Denouncing dire reproach to luckless fools,
Unskill’d to plod in mathematic rules.
Happy the youth in Euclid’s axiorn tried,
Though littie versed in any art beside;
Who, scarcely skill’d an English line tc pen,
Scans Attic metres with a critic’s ken.
What, though he knows not how his fathers bled,
When civil discord piled the fields with dead,
When Edward bade his conquering bands advance
Or Henry trampled on the crest of France.
Though marvelling at the name of Magna Charta,
Yet well he recollects the laws of Sparta;
Can tell what edicts sage Lycurgus made,
While Blackstone’s on the shelf neglected laid;
Of Grecian dramas vaunts the deathless fame,
Of Avon’s bard remembering scarce the name.
Such is the youth whose scientific pate
Class-honours, medals, fellowships, await
Or even, perhaps, the declamation prize
If to such glorious height he lifts his eyes.
But lo! no common orator can hope
The envied silver cup within his scope.
Not that our heads much eloquence require,
Th’ ATHENIAN’S glowing style, or Tully’s fire.
A manner clear or warm is useless, since
We do not try by speaking to convince.
Be other orators of pleasing proud,-
We speak to please ourselves, not move the crowd:
Our gravity prefers the muttering tone,
A proper mixture of the squeak and groan:
No borrow’d grace of action must he seen;
The slightest motion would displease the Dean;
Whilst everv staring graduate would prate
Against what he could never imitate.
The man who hopes t’ obtain the promised cup
Must in one posture stand, and ne’er look up;
Nor stop, but rattle over every word –
No matter what, so it can not be heard.
Thus let him hurry on, nor think to rest:
Who speaks the fastest’s sure to speak the best;
Who utters most within the shortest space
May safely hope to win the wordy race.
The sons of science these, who, thus repaid,
Linger in ease in Granta’s sluggish shade;
Where on Cam’s sedgy banks supine they lie,
Unknown, unhonour’d live, unwept-for die:
Dull as the pictures which adorn their halls,
They think all learning fix’d within their walls:
In manners rude, in foolish forms precise,
All modern arts affecting to despise;
Yet prizing Bentley’s, Brunck’s, or Porson’s note,
More than the verse on which the critic wrote:
Vain as their honours, heavy as their ale,
Sad as their wit, and tedious as their tale;
To friendship dead, though not untaught to feel
When Self and Church demand a bigot zeal.
With eager haste they court the lord of power,
Whether ‘tis Pitt or Petty rules the hour;
To him, with suppliant smiles, they bend the head,
While distant mitres to their eyes are spread.
But should a storm o’erwhelm him with disgrace,
They’d fly to seek the next who fill’d his place.
Such are the men who learning’s treasures guard!
Such is their practice, such is their reward!
/> This much, at least, we may presume to say –
The premium can’t exceed the price they pay.
1806
TO A BEAUTIFUL QUAKER
Sweet girl! though only once we met,
That meeting I shall ne’er forget;
And though we ne’er may meet again,
Remembrance will thy form retain.
I would not say, “I love,” but still
My senses struggle with my will:
In vain, to drive thee from my breast,
My thoughts are more and more represt;
In vain I check the rising sighs,
Another to the last replies:
Perhaps this is not love, but yet
Our meeting I can ne’er forget.
What though we never silence broke,
Our eyes a sweeter language spoke.
The toungue in flattering falsehood deals,
And tells a tale in never feels;
Deceit the guilty lips impart,
And hush the mandates of the heart;
But soul’s interpreters, the eyes,
Spurn such restraint and scorn disguise.
As thus our glances oft conversed,
And all our bosoms felt, rehearsed,
No spirit, from within, reproved us,
Say rather, “‘twas the spirit moved us.”
Though what they utter’d I repress,
Yet I conceive thou’lt partly guess;
For as on thee my memory ponders,
Perchance to me thine also wanders.
This for myself, at least, I’ll say,
Thy form appears through night, through day:
Awake, with it my fancy teems;
In sleep, it smiles in fleeting dreams;
The vision charms the hours away,
And bids me curse Aurora’s ray
For breaking slumbers of delight
Which make me wish for endless night:
Since, oh! whate’er my future fate,
Shall joy or woe my steps await,
Tempted by love, by storms beset,
Thine image I can ne’er forget.
Alas! again no more we meet,
No more former looks repeat;
Then let me breathe this parting prayer,
The dictate of my bosom’s care:
“May heaven so guard my lovely quaker,
That anguish never can o’ertake her;
That peace and virtue ne’er forsake her,
But bliss be aye her heart’s partaker!
Oh, may the happy mortal, fated
To be by dearest ties related,
For her each hour new joys discover,
And lose the husband in the lover!
May that fair bosom never know
What ‘t is to feel the restless woe
Which stings the soul with vain regret,
Of him who never can forget!”
THE CORNELIAN
No specious splendour of this stone
Endears it to my memory ever;
With lustre only once it shone,
And blushes modest as the giver.
Some, who can sneer at friendship’s ties,
Have, for my weakness, oft reproved me;
Yet still the simple gift I prize,-
For I am sure the giver loved me.
He offer’d it with downcast look,
As fearful that I ,ight refuse it;
I told him when the gift I took,
My only fear should be to lose it.
This pledge attentively I view’d,
And sparkling as I held it near,
Methought one drop the stone bedew’d,
And ever since I’ve loved a tear.
Still, to adorn his humble youth,
Nor wealth nor birth their treasures yield;
But he who seeks the flowers of truth,
Must quit the garden for the field.
‘Tis not the plant uprear’d in sloth,
Which beauty shows, and sheds perfume;
The flowers which yield the most of both
In Nature’s wild luxuriance bloom.
Had Fortune aided Nature’s care,
For once forgetting to be blind,
His would have been an ample share,
If well proportion’d to his mind.
But had the goddess clearly seen,
His form had fix’d her fickle breast;
Her countless hoards would his have been,
And none remain’d to give the rest.
AN OCCASIONAL PROLOGUE
DELIVERED PREVIOUS TO THE PERFORMANCE OF ‘THE WHEEL OF FORTUNE’ AT A PRIVATE THEATRE
Since the refinement of this polish’d age
Has swept irnmortal raillery from the stage;
Since taste has now expunged licentious wit,
Which stamp’d disgrace on all an author writ;
Since now to please with purer scenes we seek,
Nor dare to call the blush from Beauty’s cheek;
Oh! let the modest Muse some pity claim,
And meet indulgence, though she find not fame.
Still, not for her alone we wish respect,
Others appear more conscious of defect;
To-night no veteran Roscii you behold,
In all the arts of scenic action old;
No Cooke, no Kemble, can salute you here,
No Siddons draw the sympathetic tear;
To-night you throng to witness the début
Of embryo actors, to the Drama new:
Here, then, our almost unfledged wings we try;
Clip not our pinions ere the birds can fly:
Failing in this our first attempt to soar,
Drooping, alas! we fall to rise no more.
Not one poor trembler only fear betrays
Who hopes, yet almost dreads, to meet your praise,
But all our dramatis personæ wait
In fond suspense this crisis of their fate.
No venal views our prosress can retard,
Your generous plaudits are our sole reward.
For these, each Hero all his power displays,
Each timid Heroine shrinks before your gaze.
Surely the last will some protection find;
None to the softer sex can prove unkind
While Youth and Beauty form the female shield,
The sternest censor to the fair must yield.
Yet, should our feeble efforts nought avail,
Should, after all, our best endeavours fail,
Still let some mercy in your bosoms live,
And, if you can’t applaud, at le’st forgive.
ON THE DEATH OF MR. FOX
THE FOLLOWING ILLIBERAL IMPROMPTU APPEARED IN A MORNING PAPER
‘Our nation’s foes lament on Fox’s death,
But bless the hour when PITT resign’d his breath:
These feelings wide, let sense and truth unclue,
We give the palm where Justice points its due.’
TO WHICH THE AUTHOR OF THESE PIECES SENT THE FOLLOWING REPLY
Oh factious viper! whose envenom’d tooth
Would mangle still the dead, perverting truth;
What though our ‘nation’s foes’ lament the fate
With generous’ feeling, of the good and great’
Shall dastard tongues essay to blast the name
Of him whose meed exists in endless fame?
When PITT expired in plenitude of power,
Though Ilisuccess obscured his dying hour,
Pity her dewy wings before him spread,
For noble spirits ‘war not with the dead:’
His friends, in tears, a last sad requiem gave,
As all his errors slumber’d in the grave;
He sunk, an Atlas bending ‘neath the weight
Of cares o’erwhelmlng
our conflicting state:
When, lo! a Hercules in FOX appear’d
Who for a time the ruin’d fabric rear’d:
He, too, is fall’n, who Britain’s loss supplied,
With him our fast reviving hopes have died;
Not one great people only raise his urn,
All Europe’s far-extended regions mourn.
‘These feelings wide, let sense and truth unclue,
To give the palm where Justice points its due;’
Yet let not canker’d Calumny assail,
Or round our statesman wind her gloomy veil.
FOX o’er whose corse a mourning world must weep,
Whose dear remains in honour’d marble sleep;
For whom, at last, e’en hostile nations groan,
While friends and foes alike his talents own;
FOX shall in Britain’s future annals shine,
Nor e’en to PITT the patriot’s palm resign;
Which Envy, wearing Candour’s sacred mask,
For PITT, and PITT alone, has dared to ask.
THE TEAR
‘O lachrymarum fons, tenero sacros
Ducentium ortus ex animo; quater
Felix! in imo qui scatentem
Pectore te, pia Nympha, sensit.’ — GRAY
When Friendship or Love our sympathies move,
When Truth, in a glance, should appear,
The lips may beguile with a dimple or smile,
But the test of affection’s a Tear:
Too oft is a smile but the hypocrite’s wile,
To mask detestation, or fear;
Give me the soft sigh, whilst the soultelling eye
Is dimm’d, for a time, with a Tear:
Mild Charity’s glow, to us mortals below,
Shows the soul from barbarity clear;
Compassion will melt, where this virtue is felt,
And its dew is diffused in a Tear:
The man, doom’d to sail with the blast of the gale,
Through billows Atlantic to steer,
As he bends o’er the wave which may soon be his grave,
The green sparkles bright with a Tear;
The Soldier braves death for a fanciful wreath
In Glory’s romantic career;
But he raises the foe when in battle laid low,
And bathes every wound with a Tear.
If, with high-bounding pride he return to his bride!
Renouncing the gore-crimson’d spear;
All his toils are repaid when, embracing the maid,
From her eyelid he kisses the Tear.
Sweet scene of my youth! seat of Friendship and Truth,
Where Love chas’d each fast-fleeting year
Loth to leave thee, I mourn’d, for a last look I turn’d,
But thy spire was scarce seen through a Tear:
Though my vows I can pour, to my Mary no more,
My Mary, to Love once so dear,