The star of stars, the cynosure,
The artist’s and the poet’s theme,
The young man’s vision, the old man’s dream, —
Granada by its winding stream, 65
The city of the Moor!
And there the Alhambra still recalls
Aladdin’s palace of delight:
Allah il Allah! through its halls
Whispers the fountain as it falls, 70
The Darro darts beneath its walls,
The hills with snow are white.
Ah yes, the hills are white with snow,
And cold with blasts that bite and freeze;
But in the happy vale below 75
The orange and pomegranate grow,
And wafts of air toss to and fro
The blossoming almond trees.
The Vega cleft by the Xenil,
The fascination and allure 80
Of the sweet landscape chains the will;
The traveller lingers on the hill,
His parted lips are breathing still
The last sigh of the Moor.
How like a ruin overgrown 85
With flowers that hide the rents of time,
Stands now the Past that I have known;
Castles in Spain, not built of stone
But of white summer clouds, and blown
Into this little mist of rhyme! 90
Vittoria Colonna
Vittoria Colonna, on the death of her husband, the Marchese di Pescara, retired to her castle at Ischia (Inarimé), and there wrote the Ode upon his death which gained her the title of Divine. H. W. L.
ONCE more, once more, Inarimé,
I see thy purple halls! — once more
I hear the billows of the bay
Wash the white pebbles on thy shore.
High o’er the sea-surge and the sands, 5
Like a great galleon wrecked and cast
Ashore by storms, thy castle stands,
A mouldering landmark of the Past.
Upon its terrace-walk I see
A phantom gliding to and fro; 10
It is Colonna, — it is she
Who lived and loved so long ago.
Pescara’s beautiful young wife,
The type of perfect womanhood,
Whose life was love, the life of life, 15
That time and change and death withstood.
For death, that breaks the marriage band
In others, only closer pressed
The wedding-ring upon her hand
And closer locked and barred her breast. 20
She knew the life-long martyrdom,
The weariness, the endless pain
Of waiting for some one to come
Who nevermore would come again.
The shadows of the chestnut trees, 25
The odor of the orange blooms,
The song of birds, and, more than these,
The silence of deserted rooms;
The respiration of the sea,
The soft caresses of the air, 30
All things in nature seemed to be
But ministers of her despair;
Till the o’erburdened heart, so long
Imprisoned in itself, found vent
And voice in one impassioned song 35
Of inconsolable lament.
Then as the sun, though hidden from sight,
Transmutes to gold the leaden mist,
Her life was interfused with light,
From realms that, though unseen, exist. 40
Inarimé! Inarimé!
Thy castle on the crags above
In dust shall crumble and decay,
But not the memory of her love.
The Revenge of Rain-in-the-Face
IN that desolate land and lone,
Where the Big Horn and Yellowstone
Roar down their mountain path,
By their fires the Sioux Chiefs
Muttered their woes and griefs 5
And the menace of their wrath.
“Revenge!” cried Rain-in-the-Face,
“Revenge upon all the race
Of the White Chief with yellow hair!
And the mountains dark and high 10
From their crags reëchoed the cry
Of his anger and despair.
In the meadow, spreading wide
By woodland and river-side
The Indian village stood; 15
All was silent as a dream,
Save the rushing of the stream
And the blue-jay in the wood.
In his war paint and his beads,
Like a bison among the reeds, 20
In ambush the Sitting Bull
Lay with three thousand braves
Crouched in the clefts and caves,
Savage, unmerciful!
Into the fatal snare 25
The White Chief with yellow hair
And his three hundred men
Dashed headlong, sword in hand;
But of that gallant band
Not one returned again. 30
The sudden darkness of death
Overwhelmed them like the breath
And smoke of a furnace fire:
By the river’s bank, and between
The rocks of the ravine, 35
They lay in their bloody attire.
But the foemen fled in the night,
And Rain-in-the-Face, in his flight,
Uplifted high in air
As a ghastly trophy, bore 40
The brave heart, that beat no more,
Of the White Chief with yellow hair.
Whose was the right and the wrong?
Sing it, O funeral song,
With a voice that is full of tears, 45
And say that our broken faith
Wrought all this ruin and scathe,
In the Year of a Hundred Years.
To the River Yvette
O LOVELY river of Yvette!
O darling river! like a bride,
Some dimpled, bashful, fair Lisette,
Thou goest to wed the Orge’s tide.
Maincourt, and lordly Dampierre, 5
See and salute thee on thy way,
And, with a blessing and a prayer,
Ring the sweet bells of St. Forget.
The valley of Chevreuse in vain
Would hold thee in its fond embrace; 10
Thou glidest from its arms again
And hurriest on with swifter pace.
Thou wilt not stay; with restless feet,
Pursuing still thine onward flight,
Thou goest as one in haste to meet 15
Her sole desire, her heart’s delight.
O lovely river of Yvette!
O darling stream! on balanced wings
The wood-birds sang the chansonnette
That here a wandering poet sings. 20
The Emperor’s Glove
“Combien faudrait-il de peaux d’Espagne pour faire un gant de cette grandeur?” A play upon the words gant, a glove, and Gand, the French for Ghent. H. W. L.
ON St. Bavon’s tower, commanding
Half of Flanders, his domain,
Charles the Emperor once was standing,
While beneath him on the landing
Stood Duke Alva and his train. 5
Like a print in books of fables,
Or a model made for show,
With its pointed roofs and gables,
Dormer windows, scrolls and labels,
Lay the city far below. 10
Through its squares and streets and alleys
Poured the populace of Ghent;
As a routed army rallies,
Or as rivers run through valleys,
Hurrying to their homes they went. 15
“Nest of Lutheran misbelievers!”
Cried Duke Alva as he gazed;
“Haunt of traitors and deceivers,
Stronghold of insurgent weavers,
Let it to the ground be ra
zed!” 20
On the Emperor’s cap the feather
Nods, as laughing he replies:
“How many skins of Spanish leather,
Think you, would, if stitched together,
Make a glove of such a size?” 25
A Ballad of the French Flee
October, 1746
Mr. Thomas Prince loquitur
Written at the instance of the Rev. E. E. Hale, when efforts were making to save from destruction the Old South Meeting House in Boston. Mr. Hale sent Mr. Longfellow a passage out of Hutchinson’s history, and referred him to Prince’s Thanksgiving sermon, given at the Old South in 1746.
A FLEET with flags arrayed
Sailed from the port of Brest,
And the Admiral’s ship displayed
The signal: “Steer southwest.”
For this Admiral D’Anville 5
Had sworn by cross and crown
To ravage with fire and steel
Our helpless Boston Town.
There were rumors in the street,
In the houses there was fear 10
Of the coming of the fleet,
And the danger hovering near.
And while from mouth to mouth
Spread the tidings of dismay,
I stood in the Old South, 15
Saying humbly: “Let us pray!
“O Lord! we would not advise;
But if in thy Providence
A tempest should arise
To drive the French Fleet hence, 20
And scatter it far and wide,
Or sink it in the sea,
We should be satisfied,
And thine the glory be.”
This was the prayer I made, 25
For my soul was all on flame,
And even as I prayed
The answering tempest came;
It came with a mighty power,
Shaking the windows and walls, 30
And tolling the bell in the tower,
As it tolls at funerals.
The lightning suddenly
Unsheathed its flaming sword,
And I cried: “Stand still, and see 35
The salvation of the Lord!”
The heavens were black with cloud,
The sea was white with hail,
And ever more fierce and loud
Blew the October gale. 40
The fleet it overtook,
And the broad sails in the van
Like the tents of Cushan shook,
Or the curtains of Midian.
Down on the reeling decks 45
Crashed the o’erwhelming seas;
Ah, never were there wrecks
So pitiful as these!
Like a potter’s vessel broke
The great ships of the line; 50
They were carried away as a smoke,
Or sank like lead in the brine.
O Lord! before thy path
They vanished and ceased to be,
When thou didst walk in wrath 55
With thine horses through the sea!
The Leap of Roushan Beg
MOUNTED on Kyrat strong and fleet,
His chestnut steed with four white feet,
Roushan Beg, called Kurroglou,
Son of the road and bandit chief,
Seeking refuge and relief, 5
Up the mountain pathway flew.
Such was Kyrat’s wondrous speed,
Never yet could any steed
Reach the dust-cloud in his course.
More than maiden, more than wife, 10
More than gold and next to life
Roushan the Robber loved his horse.
In the land that lies beyond
Erzeroum and Trebizond,
Garden-girt his fortress stood; 15
Plundered khan, or caravan
Journeying north from Koordistan,
Gave him wealth and wine and food
Seven hundred and fourscore
Men at arms his livery wore, 20
Did his bidding night and day;
Now, through regions all unknown,
He was wandering, lost, alone,
Seeking without guide his way.
Suddenly the pathway ends, 25
Sheer the precipice descends,
Loud the torrent roars unseen;
Thirty feet from side to side
Yawns the chasm; on air must ride
He who crosses this ravine. 30
Following close in his pursuit,
At the precipice’s foot
Reyhan the Arab of Orfah
Halted with his hundred men,
Shouting upward from the glen, 35
“La Illáh illa Alláh!”
Gently Roushan Beg caressed
Kyrat’s forehead, neck, and breast;
Kissed him upon both his eyes,
Sang to him in his wild way, 40
As upon the topmost spray
Sings a bird before it flies.
“O my Kyrat, O my steed,
Round and slender as a reed,
Carry me this peril through! 45
Satin housings shall be thine,
Shoes of gold, O Kyrat mine,
O thou soul of Kurroglou!
“Soft thy skin as silken skein,
Soft as woman’s hair thy mane, 50
Tender are thine eyes and true;
All thy hoofs like ivory shine,
Polished bright; O life of mine,
Leap, and rescue Kurroglou!”
Kyrat, then, the strong and fleet, 55
Drew together his four white feet,
Paused a moment on the verge,
Measured with his eye the space,
And into the air’s embrace
Leaped as leaps the ocean surge. 60
As the ocean surge o’er sand
Bears a swimmer safe to land,
Kyrat safe his rider bore;
Rattling down the deep abyss
Fragments of the precipice 65
Rolled like pebbles on a shore.
Roushan’s tasselled cap of red
Trembled not upon his head,
Careless sat he and upright;
Neither hand nor bridle shook, 70
Nor his head he turned to look,
As he galloped out of sight.
Flash of harness in the air,
Seen a moment like the glare
Of a sword drawn from its sheath; 75
Thus the phantom horseman passed,
And the shadow that he cast
Leaped the cataract underneath.
Reyhan the Arab held his breath
While this vision of life and death 80
Passed above him. “Allahu!”
Cried he. “In all Koordistan
Lives there not so brave a man
As this Robber Kurroglou!”
Haroun al Raschid
ONE day, Haroun Al Raschid read
A book wherein the poet said: —
“Where are the kings, and where the rest
Of those who once the world possessed?
“They’re gone with all their pomp and show, 5
They’re gone the way that thou shalt go.
“O thou who choosest for thy share
The world, and what the world calls fair,
“Take all that it can give or lend,
But know that death is at the end!” 10
Haroun Al Raschid bowed his head:
Tears fell upon the page he read.
King Trisanku
VISWAMITRA the Magician,
By his spells and incantations,
Up to Indra’s realms elysian
Raised Trisanku, king of nations.
Indra and the gods offended 5
Hurled him downward, and descending
In the air he hung suspended,
With these equal powers contending.
Thus by aspirations lifted,
By misgivings downward driven, 10
Midway between earth and heaven.
A Wraith in the Mist
“Sir, I should build me a fortification, if I came to live here.” — BOSWELL’S Johnson.
ON the green little isle of Inchkenneth,
Who is it that walks by the shore,
So gay with his Highland blue bonnet,
So brave with his targe and claymore?
His form is the form of a giant, 5
But his face wears an aspect of pain;
Can this be the Laird of Inchkenneth?
Can this be Sir Allan McLean?
Ah, no! It is only the Rambler,
The Idler, who lives in Bolt Court, 10
And who says, were he Laird of Inchkenneth,
He would wall himself round with a fort.
The Three Kings
THREE Kings came riding from far away,
Melchior and Gaspar and Baltasar;
Three Wise Men out of the East were they,
And they travelled by night and they slept by day,
For their guide was a beautiful, wonderful star. 5
The star was so beautiful, large, and clear,
That all the other stars of the sky
Became a white mist in the atmosphere,
And by this they knew that the coming was near
Of the Prince foretold in the prophecy. 10
Three caskets they bore on their saddle-bows,
Three caskets of gold with golden keys;
Their robes were of crimson silk with rows
Of bells and pomegranates and furbelows,
Their turbans like blossoming almond-trees. 15
And so the Three Kings rode into the West,
Through the dusk of night, over hill and dell,
Delphi Complete Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (Delphi Poets Series Book 13) Page 81
