And Rome, half-barbarous, bound Achaia's

chain :

So Russia's spirit, 'midst Sclavonic night,

Burns with a fire more dread than all your polished light.

But Russia's limbs (so blinded statesmen speak) Are crude, and too colossal to cohere.

O, lamentable weakness! reckoning weak The stripling Titan, strengthening year by

year.

What implement lacks he for war's career, That grows on earth, or in its floods and mines, (Eighth sharer of the inhabitable sphere) Whom Persia bows to, China ill confines,

And India's homage waits, when Albion's star declines!

But time will teach the Russ, ev'n conquering War

Has handmaid arts: ay, ay, the Russ will woo All sciences that speed Bellona's car,

All murder's tactic arts, and win them too;

But never holier Muses shall imbue

His breast, that's made of nature's basest

clay :

The sabre, knout, and dungeon's vapour blue His laws and ethics: far from him away

Are all the lovely Nine, that breathe but Freedom's day.

Say, ev'n his serfs, half-humanized, should learn Their human rights,-will Mars put out his flame

In Russian bosoms? no, he 'll bid them burn A thousand years for nought but martial fame, Like Romans :-yet forgive me, Roman name! Rome could impart what Russia never can; Proud civic rights to salve submission's shame. Our strife is coming; but in freedom's van The Polish eagle's fall is big with fate to man.

Proud bird of old! Mohammed's moon recoil'd
Before thy swoop: had we been timely bold,
That swoop, still free, had stunn'd the Russ,
and foil'd

Earth's new oppressors, as it foil'd her old.
Now thy majestic eyes are shut and cold :
And colder still Polonia's children find
The sympathetic hands, that we outhold.

But, Poles, when we are gone, the world will mind,

Ye bore the brunt of fate, and bled for humankind.

So hallowedly have ye fulfill'd your part,
My pride repudiates ev'n the sigh that blends.
With Poland's name-name written on my

heart.

My heroes, my grief-consecrated friends!
Your sorrow, in nobility, transcends

Your conqueror's joy: his cheek may blush ; but shame

Can tinge not yours, though exile's tear descends;

Nor would ye change your conscience, cause,

and name,

For his, with all his wealth, and all his felon fame.

Thee, Niemciewitz, whose song of stirring power
The Czar forbids to sound in Polish lands;
Thee, Czartoryski, in thy banish'd bower,
The patricide, who in thy palace stands,
May envy: proudly may Polonia's bands
Throw down their swords at Europe's feet in

scorn

Saying "Russia from the metal of these

brands

Shall forge the fetters of your sons unborn ; Our setting star is your misfortunes' rising morn.”

1831.

LINES

ON LEAVING A SCENE IN BAVARIA.

ADIEU the woods and waters' side,
Imperial Danube's rich domain !
Adieu the grotto, wild and wide,

The rocks abrupt and grassy plain !
For pallid Autumn once again
Hath swell'd each torrent of the hill;
Her clouds collect, her shadows sail,
And watery winds that sweep the vale
Grow loud and louder still.

But not the storm, dethroning fast
Yon monarch oak of massy pile;

Nor river roaring to the blast

Around its dark and desert isle; Nor church-bell tolling to beguile The cloud-born thunder passing by, Can sound in discord to my soul: Roll on, ye mighty waters, roll! And rage, thou darken'd sky!

Thy blossoms now no longer bright;
Thy wither'd woods no longer green;
Yet, Eldurn shore, with dark delight
I visit thy unlovely scene!

For many a sunset hour serene
My steps have trod thy mellow dew;
When his green light the glowworm gave,
When Cynthia from the distant wave

Her twilight anchor drew,

And plough'd, as with a swelling sail,
The billowy clouds and starry sea;
Then while thy hermit nightingale
Sang on his fragrant apple-tree,—
Romantic, solitary, free,

The visitant of Eldurn's shore,

On such a moonlight mountain stray'd,
As echoed to the music made

By Druid harps of yore.

Around thy savage hills of oak,
Around thy waters bright and blue,
No hunter's horn the silence broke,
No dying shriek thine echo knew ;
But safe, sweet Eldurn woods, to you
The wounded wild deer ever ran,

Whose myrtle bound their grassy cave,
Whose very rocks a shelter gave

From blood-pursuing man.