The war-note of Lochiel, which Albyn's hills
Have heard, and heard, too, have her Saxon foes;--
How in the noon of night that pibroch thrills,
Savage and shrill! But with the breath which fills
Their mountain-pipe, so fill the mountaineers
With the fierce native daring which instils
The stirring memory of a thousand years,
And Evan's--Donald's[4.B.] fame rings in each clansman's ears!
XXVII.
And Ardennes[5.B.] waves above them her green leaves,[hn]
Dewy with Nature's tear-drops, as they pass--
Grieving, if aught inanimate e'er grieves,
Over the unreturning brave,--alas!
Ere evening to be trodden like the grass
Which now beneath them, but above shall grow
In its next verdure, when this fiery mass
Of living Valour, rolling on the foe
And burning with high Hope, shall moulder cold and low.
XXVIII.
Last noon beheld them full of lusty life;--
Last eve in Beauty's circle proudly gay;
The Midnight brought the signal-sound of strife,
The Morn the marshalling in arms,--the Day
Battle's magnificently-stern array!
The thunder-clouds close o'er it, which when rent
The earth is covered thick with other clay
Which her own clay shall cover, heaped and pent,
Rider and horse,--friend,--foe,--in one red burial blent!
XXIX.
Their praise is hymned by loftier harps than mine;
Yet one I would select from that proud throng,
Partly because they blend me with his line,
And partly that I did his Sire some wrong,[292]
And partly that bright names will hallow song;[ho]
And his was of the bravest, and when showered
The death-bolts deadliest the thinned files along,
Even where the thickest of War's tempest lowered,
They reached no nobler breast than thine, young, gallant Howard![293]
XXX.
There have been tears and breaking hearts for thee,
And mine were nothing, had I such to give;
But when I stood beneath the fresh green tree,
Which living waves where thou didst cease to live,
And saw around me the wide field revive
With fruits and fertile promise, and the Spring[294]
Come forth her work of gladness to contrive,
With all her reckless birds upon the wing,
I turned from all she brought to those she could not bring.[6.B.]
XXXI.
I turned to thee, to thousands, of whom each
And one as all a ghastly gap did make
In his own kind and kindred, whom to teach
Forgetfulness were mercy for their sake;
The Archangel's trump, not Glory's, must awake
Those whom they thirst for; though the sound of Fame
May for a moment soothe, it cannot slake
The fever of vain longing, and the name
So honoured but assumes a stronger, bitterer claim.
XXXII.
They mourn, but smile at length--and, smiling, mourn:
The tree will wither long before it fall;
The hull drives on, though mast and sail be torn;[hp]
The roof-tree sinks, but moulders on the hall
In massy hoariness; the ruined wall
Stands when its wind-worn battlements are gone;
The bars survive the captive they enthral;
The day drags through though storms keep out the sun;[hq]
And thus the heart will break, yet brokenly live on:[295]
XXXIII.
Even as a broken Mirror,[296] which the glass
In every fragment multiplies--and makes
A thousand images of one that was,
The same--and still the more, the more it breaks;
And thus the heart will do which not forsakes,
Living in shattered guise; and still, and cold,
And bloodless, with its sleepless sorrow aches,
Yet withers on till all without is old,
Showing no visible sign, for such things are untold.
XXXIV.
There is a very life in our despair,
Vitality of poison,--a quick root
Which feeds these deadly branches; for it were
As nothing did we die; but Life will suit
Itself to Sorrow's most detested fruit,
Like to the apples on the Dead Sea's shore,[7.B.]
All ashes to the taste: Did man compute
Existence by enjoyment, and count o'er
Such hours 'gainst years of life,--say, would he name threescore?
XXXV.
The Psalmist numbered out the years of man:
They are enough; and if thy tale be _true_,[hr]
Thou, who didst grudge him even that fleeting span,[297]
More than enough, thou fatal Waterloo!
Millions of tongues record thee, and anew
Their children's lips shall echo them, and say--
"Here, where the sword united nations drew,[hs]
Our countrymen were warring on that day!"
And this is much--and all--which will not pass away.
XXXVI.
There sunk the greatest, nor the worst of men,
Whose Spirit, antithetically mixed,
One moment of the mightiest, and again
On little objects with like firmness fixed;[ht]
Extreme in all things! hadst thou been betwixt,
Thy throne had still been thine, or never been;
For Daring made thy rise as fall: thou seek'st[hu][298]
Even now to re-assume the imperial mien,[299]
And shake again the world, the Thunderer of the scene!
XXXVII.
Conqueror and Captive of the Earth art thou!
She trembles at thee still, and thy wild name[hv]
Was ne'er more bruited in men's minds than now
That thou art nothing, save the jest of Fame,
Who wooed thee once, thy Vassal, and became[hw]
The flatterer of thy fierceness--till thou wert
A God unto thyself; nor less the same
To the astounded kingdoms all inert,
Who deemed thee for a time whate'er thou didst assert.
XXXVIII.
Oh, more or less than man--in high or low--
Battling with nations, flying from the field;
Now making monarchs' necks thy footstool, now
More than thy meanest soldier taught to yield;
An Empire thou couldst crush, command, rebuild,
But govern not thy pettiest passion, nor,
However deeply in men's spirits skilled,
Look through thine own, nor curb the lust of War,
Nor learn that tempted Fate will leave the loftiest Star.
XXXIX.
Yet well thy soul hath brooked the turning tide
With that untaught innate philosophy,
Which, be it Wisdom, Coldness, or deep Pride,[hx]
Is gall and wormwood to an enemy.
When the whole host of hatred stood hard by,
To watch and mock thee shrinking, thou hast smiled[hy]
With a sedate and all-enduring eye;--
When Fortune fled her spoiled and favourite child,
He stood unbowed beneath the ills upon him piled.
XL.
Sager than in thy fortunes; for in them[hz]
Ambition steeled thee on too far to show
That just habitual scorn, which could contemn
Men and their thoughts; 'twas wise to feel, not so
To wear it ever on thy lip and brow,
And spurn the instruments thou wert to use
Till they were turned unto thine overthrow:
'Tis but a worthless world to win or lose;
So hath it proved to thee, and all such lot who choose.
XLI.
If, like a tower upon a headlong rock,
Thou hadst been made to stand or fall alone,
Such scorn of man had helped to brave the shock;
But men's thoughts were the steps which paved thy throne,
_Their_ admiration thy best weapon shone;
The part of Philip's son was thine, not then
(Unless aside thy Purple had been thrown)
Like stern Diogenes to mock at men--
For sceptred Cynics Earth were far too wide a den.[8.B.]
XLII.
But Quiet to quick bosoms is a Hell,
And _there_ hath been thy bane; there is a fire
And motion of the Soul which will not dwell
In its own narrow being, but aspire
Beyond the fitting medium of desire;
And, but once kindled, quenchless evermore,
Preys upon high adventure, nor can tire[ia]
Of aught but rest; a fever at the core,
Fatal to him who bears, to all who ever bore.
XLIII.
This makes the madmen who have made men mad
By their contagion; Conquerors and Kings,
Founders of sects and systems, to whom add
Sophists, Bards, Statesmen, all unquiet things
Which stir too strongly the soul's secret springs,[ib]
And are themselves the fools to those they fool;
Envied, yet how unenviable! what stings
Are theirs! One breast laid open were a school
Which would unteach Mankind the lust to shine or rule:
XLIV.
Their breath is agitation, and their life
A storm whereon they ride, to sink at last,
And yet so nursed and bigoted to strife,
That should their days, surviving perils past,
Melt to calm twilight, they feel overcast[ic]
With sorrow and supineness, and so die;
Even as a flame unfed, which runs to waste
With its own flickering, or a sword laid by,
Which eats into itself, and rusts ingloriously.
XLV.
He who ascends to mountain-tops, shall find
The loftiest peaks most wrapt in clouds and snow;
He who surpasses or subdues mankind,
Must look down on the hate of those below.[id]
Though high _above_ the Sun of Glory glow,
And far _beneath_ the Earth and Ocean spread,
_Round_ him are icy rocks, and loudly blow
Contending tempests on his naked head,[ie]
And thus reward the toils which to those summits led.
XLVI.
Away with these! true Wisdom's world will be[if]
Within its own creation, or in thine,
Maternal Nature! for who teems like thee,[ig]
Thus on the banks of thy majestic Rhine?
There Harold gazes on a work divine,
A blending of all beauties; streams and dells,
Fruit, foliage, crag, wood, cornfield, mountain, vine,
And chiefless castles breathing stern farewells
From gray but leafy walls, where Ruin greenly dwells.[ih]
XLVII.
And there they stand, as stands a lofty mind,
Worn, but unstooping to the baser crowd,
All tenantless, save to the crannying Wind,
Or holding dark communion with the Cloud
There was a day when they were young and proud;
Banners on high, and battles[300] passed below;
But they who fought are in a bloody shroud,
And those which waved are shredless dust ere now,[ii]
And the bleak battlements shall bear no future blow.
XLVIII.
Beneath these battlements, within those walls,
Power dwelt amidst her passions; in proud state
Each robber chief upheld his armed halls,
Doing his evil will, nor less elate
Than mightier heroes of a longer date.
What want these outlaws conquerors should have[ij][9.B.]
But History's purchased page to call them great?
A wider space--an ornamented grave?
Their hopes were not less warm, their souls were full as brave.[ik]
XLIX.
In their baronial feuds and single fields,
What deeds of prowess unrecorded died!
And Love, which lent a blazon to their shields,[301]
With emblems well devised by amorous pride,
Through all the mail of iron hearts would glide;
But still their flame was fierceness, and drew on
Keen contest and destruction near allied,
And many a tower for some fair mischief won,
Saw the discoloured Rhine beneath its ruin run.
L.
But Thou, exulting and abounding river!
Making thy waves a blessing as they flow
Through banks whose beauty would endure for ever
Could man but leave thy bright creation so,
Nor its fair promise from the surface mow[il]
With the sharp scythe of conflict, then to see
Thy valley of sweet waters, were to know[302]
Earth paved like Heaven--and to seem such to me,[im]
Even now what wants thy stream?--that it should Lethe be.
LI.
A thousand battles have assailed thy banks,
But these and half their fame have passed away,
And Slaughter heaped on high his weltering ranks:
Their very graves are gone, and what are they?[303]
Thy tide washed down the blood of yesterday,
And all was stainless, and on thy clear stream
Glassed, with its dancing light, the sunny ray;[in]
But o'er the blacken'd memory's blighting dream
Thy waves would vainly roll, all sweeping as they seem.
LII.
Thus Harold inly said, and passed along,
Yet not insensible to all which here
Awoke the jocund birds to early song
In glens which might have made even exile dear:
Though on his brow were graven lines austere,
And tranquil sternness, which had ta'en the place
Of feelings fierier far but less severe--
Joy was not always absent from his face,
But o'er it in such scenes would steal with transient trace.
LIII.
Nor was all Love shut from him, though his days
Of Passion had consumed themselves to dust.
It is in vain that we would coldly gaze
On such as smile upon us; the heart must
Leap kindly back to kindness, though Disgust[io]
Hath weaned it from all worldlings: thus he felt,
For there was soft Remembrance, and sweet Trust
In one fond breast, to which his own would melt,
And in its tenderer hour on that his bosom dwelt.[304]
LIV.
And he had learned to love,--I know not why,
For this in such as him seems strange of mood,
The helpless looks of blooming Infancy,
Even in its earliest nurture; what subdued,
To change like this, a mind so far imbued
With scorn of man, it little boots to know;
But thus it was; and though in solitude
Small power the nipped affections have to grow,
In him this glowed when all beside had ceased to glow.
LV.
And there was one soft breast, as hath been said,[ip]
Which unto his was bound by stronger ties
Than the church links withal; and--though unwed,
_That_ love was pure--and, far above disguise,[iq]
Had stood the test of mortal enmities
Still undivided, and cemented more
By peril, dreaded most in female eyes;[305]
But this was firm, and from a foreign shore
Well to that heart might his these absent greetings pour![ir]
1.
The castled Crag of Drachenfels[306][10.B.]
Frowns o'er the wide and winding Rhine,
Whose breast of waters broadly swells
Between the banks which bear the vine,
And hills all rich with blossomed trees,
And fields which promise corn and wine,
And scattered cities crowning these,
Whose far white walls along them shine,
Have strewed a scene, which I should see
With double joy wert _thou_ with me.
2.
And peasant girls, with deep blue eyes,
And hands which offer early flowers,
Walk smiling o'er this Paradise;
Above, the frequent feudal towers
Through green leaves lift their walls of gray;
And many a rock which steeply lowers,
And noble arch in proud decay,
Look o'er this vale of vintage-bowers;
But one thing want these banks of Rhine,--
Thy gentle hand to clasp in mine!
3.
I send the lilies given to me--
Though long before thy hand they touch,
I know that they must withered be,
But yet reject them not as such;
For I have cherished them as dear,
Because they yet may meet thine eye,
And guide thy soul to mine even here,
When thou behold'st them drooping nigh,
And know'st them gathered by the Rhine,
And offered from my heart to thine!
4.
The river nobly foams and flows--
The charm of this enchanted ground,
And all its thousand turns disclose
Some fresher beauty varying round:
The haughtiest breast its wish might bound
Through life to dwell delighted here;
Nor could on earth a spot be found
To Nature and to me so dear--
Could thy dear eyes in following mine
Still sweeten more these banks of Rhine!
LVI.
By Coblentz, on a rise of gentle ground,
There is a small and simple Pyramid,
Crowning the summit of the verdant mound;
Beneath its base are Heroes' ashes hid--
Our enemy's--but let not that forbid
Honour to Marceau! o'er whose early tomb[is]
Tears, big tears, gushed from the rough soldier's lid,
Lamenting and yet envying such a doom,
Falling for France, whose rights he battled to resume.
LVII.
Brief, brave, and glorious was his young career,--
His mourners were two hosts, his friends and foes;
And fitly may the stranger lingering here
Pray for his gallant Spirit's bright repose;--
For he was Freedom's Champion, one of those,
The few in number, who had not o'erstept[307]
The charter to chastise which she bestows
On such as wield her weapons; he had kept
The whiteness of his soul--and thus men o'er him wept.[11.B.]
LVIII.
Here Ehrenbreitstein,[12.B.] with her shattered wall
Black with the miner's blast, upon her height
Yet shows of what she was, when shell and ball
Rebounding idly on her strength did light:--
A Tower of Victory! from whence the flight
Of baffled foes was watched along the plain:
But Peace destroyed what War could never blight,
And laid those proud roofs bare to Summer's rain--
On which the iron shower for years had poured in vain.[308]
LIX.
Adieu to thee, fair Rhine! How long delighted
The stranger fain would linger on his way!
Thine is a scene alike where souls united
Or lonely Contemplation thus might stray;
And could the ceaseless vultures cease to prey[it]
On self-condemning bosoms, it were here,
Where Nature, nor too sombre nor too gay,
Wild but not rude, awful yet not austere,[iu]
Is to the mellow Earth as Autumn to the year.[309]
LX.
Adieu to thee again! a vain adieu!
There can be no farewell to scene like thine;
The mind is coloured by thy every hue;
And if reluctantly the eyes resign
Their cherished gaze upon thee, lovely Rhine!
'Tis with the thankful glance of parting praise;
More mighty spots may rise--more glaring shine,[iv]
But none unite in one attaching maze
The brilliant, fair, and soft,--the glories of old days,
LXI.
The negligently grand, the fruitful bloom[310]
Of coming ripeness, the white city's sheen,
The rolling stream, the precipice's gloom,
The forest's growth, and Gothic walls between,--
The wild rocks shaped, as they had turrets been,
In mockery of man's art; and these withal
A race of faces happy as the scene,
Whose fertile bounties here extend to all,
Still springing o'er thy banks, though Empires near them fall.
LXII.
But these recede. Above me are the Alps,
The Palaces of Nature, whose vast walls
Have pinnacled in clouds their snowy scalps,[iw]
And throned Eternity in icy halls
Of cold Sublimity, where forms and falls[311]
The Avalanche--the thunderbolt of snow!
All that expands the spirit, yet appals,
Gather around these summits, as to show
How Earth may pierce to Heaven, yet leave vain man below.
LXIII.
But ere these matchless heights I dare to scan,
There is a spot should not be passed in vain,--
Morat! the proud, the patriot field! where man
May gaze on ghastly trophies of the slain,
Nor blush for those who conquered on that plain;
Here Burgundy bequeathed his tombless host,
A bony heap, through ages to remain,
Themselves their monument;[312]--the Stygian coast
Unsepulchred they roamed, and shrieked each
wandering ghost.[ix][313][13.B.]
LXIV.
While Waterloo with Cannae's carnage vies,[314]
Morat and Marathon twin names shall stand;
They were true Glory's stainless victories,
Won by the unambitious heart and hand
Of a proud, brotherly, and civic band,
All unbought champions in no princely cause
Of vice-entailed Corruption; they no land[iy]
Doomed to bewail the blasphemy of laws
Making Kings' rights divine, by some Draconic clause.
LXV.
By a lone wall a lonelier column rears
A gray and grief-worn aspect of old days;
'Tis the last remnant of the wreck of years,
And looks as with the wild-bewildered gaze
Of one to stone converted by amaze,
Yet still with consciousness; and there it stands
Making a marvel that it not decays,
When the coeval pride of human hands,
Levelled Aventicum,[14.B.] hath strewed her subject lands.
LXVI.
And there--oh! sweet and sacred be the name!--
Julia--the daughter--the devoted--gave
Her youth to Heaven; her heart, beneath a claim
Nearest to Heaven's, broke o'er a father's grave.
Justice is sworn 'gainst tears, and hers would crave
The life she lived in--but the Judge was just--
And then she died on him she could not save.[iz]
Their tomb was simple, and without a bust,[ja]
And held within their urn one mind--one heart--one dust.[15.B.]
LXVII.
But these are deeds which should not pass away,
And names that must not wither, though the Earth
Forgets her empires with a just decay,
The enslavers and the enslaved--their death and birth;
The high, the mountain-majesty of Worth
Should be--and shall, survivor of its woe,
And from its immortality, look forth
In the sun's face, like yonder Alpine snow,[16.B.]
Imperishably pure beyond all things below.
LXVIII.
Lake Leman woos me with its crystal face,
The mirror where the stars and mountains view
The stillness of their aspect in each trace
Its clear depth yields of their far height and hue:[jb]
There is too much of Man here,[315] to look through
With a fit mind the might which I behold;
But soon in me shall Loneliness renew
Thoughts hid, but not less cherished than of old,
Ere mingling with the herd had penned me in their fold.
LXIX.
To fly from, need not be to hate, mankind:
All are not fit with them to stir and toil,
Nor is it discontent to keep the mind
Deep in its fountain, lest it overboil[jc][316]
In the hot throng, where we become the spoil
Of our infection, till too late and long
We may deplore and struggle with the coil,
In wretched interchange of wrong for wrong
Midst a contentious world, striving where none are strong.[jd]
LXX.
There, in a moment, we may plunge our years[317]
In fatal penitence, and in the blight
Of our own Soul turn all our blood to tears,
And colour things to come with hues of Night;
The race of life becomes a hopeless flight
To those that walk in darkness: on the sea
The boldest steer but where their ports invite--
But there are wanderers o'er Eternity[je][318]
Whose bark drives on and on, and anchored ne'er shall be.
LXXI.
Is it not better, then, to be alone,
And love Earth only for its earthly sake?
By the blue rushing of the arrowy[319] Rhone,[17.B.]
Or the pure bosom of its nursing Lake,
Which feeds it as a mother who doth make
A fair but froward infant her own care,
Kissing its cries away as these awake;--[jf]
Is it not better thus our lives to wear,
Than join the crushing crowd, doomed to inflict or bear?
LXXII.
I live not in myself, but I become
Portion of that around me; and to me
High mountains are a feeling, but the hum[320]
Of human cities torture: I can see[jg]
Nothing to loathe in Nature, save to be[jh]
A link reluctant in a fleshly chain,
Classed among creatures, when the soul can flee,
And with the sky--the peak--the heaving plain[ji]
Of Ocean, or the stars, mingle--and not in vain.
LXXIII.
And thus I am absorbed, and this is life:--
I look upon the peopled desert past,
As on a place of agony and strife,
Where, for some sin, to Sorrow I was cast,
To act and suffer, but remount at last[jj]
With a fresh pinion; which I feel to spring,
Though young, yet waxing vigorous as the Blast
Which it would cope with, on delighted wing,
Spurning the clay-cold bonds which round our being cling.[jk][321]
LXXIV.
And when, at length, the mind shall be all free
From what it hates in this degraded form,[jl]
Reft of its carnal life, save what shall be
Existent happier in the fly and worm,--
When Elements to Elements conform,
And dust is as it should be, shall I not
Feel all I see less dazzling but more warm?
The bodiless thought? the Spirit of each spot?[jm]
Of which, even now, I share at times the immortal lot?[322]
LXXV.
Are not the mountains, waves, and skies, a part[jn]
Of me and of my Soul, as I of them?
Is not the love of these deep in my heart
With a pure passion? should I not contemn
All objects, if compared with these? and stem
A tide of suffering, rather than forego
Such feelings for the hard and worldly phlegm
Of those whose eyes are only turned below,
Gazing upon the ground, with thoughts which dare not glow?[jo][323]
LXXVI.
But this is not my theme; and I return[jp]
To that which is immediate, and require
Those who find contemplation in the urn,
To look on One, whose dust was once all fire,--
A native of the land where I respire
The clear air for a while--a passing guest,
Where he became a being,--whose desire
Was to be glorious; 'twas a foolish quest,
The which to gain and keep, he sacrificed all rest.
LXXVII.
Here the self-torturing sophist, wild Rousseau,[jq]
The apostle of Affliction, he who threw
Enchantment over Passion, and from Woe
Wrung overwhelming eloquence, first drew
The breath which made him wretched; yet he knew
How to make Madness beautiful, and cast
O'er erring deeds and thoughts, a heavenly hue[jr]
Of words, like sunbeams, dazzling as they past
The eyes, which o'er them shed tears feelingly and fast.
LXXVIII.
His love was Passion's essence--as a tree
On fire by lightning; with ethereal flame
Kindled he was, and blasted; for to be
Thus, and enamoured, were in him the same.[js]
But his was not the love of living dame,
Nor of the dead who rise upon our dreams,
But of ideal Beauty, which became
In him existence, and o'erflowing teems
Along his burning page, distempered though it seems.
LXXIX.
_This_ breathed itself to life in Julie, _this_
Invested her with all that's wild and sweet;
This hallowed, too, the memorable kiss[18.B.]
Which every morn his fevered lip would greet,
From hers, who but with friendship his would meet;
But to that gentle touch, through brain and breast
Flashed the thrilled Spirit's love-devouring heat;[jt]
In that absorbing sigh perchance more blest
Than vulgar minds may be with all they seek possest.
LXXX.
His life was one long war with self-sought foes,
Or friends by him self-banished;[324] for his mind
Had grown Suspicion's sanctuary, and chose,
For its own cruel sacrifice, the kind,[ju]
'Gainst whom he raged with fury strange and blind.
But he was phrensied, wherefore, who may know?
Since cause might be which Skill could never find;[jv]
But he was phrensied by disease or woe,
To that worst pitch of all, which wears a reasoning show.
LXXXI.
For then he was inspired,[325] and from him came,
As from the Pythian's mystic cave of yore,
Those oracles which set the world in flame,[326]
Nor ceased to burn till kingdoms were no more:
Did he not this for France? which lay before
Bowed to the inborn tyranny of years?[327]
Broken and trembling to the yoke she bore,
Till by the voice of him and his compeers,
Roused up to too much wrath which follows o'ergrown fears?
LXXXII.
They made themselves a fearful monument!
The wreck of old opinions--things which grew,[jw]
Breathed from the birth of Time: the veil they rent,
And what behind it lay, all earth shall view.[jx]
But good with ill they also overthrew,
Leaving but ruins, wherewith to rebuild
Upon the same foundation, and renew
Dungeons and thrones, which the same hour refilled,
As heretofore, because Ambition was self-willed.
LXXXIII.
But this will not endure, nor be endured!
Mankind have felt their strength, and made it felt.
They might have used it better, but, allured
By their new vigour, sternly have they dealt
On one another; Pity ceased to melt
With her once natural charities. But they,
Who in Oppression's darkness caved had dwelt,
They were not eagles, nourished with the day;
What marvel then, at times, if they mistook their prey?
LXXXIV.
What deep wounds ever closed without a scar?
The heart's bleed longest, and but heal to wear
That which disfigures it; and they who war
With their own hopes, and have been vanquished, bear
Silence, but not submission: in his lair
Fixed Passion holds his breath, until the hour
Which shall atone for years; none need despair:
It came--it cometh--and will come,--the power
To punish or forgive--in _one_ we shall be slower.[jy][328]
LXXXV.
Clear, placid Leman! thy contrasted lake,
With the wild world I dwelt in, is a thing
Which warns me, with its stillness, to forsake
Earth's troubled waters for a purer spring.
This quiet sail is as a noiseless wing
To waft me from distraction; once I loved
Torn Ocean's roar, but thy soft murmuring
Sounds sweet as if a Sister's voice reproved,
That I with stern delights should e'er have been so moved.
LXXXVI.
It is the hush of night, and all between
Thy margin and the mountains, dusk, yet clear,
Mellowed and mingling, yet distinctly seen,
Save darkened Jura,[329] whose capt heights appear
Precipitously steep; and drawing near,
There breathes a living fragrance from the shore,
Of flowers yet fresh with childhood; on the ear
Drops the light drip of the suspended oar,
Or chirps the grasshopper one good-night carol more.
LXXXVII.
He is an evening reveller, who makes[jz]
His life an infancy, and sings his fill;[ka][330]
At intervals, some bird from out the brakes
Starts into voice a moment, then is still.
There seems a floating whisper on the hill,
But that is fancy--for the Starlight dews
All silently their tears of Love instil,
Weeping themselves away, till they infuse
Deep into Nature's breast the spirit of her hues.[kb]
LXXXVIII.
Ye Stars! which are the poetry of Heaven!
If in your bright leaves we would read the fate
Of men and empires,--'tis to be forgiven,
That in our aspirations to be great,
Our destinies o'erleap their mortal state,
And claim a kindred with you; for ye are
A Beauty and a Mystery, and create
In us such love and reverence from afar,
That Fortune,--Fame,--Power,--Life, have named themselves a Star.[331]
LXXXIX.
All Heaven and Earth are still--though not in sleep,
But breathless, as we grow when feeling most;[332]
And silent, as we stand in thoughts too deep:--
All Heaven and Earth are still: From the high host
Of stars, to the lulled lake and mountain-coast,
All is concentered in a life intense,
Where not a beam, nor air, nor leaf is lost,
But hath a part of Being, and a sense
Of that which is of all Creator and Defence.[333]
XC.
Then stirs the feeling infinite, so felt[kc]
In solitude, where we are _least_ alone;
A truth, which through our being then doth melt,
And purifies from self: it is a tone,
The soul and source of Music, which makes known[kd]
Eternal harmony, and sheds a charm
Like to the fabled Cytherea's zone,[334]
Binding all things with beauty;--'twould disarm
The spectre Death, had he substantial power to harm.
XCI.
Not vainly did the early Persian make[335]
His altar the high places, and the peak
Of earth-o'ergazing mountains,[19.B.] --and thus take
A fit and unwalled temple, there to seek
The Spirit, in whose honour shrines are weak
Upreared of human hands. Come, and compare
Columns and idol-dwellings--Goth or Greek--
With Nature's realms of worship, earth and air--
Nor fix on fond abodes to circumscribe thy prayer!
XCII.
The sky is changed!--and such a change! Oh Night,[20.B.]
And Storm, and Darkness, ye are wondrous strong,
Yet lovely in your strength, as is the light
Of a dark eye in Woman![336] Far along,
From peak to peak, the rattling crags among
Leaps the live thunder! Not from one lone cloud,
But every mountain now hath found a tongue,
And Jura answers, through her misty shroud,
Back to the joyous Alps, who call to her aloud!
XCIII.
And this is in the Night:--Most glorious Night![ke]
Thou wert not sent for slumber! let me be
A sharer in thy fierce and far delight,--
A portion of the tempest and of thee![kf]
How the lit lake shines, a phosphoric sea,[kg]
And the big rain comes dancing to the earth!
And now again 'tis black,--and now, the glee
Of the loud hills shakes with its mountain-mirth,
As if they did rejoice o'er a young Earthquake's birth.[kh]
XCIV.
Now, where the swift Rhone cleaves his way between
Heights which appear as lovers who have parted[ki][337]
In hate, whose mining depths so intervene,
That they can meet no more, though broken-hearted:
Though in their souls, which thus each other thwarted,
Love was the very root of the fond rage
Which blighted their life's bloom, and then departed:--
Itself expired, but leaving them an age
Of years all winters,--war within themselves to wage:[kj]
XCV.
Now, where the quick Rhone thus hath cleft his way,
The mightiest of the storms hath ta'en his stand:
For here, not one, but many, make their play,
And fling their thunder-bolts from hand to hand,
Flashing and cast around: of all the band,
The brightest through these parted hills hath forked
His lightnings,--as if he did understand,
That in such gaps as Desolation worked,
There the hot shaft should blast whatever therein lurked.
XCVI.
Sky--Mountains--River--Winds--Lake--Lightnings! ye!
With night, and clouds, and thunder--and a Soul
To make these felt and feeling, well may be
Things that have made me watchful; the far roll
Of your departing voices, is the knoll[338]
Of what in me is sleepless,--if I rest.
But where of ye, O Tempests! is the goal?
Are ye like those within the human breast?
Or do ye find, at length, like eagles, some high nest?
XCVII.
Could I embody and unbosom now
That which is most within me,--could I wreak
My thoughts upon expression, and thus throw
Soul--heart--mind--passions--feelings--strong or weak--
All that I would have sought, and all I seek,
Bear, know, feel--and yet breathe--into _one_ word,
And that one word were Lightning, I would speak;
But as it is, I live and die unheard,
With a most voiceless thought, sheathing it as a sword.
XCVIII.
The Morn is up again, the dewy Morn,
With breath all incense, and with cheek all bloom--
Laughing the clouds away with playful scorn,
And living as if earth contained no tomb,--
And glowing into day: we may resume
The march of our existence: and thus I,
Still on thy shores, fair Leman! may find room
And food for meditation, nor pass by
Much, that may give us pause, if pondered fittingly.
XCIX.
Clarens! sweet Clarens[339] birthplace of deep Love!
Thine air is the young breath of passionate Thought;
Thy trees take root in Love; the snows above,[kk]
The very Glaciers have his colours caught,
And Sun-set into rose-hues sees them wrought[21.B.]
By rays which sleep there lovingly: the rocks,[kl]
The permanent crags, tell here of Love, who sought
In them a refuge from the worldly shocks,
Which stir and sting the Soul with Hope that woos, then mocks.
C.
Clarens! by heavenly feet thy paths are trod,--[km]
Undying Love's, who here ascends a throne
To which the steps are mountains; where the God
Is a pervading Life and Light,--so shown[kn]
Not on those summits solely, nor alone
In the still cave and forest; o'er the flower
His eye is sparkling, and his breath hath blown,
His soft and summer breath, whose tender power[ko]
Passes the strength of storms in their most desolate hour.
CI.
All things are here of _Him_; from the black pines,[340]
Which are his shade on high, and the loud roar
Of torrents, where he listeneth, to the vines
Which slope his green path downward to the shore,
Where the bowed Waters meet him, and adore,
Kissing his feet with murmurs; and the Wood,
The covert of old trees, with trunks all hoar,
But light leaves, young as joy, stands where it stood,[kp]
Offering to him, and his, a populous solitude.
CII.
A populous solitude of bees and birds,
And fairy-formed and many-coloured things,
Who worship him with notes more sweet than words,[kq]
And innocently open their glad wings,
Fearless and full of life: the gush of springs,
And fall of lofty fountains, and the bend
Of stirring branches, and the bud which brings
The swiftest thought of Beauty, here extend
Mingling--and made by Love--unto one mighty end.
CIII.
He who hath loved not, here would learn that lore,[341]
And make his heart a spirit; he who knows
That tender mystery, will love the more;
For this is Love's recess, where vain men's woes,
And the world's waste, have driven him far from those,[kr]
For 'tis his nature to advance or die;
He stands not still, but or decays, or grows
Into a boundless blessing, which may vie
With the immortal lights, in its eternity!
CIV.
'Twas not for fiction chose Rousseau this spot,
Peopling it with affections; but he found
It was the scene which Passion must allot
To the Mind's purified beings; 'twas the ground
Where early Love his Psyche's zone unbound,[342]
And hallowed it with loveliness: 'tis lone,
And wonderful, and deep, and hath a sound,
And sense, and sight of sweetness; here the Rhone
Hath spread himself a couch, the Alps have reared a throne.
CV.
Lausanne! and Ferney! ye have been the abodes
Of Names which unto you bequeathed a name;[22.B.]
Mortals, who sought and found, by dangerous roads,
A path to perpetuity of Fame:
They were gigantic minds, and their steep aim
Was, Titan-like, on daring doubts to pile
Thoughts which should call down thunder, and the flame
Of Heaven again assailed--if Heaven, the while,
On man and man's research could deign do more than smile.
CVI.
The one was fire and fickleness,[343] a child
Most mutable in wishes, but in mind
A wit as various,--gay, grave, sage, or wild,--
Historian, bard, philosopher, combined;[ks]
He multiplied himself among mankind,
The Proteus of their talents: But his own
Breathed most in ridicule,--which, as the wind,
Blew where it listed, laying all things prone,--
Now to o'erthrow a fool, and now to shake a throne.[344]
CVII.
The other, deep and slow, exhausting thought,[kt]
And hiving wisdom with each studious year,
In meditation dwelt--with learning wrought,
And shaped his weapon with an edge severe,
Sapping a solemn creed with solemn sneer;
The lord of irony,--that master-spell,
Which stung his foes to wrath, which grew from fear[ku][345]
And doomed him to the zealot's ready Hell,
Which answers to all doubts so eloquently well.
CVIII.
Yet, peace be with their ashes,--for by them,
If merited, the penalty is paid;
It is not ours to judge,--far less condemn;
The hour must come when such things shall be made
Known unto all,--or hope and dread allayed
By slumber, on one pillow, in the dust,[kv]
Which, thus much we are sure, must lie decayed;
And when it shall revive, as is our trust,[346]
'Twill be to be forgiven--or suffer what is just.
CIX.
But let me quit Man's works, again to read
His Maker's, spread around me, and suspend
This page, which from my reveries I feed,
Until it seems prolonging without end.
The clouds above me to the white Alps tend,
And I must pierce them, and survey whate'er[347]
May be permitted, as my steps I bend
To their most great and growing region, where
The earth to her embrace compels the powers of air.
CX.
Italia too! Italia! looking on thee,
Full flashes on the Soul the light of ages,
Since the fierce Carthaginian almost won thee,
To the last halo of the Chiefs and Sages
Who glorify thy consecrated pages;
Thou wert the throne and grave of empires; still,[348]
The fount at which the panting Mind assuages
Her thirst of knowledge, quaffing there her fill,
Flows from the eternal source of Rome's imperial hill.
CXI.
Thus far have I proceeded in a theme
Renewed with no kind auspices:--to feel
We are not what we have been, and to deem
We are not what we should be,--and to steel
The heart against itself; and to conceal,
With a proud caution, love, or hate, or aught,--
Passion or feeling, purpose, grief, or zeal,--
Which is the tyrant Spirit of our thought,
Is a stern task of soul:--No matter,--it is taught.[349]
CXII.
And for these words, thus woven into song,
It may be that they are a harmless wile,--[kw]
The colouring of the scenes which fleet along,[kx]
Which I would seize, in passing, to beguile
My breast, or that of others, for a while.
Fame is the thirst of youth,--but I am not[ky]
So young as to regard men's frown or smile,
As loss or guerdon of a glorious lot;--
I stood and stand alone,--remembered or forgot.
CXIII.
I have not loved the World, nor the World me;
I have not flattered its rank breath,[350] nor bowed
To its idolatries a patient knee,
Nor coined my cheek to smiles,--nor cried aloud
In worship of an echo: in the crowd
They could not deem me one of such--I stood
Among them, but not of them[351]--in a shroud
Of thoughts which were not their thoughts, and still could,
Had I not filed my mind, which thus itself subdued.[23.B.]
CXIV.
I have not loved the World, nor the World me,--
But let us part fair foes; I do believe,
Though I have found them not, that there may be
Words which are things,--hopes which will not deceive,
And Virtues which are merciful, nor weave
Snares for the failing; I would also deem
O'er others' griefs that some sincerely grieve--[kz][24.B.]
That two, or one, are almost what they seem,--
That Goodness is no name--and Happiness no dream.
CXV.[352]
My daughter! with thy name this song begun!
My daughter! with thy name thus much shall end!--
I see thee not--I hear thee not--but none
Can be so wrapt in thee; Thou art the Friend
To whom the shadows of far years extend:
Albeit my brow thou never should'st behold,
My voice shall with thy future visions blend,
And reach into thy heart,--when mine is cold,--
A token and a tone, even from thy father's mould.
CXVI.
To aid thy mind's developement,--to watch
Thy dawn of little joys,--to sit and see
Almost thy very growth,--to view thee catch
Knowledge of objects,--wonders yet to thee!
To hold thee lightly on a gentle knee,
And print on thy soft cheek a parent's kiss,--
This, it should seem, was not reserved for me--
Yet this was in my nature:--as it is,
I know not what is there, yet something like to this.
CXVII.
Yet, though dull Hate as duty should be taught,[353]
I know that thou wilt love me: though my name
Should be shut from thee, as a spell still fraught
With desolation, and a broken claim:
Though the grave closed between us,--'twere the same,
I know that thou wilt love me--though to drain[354]
_My_ blood from out thy being were an aim,
And an attainment,--all would be in vain,--
Still thou would'st love me, still that more than life retain.
CXVIII.
The child of Love![355] though born in bitterness,
And nurtured in Convulsion! Of thy sire
These were the elements,--and thine no less.
As yet such are around thee,--but thy fire
Shall be more tempered, and thy hope far higher!
Sweet be thy cradled slumbers! O'er the sea
And from the mountains where I now respire,
Fain would I waft such blessing upon thee,
As--with a sigh--I deem thou might'st have been to me![la]
FOOTNOTES:
[275] {209} [D'Alembert (Jean-le-Rond, philosopher, mathematician, and
belletrist, 1717-1783) had recently lost his friend, Mlle. (Claire
Francoise) L'Espinasse, who died May 23, 1776. Frederick prescribes
_quelque probleme bien difficile a resoudre_ as a remedy for vain
regrets (_Oeuvres de Frederic II., Roi de Prusse_, 1790, xiv. 64, 65).]
[276] {215} ["If you turn over the earlier pages of the Huntingdon
peerage story, you will see how common a name Ada was in the early
Plantagenet days. I found it in my own pedigree in the reigns of John
and Henry.... It is short, ancient, vocalic, and had been in my family;
for which reasons I gave it to my daughter."--Letter to Murray, Ravenna,
October 8, 1820.
The Honourable Augusta Ada Byron was born December 10, 1815; was married
July 8, 1835, to William King Noel (1805-1893), eighth Baron King,
created Earl of Lovelace, 1838; and died November 27, 1852. There were
three children of the marriage--Viscount Ockham (d. 1862), the present
Earl of Lovelace, and the Lady Anna Isabella Noel, who was married to
Wilfrid Scawen Blunt, Esq., in 1869.
"The Countess of Lovelace," wrote a contributor to the _Examiner_,
December 4, 1852, "was thoroughly original, and the poet's temperament
was all that was hers in common with her father. Her genius, for genius
she possessed, was not poetic, but metaphysical and mathematical, her
mind having been in the constant practice of investigation, and with
rigour and exactness." Of her devotion to science, and her original
powers as a mathematician, her translation and explanatory notes of F.
L. Menabrea's _Notices sur le machine Analytique de Mr. Babbage_, 1842,
a defence of the famous "calculating machine," remain as evidence.
"Those who view mathematical science not merely as a vast body of
abstract and immutable truths, ... but as possessing a yet deeper
interest for the human race, when it is remembered that this science
constitutes the language through which alone we can adequately express
the great facts of the natural world ... those who thus think on
mathematical truth as the instrument through which the weak mind of man
can most effectually read his Creator's works, will regard with especial
interest all that can tend to facilitate the translation of its
principles into explicit practical forms." So, for the moment turning
away from algebraic formulae and abstruse calculations, wrote Ada, Lady
Lovelace, in her twenty-eighth year. See "Translator's Notes," signed A.
A. L., to _A Sketch of the Analytical Engine invented by Charles
Babbage, Esq._, London, 1843.
It would seem, however, that she "wore her learning lightly as a
flower." "Her manners [_Examiner_], her tastes, her accomplishments, in
many of which, music especially, she was proficient, were feminine in
the nicest sense of the word." Unlike her father in features, or in the
bent of her mind, she inherited his mental vigour and intensity of
purpose. Like him, she died in her thirty-seventh year, and at her own
request her coffin was placed by his in the vault at Hucknall Torkard.
(See, too, _Athenaeum_, December 4, 1852, and _Gent. Mag._, January,
1853.)]
[gh] {216} _could grieve my gazing eye._--[C. erased.]
[277] Compare _Henry V._, act iii. sc. 1, line 1--"Once more unto the
breach, dear friends, once more."
[278] {217} [Compare _The Two Noble Kinsmen_ (now attributed to
Shakespeare, Fletcher, and Massinger), act ii. sc. 1, lines 73, _seq._--
"Oh, never
Shall we two exercise like twins of Honour
Our arms again, and feel our fiery horses
Like proud seas under us."
"Out of this somewhat forced simile," says the editor (John Wright) of
Lord Byron's _Poetical Works_, issued in 1832, "by a judicious
transposition of the comparison, and by the substitution of the more
definite _waves_ for _seas_, Lord Byron's clear and noble thought has
been produced." But the literary artifice, if such there be, is
subordinate to the emotion of the writer. It is in movement, progress,
flight, that the sufferer experiences a relief from the poignancy of his
anguish.]
[gi] _And the rent canvass tattering_----.--[C.]
[279] ["The metaphor is derived from a torrent-bed, which, when dried
up, serves for a sandy or shingly path."--Note by H. F. Tozer, _Childe
Harold_, 1885, p. 257. Or, perhaps, the imagery has been suggested by
the action of a flood, which ploughs a channel for itself through
fruitful soil, and, when the waters are spent, leaves behind it "a
sterile track," which does, indeed, permit the traveller to survey the
desolation, but serves no other purpose of use or beauty.]
[gj] {218} _I would essay of all I sang to sing_.--[MS.]
[280] [Compare Manfred, act ii. sc. 1, lines 51, 52--
"Think'st thou existence doth depend on time?
It doth; but actions are our epoch."]
[gk] {219} _Still unimpaired though worn_----.--[MS. erased.]
[281] [It is the poet's fond belief that he can find the true reality in
"the things that are not seen."
"Out of these create he can
Forms more real than living man--
Nurslings of Immortality."
"Life is but thought," and by the power of the imagination he thinks to
"gain a being more intense," to add a cubit to his spiritual stature.
Byron professes the same faith in _The Dream_ (stanza i. lines 19-22),
which also belongs to the summer of 1816--
"The mind can make
Substance, and people planets of its own
With beings brighter than have been, and give
A breath to forms which can outlive all flesh."
At this stage of his poetic growth, in part converted by Shelley, in
part by Wordsworth as preached by Shelley, Byron, so to speak, "got
religion," went over for a while to the Church of the mystics. There
was, too, a compulsion from within. Life had gone wrong with him, and,
driven from memory and reflection, he looks for redemption in the new
earth which Imagination and Nature held in store.]
[gl]
_A brighter being that we thus endow_
_With form our fancies_----.--[MS.]
[gm] {220} _A dizzy world_----.--[MS. erased.]
[282] [Compare _The Dream_, viii. 6, _seq_.--
"Pain was mixed
In all which was served up to him, until
* * * * *
He fed on poisons, and they had no power,
But were a kind of nutriment."]
[gn] _To bear unbent what Time cannot abate_.--[MS.]
[283] [Of himself as distinct from Harold he will say no more. On the
tale or spell of his own tragedy is set the seal of silence; but of
Harold, the idealized Byron, he once more takes up the parable. In
stanzas viii.-xv. he puts the reader in possession of some natural
changes, and unfolds the development of thought and feeling which had
befallen the Pilgrim since last they had journeyed together. The
youthful Harold had sounded the depth of joy and woe. Man delighted him
not--no, nor woman neither. For a time, however, he had cured himself of
this trick of sadness. He had drunk new life from the fountain of
natural beauty and antique lore, and had returned to take his part in
the world, inly armed against dangers and temptations. And in the world
he had found beauty, and fame had found him. What wonder that he had
done as others use, and then discovered that he could not fare as others
fared? Henceforth there remained no comfort but in nature, no refuge but
in exile!]
[go] {221}
_He of the breast that strove no more to feel,_
_Scarred with the wounds_----.--[MS.]
[gp] {222} _Secure in curbing coldness_----.--[MS.]
[gq] _Shines through the wonder-works--of God and Nature's hand_.--[MS.]
[gr]
_Who can behold the flower at noon, nor seek_
_To pluck it? who can stedfastly behold_.--[MS.]
[gs] _Nor feel how Wisdom ceases to be cold_.--[MS. erased.]
[284] [The Temple of Fame is on the summit of a mountain; "Clouds
overcome it;" but to the uplifted eye the mists dispel, and behold the
goddess pointing to her star--the star of glory!]
[gt] {223} _Yet with a steadier step than in his earlier time_.--[MS.
erased.]
[285] [Compare _Manfred_, act ii. sc. 2, lines 50-58--
"From my youth upwards
My spirit walked not with the souls of men,
Nor looked upon the earth with human eyes;
* * * * *
My joys, my griefs, my passions, and my powers
Made me a stranger; though I wore the form,
I had no sympathy with breathing flesh."
Compare, too, with stanzas xiii., xiv., _ibid_., lines 58-72.]
[gu] _Fool he not to know_.--[MS. erased.]
[gv]
_Where there were mountains there for him were friends_.
_Where there was Ocean--there he was at home_.--[MS.]
[gw] {224}
_Like the Chaldean he could gaze on stars_.--[MS.]
----_adored the stars_.--[MS. erased.]
[gx] _That keeps us from that Heaven on which we love to think_.--[MS.]
[gy]
_But in Man's dwelling--Harold was a thing_
_Restless and worn, and cold and wearisome_.--[MS.]
[286] {225} [In this stanza the mask is thrown aside, and "the real Lord
Byron" appears _in propria persona_.]
[287] [The mound with the Belgian lion was erected by William I. of
Holland, in 1823.]
[gz] {226} _None; but the moral truth tells simpler so_.--[MS.]
[288] [Stanzas xvii., xviii., were written after a visit to Waterloo.
When Byron was in Brussels, a friend of his boyhood, Pryse Lockhart
Gordon, called upon him and offered his services. He escorted him to the
field of Waterloo, and received him at his house in the evening. Mrs.
Gordon produced her album, and begged for an autograph. The next morning
Byron copied into the album the two stanzas which he had written the day
before. Lines 5-8 of the second stanza (xviii.) ran thus--
"Here his last flight the haughty Eagle flew,
Then tore with bloody beak the fatal plain,
Pierced with the shafts of banded nations through ..."
The autograph suggested an illustration to an artist, R. R. Reinagle
(1775-1863), "a pencil-sketch of a spirited chained eagle, grasping the
earth with his talons." Gordon showed the vignette to Byron, who wrote
in reply, "Reinagle is a better poet and a better ornithologist than I
am; eagles and all birds of prey attack with their talons and not with
their beaks, and I have altered the line thus--
"'Then tore with bloody talon the rent plain.'"
(See _Personal Memoirs of Pryse Lockhart Gordon_, 1830, ii. 327, 328.)]
[ha] ----_and still must be_.--[MS.]
[hb] ----_the fatal Waterloo_.--[MS.]
[hc]
_Here his last flight the haughty eagle flew_.--[MS.]
_Then bit with bloody beak the rent plain_.--[MS. erased.]
_Then tore with bloody beak_----.--[MS.]
[hd] {227} _And Gaul must wear the links of her own broken
chain_.--[MS.]
[289] [With this "obstinate questioning" of the final import and outcome
of "that world-famous Waterloo," compare the _Ode from the French_, "We
do not curse thee, Waterloo," written in 1815, and published by John
Murray in _Poems_ (1816). Compare, too, _The Age of Waterloo_, v. 93,
"Oh, bloody and most bootless Waterloo!" and _Don Juan_, Canto VIII.
stanzas xlviii.-l., etc. Shelley, too, in his sonnet on the _Feelings of
a Republican on the Fall of Bonaparte_ (1816), utters a like lament
(Shelley's _Works_, 1895, ii. 385)--
"I know
Too late, since thou and France are in the dust,
That Virtue owns a more eternal foe
Than Force or Fraud: old Custom, legal Crime,
And bloody Faith, the foulest birth of Time."
Even Wordsworth, after due celebration of this "victory sublime," in his
sonnet _Emperors and Kings, etc._ (_Works_, 1889, p. 557), solemnly
admonishes the "powers"--
"Be just, be grateful; nor, the oppressor's creed
Reviving heavier chastisement deserve
Than ever forced unpitied hearts to bleed."
But the Laureate had no misgivings, and in _The Poet's Pilgrimage_, iv.
60, celebrates the national apotheosis--
"Peace hath she won ... with her victorious hand
Hath won thro' rightful war auspicious peace;
Nor this alone, but that in every land
The withering rule of violence may cease.
Was ever War with such blest victory crowned!
Did ever Victory with such fruits abound!"]
[he] {228} _Or league to teach their kings_----.--[MS.]
[290] [The most vivid and the best authenticated account of the Duchess
of Richmond's ball, which took place June 15, the eve of the Battle of
Quatrebras, in the duke's house in the Rue de la Blanchisserie, is to be
found in Lady de Ros's (Lady Georgiana Lennox) _Personal Recollections
of the Great Duke of Wellington_, which appeared first in _Murray's
Magazine_, January and February, 1889, and were republished as _A Sketch
of the Life of Georgiana, Lady de Ros_, by her daughter, the Hon. Mrs.
J. R. Swinton (John Murray, 1893). "My mother's now famous ball," writes
Lady de Ros (_A Sketch, etc._, pp. 122, 123), "took place in a large
room on the ground-floor on the left of the entrance, connected with the
rest of the house by an ante-room. It had been used by the coachbuilder,
from whom the house was hired, to put carriages in, but it was papered
before we came there; and I recollect the paper--a trellis pattern with
roses.... When the duke arrived, rather late, at the ball, I was
dancing, but at once went up to him to ask about the rumours. 'Yes, they
are true; we are off to-morrow.' This terrible news was circulated
directly, and while some of the officers hurried away, others remained
at the ball, and actually had not time to change their clothes, but
fought in evening costume."]
[hf] {229}
_The lamps shone on lovely dames and gallant men_.--[MS.]
_The lamps shone on ladies_----.--[MS. erased.]
[hg] {230} _With a slow deep and dread-inspiring roar_.--[MS. erased.]
[hh]
_Arm! arm, and out! it is the opening cannon's roar_.--[MS.]
_Arm--arm--and out--it is--the cannon's opening roar_.--[C.]
[291] [Frederick William, Duke of Brunswick (1771-1815), brother to
Caroline, Princess of Wales, and nephew of George III., fighting at
Quatrebras in the front of the line, "fell almost in the beginning of
the battle." His father, Charles William Ferdinand, born 1735, the
author of the fatal manifesto against the army of the French Republic
(July 15, 1792), was killed at Auerbach, October 14, 1806. In the plan
of the Duke of Richmond's house, which Lady de Ros published in her
_Recollections_, the actual spot is marked (the door of the ante-room
leading to the ball-room) where Lady Georgiana Lennox took leave of the
Duke of Brunswick. "It was a dreadful evening," she writes, "taking
leave of friends and acquaintances, many never to be seen again. The
Duke of Brunswick, as he took leave of me ... made me a civil speech as
to the Brunswickers being sure to distinguish themselves after 'the
honour' done them by my having accompanied the Duke of Wellington to
their review! I remember being quite provoked with poor Lord Hay, a
dashing, merry youth, full of military ardour, whom I knew very well,
for his delight at the idea of going into action ... and the first news
we had on the 16th was that he and the Duke of Brunswick were
killed."--_A Sketch, etc._, pp. 132, 133.]
[hi] {231}
_His heart replying knew that sound too well_.--[MS.]
_And the hoped vengeance for a Sire so dear_
_As him who died on Jena--whom so well_
_His filial heart had mourned through many a year_
_Roused him to valiant fury nought could quell_.--[MS. erased.]
[hj] ----_tremors of distress_.--[MS.]
[hk]
----_which did press_
_Like death upon young hearts_----.--[MS.]
[hl] _Oh that on night so soft, such heavy morn should rise_.--[MS.]
[hm] {232}
_And wakening citizens with terror dumb_
_Or whispering with pale lips--"The foe--They come, they come."_--[MS.]
_Or whispering with pale lips--"The Desolation's come."_--[MS. erased.]
[hn]
_And Soignies waves above them_----.--[MS.]
_And Ardennes_----.--[C.]
[292] {233} [_Vide ante, English Bards, etc._, line 726, note: _Poetical
Works_, 1898, i. 354.]
[ho] _But chiefly_----.--[MS.]
[293] {234} [The Hon. Frederick Howard (1785-1815), third son of
Frederick, fifth Earl of Carlisle, fell late in the evening of the 18th
of June, in a final charge of the left square of the French Guard, in
which Vivian brought up Howard's hussars against the French. Neither
French infantry nor cavalry gave way, and as the Hanoverians fired but
did not charge, a desperate combat ensued, in which Howard fell and many
of the 10th were killed.--_Waterloo: The Downfall of the First
Napoleon_, G. Hooper, 1861, p. 236.
Southey, who had visited the field of Waterloo, September, 1815, in his
_Poet's Pilgrimage_ (iii. 49), dedicates a pedestrian stanza to his
memory--
"Here from the heaps who strewed the fatal plain
Was Howard's corse by faithful hands conveyed;
And not to be confounded with the slain,
Here in a grave apart with reverence laid,
Till hence his honoured relics o'er the seas
Were borne to England, where they rest in peace."]
[294] [Autumn had been beforehand with spring in the work of renovation.
"Yet Nature everywhere resumed her course;
Low pansies to the sun their purple gave,
And the soft poppy blossomed on the grave."
_Poet's Pilgrimage_, iii. 36.
But the contrast between the continuous action of nature and the doom of
the unreturning dead, which does not greatly concern Southey, fills
Byron with a fierce desire to sum the price of victory. He flings in the
face of the vain-glorious mourners the bitter reality of their abiding
loss. It was this prophetic note, "the voice of one crying in the
wilderness," which sounded in and through Byron's rhetoric to the men of
his own generation.]
[hp] {235} _And dead within behold the Spring return_.--[MS. erased.]
[hq] {236} _It still is day though clouds keep out the Sun_.--[MS.]
[295] [So, too, Coleridge. "Have you never seen a stick broken in the
middle, and yet cohering by the rind? The fibres, half of them actually
broken and the rest sprained, and, though tough, unsustaining? Oh, many,
many are the broken-hearted for those who know what the moral and
practical heart of the man is."--_Anima Poetae_, 1895, p. 303.]
[296] [According to Lady Blessington (_Conversations_, p. 176), Byron
maintained that the image of the broken mirror had in some mysterious
way been suggested by the following quatrain which Curran had once
repeated to him:--
"While memory, with more than Egypt's art
Embalming all the sorrows of the heart,
Sits at the altar which she raised to woe,
And finds the scene whence tears eternal flow."
But, as M. Darmesteter points out, the true source of inspiration was a
passage in Burton's _Anatomy of Melancholy_--"the book," as Byron
maintained, "in my opinion most useful to a man who wishes to acquire
the reputation of being well-read with the least trouble" (_Life_, p.
48). Burton is discoursing on injury and long-suffering. "'Tis a Hydra's
head contention; the more they strive, the more they may; and as
Praxiteles did by his glass [see Cardan, _De Consolatione_, lib. iii.],
when he saw a scurvy face in it, break it in pieces; but for the one he
saw, he saw many more as bad in a moment; for one injury done, they
provoke another _cum fanore_, and twenty enemies for one."--_Anatomy of
Melancholy_, 1893, ii. 228. Compare, too, Carew's poem, _The Spark_,
lines 23-26--
"And as a looking-glass, from the aspect,
Whilst it is whole doth but one face reflect,
But being crack'd or broken, there are shewn
Many half-faces, which at first were one.
Anderson's _British Poets_, 1793, iii. 703.]
[hr] {237} _But not his pleasure--such might be a task_.--[MS. erased.]
[297] [The "tale" or reckoning of the Psalmist, the span of threescore
years and ten, is contrasted with the tale or reckoning of the age of
those who fell at Waterloo. A "fleeting span" the Psalmist's; but,
reckoning by Waterloo, "more than enough." Waterloo grudges even what
the Psalmist allows.]
[hs] {238}
_Here where the sword united Europe drew_
_I had a kinsman warring on that day_.--[MS.]
[ht] _On little thoughts with equal firmness fixed._--[MS.]
[hu]
_For thou hast risen as fallen--even now thou seek'st_
_An hour_----.--[MS.]
[298] [Byron seems to have been unable to make up his mind about
Napoleon. "It is impossible not to be dazzled and overwhelmed by his
character and career," he wrote to Moore (March 17, 1815), when his
Heros de Roman, as he called him, had broken open his "captive's cage"
and was making victorious progress to the capital. In the _Ode to
Napoleon Buonaparte_, which was written in April, 1814, after the first
abdication at Fontainebleau, the dominant note is astonishment mingled
with contempt. It is the lamentation over a fallen idol. In these
stanzas (xxxvi.-xlv.) he bears witness to the man's essential greatness,
and, with manifest reference to his own personality and career,
attributes his final downfall to the peculiar constitution of his genius
and temper. A year later (1817), in the Fourth Canto (stanzas
lxxxix.-xcii.), he passes a severe sentence. Napoleon's greatness is
swallowed up in weakness. He is a "kind of bastard Caesar,"
self-vanquished, the creature and victim of vanity. Finally, in The Age
of Bronze, sections iii.-vi., there is a reversion to the same theme,
the tragic irony of the rise and fall of the "king of kings, and yet of
slaves the slave."
As a schoolboy at Harrow, Byron fought for the preservation of
Napoleon's bust, and he was ever ready, in defiance of national feeling
and national prejudice, to celebrate him as "the glorious chief;" but
when it came to the point, he did not "want him here," victorious over
England, and he could not fail to see, with insight quickened by
self-knowledge, that greatness and genius possess no charm against
littleness and commonness, and that the "glory of the terrestrial" meets
with its own reward. The moral is obvious, and as old as history; but
herein lay the secret of Byron's potency, that he could remint and issue
in fresh splendour the familiar coinage of the world's wit. Moreover, he
lived in a great age, when great truths are born again, and appear in a
new light.]
[299] [The stanza was written while Napoleon was still under the
guardianship of Admiral Sir George Cockburn, and before Sir Hudson Lowe
had landed at St. Helena; but complaints were made from the first that
imperial honours which were paid to him by his own suite were not
accorded by the British authorities.]
[hv] {239}
----_and thy dark name_
_Was ne'er more rife within men's mouths than now_.--[MS.]
[hw] _Who tossed thee to and fro till_----.--[MS. erased.]
[hx] _Which be it wisdom, weakness_----.--[MS.]
[hy]
_To watch thee shrinking calmly hadst thou smiled._--[MS.]
_With a sedate tho' not unfeeling eye._--[MS. erased.]
[hz] {241}
_Greater than in thy fortunes; for in them_
_Ambition lured thee on too far to show_
_That true habitual scorn_----.--[MS.]
[ia] {242} _Feeds on itself and all things_----.--[MS.]
[ib]
_Which stir too deeply_----[MS.]
_Which stir the blood too boiling in its springs_.--[MS. erased.]
[ic] {243} ----_they rave overcast_.--[MS.]
[id] ----_the hate of all below_.--[MS.]
[ie] ----_on his single head_.--[MS.]
[if] ----_the wise man's World will be_.--[MS.]
[ig] ----_for what teems like thee_.--[MS.]
[ih] {244} _From gray and ghastly walls--where Ruin kindly
dwells_.--[MS.]
[300] [For the archaic use of "battles" for "battalions," compare
_Macbeth_, act v. sc. 4, line 4; and Scott's _Lord of the Isles_,
vi. 10--
"In battles four beneath their eye,
The forces of King Robert lie."]
[ii] ----_are shredless tatters now_.--[MS.]
[ij] {245}
_What want these outlaws that a king should have_
_But History's vain page_----.--[MS.]
[ik] ----_their hearts were far more brave_.--[MS.]
[301] [The most usual device is a bleeding heart.]
[il]
_Nor mar it frequent with an impious show_
_Of arms or angry conflict_----.--[MS.]
[302] {246} [Compare Moore's lines, _The Meeting of the Waters_--
"There is not in the wide world a valley so sweet
As that vale in whose bosom the wide waters meet."]
[im]
_Earth's dreams of Heaven--and such to seem to me_
_But one thing wants thy stream_----.--[MS.]
[303] [Compare Lucan's _Pharsalia_, ix. 969, "Etiam periere ruinae;" and
the lines from Tasso's _Gerusalemme Liberata_, xv. 20, quoted in
illustration of Canto II. stanza liii.]
[in]
_Glassed with its wonted light, the sunny ray;_
_But o'er the mind's marred thoughts--though but a dream_.--[MS.]
[io] {247} _Repose itself on kindness_----[MS.]
[304] [Two lyrics, entitled _Stanzas to Augusta_, and the _Epistle to
Augusta_, which were included in _Domestic Pieces_, published in 1816,
are dedicated to the same subject--the devotion and faithfulness of his
sister.]
[ip] {248} _But there was one_----.--[MS.]
[iq] _Yet was it pure_----.--[MS.]
[305] [It has been supposed that there is a reference in this passage,
and again in _Stanzas to Augusta_ (dated July 24, 1816), to "the only
important calumny"--to quote Shelley's letter of September 29,
1816--"that was even ever advanced" against Byron. "The poems to
Augusta," remarks Elze (_Life of Lord Byron_, p. 174), "prove, further,
that she too was cognizant of the calumnious accusations; for under no
other supposition is it possible to understand their allusions." But the
mere fact that Mrs. Leigh remained on terms of intimacy and affection
with her brother, when he was under the ban of society, would expose her
to slander and injurious comment, "peril dreaded most in female eyes;"
whereas to other calumnies, if such there were, there could be no other
reference but silence, or an ecstasy of wrath and indignation.]
[ir]
_Thus to that heart did his its thoughts in absence pour_.--[MS.]
----_its absent feelings pour_.--[MS. erased.]
[306] {249} [Written on the Rhine bank, May 11, 1816.--MS. M.]
[is] {251} _A sigh for Marceau_----.--[MS.]
[307] [Marceau (_vide post_, note 2, p. 296) took part in crushing the
Vendean insurrection. If, as General Hoche asserts in his memoirs, six
hundred thousand fell in Vendee, Freedom's charter was not easily
overstepped.]
[308] {252} [Compare Gray's lines in _The Fatal Sisters_--
"Iron-sleet of arrowy shower
Hurtles in the darken'd air."]
[it] _And could the sleepless vultures_----.--[MS.]
[iu] _Rustic not rude, sublime yet not austere_.--[MS.]
[309] [Lines 8 and 9 may be cited as a crying instance of Byron's faulty
technique. The collocation of "awful" with "austere," followed by
"autumn" in the next line, recalls the afflictive assonance of "high
Hymettus," which occurs in the beautiful passage which he stole from
_The Curse of Minerva_ and prefixed to the third canto of _The Corsair_.
The sense of the passage is that, as in autumn, the golden mean between
summer and winter, the year is at its full, so in the varied scenery of
the Rhine there is a harmony of opposites, a consummation of beauty.]
[iv] {253}
_More mighty scenes may rise--more glaring shine_
_But none unite in one enchanted gaze_
_The fertile--fair--and soft--the glories of old days_.--[MS.]
[310] [The "negligently grand" may, perhaps, refer to the glories of old
days, now in a state of neglect, not to the unstudied grandeur of the
scene taken as a whole; but the phrase is loosely thrown out in order to
convey a general impression, "an attaching maze," an engaging attractive
combination of images, and must not be interrogated too closely.]
[iw] {254}
_Around in chrystal grandeur to where falls_
_The avalanche--the thunder-clouds of snow_.--[MS.]
[311] [Compare the opening lines of Coleridge's _Hymn before Sunrise in
the Valley of Chamouni_--
"Hast thou a charm to stay the morning star
In his steep course? So long he seems to pause
On thy bald awful head, O sovran Blanc!"
The "thunderbolt" (line 6) recurs in _Manfred_, act i. sc. 1--
"Around his waist are forests braced,
The Avalanche in his hand;
But ere its fall, that thundering ball
Must pause for my command."]
[312] {255} [The inscription on the ossuary of the Burgundian troops
which fell in the battle of Morat, June 14, 1476, suggested this variant
of _Si monumentum quaeris_--
"Deo Optimo Maximo.
Inclytissimi et fortissimi Burgundiae ducis exercitus, Moratum
obsidens, ab Helvetiis caesus, hoc sui monumentum reliquit."]
[ix] _Unsepulchred they roam, and shriek_----[MS.]
[313] [The souls of the suitors when Hermes "roused and shepherded them
followed gibbering" ([Greek: tri/zousai]).--_Od._, xxiv. 5. Once, too,
when the observance of the _dies Parentales_ was neglected, Roman ghosts
took to wandering and shrieking.
"Perque vias Urbis, Latiosque ululasse per agros
Deformes animas, vulgus inane ferunt."
Ovid, _Fasti_, ii. lines 553, 554.
The Homeric ghosts gibbered because they were ghosts; the Burgundian
ghosts because they were confined to the Stygian coast, and could not
cross the stream. For once the "classical allusions" are forced and
inappropriate.]
[314] [Byron's point is that at Morat 15,000 men were slain in a
righteous cause--the defence of a republic against an invading tyrant;
whereas the lives of those that fell at Cannae and at Waterloo were
sacrificed to the ambition of rival powers fighting for the mastery.]
[iy] {255}
----_their proud land_
_Groan'd not beneath_----.--[MS.]
[iz] {257} _And thus she died_----.--[MS.]
[ja] _And they lie simply_----.--[MS. erased.]
[jb] _The dear depths yield_----.--[MS.]
[315] ["Haunted and hunted by the British tourist and gossip-monger,
Byron took refuge, on June 10, at the Villa Diodati; but still the
pursuers strove to win some wretched consolation by waylaying him in his
evening drives, or directing the telescope upon his balcony, which
overlooked the lake, or upon the hillside, with its vineyards, where he
lurked obscure" (Dowden's _Life of Shelley_, 1896, p. 309). It is
possible, too, that now and again even Shelley's companionship was felt
to be a strain upon nerves and temper. The escape from memory and
remorse, which could not be always attained in the society of a chosen
few, might, he hoped, be found in solitude, face to face with nature.
But it was not to be. Even nature was powerless to "minister to a mind
diseased." At the conclusion of his second tour (September 29, 1816), he
is constrained to admit that "neither the music of the shepherd, the
crashing of the avalanche, nor the torrent, the mountain, the glacier,
the forest, nor the cloud, have for one moment lightened the weight upon
my heart, nor enabled me to lose my own wretched identity in the
majesty, and the power, and the glory, around, above, and beneath me"
(_Life_, p. 315). Perhaps Wordsworth had this confession in his mind
when, in 1834, he composed the lines, "Not in the Lucid Intervals of
Life," of which the following were, he notes, "written with Lord Byron's
character as a past before me, and that of others, his contemporaries,
who wrote under like influences:"--
"Nor do words,
Which practised talent readily affords,
Prove that his hand has touched responsive chords
Nor has his gentle beauty power to move
With genuine rapture and with fervent love
The soul of Genius, if he dare to take
Life's rule from passion craved for passion's sake;
Untaught that meekness is the cherished bent
Of all the truly great and all the innocent.
But who is innocent? By grace divine,
Not otherwise, O Nature! are we thine,
Through good and evil there, in just degree
Of rational and manly sympathy."
_The Works of W. Wordsworth_, 1889, p. 729.
Wordsworth seems to have resented Byron's tardy conversion to "natural
piety," regarding it, no doubt, as a fruitless and graceless endeavour
without the cross to wear the crown. But if Nature reserves her balms
for "the innocent," her quality of inspiration is not "strained." Byron,
too, was nature's priest--
"And by that vision splendid
Was on his way attended."]
[jc] {259} _In its own deepness_----[MS.]
[316] [The metaphor is derived from a hot spring which appears to boil
over at the moment of its coming to the surface. As the particles of
water, when they emerge into the light, break and bubble into a seething
mass; so, too, does passion chase and beget passion in the "hot throng"
of general interests and individual desires.]
[jd] _One of a worthless world--to strive where none are strong._--[MS.]
[317] [The thought which underlies the whole of this passage is that man
is the creature and thrall of fate. In society, in the world, he is
exposed to the incidence of passion, which he can neither resist nor
yield to without torture. He is overcome by the world, and, as a last
resource, he turns to nature and solitude. He lifts up his eyes to the
hills, unexpectant of Divine aid, but in the hope that, by claiming
kinship with Nature, and becoming "a portion of that around" him, he may
forego humanity, with its burden of penitence, and elude the curse.
There is a further reference to this despairing recourse to Nature in
_The Dream_, viii. 10, _seq_.--
" ... he lived
Through that which had been death to many men,
And made him friends of mountains: with the stars
And the quick Spirit of the Universe
He held his dialogues! and they did teach
To him the magic of their mysteries."]
[je] {260} ----_through Eternity._--[MS.]
[318] [Shelley seems to have taken Byron at his word, and in the
_Adonais_ (xxx. 3, _seq._) introduces him in the disguise of--
"The Pilgrim of Eternity, whose fame
Over his living head like Heaven is bent,
An early but enduring monument."
Notwithstanding the splendour of Shelley's verse, it is difficult to
suppress a smile. For better or for worse, the sense of the ludicrous
has asserted itself, and "brother" cannot take "brother" quite so
seriously as in "the brave days of old." But to each age its own humour.
Not only did Shelley and Byron worship at the shrine of Rousseau, but
they took delight in reverently tracing the footsteps of St. Preux and
Julie.]
[319] {261} [The name "Tigris" is derived from the Persian _tir_
(Sanscrit _Tigra_), "an arrow." If Byron ever consulted Hofmann's
_Lexicon Universale_, he would have read, "_Tigris_, a velocitate dictus
quasi _sagitta_;" but most probably he neither had nor sought an
authority for his natural and beautiful simile.]
[jf] _To its young cries and kisses all awake._--[MS.]
[320] [Compare _Tintern Abbey_. In this line, both language and
sentiment are undoubtedly Wordsworth's--
"The sounding cataract
Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock,
The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood,
Their colours, and their forms, were then to me
An appetite, a _feeling_, and a love,
That had no need of a remoter charm."
But here the resemblance ends. With Wordsworth the mood passed, and he
learned
"To look on Nature, not as in the hour
Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes
The still, sad music of humanity,
Not harsh nor grating, but of amplest power
To chasten and subdue."
He would not question Nature in search of new and untainted pleasure,
but rests in her as inclusive of humanity. The secret of Wordsworth is
acquiescence; "the still, sad music of humanity" is the key-note of his
ethic. Byron, on the other hand, is in revolt. He has the ardour of a
pervert, the rancorous scorn of a deserter. The "hum of human cities" is
a "torture." He is "a link reluctant in a fleshly chain." To him Nature
and Humanity are antagonists, and he cleaves to the one, yea, he would
take her by violence, to mark his alienation and severance from the
other.]
[jg] _Of peopled cities_----[MS.]
[jh] {262}
----_but to be_
_A link reluctant in a living chain_
_Classing with creatures_----[MS.]
[ji] _And with the air_----[MS.]
[jj] _To sink and suffer_----[MS.]
[jk] ----_which partly round us cling._--[MS.]
[321] [Compare Horace, _Odes_, iii. 2. 23, 24--
"Et udam
Spernit humum fugiente penna."]
[jl] {263} ----_in this degrading form._--[MS.]
[jm] ----_the Spirit in each spot._--[MS.]
[322][The "bodiless thought" is the object, not the subject, of his
celestial vision. "Even now," as through a glass darkly, and with eyes
"Whose half-beholdings through unsteady tears
Gave shape, hue, distance to the inward dream,"
his soul "had sight" of the spirit, the informing idea, the essence of
each passing scene; but, hereafter, his bodiless spirit would, as it
were, encounter the place-spirits face to face. It is to be noted that
warmth of feeling, not clearness or fulness of perception, attends this
spiritual recognition.]
[jn] [_Is not_] _the universe a breathing part?_--[MS.]
[jo] {264} _And gaze upon the ground with sordid thoughts and
slow._--[MS.]
[323] [Compare Coleridge's _Dejection. An Ode_, iv. 4-9--
"And would we aught behold, of higher worth,
Than that inanimate cold world allowed
To the poor, loveless, ever-anxious crowd;
Ah! from the soul itself must issue forth
A light, a glory, a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the earth."]
[jp] _But this is not a time--I must return._--[MS.]
[jq] _Here the reflecting Sophist_----.--[MS.]
[jr] {265}
_O'er sinful deeds and thoughts the heavenly hue_
_With words like sunbeams dazzling as they passed_
_The eye that o'er them shed deep tears which flowed too fast_.--[MS.]
_O'er deeds and thoughts of error the bright hue_.--[MS. erased.]
[js] _Like him enamoured were to die the same_.--[MS.]
[jt] {266} ----_self-consuming heat_.--[MS. erased.]
[324] [As, for instance, with Madame de Warens, in 1738; with Madame
d'Epinay; with Diderot and Grimm, in 1757; with Voltaire; with David
Hume, in 1766 (see "Rousseau in England," _Q. R._, No. 376, October,
1898); with every one to whom he was attached or with whom he had
dealings, except his illiterate mistress, Theresa le Vasseur. (See
_Rousseau_, by John Morley, 2 vols., 1888, _passim_.)]
[ju] _For its own cruel workings the most kind_.--[MS. erased.]
[jv] _Since cause might be yet leave no trace behind_.--[MS.]
[325] ["He was possessed, as holier natures than his have been, by an
enthusiastic vision, an intoxicated confidence, a mixture of sacred rage
and prodigious love, an insensate but absolutely disinterested revolt
against the stone and iron of a reality which he was bent on melting in
a heavenly blaze of splendid aspiration and irresistibly persuasive
expression."--_Rousseau_, by John Morley, 1886, i. 137.]
[326] {267} [Rousseau published his _Discourses_ on the influence of the
sciences, on manners, and on inequality (_Sur l'Origine ... de
l'Inegalite parmi les Hommes_) in 1750 and 1753; _Emile, ou, de
l'Education_, and _Du Contrat Social_ in 1762.]
[327] ["What Rousseau's Discourse [_Sur l'Origine ... de l'Inegalite_,
etc.] meant ... is not that all men are born equal. He never says
this.... His position is that the artificial differences, springing from
the conditions of the social union, do not coincide with the differences
in capacity springing from original constitution; that the tendency of
the social union as now organized is to deepen the artificial
inequalities, and make the gulf between those endowed with privileges
and wealth, and those not so endowed, ever wider and wider.... It was
... [the influence of Rousseau ... and those whom he inspired] which,
though it certainly did not produce, yet did as certainly give a deep
and remarkable bias, first to the American Revolution, and a dozen years
afterwards to the French Revolution."--_Rousseau_, 1888, i. 181, 182.]
[jw]
----_thoughts which grew_
_Born with the birth of Time_----.--[MS.]
[jx]
----_even let me view_
_But good alas_----.--[MS.]
[jy] {268} ----_in both we shall lie slower_.--[MS. erased.]
[328] [The substitution of "one" for "both" (see _var._ i.) affords
conclusive proof that the meaning is that the next revolution would do
its work more thoroughly and not leave things as it found them.]
[329] {269} [After sunset the Jura range, which lies to the west of the
Lake, would appear "darkened" in contrast to the afterglow in the
western sky.]
[jz] {270} _He is an endless reveller_----.--[MS. erased.]
[ka] _Him merry with light talking with his mate_.--[MS. erased.]
[330] [Compare Anacreon ([Greek: Ei)s te/ttiga]), _Carm._ xliii. line 15--
[Greek: To\ de\ ge~ras ou)\ se tei/rei.].]
[kb] _Deep into Nature's breast the existence which they lose_.--[MS.]
[331] [For the association of "Fortune" and "Fame" with a star, compare
stanza xi. lines 5, 6--
"Who can contemplate Fame through clouds unfold
The _star_ which rises o'er her steep," etc.?
And the allusion to Napoleon's "star," stanza xxxviii. line 9--
"Nor learn that tempted Fate will leave the loftiest _Star_."
Compare, too, the opening lines of the _Stanzas to Augusta_ (July 24,
1816)--
"Though the day of my destiny's over,
And the _star_ of my fate has declined."
"Power" is symbolized as a star in _Numb._ xxiv. 17, "There shall come a
_star_ out of Jacob, and a Sceptre shall rise out of Israel;" and in the
divine proclamation, "I am the root and the offspring of David, and the
bright and morning _star_" (_Rev._ xxii. 16).
The inclusion of "life" among star similes may have been suggested by
the astrological terms, "house of life" and "lord of the ascendant."
Wordsworth, in his Ode (_Intimations of Immortality, etc._) speaks of
the soul as "our life's _star_." Mr. Tozer, who supplies most of these
"comparisons," adds a line from Shelley's _Adonais_, 55. 8 (Pisa,
1821)--
"The soul of Adonais, like a _star_."]
[332] {271} [Compare Wordsworth's sonnet, "It is a Beauteous," etc.--
"It is a beauteous evening, calm and free,
The holy time is quiet as a nun
Breathless with adoration."]
[333] [Here, too, the note is Wordsworthian, though Byron represents as
inherent in Nature, that "sense of something far more deeply
interfused," which Wordsworth (in his _Lines_ on Tintern Abbey) assigns
to his own consciousness.]
[kc] {272} _It is a voiceless feeling chiefly felt_.--[MS.]
[kd] _Of a most inward music_----.--[MS.]
[334] [As the cestus of Venus endowed the wearer with magical
attraction, so the immanence of the Infinite and the Eternal in "all
that formal is and fugitive," binds it with beauty and produces a
supernatural charm which even Death cannot resist.]
[335] [Compare Herodotus, i. 131, [Greek: Oi(de\ nomi/zousi Dii) me,
e)pi\ ta\ y(pselo/tata to~n ou)re/on a)nabai/nontes, thysi/as e(/rdein,
to ky/klon pa/nta tou~ y)rano Di/a kale/ontes]. Perhaps, however, "early
Persian" was suggested by a passage in "that drowsy, frowsy poem, _The
Excursion_"--
"The Persian--zealous to reject
Altar and image and the inclusive walls
And roofs and temples built by human hands--
To loftiest heights ascending, from their tops
With myrtle-wreathed tiara on his brow,
Presented sacrifice to moon and stars."
_The Excursion_, iv. (_The Works of Wordsworth_, 1889, p. 461).]
[336] {273} [Compare the well-known song which forms the prelude of the
_Hebrew Melodies_--
"She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes."]
[ke]
----_Oh glorious Night_
_That art not sent_----.--[MS.]
[kf] {274} _A portion of the Storm--a part of thee_.--[MS.]
[kg] ----_a fiery sea_.--[MS.]
[kh] _As they had found an heir and feasted o'er his birth_.--[MS.
erased.]
[ki]
_Hills which look like brethren with twin heights_
_Of a like aspect_----.--[MS. erased.]
[337] [There can be no doubt that Byron borrowed this metaphor from the
famous passage in Coleridge's _Christabel_ (ii. 408-426), which he
afterwards prefixed as a motto to _Fare Thee Well_.
The latter half of the quotation runs thus--
"But never either found another
To free the hollow heart from paining--
They stood aloof, the scars remaining,
Like cliffs which had been rent asunder;
A dreary sea now flows between,
But neither heat, nor frost, nor thunder,
Shall wholly do away, I ween,
The marks of that which once had been."]
[kj] {275} _Of separation drear_----.--[MS. erased.]
[338] [There are numerous instances of the use of "knoll" as an
alternative form of the verb "to knell;" but Byron seems, in this
passage, to be the authority for "knoll" as a substantive.]
[339] [For Rousseau's description of Vevey, see _Julie; ou, La Nouvelle
Heloise_, Partie I. Lettre xxiii., _Oevres de J. J. Rousseau_, 1836, ii.
36: "Tantot d'immenses rochers pendoient en ruines au-dessus de ma tete.
Tantot de hautes et bruyantes cascades m'inondoient de leur epais
brouillard: tantot un torrent eternel ouvroit a mes cotes un abime dont
les yeux n'osoient sonder la profondeur. Quelquefois je me perdois dans
l'obscurite d'un bois touffu. Quelquefois, en sortant d'un gouffre, une
agreable prairie, rejouissoit tout-a-coup mes regards. Un melange
etonnant de la nature sauvage et de la nature cultivee, montroit partout
la main des hommes, ou l'on eut cru qu'ils n'avoient jamais penetre: a
cote d'une caverne on trouvoit des maisons; on voyoit des pampres secs
ou l'on n'eut cherche que des ronces, des vignes dans des terres
eboullees, d'excellens fruits sur des rochers, et des champs dans des
precipices." See, too, Lettre xxxviii. p. 56; Partie IV. Lettre xi. p.
238 (the description of Julie's Elysium); and Partie IV. Lettre xvii. p.
260 (the excursion to Meillerie).
Byron infuses into Rousseau's accurate and charming compositions of
scenic effects, if not the "glory," yet "the freshness of a dream." He
belonged to the new age, with its new message from nature to man, and,
in spite of theories and prejudices, listened and was convinced. He
extols Rousseau's recognition of nature, lifting it to the height of his
own argument; but, consciously or unconsciously, he desires to find, and
finds, in nature a spring of imagination undreamt of by the Apostle of
Sentiment. There is a whole world of difference between Rousseau's
persuasive and delicate patronage of Nature, and Byron's passionate,
though somewhat belated, surrender to her inevitable claim. With
Rousseau, Nature is a means to an end, a conduct of refined and
heightened fancy; whereas, to Byron, "her reward was with her," a
draught of healing and refreshment.]
[kk] {277} _The trees have grown from Love_----.--[MS. erased.]
[kl] {278} _By rays which twine there_----.--[MS.]
[km]
_Clarens--sweet Clarens--thou art Love's abode_--
_Undying Love's--who here hath made a throne_.--[MS.]
[kn]
_And girded it with Spirit which is shown_
_From the steep summit to the rushing Rhone_.--[MS. erased.]
[ko]
----_whose searching power_
_Surpasses the strong storm in its most desolate hour_.--[MS.]
[340] [Compare _La Nouvelle Heloise_, Partie IV. Lettre xvii, _Oeuvres,
etc._, ii. 262: "Un torrent, forme par la fonte des neiges, rouloit a
vingt pas de nous line eau bourbeuse, et charrioit avec bruit du limon,
du sable et des pierres.... Des forets de noirs sapins nous ombrageoient
tristement a droite. Un grand bois de chenes etoit a gauche au-dela du
torrent."]
[kp] {279} _But branches young as Heaven_----[MS. erased,]
[kq] ----_with sweeter voice than words_.--[MS.]
[341] [Compare the _Pervigilium Veneris_--
"Cras amet qui nunquam amavit,
Quique amavit eras amet."
("Let those love now, who never loved before;
Let those who always loved, now love the more.")
Parnell's _Vigil of Venus: British Poets_, 1794, vii. 7.]
[kr] {279} ----_driven him to repose._--[MS.]
[342] [Compare _Confessions of J. J. Rousseau_, lib. iv., _passim._]
[343] {281} [In his appreciation of Voltaire, Byron, no doubt, had in
mind certain strictures of the lake school--"a school, as it is called,
I presume, from their education being still incomplete." Coleridge, in
_The Friend_ (1850, i. 168), contrasting Voltaire with Erasmus, affirms
that "the knowledge of the one was solid through its whole extent, and
that of the other extensive at a chief rate in its superficiality," and
characterizes "the wit of the Frenchman" as being "without imagery,
without character, and without that pathos which gives the magic charm
to genuine humour;" and Wordsworth, in the second book of _The
Excursion_ (_Works of Wordsworth_, 1889, p. 434), "unalarmed" by any
consideration of wit or humour, writes down Voltaire's _Optimist_
(_Candide, ou L'Optimisme_), which was accidentally discovered by the
"Wanderer" in the "Solitary's" pent-house, "swoln with scorching damp,"
as "the dull product of a scoffer's pen." Byron reverts to these
contumelies in a note to the Fifth Canto of _Don Juan_ (see _Life_,
Appendix, p. 809), and lashes "the school" _secundum artem._]
[ks]
_Coping with all and leaving all behind_
_Within himself existed all mankind_--
_And laughing at their faults betrayed his own_
_His own was ridicule which as the Wind_.--[MS.]
[344] {282} [In his youth Voltaire was imprisoned for a year (1717-18)
in the Bastille, by the regent Duke of Orleans, on account of certain
unacknowledged lampoons (_Regnante Puero, etc._); but throughout his
long life, so far from "shaking thrones," he showed himself eager to
accept the patronage and friendship of the greatest monarchs of the
age--of Louis XV., of George II. and his queen, Caroline of Anspach, of
Frederick II., and of Catharine of Russia. Even the Pope Benedict XIV.
accepted the dedication of _Mahomet_ (1745), and bestowed an apostolical
benediction on "his dear son." On the other hand, his abhorrence of war,
his protection of the oppressed, and, above all, the questioning spirit
of his historical and philosophical writings (e.g. _Les Lettres sur les
Anglais_, 1733; _Annales de l'Empire depuis Charlemagne_, 1753, etc.)
were felt to be subversive of civil as well as ecclesiastical tyranny,
and, no doubt, helped to precipitate the Revolution.
The first half of the line may be illustrated by his quarrel with
Maupertuis, the President of the Berlin Academy, which resulted in the
production of the famous _Diatribe of Doctor Akakia, Physician to the
Pope_ (1752), by a malicious attack on Maupertuis's successor, Le Franc
de Pompignan, and by his caricature of the critic Elie Catharine Freron,
as _Frelon_ ("Wasp"), in _L'Ecossaise_, which was played at Paris in
1760.--_Life of Voltaire_, by F. Espinasse, 1892, pp. 94, 114, 144.]
[kt]
----_concentering thought_
_And gathering wisdom_----.--[MS.]
[ku] {283} _Which stung his swarming foes with rage and fear_.--[MS.]
[345] [The first three volumes of Gibbon's _Decline and Fall of the
Roman Empire_, contrary to the author's expectation, did not escape
criticism and remonstrance. The Rev. David Chetsum (in 1772 and
(enlarged) 1778) published _An Examination of, etc._, and Henry Edward
Davis, in 1778, _Remarks on_ the memorable Fifteenth and Sixteenth
Chapters. Gibbon replied by a _Vindication_, issued in 1779. Another
adversary was Archdeacon George Travis, who, in his _Letter_, defended
the authenticity of the text on "Three Heavenly Witnesses" (1 _John_ v.
7), which Gibbon was at pains to deny (ch. xxxvii. note 120). Among
other critics and assailants were Joseph Milner, Joseph Priestley, and
Richard Watson afterwards Bishop of Llandaff. (For Porson's estimate of
Gibbon, see preface to _Letters to Mr. Archdeacon Travis, etc._, 1790.)]
[kv] _In sleep upon one pillow_----.--[MS.]
[346] [There is no reason to suppose that this is to be taken
ironically. He is not certain whether the "secrets of all hearts shall
be revealed," or whether all secrets shall be kept in the silence of
universal slumber; but he looks to the possibility of a judgment to
come. He is speaking for mankind generally, and is not concerned with
his own beliefs or disbeliefs.]
[347] {284} [The poet would follow in the wake of the clouds. He must
pierce them, and bend his steps to the region of their growth, the
mountain-top, where earth begets and air brings forth the vapours.
Another interpretation is that the Alps must be pierced in order to
attain the great and ever-ascending regions of the mountain-tops
("greater and greater as we proceed"). In the next stanza he pictures
himself looking down from the summit of the Alps on Italy, the goal of
his pilgrimage.]
[348] [The Roman Empire engulfed and comprehended the great empires of
the past--the Persian, the Carthaginian, the Greek. It fell, and
kingdoms such as the Gothic (A.D. 493-554), the Lombardic (A.D. 568-774)
rose out of its ashes, and in their turn decayed and passed away.]
[349] {285} [The task imposed upon his soul, which dominates every other
instinct, is the concealment of any and every emotion--"love, or hate,
or aught," not the concealment of the particular emotion "love or hate,"
which may or may not be the "master-spirit" of his thought. He is
anxious to conceal his feelings, not to keep the world in the dark as to
the supreme feeling which holds the rest subject.]
[kw] _They are but as a self-deceiving wile_.-[MS. erased.]
[kx] _The shadows of the things that pass along_.--[MS.]
[ky] {286}
_Fame is the dream of boyhood--I am not_
_So young as to regard the frown or smile_
_Of crowds as making an immortal lot_.--[MS. (lines 6, 7 erased).]
[350] [Compare Shakespeare, _Coriolanus_, act iii. sc. 1, lines 66, 67--
"For the mutable, rank-scented many, let them
Regard me as I do not flatter."]
[351] [Compare _Manfred_, act ii. sc. 2, lines 54-57--
"My spirit walked not with the souls of men,
Nor looked upon the earth with human eyes;
The thirst of their ambition was not mine,
The aim of their existence was not mine."]
[kz] {287} _O'er misery unmixedly some grieve_.--[MS.]
[352] [Byron was at first in some doubt whether he should or should not
publish the "concluding stanzas of _Childe Harold_ (those to my
_daughter_);" but in a letter to Murray, October 9, 1816, he reminds him
of his later determination to publish them with "the rest of the
Canto."]
[353] {288} ["His allusions to me in _Childe Harold_ are cruel and cold,
but with such a semblance as to make _me_ appear so, and to attract
sympathy to himself. It is said in this poem that hatred of him will be
taught as a lesson to his child. I might appeal to all who have ever
heard me speak of him, and still more to my own heart, to witness that
there has been no moment when I have remembered injury otherwise than
affectionately and sorrowfully. It is not my duty to give way to
hopeless and wholly unrequited affection, but so long as I live my chief
struggle will probably be not to remember him too kindly."--(_Letter of
Lady Byron to Lady Anne Lindsay_, extracted from Lord Lindsay's letter
to the _Times_, September 7, 1869.)
According to Mrs. Leigh (see her letter to Hodgson, Nov., 1816, _Memoirs
of Rev. F. Hodgson_, 1878, ii. 41), Murray paid Lady Byron "the
compliment" of showing her the transcription of the Third Canto, a day
or two after it came into his possession. Most probably she did not know
or recognize Claire's handwriting, but she could not fail to remember
that but one short year ago she had herself been engaged in transcribing
_The Siege of Corinth_ and _Parisina_ for the press. Between the making
of those two "fair copies," a tragedy had intervened.]
[354] {289} [The Countess Guiccioli is responsible for the statement
that Byron looked forward to a time when his daughter "would know her
father by his works." "Then," said he, "shall I triumph, and the tears
which my daughter will then shed, together with the knowledge that she
will have the feelings with which the various allusions to herself and
me have been written, will console me in my darkest hours. Ada's mother
may have enjoyed the smiles of her youth and childhood, but the tears of
her maturer age will be for me."--_My Recollections of Lord Byron_, by
the Countess Guiccioli, 1869, p. 172.]
[355] [For a biographical notice of Ada Lady Lovelace, including
letters, elsewhere unpublished, to Andrew Crosse, see _Ada Byron_, von
E. Koelbing, _Englische Studien_, 1894, xix. 154-163.]
[la]
_End of Canto Third_.
_Byron. July 4, 1816, Diodati_.--[C.]
NOTES TO CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE.