ROLL on thou Bosphorus, in wrath or play,
Roused by the storm, or gilded by the ray;
With thy blue billows to the boundless sea
Roll on, like Time unto Eternity.
Thy empire nought shall change; upon thy breast
Guilt hath no record, tyranny no rest;
Roll on: the rock-built city shall decay,
Man sleep in death, and kingdoms pass away,
But thou, unbowed, shalt steal like music by,
Or lift thy Titan strength, and dare the sky.
Alas for proud Byzantium! on _her_ head
The fire may smoulder and the foe may tread,
Yet with heroic look and lovely form
She mocks the deep, unconscious of the storm;
Her footstool is the shore, which hears the moan
Of dying waves; the mountain is her throne;
Her princely minarets, whose spires on high
Gleam with their crescents in the cloudless sky;
Her temples, bathed in all the pomp of day;
Her domes, that backward flash the living ray;
Her cool kiosks, round which, from granite white,
High sparkling fountains catch a rainbow light;
And the dark cypress, sombre and o'ercast,
Which hints cold sleep, the longest and the last;
Each scene around this haughty city throws
A mingled charm of action and repose;
Each feature speaks of glory wrapt in gloom,
The feast, the shroud, the palace, and the tomb.
Yes, thou art fair; but still my soul surveys
A vision of delight, and still I gaze,
Proud city, on the past; when first the beam
Slept on thy temples in its mid-day dream,
Methinks the genius of thy father-land
Raised his gray head and clenched his withered hand,
Exulting, in a parent's pride, to see
Old Rome, _without her gods_, revived in thee.
Beautiful Queen! unlike thy high compeers,
Thou wast not cradled in the lap of years;
But, like celestial Pallas, hymned of old,
Thy sovereign form, inviolate and bold,
Sprung to the perfect zenith of its prime,
And took no favor from the hands of Time.
There every glorious gift of every zone
Was flung before thee on thy virgin throne:
No breeze could blow but unto thee some slave,
Some handmaid ship, came riding o'er the wave;
The costly treasures of thy marble isle,
The spice of Ind, the riches of the Nile,
The stores of earth, like streams that seek the sea,
Poured out the tribute of their wealth for thee.
Oh! proud was thy dominion; states and kings
Slept 'neath the shadow of thine outstretched wings;
And to the moral eye, how more than fair
Were thy peculiar charms, which boasted there
No proud pantheon flaming in the sun,
To claim for many gods that due to One;
No scene of tranquil grove and babbling stream,
Of vain philosophy to boast and dream,
Till Reason shows a maze without a clue,
And Truth seems false, and Falsehood's self seems true.
Oh, no! upon thy temples, gladly bright,
The truth revealed shed down its living light;
Thine was no champion-badge of pagan shame,
But that best gift, the Cross of HIM who came
To lift the guilty spirit from the sod,
To point from earth to heaven, from man to GOD.
Alas! that peace so gentle, hope so fair,
Should wake but strife, should herald but despair;
Oh, thine, Byzantium, thine were bitter tears,
A couch of fever and a throne of fears;
When passion drugged the bowl and grasped the steel,
When murder followed in the track of zeal;
When that religion, born to guide and bless,
Itself became perverse and merciless:
While factions of the circus and the shrine,
And lords like slaves and slaves like lords, were thine.
What boots the well-known tale so often told?
The feuds that found them frantic left them cold;
The crimes that made them wicked made them weak,
And bloodless might the Arab spread, and wreak
His wasting vengeance; while the soldier slept
The spoiler plundered and the province wept:
Thus did thine empire sink in slow decay,
Thus were its lordly branches lopt away;
And thou, exposed and stript, wast left instead
To bear the lightning on thy naked head.
Yet wert thou noble still; in vain, in vain
The Vandal strove--he could not break his chain;
The bold Bulgarian cursed thee as he bled,
The Persian trembled, and the pirate fled;
Twice did the baffled Arab onward press
To drink thy tears of danger and distress;
Twice did the fiery Frank usurp thy halls,
And twice the Grecian drove him from thy walls:
And when at last up sprung thy Tartar foe,
With fire and sword more dread than Dandolo,
Vain was the task; the triumph was not won
Till fraud achieved what treason had begun;
Till blood made red thy ramparts and thy waves,
And one man's glory left ten thousand graves.
But in that fierce distress, and at thy cry,
Did none defend thee, and did none reply?
No! kings were deaf, and pontiffs, in their pride,
Like Levites gazed, and like them turned aside;
While infidels within Sophia's shrine
Profaned the cup that held the sacred wine;
And, worse than the idolaters of old,
Proclaimed that prophet chief, whose books unfold
The deadliest faith that ever framed a spell
To make of heaven an earth, of earth a hell.
Yet stood there one erect in might and mind,
Before him groaned Despair, and Death behind;
Oh thou last Cæsar, greater midst thy tears
Than all thy laureled and renowned compeers,
I see thee yet, I see thee kneeling where
The patriarch lifts the cup and breathes the prayer;
Now in the tempest of the battle's strife,
Where trumpets drown the shrieks of parting life,
Now with a thousand wounds upon thy breast
I see thee pillow thy calm head in rest;
And, like a glory-circled martyr, claim
The wings of death to speed thy soul from shame.
But thou, fair city! to the Turk bowed down,
Didst lose the brightest jewels of thy crown:
They could not spoil thee of thy skies, thy sea,
Thy mountain belts of strength and majesty;
But the bright cross, the volumes rescued long,
Sunk 'neath the feet of that barbarian throng;
While rose the gorgeous Haram in its sin,
So fair without, so deadly foul within:
That sepulchre in all except repose,
Where woman strikes the lute and plucks the rose,
Strives to be gay but feels, despite the will,
The heart, the heart is true to nature still.
Yet, for a season, did the Moslem's hand
Win for thy state an aspect of command;
Let Syria, Egypt tell, let Persia's shame,
Let haughty Barbarossa's deathless name,
Let Buda speak, let Rhodes, whose knighted brave
Were weak to serve her, impotent to save:
Zeal in the rear and valor in the van
Spread far the fiats of thy sage divan,
Till stretched the sceptre of thy sway, awhile
Victorious, from the Dnieper to the Nile.
Brief, transitory glory, foul the day,
Foul thy dishonor, when in Corinth's bay,
'Neath the rich sun triumphant Venice spread
Her lion banner as the Moslem fled;
When proud Vienna's sallying troops were seen,
When Zeuta's laurels decked the brave Eugene;
When the great shepherd led the Persian van,
And Cyrus lived again in KOULI KHAN;
And last and worst, when Freedom spurned the yoke,
And tyrants trembled as the GREEK awoke!
Now joy to Greece! the genius of her clime
Shall cast its gauntlet at the tyrant Time.
And wake again the valor and the fire
Which rears the trophy or attunes the lyre.
Oh known how early, and beloved how long,
The sea-girt shrines of battle and of song,
The clustering isles that by the Ocean prest,
In sunshine slumber on his dark blue breast:
Land of the brave, athwart whose ghastly night
Streams the bright dawn, red harbinger of light,
May Glory now efface each blot of shame,
May Freedom's torch yet light the path to fame;
May Christian truth in this, thy second birth,
Add strength to empire, give to wisdom worth,
And with the rich-fraught hopes of coming years
Inspire thy triumphs while it dries thy tears!
Yes, joy to Greece! but even a brighter star
On Hope's horizon sheds its light afar:
Oh Stamboul! thou who once didst clasp the sign,
What if again Sophia's holy shrine
Should, deaf to creeds of sensual joy and strife,
Reëcho to the words whose gift is life;
If down those isles the billowy music's swell
Should pour the song of Judah, and should tell
Of sinners met in penitence to kneel,
And bless the comfort they have learned to feel;
Then though thy fortune or thy fame decline,
Then oh! how _more_ than victory were thine!
Ah! dear RELIGION, born of HIM who smiled
And prayed for pardon when the Jew reviled,
No rose-bound Houris with a song of glee
Strew the rich couch, no tyrant strikes for thee;
Thy holier altar feeds its silent fire
With love, not hate--with reason, not desire;
Welcome in weal or woe, thy sovereign might
Can temper sorrow or enrich delight;
Prepared to gild with hope our darkest hours,
Or crown the brimming cup of joy with flowers;
Thine is the peace-branch, thine the pure command
Which joins mankind like brothers hand in hand;
And oh! 'tis thine to purge each worldly stain,
Wrench the loose links which bind this mortal chain,
Whisper of realms untravelled, paths untrod,
And lead, like Jacob's ladder, up to GOD!