THE ARSENAL AT SPRINGFIELD. THIS is the Arsenal. From floor to ceiling, Like a huge organ, rise the burnished arms; But from their silent pipes no anthem pealing Startles the villages with strange alarms. Ah! what a sound will rise, how wild and dreary, When the death-angel touches those swift keys! What loud lament and dismal Miserere Will mingle with their awful symphonies! I hear even now the infinite fierce chorus, before us, On helm and harness rings the Saxon hammer, Through Cimbric forest roars the Norseman's song, And loud, amid the universal clamour, O'er distant deserts sounds the Tartar gong. I hear the Florentine, who from his palace And Aztec priests upon their teocallis Beat the wild war-drums made of serpent's skin; THE ARSENAL AT SPRINGFIELD. The tumult of each sacked and burning village; The shout that every prayer for mercy drowns; The soldiers' revels in the midst of pillage; The wail of famine in beleaguered towns; The bursting shell, the gateway wrenched asunder, The diapason of the cannonade. Is it, O man, with such discordant noises, With such accursed instruments as these, Thou drownest Nature's sweet and kindly voices, And jarrest the celestial harmonies? Were half the power, that fills the world with terror, 191 Were half the wealth, bestowed on camps and courts, Given to redeem the human mind from error, The warrior's name would be a name abhorred! Would wear for evermore the curse of Cain! Down the dark future, through long generations, I hear once more the voice of Christ say, "Peace!" Peace! and no longer from its brazen portals The blast of War's great organ shakes the skies! The holy melodies of love arise. NUREMBERG. IN the valley of the Pegnitz, where across broad meadow lands Quaint old town of toil and traffic, quaint old town of art and song, Memories haunt thy pointed gables, like the rooks that round them throng: Memories of the Middle Ages, when the emperors, rough and bold, Had their dwelling in thy castle, time-defying, centuries old; And thy brave and thrifty burghers boasted, in their uncouth rhyme. That their great imperial city stretched its hand through every clime. In the court-yard of the castle, bound with many an iron band, On the square the oriel window, where in old heroic days Everywhere I see around me rise the wondrous world of Art: Fountains wrought with richest sculpture standing in the common mart; NUREMBERG. And above cathedral doorways saints and bishops carved in stone, 193 In the church of sainted Sebald sleeps enshrined his holy dust, In the church of sainted Lawrence stands a pix of sculpture rare, Here, when Art was still religion, with a simple, reverent heart, Hence in silence and in sorrow, toiling still with busy hand, Emigravit is the inscription on the tomb-stone where he lies; Fairer seems the ancient city, and the sunshine seems more fair, Through these streets so broad and stately, these obscure and dismal lanes, Walked of yore the Master-singers, chanting rude poetic strains. From remote and sunless suburbs, came they to the friendly guild, Building nests in Fame's great temple, as in spouts the swallows build. As the weaver plied the shuttle, wove he too the mystic rhyme, Thanking God, whose boundless wisdom makes the flowers of poesy bloom In the forge's dust and cinders, in the tissues of the loom. Here Hans Sachs, the cobbler-poet, laureate of the gentle craft, Wisest of the Twelve Wise Masters, in huge folios sang and laughed. But his house is now an ale-house, with a nicely sanded floor, Painted by some humble artist, as in Adam Puschman's song, As the old man gray and dove-like, with his great beard white and long. And at night the swart mechanic comes to drown his cark and care, Quaffing ale from pewter tankards, in the master's antique chair. |