EPISTLE III. TO THE MARCHIONESS DOWAGER OF D--LL. FROM BERMUDA, JANUARY, 1804. LADY, where'er you roam, whatever beam Yet, Lady! no-for song so rude as mine, The morn was lovely, every wave was still, 'Nothing can be more romantic than the little harbour of St George. The number of beautiful islets, the singular clearness of the water, and the animated play of the graceful little boats, gliding for ever between the islands, and seeming to sail from one cedargrove into another, form altogether the sweetest miniature of nature that can be imagined. 2 This is an illusion which, to the few who are fanciful enough to indulge in it, renders the scenery of Bermuda particularly interesting. In the short but beautiful twilight of their spring evenings, the white cottages scattered over the islands, and but partially seen through the trees that surround them, assume often the appearance of little Grecian temples, and fancy may embellish the poor fisherman's hut with columns which the pencil of Claude might imitate. I had one favourite object of this kind in my walks, which the bospitality of its owner robbed me of, by asking me to visit him. He was a plain good man, and received me well and warmly, but I never could turn his house into a Grecian temple again. 3 M. GEBELIN says, in his Monde Primitif, Lorsque Strabon crut que les anciens théologiens et poetes plaçaient les Champs Elysées dans les lales de l'Océan Atlantique, il n'entendit rien à leur doc- Ariel. Among the many charms which Bermuda has for a poetic trine. M. GEBELIN's supposition, I have no doubt, is the more cor- eye, we cannot for an instant forget that it is the scene of SHAKrect: but that of STRABO is, in the present instance, most to my pur-SPEARE's Tempest, and that here be conjured up the delicate Ariel, * pose. who alone is worth the whole heaven of ancient mythology. Upon its shining side, the mystic notes Of those entrancing airs1 The Genii of the deep were wont to swell, With the bright treasure to my choral sky, Where she, who waked its early swell, The syren, with a foot of fire, When Heaven's eternal orbs their midnight music roll'd! Walks o'er the great string of my Orphic Lyre, 5 Oh! seek it, wheresoe'er it floats; And, if the power Of thrilling numbers to thy soul be dear, When Luna's distant tone falls faintly on his ear! 2 That, through the circle of creation's zone, Murmuring o'er beds of pearl; song, In the « Histoire naturelle des Antilles, there is an account of some curious shells, found at Curaçoa, on the back of which were lines, filled with musical characters so distinct and perfect, that the writer assures us a very charming trio was sung from one of them. On le nomme musical, parce qu'il porte sur le dos de lignes noiratres pleines de notes, qui ont une espèce de clé pour les mettre en chant, de sorte que l'on dirait qu'il ne manque que la lettre à cette tablature naturelle. Ce curieux gentilhomme (M. du Montel) rapporte qu'il en a vu qui avaient cinq lignes, une clé, et des notes, qui formaient un accord parfait. Quelqu'un y avait ajouté la lettre, que la nature avait oubliée, et la faisait chanter en forme de trio, The author adds, dont l'air était fort agréable. Chap. 19, art. 11. a poet might imagine that these shells were used by the Syrens at their concerts. According to CICERO, and his commentator, MACROBIUS, the lunar tone is the gravest and faintest on the planetary heptachord. Quam ob causam summus ille cœli stellifer cursus, cujus conversio est concitatior, acuto et excitato movetur sono; gravissimo autem hic lunaris atque infimus. Somn Scip. Because, says MACROBIUS, spiritu ut in extremitate languescente jam volvitur, et propter angustias quibus penultimus orbis arctatur impetu leniore convertitur.. In Soma. Scip. lib. a, cap. 4. It is not very easy to understand the ancients in their musical arrangement of the heavenly bodies. See PTOLEM. lib. 3. LEONE HEBREO, pursuing the idea of ARISTOTLE, that the heavens are animal, attributes their harmony to perfect and reciprocal love. • Non pero manca fra loro il perfetto e reciproco amore : la causa principale, che ne mostra il loro amore, è la lor amicizia armoniaca e la concordanza, che perpetuamente si trova in loro. Dialog. 2. di Amore, p. 58. This reciproco amore of LEONE is the photos of the ancient EMPEDOCLES, who seems, in his Love and Bate of the Elements, to have given a glimpse of the principles of attraction and repulsion. See the fragment to which I allude in LAERTIES, Άλλοτε μεν φιλότητι, συνερχομεν. κ. τ. λ. Lib. 8, cap. 2, D. 12. 3 LEUCIPPES, the atomist, imagined a kind of vortices in the hea Or guides around the burning pole The winged chariot of some blissful soul!6 While thou! Oh, son of earth! what dream shall rise for thee; Beneath Hispania's sun, Thou 'It see a streamlet run, Which I have warm'd with dews of melody; 7 Down the still current, like a harp it sighs! I HERACLIDES, upon the allegories of HOMER, conjectures that the idea of the harmony of the spheres originated with this poet, who, in representing the solar beams as arrows, supposes them to emit a peculiar sound in the air. In the account of Africa which D'ABLANCOURT has translated there is mention of a tree in that country, whose branches when shaken by the hand produce very sweet sounds. Le même antear (ABENZEGAR) dit, qu'il y a un certain arbre, qui produit des gaules comme d'o.ier, et qu'en les prenant à la main et les branlant, elles font une espèce d'harmonie fort agréable, etc. etc.-L Afrique de MARMOL. Alluding to the extinction, or at least the disappearance, of some of those fixed stars, which we are taught to consider as suns, attended each by its system. DESCARTES thought that our earth might formerly have been a sun, which became obscured by a thick inc-astation over its surface. This probably suggested the idea of a central fire. 4 PORPHYRY says, that PYTHAGORAS held the sea to be a tear.Ty Sadattav μev exalet etvat daxpuoy. De Vit. And some one else, if I mistake not, has added the Planet Saturn as the source of it. EMPEDOCLES, with similar affectation, called the sea the sweat of the earth: topot T5775. See RITTERSuestes upon PORPHYRY, Num. 4.. The system of the harmonised orbs was styled by the ancients the Great Lyre of Orpheus, for which Lucian accounts, de Aupn ἑπτακιτος εουτα την των κινουμένων αέρων άρμονιαν GUVEбxλλto. x. T. λ. in Astrolog. 6 Διειλε ψυχας ισαρίθμους τους αςροις, ένειμε 9' ένας ην προς έκασον, και εμβίβασας ΩΣ ΕΙΣ ΟΧΗΜΑ. "This musical river is mentioned in the romance of Achilles Tatius. Emet пotaμov ην δε ακούσαι θέλης του ύδατος λaλoutos. The Latin version, in supplying the hiatus which is in the original, has placed the river in Hispania. In Hispania quoque fluvius est, quem primo aspectu, etc. etc. These two lines are translated from the words of Achilles Tatius. Eav yap ολιγος ανεμος εις τας δίνας εμπεση, το μεν vens, which he borrowed from ANASAGORAS, and possibly suggested ύδωρ ὡς χορδη κρούεται. το δε πνευμα του ύδατος πλήκτρον γίνεται. το ρευμα δε ὡς κιθαρα λαλει. Lib. 2. to DESCARTES. And I will send thee such a god like dream, From which his soul had drunk its fire! Oh! think what visions, in that lonely hour, Stole o'er his musing breast! What pious ecstasy 4 Wafted his prayer to that eternal Power, Or, dost thou know what dreams I wove, From every earthly chain, From wreaths of pleasure and from bonds of pain, Drank at the source of Nature's fontal number. 7 EPISTLE IV. TO GEORGE MORGAN, ESQ. OF NORFOLK, VIRGINIA.1 FROM BERMUDA, JANUARY, 1804. Κείνη δ' ηνεμόεσσα και Άτροπος, δια θ' αλιπληξ, αι θύτης και μαλλον επιδρομος πεπερ ίπποις, ποντω ενεςηρίκται. CALLIMACH. Hymn. in Del. v. 11. On what a tempest whirl'd us hither! 2 And even our haughty main-mast bow'd! In songs elysian lapp'd my mind! The casket where my memory lays Those little gems of poesy, Which time has saved from ancient days! Take one of these, to LAIS sung, SWEETLY 3 you kiss, my LAIS dear! But, while you kiss, I feel a tear, › ERATOSTHENES, telling the extreme veneration of Orpheus for Apollo, says that he was accustomed to go to the Pangæan mountain at day-break, and there wait the rising of the sun, that he might be the first to hail its beams. Ejerpoμevos tε TXS VUXTOS, κατά την έωθινην επί το όρος το καλούμε τον Παγ γαιον, προσέμενε τας ανατολας, ίνα ίδη τον Ήλιον dispositions of the family with whom he resides, and the cordial πρωτον. Καταφέρισμ. 24. • There are some verses of ORPHEUS preserved to us, which contain sublime ideas of the unity and magnificence of the Deity. As those which JUSTIN MARTYR has produced: Ούτος μεν χαλκείον ες ουρανον εστήρικται Xpuseroy eve Spovw, x. v. λ. Ad Græc. cohortat. It is thought by some, that these are to be reckoned amongst the fabrications which were frequent in the early times of Christianity. Still it appears doubtful to whom we should impate them; they are too pious for the Pagans, and too poetical for the Fathers. In one of the Hymns of ORPHECS, he attributes a figured seal to Apollo, with which he imagines that deity to have stamped a variety of forms upon the universe. ⚫ Allading to the cave near Samos, where Pythagoras devoted the greater part of his days and nights to meditation and the mysteries of his philosophy. Jamblick, de Vit. This, as HOLSTENIUS remarks, was in imitation of the Magi. ? The tetractys, or sacred number of the Pythagoreans, on which they solemnly swore, and which they called 22 asynov puses, the fountain of perennial nature.» LUCIAN has ridicaled this religious arithmetic very finely in his Sale of Philosophers. *This diadem is intended to represent the analogy between the notes of music and the prismatic coloars. We find in Plutarch a vague intimation of this kindred harmony in colours and sounds. Opts TE KHI XOY, μeta povns TE XXI portos Try appoviav επιφαίνουσι. De Musica. CASSIODORUS, whose idea I may be supposed to have horrowed, says, in a letter upon music to Boetius, Ut diadema oculis, varia luce gemmarum, sic cythara diversitate soni, blanditur auditai. This is indeed the only tolerable thought in the letter. Lib. 2, Variar. This gentleman is attached to the British consulate at Norfolk. His talents are worthy of a much higher sphere, but the excellent repose he enjoys amongst some of the kindest hearts in the world, should be almost enough to atone to him for the worst caprices of fortune. The consul himself, Colonel Hamilton, is one among the very few instances of a man, ardently loyal to his king, and yet beloved by the Americans. His house is the very temple of hospitality, and I sincerely pity the heart of that stranger who, warm from the welcome of such a board, and with the taste of such Madeira still upon his lips, col dolce in bocca, could sit down to write a libel on his host, in the true spirit of a modern philosophist, See the Travels of the DUKE DE LA ROCHEFOUCAULT LIANCOURT, vol. 2. We were seven days on our passage from Norfolk to Bermuda, during three of which we were forced to lay-to in a gale of wind. The Driver sloop of war, in which I went, was built at Bermuda of cedar, and is accounted an excellent sea-boat. She was then commanded by my very regretted friend Captain Compton, who in July last was killed aboard the Lilly, in an action with a French privateer. Poor Compton! he fell a victim to the strange impolicy of allowing such a miserable thing as the Lilly to remain in the service; so small, crank, and unmanageable, that a well-manned merchantman was at any time a match for her. This epigram is by PACLES SILENTIABICS, and may be found in the Analects of BRUNCK, vol. 3, p. 72. But as the reading there is somewhat different from what I have followed in this translation, I shall give it as I had it in my memory at the time, and as it is in HEINSIes, who, I believe, first produced the epigram. See his Poemata. Που μεν εστι φιλημα το Λαίδος· ήδυ δε αυτών Και πολυ κιχλίζουσα σοβείς ευβοστρυχον αιγλην 82 Bitter as those when lovers part, Our last-go, false to Heaven and me! SUCH, while in air I floating hung, Such was the strain, Morgante mio! The Muse and I together sung, With Boreas to make out the trio. But, bless the little fairy isle! How sweetly, after all our ills, We saw the dewy morning smile Serenely o'er its fragrant hills! And felt the pure elastic flow Of airs, that round this Eden blow With honey freshness, caught by stealth Warm from the very lips of health! Oh! could you view the scenery dear, That now beneath my window lies, You'd think that Nature lavish'd here Her purest wave, her softest skies, To make a heaven for Love to sigh in, For bards to live and saints to die in! Close to my wooded bank below, In glassy calm the waters sleep, And to the sun-beam proudly show The coral rocks they love to steep!' That languish idly round the mast. To float along a burning sky! To him, who in his heaven-ward flight, Μυρομενην δ' εφίλησαν τα δ' ὡς δροσερης απο πηγής, The water is so clear around the island, that the rocks are seen beneath to a very great depth, and, as we entered the harbour, they appeared to us so near the surface, that it seemed impossible we should not strike on them. There is no necessity, of course, for heaving the lead, and the negro pilot, lookin; down at the rocks from the bows of the ship, takes her through this difficult n vigation, with a skill and confidence which seem to astonish some of the oldest sailors. 3 In KIRCHER'S Ecstatic Journey to Heaven, Cosmiel, the genius of the world, gives Theodidactus a boat of asbestos, with which Sail'd, o'er the Sun's ethereal wave, To planet-isles of odorous light! Sweet Venus, what a clime he found Within thy orb's ambrosial round!' There spring the breezes, rich and warm, That pant around thy twilight car; There angels dwell, so pure of form, That each appears a living star! These are the sprites, oh radiant queen! Thou send'st so often to the bed Of her I love, with spell unseen, Thy planet's brightning balm to shed; To make the eye's enchantment clearer, To give the cheek one rose-bud more, And bid that flushing lip be dearer, Which had been, oh! too dear before! But, whither means the Muse to roam? he embarks into the regions of the sun. Vides (says Cosmiel hanc asbestinam naviculam commoditati tuæ præparatam. kinerar. 1, dial. 1, cap. 5. There are some very strange fancies in this work of Kircher. When the genius of the world and his fellow-traveller arrive at the planet Venus, they find an island of loveliness, full of odours and intelligences, where an els preside, who shed the cosmetic influence of this planet over the earth; such being, according to astrologers, the vis influxivas of Venus. When they are in this part of the heavens, a casuistical question occurs to Theodidactus, and be asks Whether baptism may be performed with the waters of Venus? An aquis globi Veneris baptismus institui possit? to which the genius answers, Certainly. 2 This idea is FATHER KIRCHER'S. Tot animatos soles dixisses. Itinerar, i, dial. 1, cap. 5. I cannot warn thee! every touch, That brings my pulses close to thine, Tells me I want thy aid as much, Oh! quite as much, as thou dost mine! Yet stay, dear love-one effort yet- The light that leads my soul astray! Thou say'st that we were born to meet, Oh, lady! think, how man's deceit Can seem to sigh and feign to feel! When o'er thy face some gleam of thought, The sympathy I then betray'd, Perhaps was but the child of art; The guile of one who long hath play'd With all these wily nets of heart. Oh! thou hast not my virgin vow! Though few the years I yet have told, Canst thou believe I lived till now With loveless heart or senses cold? No-many a throb of bliss and pain, While some I truly, dearly loved! The cheek to thine I fondly lay, To theirs hath been as fondly laid; The words to thee I warmly say, To them have been as warmly said. Which long hath lost its early spring; While thus to mine thy bosom lies, While thus our breaths commingling glow, 'T were more than woman to be wise, "T were more than man to wish thee so! Did we not love so true, so dear, This lapse could never be forgiven; But hearts so fond and lips so near Give me the ring, and now-Oh heaven! ΤΟ ON SEEING HER WITH A WHITE VEIL AND A RICH GIRDLE. Μαργαριται δηλουσι δακρυων ροου. Put off the vestal veil, nor, oh! |