"Here will we sit, and let the sounds of music
Creep in our ears. Soft stillness and the night
Become the touches of sweet harmony."
WHERE the proud Alps lift up their cliffs to heaven, Where the wild Rhone is dashing on his waves, A peaceful spot shut out from all the world
By mountains, on whose bold and craggy heights
Storm spirits held their loudest revelry,
While at their feet moonbeams were sleeping on, -
It was a wild, but 't was a peaceful spot;
It was his home and yet it had been long
Since he had gazed upon its loveliness;
War's angry trumpet summoned him away,
To fight his country's battles; he had seen
Cities and men of different name and clime,
Had braved the angry storms of northern lands,
And viewed the splendor of a Persian sunset,
Had known earth's pleasures and its honors too,
But yet they were not home! — Fourscore summers
Had left their signet on his hoary head,
And now he wished to lay his ashes down,
To sleep their longest sleep in that still place.
It was a lovely night: the storm had past,
And cliff, and rock, and shrub, and mountain stream,
* Written, probably, at sixteen; and illustrating the influence of music by three incidents familiar to most readers.
Were quiet in the moonlight,—you might dream,
It was the eve before Creation waked;
And all was bright, save where those Alpine cliffs
Cast their long shadows o'er the brilliant scene.
Hush! hush! there is a ripple on the waters;
And you may hear far, far away the plash
Of the light oar ! — Nearer and nearer yet!
And the trim bark is floating calmly down;
And there, before him, the past scenes of youth
And infancy were sleeping bright and noiseless;
They were the same, as purely beautiful
To him as ever, -
Was it not heaven to gaze again upon them?
But hark! the sounds of music o'er that wave!
Softer and sweeter they are floating now,
and still loved as much!
Breathing their richness o'er the silent water.
"True, other climes may be more fair,
And fruits and flowers grow lovelier there ;
Dearer to me than all the rest,
Thou art the land I love the best!
"Our hearts are warm, our souls are free, Our bosoms bound full merrily;
Our hearts, our souls, our arms, shall be
Devoted still to thine and thee!"
And could it be? - It was indeed the same !
He knew it from his boyhood up; and once
He loved to listen to the thrilling strain,
As it rang wild and loud from cave to cave.
It was indeed the same! and that, the home,
Where he had loved so well to hear it sung!
He caught the sound, ere it had died away,
And chanted one more strain; it was the one
He used to love the best in days gone by.
"Oh! let my sleeping ashes lie
Beneath thy green sod peacefully,
Most loved of all, my native land,
My home, my country, Switzerland!
The song was hushed; the echo came and went,
And all was still again. That little bark
Floated as smoothly and as calmly on;
But he, who had been guiding it, was sleeping.
"And I have loved thee, ocean! and my joy
Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be
Borne, like thy billows, onward; from a boy
I wantoned with thy breakers."
HAIL to thy billows! I will love thee still! Though danger, death, and tempest rest upon thee, Yet I will love thee still! There is a pomp, A kingly pride and majesty upon thee; And, when the angry tempest was abroad, I have felt fain to mingle with thy waves, Amid the angry war of earth and heaven, And be borne on with thy billows!
Proudly those gallant ships are wafted on,
And bright the streamers that are flaunting high, And soft the breeze that sports amid their folds, And calm the waters over which they float.
It was a goodly sight; and far from foreign lands
The GoD of tempests had preserved them hither.
Far from the bosom of their sunny homes
They had gone forth in search of lands unknown;
And, though the tempest had been sore upon them,
Through doubt and death and danger they had come,
And come in peace. It was a Sabbath eve :
The Sabbath sun was calmly sinking down,
And his last rays of heavenly brilliancy
Rested alike on sail and shore and wave;
The very winds and waters were as calm
As when their Maker bid them, "Peace! be still."
And there, in the unbroken sleep of ages,
The object of their hopes and fears and prayers
Lay in its loveliness. "Gracias a Dios!"
And ten thousand voices swelled the chorus,
"Gracias á Dios!" and the sound went forth
In holy majesty upon the waters,
"Gracias a Dios!" and the echo came
Back from the shore in soft and silvery richness.
And then a strain of sweetest harmony,
The sound of flute and harp and trumpet, came,
And rose and swelled in its unearthly sweetness,
Till the whole air was changed to harmony:
And then at last, that strain! it died away,
Till far, far off upon the rippled sea,
Its holy music melted into silence.
"Oh, surely melody from Heaven was sent,
To cheer the soul when tired with human strife,
And soothe the wayward heart by sorrow rent."
THERE is a land of melody and love,
There is a land of poetry and feeling,
And, though the soul that once inspired has fled,
Still it is lovely. T is said that beauty
Doth seem most fair, most beautiful, in death;
And so, methinks, it is with Italy.
It was a kingly pile of olden time;
And he, who gazed upon its moss-grown tower,
Its Gothic buttresses and battlements,
Might know full well it was of "days gone by."
That night there was a holy festival;
And homeless poverty, and titled pomp,
Were gathered there within those holy walls :
Crowd after crowd they came, till there they stood
A vast, a mighty mass of human life,
In hushed and motionless expectancy.
And one there was among that multitude,
A man of princely birth, a man of crime,
Whose heart was black with many a heinous sin:
Ay sins of every name and every die
Were heaped in frightful gathering on his soul.
The sound was soft at first; and you might dream It was an angel's whisper: :once it rose,
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