Chief isle of the embowered Cyclades, Rejoice, O Delos, with thine olives green, And poplars, and lawn-shading palms, and beech, Where was he, when the Giant of the Sun 25 Stood bright, amid the sorrow of his peers? 30 And his twin-sister sleeping in their bower, And in the morning twilight wandered forth Full ankle-deep in lillies of the vale. The nightingale had ceas'd, and a few stars 35 40 While from beneath some cumbrous boughs hard by 45 And there was purport in her looks for him, "Or hath that antique mien and robed form 50 55 "These grassy solitudes, and seen the flowers "Or I have dream'd."-"Yes," said the supreme shape, "Thou hast dream'd of me; and awaking up "Didst find a lyre all golden by thy side, 60 "Listen'd in pain and pleasure at the birth "Whose strings touch'd by thy fingers, all the vast "Unwearied ear of the whole universe 65 Thus answer'd, while his white melodious throat "That thou shouldst weep, so gifted? Tell me, youth, "What sorrow thou canst feel; for I am sad "When thou dost shed a tear: explain thy griefs "To one who in this lonely isle hath been "The watcher of thy sleep and hours of life, "From the young day when first thy infant hand "Pluck'd witless the weak flowers, till thine arm "Could bend that bow heroic to all times. "Show thy heart's secret to an ancient Power "Who hath forsaken old and sacred thrones "For prophecies of thee, and for the sake "Of loveliness new born."-Apollo then, With sudden scrutiny and gloomless eyes, 70 75 80 'Thy name is on my tongue, I know not how ; 85 90 "Like one who once had wings.-O why should I "Feel curs'd and thwarted, when the liegeless air "Yields to my step aspirant? why should I "Spurn the green turf as hateful to my feet? "Goddess benign, point forth some unknown thing: 95 "Are there not other regions than this isle? "What are the stars? There is the sun, the sun! "And the most patient brilliance of the moon! "And stars by thousands! Point me out the way "To any one particular beauteous star, "And I will flit into it with my lyre, "And make its silvery splendour pant with bliss. "I have heard the cloudy thunder: Where is power? "Whose hand, whose essence, what divinity "Makes this alarum in the elements, "While I here idle listen on the shores "In fearless yet in aching ignorance? "O tell me, lonely Goddess, by thy harp, 100 105 110 "Names, deeds, grey legends, dire events, rebellions, "Majesties, sovran voices, agonies, 115 "Creations and destroyings, all at once "Pour into the wide hollows of my brain, "And deify me, as if some blithe wine Beneath his white soft temples, stedfast kept Trembling with light upon Mnemosyne. Soon wild commotions shook him, and made flush 120 All the immortal fairness of his limbs ; 125 130 Kept undulation round his eager neck. Her arms as one who prophesied. At length THE END. 135 (136) Hunt says of this part of the fragment, "It strikes us that there is something too effeminate and human in the way in which Apollo receives the exaltation which his wisdom is giving him. He weeps and wonders somewhat too fondly; but his powers gather nobly on him as he proceeds." I confess that I should be disposed to rank all these symptoms of convulsion and hysteria in the same category as the fainting of lovers which Keats so frequently represented, a kind of thing which his astonishing powers of progress would infallibly have outgrown had he lived a year or two longer. The imprint of the Lamia volume, which is in the centre of the verso of the last page, is as follows :— LONDON: PRINTED BY THOMAS DAVISON, WHITEFRIARS. |