And Thou, though strong in love, art all too weak
In reason, in self-government too slow;

I counsel thee by fortitude to seek

Our blest re-union in the shades below.

The invisible world with thee hath sympathised;
Be thy affections raised and solemnised.

Learn, by a mortal yearning, to ascend—
Seeking a higher object. Love was given,
Encouraged, sanctioned, chiefly for that end;
For this the passion to excess was driven—
That self might be annulled: her bondage prove
The fetters of a dream, opposed to love."

Aloud she shrieked! for Hermes re-appears!

Round the dear Shade she would have clung-'tis vain :
The hours are past-too brief had they been years;
And him no mortal effort can detain:

Swift, toward the realms that know not earthly day,
He through the portal takes his silent way,
And on the palace-floor a lifeless corse She lay.

By no weak pity might the Gods be moved;
She who thus perished, not without the crime
Of lovers that in reason's spite have loved,
Was doomed to wear out her appointed time,
Apart from happy Ghosts-that gather flowers
Of blissful quiet 'mid unfading bowers.

-Yet tears to human suffering are due;
And mortal hopes defeated and o'erthrown
Are mourned by man, and not by man alone,
As fondly he believes.-Upon the side
Of Hellespont (such faith was entertained)
A knot of spiry trees for ages grew

From out the tomb of him for whom she died;
And ever, when such stature they had gained
That Ilium's walls were subject to their view,
The trees' tall summits withered at the sight;
A constant interchange of growth and blight!*

1814.

* For the account of these long-lived trees, see Pliny's Natural History, lib. xvi. cap. 44.; and for the features in the character of Protesilaus (page 177.) see the Iphigenia in Aulis of Euripides. Virgil places the Shade of Laodamia in a mournful region, among unhappy Lovers,

It Comes.

His Laodamia

XXX.

TO A YOUNG LADY,

WHO HAD BEEN REPROACHED FOR TAKING LONG WALKS IN THE COUNTRY.

DEAR Child of Nature, let them rail!
-There is a nest in a green dale,

A harbour and a hold,

Where thou, a Wife and Friend, shalt see

Thy own heart-stirring days, and be
A light to young and old.

There, healthy as a shepherd-boy,

And treading among flowers of joy

Which at no season fade,

Thou, while thy babes around thee cling,

Shalt show us how divine a thing

A Woman may be made.

Thy thoughts and feelings shall not die,
Nor leave thee, when grey-hairs are nigh,
A melancholy slave;

But an old age serene and bright,
And lovely as a Lapland night,

Shall lead thee to thy grave.

WITHIN the mind strong fancies work,
A deep delight the bosom thrills,
Oft as I pass along the fork

Of these fraternal hills :

Where, save the rugged road, we find
No appanage of human kind,
Nor hint of man; if stone or rock
Seem not his handy-work to mock
By something cognizably shaped;
Mockery-or model roughly hewn,
And left as if by earthquake strewn,
Or from the Flood escaped:
Altars for Druid service fit;

(But where no fire was ever lit,
Unless the glow-worm to the skies
Thence offer nightly sacrifice)

Wrinkled Egyptian monument;

Green moss-grown tower; or hoary tent; Tents of a camp that never shall be raised— On which four thousand years have gazed!

II.

Ye plough-shares sparkling on the slopes!
Ye snow-white lambs that trip
Imprisoned 'mid the formal props
Of restless ownership!

Ye trees, that may to-morrow fall
To feed the insatiate Prodigal!

Lawns, houses, chattels, groves, and fields,
All that the fertile valley shields;

Wages of folly-baits of crime,

Of life's uneasy game the stake,
Playthings that keep the eyes awake
Of drowsy, dotard Time ;—

O care! O guilt!-O vales and plains,
Here, 'mid his own unvexed domains,
A Genius dwells, that can subdue

At once all memory of You,

Most potent when mists veil the sky,

Mists that distort and magnify;

While the coarse rushes, to the sweeping breeze,

Sigh forth their ancient melodies!