XXXII. DION. (SEE PLUTARCH.) I. SERENE, and fitted to embrace, With self-sufficing solitude, But with majestic lowliness endued, Might in the universal bosom reign, II. Five thousand warriors,- O the rapturous day!Each crowned with flowers, and armed with spear and shield, Or ruder weapon which their course might yield, To Syracuse advance in bright array. Who leads them on?. The anxious people see On tables set, as if for rites divine; And, as the great Deliverer marches by, He looks on festal ground with fruits bestrown; And flowers are on his person thrown In boundless prodigality; Nor doth the general voice abstain from prayer, Invoking Dion's tutelary care, As if a very Deity he were? III. Mourn, hills and groves of Attica! and mourn, Mourn, and lament for him whose spirit dreads Your once sweet memory, studious walks and shades! For him who to divinity aspired, Not on the breath of popular applause, But through dependence on the sacred laws Framed in the schools where Wisdom dwelt retired, Intent to trace the ideal path of right (More fair than heaven's broad causeway paved with stars) Which Dion learned to measure with sublime de But he hath overleaped the eternal bars; And, following guides whose craft holds no consent With aught that breathes the ethereal element, Hath stained the robes of civil power with blood, Unjustly shed, though for the public good. Whence doubts that came too late, and wishes vain, Hollow excuses, and triumphant pain; And oft his cogitations sink as low As, through the abysses of a joyless heart, But whence that sudden check? that fearful start? Anon his lifted eyes Saw, at a long-drawn gallery's dusky bound, And hideous aspect, stalking round and round! His force on Caspian foam to try; IV. So, but from toil less sign of profit reaping, Sweeping, vehemently sweeping, - 66 Avaunt, inexplicable Guest! avaunt!" Exclaimed the Chieftain; "let me rather see The coronal that coiling vipers make; The torch that flames with many a lurid flake, Which they behold whom vengeful Furies haunt ; Who, while they struggle from the scourge to flee, Move where the blasted soil is not unworn, And, in their anguish, bear what other minds have borne !" V. But Shapes that come not at an earthly call Once raised, remains aghast, and will not fall! Your Minister would brush away The spots that to my soul adhere ; But should she labor night and day, They will not, cannot disappear; Whence angry perturbations, and that look Which no philosophy can brook! VI. Ill-fated Chief! there are whose hopes are built Upon the ruins of thy glorious name; Who, through the portal of one moment's guilt, Pursue thee with their deadly aim! O matchless perfidy! portentous lust Of monstrous crime! that horror-striking blade, Shuddered the walls, the marble city wept, · And sylvan places heaved a pensive sigh; Of spirit too capacious to require That Destiny her course should change; too just |