Her hair's long auburn waves down to her heel
Flow'd like an Alpine torrent which the sun
Dyes with his morning light,—and would conceal
Her person if allow'd at large to run;
And still they seem resentfully to feel

The silken fillet's curb, and sought to shun Their bonds whene'er some zephyr caught began To offer his young pinion as her fan.

LXXIV.

Round her she made an atmosphere of life,

The very air seem'd lighter from her eyes, They were so soft and beautiful, and rife With all we can imagine of the skies, And pure as Psyche ere she grew a wifeToo pure even for the purest human ties; Her overpowering presence made you feel It would not be idolatry to kneel.

LXXVI.

LXXVII.

LXXVIII.

LXXIX.

He praised the present and abused the past,
Reversing the good custom of old days,
An eastern anti-jacobin at last

He turn'd, preferring pudding to no praiseFor some few years his lot had been o'ercast By his seeming independent in his lays,

But now he sung the Sultan and the Pacha,
With truth like Southey, and with verse like Crashaw.

LXXX.

He was a man who had seen many changes,
And always changed as true as any needle,
His polar star being one which rather ranges,
And not the fix'd-he knew the way to wheedle;
So vile he 'scaped the doom which oft avenges;
And being fluent, (save indeed when fee'd ill,)
He lied with such a fervour of intention-
There was no doubt he earn'd his laureate pension.

LXXXI.

But he had genius-when a turncoat has it
The "vates irritabilis" takes care
That without notice few full moons shall pass it;
Even good men like to make the public stare :-
But to my subject-let me see-what was it?
Oh!-the third canto-and the pretty pair-
Their loves, and feasts, and house, and dress, and mode
Of living in their insular abode.

LXXXII.

Their poet, a sad trimmer, but no less

In company a very pleasant fellow,

Had been the favourite of full many a mess

Of men, and made them speeches when nalf mellow;
And though his meaning they could rarely guess,
Yet still they deign'd to hiccup or to bellow
The glorious meed of popular applause,

Of which the first ne'er knows the second cause.
LXXXIII.

But now being lifted into high society,

And having pick'd up several odds and end
Of free thoughts in his travels, for variety,
He deem'd, being in a lone isle among friends,
That without any danger of a riot, he

Might for long lying make himself amends;
And, singing as he sung in his warm youth
Agree to a short armistice with truth.

LXXXIV.

He had travell'd 'mong the Arabs, Turks, and Franks,
And knew the self-loves of the different nations;
And, having lived with people of all ranks,

Had something ready upon most occasions-
Which got him a few presents and some thanks.
He varied with some skill his adulations;
To" do at Rome as Romans do," a piece
Of conduct was which he observed in Greece.

LXXXV.

Thus, usually, when he was ask'd to sing,

He gave the different nations something national; "I was all the same to him—“God save the King," Or " Ca ira," according to the fashion all; Ilis muse made increment of any thing,

From the high lyrical to the low rationa! : If Pindar sang horseraces, what should hinder Himself from being as pliable as Pindar?

LXXXVI.

In France, for instance, he would write a chanson; In England, a six-canto quarto tale;

In Spain, he'd make a ballad or romance on

The last war-much the same in Portugal;

In Germany, the Pegasus he 'd prance on

Would be old Goethe's-(see what says de Staël ;) In Italy, he'd ape the "Trecentisti ;"

In Greece, he'd sing some sort of hymn like this t' ye.

The isles of Greece! the isles of Greece!

Where burning Sappho loved and sung,-
Where grew the arts of war and peace,—
Where Delos rose and Phoebus sprung!
Eternal summer gilds them yet,
But all, except their sun, is set.

The Scian and the Teian muse,

The hero's harp, the lover's lute,
Have found the fame your shores refuse;
Their place of birth alone is mute
To sounds which echo further west
Than your sires' "Islands of the Bless'd."

The mountains look on Marathon-
And Marathon looks on the sea;
And musing there an hour alone,

I dream'd that Greece might still be free,
For, standing on the Persians' grave,
I could not deem myself a slave.

A king sate on the rocky brow

Which looks o'er sea-born Salamis; And ships, by thousands, lay below,

And men in nations;-all were his! He counted them at break of dayAnd when the sun set, where were they? And where are they? and where art thou, My country? On thy voiceless shore The heroic lay is tuneless now

The heroic bosom beats no more!
And must thy lyre, so long divine,
Degenerate into hands like mine?

'Tis something, in the dearth of fame,
Though link'd among a fetter'd race,
To feel at least a patriot's shame,
Even as I sing, suffuse my face;
For what is left the poet here?
For Greeks a blush-for Greece a tear.

Must we but weep o'er days more bless'd?
Must we but blush ?-Our fathers bled.
Earth! render back from out thy breast
A remnant of our Spartan dead!
Of the three hundred grant but three,
To make a new Thermopyla.

What, silent still? and silent all?
Ah! no-the voices of the dead
Sound like a distant torrent's fall,

And answer, "Let one living head,
But one arise, we come, we come!"
"T is but the living who are dumb.
In vain-in vain: strike other chords;
Fill high the cup with Samian wine!
Leave battles to the Turkish hordes,

And shed the blood of Scio's vine! Hark! rising to the ignoble callHow answers each bold bacchanal! You have the Pyrrhic dance as yet, Where is the Pyrrhic phalanx gone? Of two such lessons, why forget

The nobler and the manlier one?
You have the letters Cadmus gave-
Think ye he meant them for a slave?
Fill high the bowl with Samian wine!
We will not think of themes like these
It made Anacreon's song divine:

He served-but served Polycrates-
A tyrant; but our masters then
Were still, at least, our countrymen.

The tyrant or the Chersonese

Was freedom's best and bravest friend That tyrant was Miltiades!

Oh! that the present hour would lend Another despot of the kind! Such chains as his were sure to bind. Fill high the bowl with Samian wine! On Suli's rock, and Parga's shore, Exists the remnant of a line

Such as the Doric mothers bore; And there, perhaps, some seed is sown, The Heracleidan blood might own. Trust not for freedom to the FranksThey have a king who buys and sells. In native swords, and native ranks,

The only hope of courage dwells; But Turkish force, and Latin fraud, Would break your shield, however broad. Fill high the bowl with Samian wine!

Our virgins dance beneath the shadeI see their glorious black eyes shine; But, gazing on each glowing maid, My own the burning tear-drop laves, To think such breasts must suckle slaves. Place me on Sunium's marbled steepWhere nothing, save the waves and I, May hear our mutual murmurs sweep;

There, swan-like, let me sing and die : A land of slaves shall ne'er be mineDash down yon cup of Samian wine!

LXXXVII.

Thus sung, or would, or could, or should have sung,
The modern Greek, in tolerable verse;

If not like Orpheus quite, when Greece was young,
Yet in these times he might have done much worse,
His strain display'd some feeling-right or wrong;
And feeling, in a poet, is the source
Of others' feeling; but they are such liars,
And take all colours-like the hands of dyers.

LXXXVIII.

But words are things, and a small drop of ink
Falling like dew upɔn a thought, produces
That which makes thousands, perhaps millions, think,
'Tis strange, the shortest letter which man ses,
Instead of speech, may form a lasting link

Of ages; to what straits old Time reduces
Frai! man, when paper-even a rag like this.
Survives himself, his tomb, and all that's his.

But let me to my story: I must own,
If I have any fault, it is digression;
Leaving my people to proceed alone,

While I soliloquize beyond expression;
But these are my addresses from the throne,
Which put off business to the ensuing session :
Forgetting each omission is a loss to
The world, not quite so great as Ariosto.

CV.

Sweet hour of twilight-in the solitude

Of the pine forest, and the silent shore Which bounds Ravenna's immemorial wood, Rooted where once the Adrian wave flow'd o'er, To where the last Cæsarean fortress stood,

Ever-green forest! which Boccaccio's lore And Dryden's lay made haunted ground to me, How have I loved the twilight hour and thee!

CVI.

The shrill cicalas, people of the pine,

Making their summer lives one ceaseless song, Were the sole echoes, save my steed's and mine, And vesper-bell's that rose the boughs along; The spectre huntsman of Onesti's line,

His hell-dogs, and their chase, and the fair throng, Which learn'd from this example not to fly From a true lover, shadow'd my mind's eye.

CVII.

Oh Hesperus! thou bringest all good things-
Home to the weary, to the hungry cheer,
To the young bird the parent's brooding wings,
The welcome stall to the o'erlabour'd steer;
Whate'er of peace about our hearthstone clings,
Whate'er our household gods protect of dear,
Are gather'd round us by thy look of rest;
Thou bring'st the child, too, to the mother's breast.

CVIII.
Soft hour! which wakes the wish and melts the heart
Of those who sail n.e seas, on the first day
When they from their sweet friends are torn apart;
Or fills with love the pilgrim on his way,
As the far bell of vesper makes him start,
Seeming to weep the dying day's decay;
Is this a fancy which our reason scorns?
Ah! surely nothing dies but something mourns!

How I have treated it, I do not know--
Perhaps no better than they have treated mo
Who have imputed such designs as show,
Not what they saw, but what they wish'd to see:
But if it gives them pleasure, be it so.
This is a liberal age, and thoughts are free'
Meantime Apollo plucks me by the ear,
And tells me to resume my story here.