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(From Knights and Freemen)
Translated by J. O. Sargent
FROM a lofty Alpine summit look down upon this land, | |
| It lies there like a volume all written by God’s hand; | |
| The mountains are the letters, as leaves the fields unroll, | |
| Saint Gothard is only an asterisk in this gigantic scroll. | |
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| Know you what there is written? O, see it beams so bright! | 5 |
| Freedom stands there, ye princes! can ye read the page aright? | |
| No chancellor engrossed it, it is no parchment chart, | |
| And the red that burns in the signet is the blood of a people’s heart. | |
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| Behold the mighty mountain,—the Monk in the country hight,— | |
| Around his brow the eagle sweeps in its heavenward flight; | 10 |
| His cowl is of rock, and the snow-crown becomes his temples well, | |
| His prayer-book the starry heavens, the universe his cell. | |
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| When a monk appears, there surely can be no lack of preaching, | |
| In the thunder of the avalanche, in the cataract he is teaching; | |
| Freedom! that is his text-word; good sirs, you do not smile, | 15 |
| It is clear the monk is a heretic,—he must go into durance vile. | |
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| Lo, in white veil the maiden raises her modest head, | |
| As morning, the bridegroom, garlands her brow with roses red; | |
| With various flowers embroidered her green apparel gleams, | |
| Where, like silver tissues inwoven, sparkle the crested streams. | 20 |
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| Over her, arched to a cupola, behold the blue air streams, | |
| The row of pointed glaciers a cathedral organ seems; | |
| With a maid and an organ together, one cannot well be wrong | |
| In listening with all assurance for music and for song. | |
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| Hear how her song magnificent thrills in the beating heart, | 25 |
| Freedom! freedom! she sings so that all our pulses start: | |
| By heavens! with such a harmony never sang daughters of earth, | |
| And they who join in the chorus are surely of heavenly birth. * * * * * | |
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