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| AH me! while up the long, long vale of time, | |
| Reflection wanders towards the eternal vast, | |
| How starts the eye, at many a change sublime, | |
| Unbosom’d dimly by the ages pass’d! | |
| What mausoleums crowd the mournful waste! | 5 |
| The tombs of empires fallen! and nations gone! | |
| Each, once inscribed, in gold, with “Aye to last,” | |
| Sate as a queen; proclaim’d the world her own, | |
| And proudly cried, “By me no sorrows shall be known.” | |
| |
| Soon fleets the sunbright form, by man adored. | 10 |
| Soon fell the head of gold, to time a prey; | |
| The arms, the trunk, his cankering tooth devour’d; | |
| And whirlwinds blew the iron dust away. | |
| Where dwelt imperial Timur?—far astray, | |
| Some lonely-musing pilgrim now inquires; | 15 |
| And, rack’d by storms, and hastening to decay, | |
| Mohammed’s mosque foresees its final fires; | |
| And Rome’s more lordly temple day by day expires. | |
| |
| As o’er proud Asian realms the traveller winds, | |
| His manly spirit, hush’d by terror, falls; | 20 |
| When some deceased town’s lost site he finds, | |
| Where ruin wild his pondering eye appals; | |
| Where silence swims along the moulder’d walls, | |
| And broods upon departed grandeur’s tomb. | |
| Through the lone, hollow aisles sad echo calls, | 25 |
| At each low step; deep sighs the breathing gloom, | |
| And weeping fields, around, bewail their Empress’s doom. | |
| |
| Where o’er an hundred realms, the throne uprose, | |
| The screech-owl nests, the panther builds his home; | |
| Sleep the dull newts, the lazy adders doze, | 30 |
| Where pomp and luxury danced the golden room. | |
| Low lies in dust the sky-resembled dome; | |
| Tall grass around the broken column waves; | |
| And brambles climb, and lonely thistles bloom: | |
| The moulder’d arch the weedy streamlet laves, | 35 |
| And low resound beneath, unnumber’d sunken graves. | |
| |
| Soon fleets the sun-bright form, by man adored; | |
| And soon man’s demon chiefs from memory fade. | |
| In musty volume, now must be explored, | |
| Where dwelt imperial nations, long decay’d. | 40 |
| The brightest meteors angry clouds invade; | |
| And where the wonders glitter’d, none explain. | |
| Where Carthage, with proud hand, the trident sway’d, | |
| Now mud-wall’d cots sit sullen on the plain, | |
| And wandering, fierce, and wild, sequester’d Arabs reign. | 45 |
| |
| In thee, O Albion! queen of nations, live | |
| Whatever splendors earth’s wide realms have known; | |
| In thee proud Persia sees her pomp revive; | |
| And Greece her arts; and Rome her lordly throne: | |
| By every wind, thy Tyrian fleets are blown; | 50 |
| Supreme, on fame’s dread roll, thy heroes stand; | |
| All ocean’s realms thy naval sceptre own; | |
| Of bards, of sages, how august thy band! | |
| And one rich Eden blooms around thy garden’d land. | |
| |
| But O how vast thy crimes! through heaven’s great year, | 55 |
| When few centurial suns have traced their way; | |
| When southern Europe, worn by feuds severe; | |
| Weak, doting, fallen, has bow’d to Russian sway; | |
| And setting glory beam’d her farewell ray; | |
| To waste, perchance, thy brilliant fields shall turn; | 60 |
| In dust, thy temples, towers, and towns decay; | |
| The forest howl, where London’s turrets burn; | |
| And all thy garlands deck thy sad, funereal urn. | |
| |
| Some land, scarce glimmering in the light of fame, | |
| Sceptred with arts, and arms (if I divine) | 65 |
| Some unknown wild, some shore without a name, | |
| In all thy pomp, shall then majestic shine. | |
| As silver-headed Time’s slow years decline, | |
| Not ruins only meet the inquiring eye: | |
| Where round yon mouldering oak vain brambles twine, | 70 |
| The filial stem, already towering high, | |
| Ere long shall stretch his arms, and nod in yonder sky. | |
| |
| Where late resounded the wild woodland roar, | |
| Now heaves the palace, now the temple smiles; | |
| Where frown’d the rude rock, and the desert shore, | 75 |
| Now pleasure sports, and business want beguiles, | |
| And commerce wings her flight to thousand isles; | |
| Culture walks forth; gay laugh the loaded fields; | |
| And jocund labor plays his harmless wiles; | |
| Glad science brightens; art her mansion builds; | 80 |
| And peace uplifts her wand, and heaven his blessing yields. | |
| |
| O’er these sweet fields, so lovely now, and gay, | |
| Where modest nature finds each want supplied, | |
| Where home-born happiness delights to play, | |
| And counts her little flock, with household pride, | 85 |
| Long frown’d, from age to age, a forest wide: | |
| Here hung the slumbering bat; the serpent dire | |
| Nested his brood, and drank the impoison’d tide; | |
| Wolves peal’d, the dark drear night, in hideous choir; | |
| Nor shrank the unmeasured howl from Sol’s terrific fire. | 90 |
| |
| No charming cot imbank’d the pebbly stream; | |
| No mansion tower’d, nor garden teem’d with good; | |
| No lawn expanded to the April beam; | |
| Nor mellow harvest hung its bending load; | |
| Nor science dawn’d; nor life with beauty glow’d; | 95 |
| Nor temple whiten’d, in the enchanting dell; | |
| In clusters wild, the sluggish wigwam stood; | |
| And, borne in snaky paths the Indian fell | |
| Now aim’d the death unseen, now scream’d the tiger-yell. | |
| |
| E’en now, perhaps, on human dust I tread, | 100 |
| Pondering, with solemn pause, the wrecks of time; | |
| Here sleeps, perchance, among the vulgar dead, | |
| Some chief, the lofty theme of Indian rhyme, | |
| Who loved ambition’s cloudy steep to climb, | |
| And smiled, death, dangers, rivals, to engage; | 105 |
| Who roused his followers’ souls to deeds sublime, | |
| Kindling to furnace heat vindictive rage, | |
| And soar’d Cæsarean heights, the Phœnix of his age. | |
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| In yon small field, that dimly steals from sight, | |
| (From yon small field these meditations grow,) | 110 |
| Turning the sluggish soil, from morn to night, | |
| The plodding hind, laborious, drives his plough, | |
| Nor dreams, a nation sleeps his foot below. | |
| There, undisturbed by the roaring wave, | |
| Released from war, and far from deadly foe, | 115 |
| Lies down, in endless rest, a nation brave, | |
| And trains, in tempests born, there find a quiet grave. | |
| |
| Oft have I heard the tale, when matron sere | |
| Sung to my infant ear the song of wo; | |
| Of maiden meek, consumed with pining care, | 120 |
| Around whose tomb the wild-rose loved to blow: | |
| Or told, with swimming eyes, how, long ago, | |
| Remorseless Indians, all in midnight dire, | |
| The little, sleeping village, did o’erthrow, | |
| Bidding the cruel flames to heaven aspire, | 125 |
| And scalp’d the hoary head, and burn’d the babe with fire | |
| |
| Then, fancy-fired, her memory wing’d its flight, | |
| To long-forgotten wars, and dread alarms, | |
| To chiefs obscure, but terrible in fight, | |
| Who mock’d each foe, and laugh’d at deadliest harms, | 130 |
| Sydneys in zeal, and Washingtons in arms. | |
| By instinct tender to the woes of man, | |
| My heart bewildering with sweet pity’s charms, | |
| Through solemn scenes, with nature’s step, she ran, | |
| And hush’d her audience small, and thus the tale began. | 135 |
| |
| “Through verdant banks where Thames’s branches glide, | |
| Long held the Pequods an extensive sway; | |
| Bold, savage, fierce, of arms the glorious pride, | |
| And bidding all the circling realms obey. | |
| Jealous, they saw the tribes, beyond the sea, | 140 |
| Plant in their climes; and towns, and cities, rise; | |
| Ascending castles foreign flags display; | |
| Mysterious art new scenes of life devise; | |
| And steeds insult the plains, and cannon rend the skies.” * * * * * | |
| “The rising clouds the savage chief descried, | 145 |
| And, round the forest, bade his heroes arm; | |
| To arms the painted warriors proudly hied, | |
| And through surrounding nations rung the alarm. | |
| The nations heard; but smiled, to see the storm, | |
| With ruin fraught, o’er Pequod mountains driven | 150 |
| And felt infernal joy the bosom warm, | |
| To see their light hang o’er the skirts of even, | |
| And other suns arise, to gild a kinder heaven.” | |
| |
| “Swift to the Pequod fortress Mason sped, | |
| Far in the wildering wood’s impervious gloom; | 155 |
| A lonely castle, brown with twilight dread; | |
| Where oft the embowel’d captive met his doom, | |
| And frequent heaved, around the hollow tomb, | |
| Scalps hung in rows, and whitening bones were strew’d; | |
| Where, round the broiling babe, fresh from the womb, | 160 |
| With howls the Powaw fill’d the dark abode, | |
| And screams, and midnight prayers, invoked the evil god. | |
| |
| “There too, with awful rites, the hoary priest, | |
| Without, beside the moss-grown altar, stood, | |
| His sable form in magic cincture dress’d, | 165 |
| And heap’d the mingled offering to his god, | |
| What time, with golden light, calm evening glow’d, | |
| The mystic dust, the flower of silver bloom, | |
| And spicy herb, his hand in order strew’d; | |
| Bright rose the curling flame; and rich perfume | 170 |
| On smoky wings upflew, or settled round the tomb. | |
| |
| “Then, o’er the circus, danced the maddening throng, | |
| As erst the Thyas roam’d dread Nysa round, | |
| And struck, to forest notes, the ecstatic song, | |
| While slow, beneath them, heav’d the wavy ground. | 175 |
| With a low, lingering groan, of dying sound, | |
| The woodland rumbled; murmured deep each stream; | |
| Shrill sung the leaves; all ether sigh’d profound; | |
| Pale tufts of purple topp’d the silver flame, | |
| And many color’d forms on evening breezes came. | 180 |
| |
| “Thin, twilight forms; attired in changing sheen | |
| Of plumes, high tinctured in the western ray: | |
| Bending, they peep’d the fleecy folds between, | |
| Their wings light rustling in the breath of May. | |
| Soft hovering round the fire, in mystic play, | 185 |
| They snuff’d the incense, waved in clouds afar, | |
| Then, silent, floated toward the setting day; | |
| Eve redden’d each fine form, each misty car; | |
| And through them faintly gleam’d, at times, the western star. | |
| |
| “Then (so tradition sings,) the train behind, | 190 |
| In plumy zones of rainbow’d beauty dress’d, | |
| Rode the Great Spirit, in the obedient wind, | |
| In yellow clouds slow sailing from the west. | |
| With dawning smiles, the God his votaries bless’d, | |
| And taught where deer retired to ivy dell; | 195 |
| What chosen chief with proud command to invest, | |
| Where crept the approaching foe, with purpose fell, | |
| And where to wind the scout, and war’s dark storm dispel. | |
| |
| “There on her lover’s tomb, in silence laid, | |
| While still, and sorrowing, shower’d the moon’s pale beam, | 200 |
| At times, expectant, slept the widow’d maid, | |
| Her soul far wandering on the sylph-wing’d dream. | |
| Wafted from evening skies, on sunny stream, | |
| Her darling youth with silver pinions shone; | |
| With voice of music, tuned to sweetest theme, | 205 |
| He told of shell-bright bowers, beyond the sun, | |
| Where years of endless joy o’er Indian lovers run. | |
| |
| “But now no awful rites, nor potent spell, | |
| To silence charm’d the peals of coming war; | |
| Or told the dread recesses of the dell, | 210 |
| Where glowing Mason led his bands from far: | |
| No spirit, buoyant on his airy car, | |
| Control’d the whirlwind of invading fight: | |
| Deep died in blood, dun evening’s falling star | |
| Sent sad o’er western hills its parting light, | 215 |
| And no returning morn dispersed the long, dark night. | |
| |
| “On the drear walls a sudden splendor glow’d, | |
| There Mason shone, and there his veterans pour’d. | |
| Anew the hero claim’d the fiends of blood, | |
| While answering storms of arrows round him shower’d, | 220 |
| And the war-scream the ear with anguish gored. | |
| Alone, he burst the gate; the forest round | |
| Re-echoed death; the peal of onset roar’d, | |
| In rush’d the squadrons; earth in blood was drown’d; | |
| And gloomy spirits fled, and corses hid the ground. | 225 |
| |
| “Not long in dubious fight the host had striven, | |
| When, kindled by the musket’s potent flame, | |
| In clouds, and fire, the castle rose to heaven, | |
| And gloom’d the world, with melancholy beam. | |
| Then hoarser groans, with deeper anguish, came; | 230 |
| And fiercer fight the keen assault repell’d: | |
| Nor e’en these ills the savage breast could tame; | |
| Like hell’s deep caves, the hideous region yell’d, | |
| Till death, and sweeping fire, laid waste the hostile field.” | |
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