A firmament reflected in a sea;
An element filling the space between;
An unknown-but no more: we humbly
With uplift hands our foreheads, lowly
Even while they brought the burden to a
A shout from the whole multitude arose,
That linger'd in the air like dying rolls
Of abrupt thunder, when Ionian shoals 310
Of dolphins bob their noses through the
brine.
Meantime, on shady levels, mossy fine,
Young companies nimbly began dancing
To the swift treble pipe, and humming
string.
Aye, those fair living forms swam heavenly
To tunes forgotten-out of memory:
Fair creatures! whose young children's
children bred
Thermopyla its heroes
- not yet dead,
But in old marbles ever beautiful.
High genitors, unconscious did they cull 320
Time's sweet first-fruits
And frantic gape of lonely Niobe,
Poor, lonely Niobe! when her lovely young
Were dead and gone, and her caressing
tongue
And giving out a shout most heaven-rend- Lay a lost thing upon her paly lip,
Conjure thee to receive our humble Pæan,
Upon thy Mount Lycean!'
And very, very deadliness did nip
Her motherly cheeks. Aroused from this
Who, suddenly, should stoop through the smooth wind,
And with the balmiest leaves his temples bind;
And, ever after, through those regions be
His messenger, his little Mercury.
Some were athirst in soul to see again
Their fellow-huntsmen o'er the wide cham-
paign
In times long past; to sit with them, and talk
Of all the chances in their earthly walk; Comparing, joyfully, their plenteous stores Of happiness, to when upon the moors, 390 Benighted, close they huddled from the cold,
And shared their famish'd scrips. Thus all out-told
Again I'll linger in a sloping mead
To hear the speckled thrushes, and see feed
Our idle sheep. So be thou cheered, sweet!
And, if thy lute is here, softly intreat
My soul to keep in its resolved course.'
Hereat Peona, in their silver source, Shut her pure sorrow-drops with glad exclaim,
Tell me thine ailment: tell me all amiss!
Ah! thou hast been unhappy at the change
Wrought suddenly in me. What indeed
more strange?
Or more complete to overwhelm surmise?
Ambition is no sluggard: 't is no prize,
That toiling years would put within my
grasp,
That I have sigh'd for: with so deadly gasp
And took a lute, from which there pulsing No man e'er panted for a mortal love.
So all have set my heavier grief above
These things which happen. Rightly have
they done:
I, who still saw the horizontal sun
Heave his broad shoulder o'er the edge of
the world,
Out-facing Lucifer, and then had hurl'd
My spear aloft, as signal for the chase
I, who, for very sport of heart, would
That but one night had wrought this flow- Commingling with her argent spheres did
Through clear and cloudy, even when she went
At last into a dark and vapoury tent -
Whereat, methought, the lidless-eyed train
Of planets all were in the blue again.
To commune with those orbs, once more I
raised
In passing here, his owlet pinions shook;
Or, it may be, ere matron Night uptook 561
Her ebon urn, young Mercury, by stealth,
Had dipt his rod in it: such garland wealth
Came not by common growth. Thus on I My sight right upward: but it was quite
Could figure out and to conception bring
All I beheld and felt. Methought I lay
Watching the zenith, where the milky way
Among the stars in virgin splendour pours;
And travelling my eye, until the doors 581
Of heaven appear'd to open for my flight,
I became loth and fearful to alight
From such high soaring by a downward glance :
So kept me steadfast in that airy trance,
Spreading imaginary pinions wide.
When, presently, the stars began to glide,
And faint away, before my eager view:
At which I sigh'd that I could not pursue,
And dropt my vision to the horizon's verge;
And lo! from opening clouds, I saw
And plays about its fancy, till the stings
Of human neighbourhood envenom all.
Unto what awful power shall I call ?
To what high fane? - Ah! see her hover-
ing feet,
More bluely vein'd, more soft, more whitely
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