But left long wrecks behind, and now again,
Borne in our old unchanged career, we move;
Thou tendest wildly onwards to the main,

And I to loving one I should not love.

The current I behold will sweep beneath

Her native walls, and murmur at her feet;
Her eyes will look on thee, when she shall breathe
The twilight air, unharm'd by summer's heat.

She will look on thee,-I have look'd on thee,
Full of that thought: and, from that moment, ne'er
Thy waters could I dream of, name, or see,
Without the inseparable sigh for her!

Her bright eyes will be imaged in thy stream,
Yes! they will meet the wave I gaze on now:
Mine cannot witness, even in a dream,

That happy wave repass me in its flow!

The wave that bears my tears returns no more:
Will she return by whom that wave shall sweep? –
Both tread thy banks, both wander on thy shore,
I by thy source, she by the dark blue deep.

But that which keepeth us apart is not

Distance, nor depth of wave, nor space of earth, But the distraction of a various lot,

As various as the climates of our birth.

A stranger loves the lady of the land,

Born far beyond the mountains, but his blood Is all meridian, as if never fann'd

By the black wind that chills the polar flood.

My blood is all meridian; were it not,

I had not left my clime, nor should I be, In spite of tortures, ne'er to be forgot,

A slave again of love,- at least of thee.

"Tis vain to struggle let me perish youngLive as I lived, and love as I have loved;

To dust if I return, from dust I sprung,

And then, at least, my heart can ne'er be moved.

April, 1819.

SONNET TO GEORGE THE FOURTH,

ON THE REPEAL OF LORD EDWARD FITZGERALD'S FORFEITURE.

To be the father of the fatherless,

To stretch the hand from the throne's height, and raise

His offspring, who expired in other days

To make thy sire's sway by a kingdom less,-
This is to be a monarch, and repress

Envy into unutterable praise."

Dismiss thy guard, and trust thee to such traits, For who would lift a hand, except to bless? Were it not easy, sir, and is 't not sweet To make thyself beloved? and to be Omnipotent by mercy's means? for thus Thy sovereignty would grow but more complete;

A despot thou, and yet thy people free,

And by the heart, not hand, enslaving us.
Bologna, August 12, 1819.

EPIGRAM.

FROM THE FRENCH OF RULHIERES.

1f, for silver or for gold,

You could melt ten thousand pimples
Into half a dozen dimples,

Then your face we might behold,

Looking, doubtless, much more snugly;

Yet even then 't would be d-d ugly.

August 12, 1819.

STANZAS.1

Could Love for ever
Run like a river,
And Time's endeavour

Be tried in vain -
No other pleasure
With this could measure;
And like a treasure

We'd hug the chain.
But since our sighing
Ends not in dying,
And, form'd for flying,
Love plumes his wing;
Then for this reason

Let's love a season;

But let that season be only Spring.
When lovers parted
Feel broken-hearted,
And, all hopes thwarted,
Expect to die;
A few years older,
Ah! how much colder
They might behold her
For whom they sigh!
When link'd together,
In every weather,
They pluck Love's feather
From out his wing-
He'll stay for ever,
But sadly shiver

Without his plumage when past the Spring

Like chiefs of Faction,
His life is action-
A formal paction

That curbs his reign,
Obscures his glory,
Despot no more, he
Such territory

Quits with disdain.
Still, still advancing,
With banners glancing,
His power enhancing,

He must move on -
Repose but cloys him,
Retreat destroys him,

Love brooks not a degraded throne.

Wait not, fond lover! Till years are over, And then recover, As from a dream. While each bewailing The other's failing, With wrath and railing, All hideous seem -While first decreasing, Yet not quite ceasing, Wait not till teasing, All passion blight: If once diminish'd Love's reign is finish'dThen part in friendship,- and bid good-night

So shall Affection

To recollection

The dear connexion

Bring back with joy: You had not waited Till, tired or hated, Your passions sated Began to cloy.

1 A friend of Lord Byron's, who was with him at Ra venna when he wrote these Stanzas, says,--"They were composed, like many others, with no view of publication, but merely to relieve himself in a moment of suffering. He had been painfully excited by some circumstances which appeared to make it necessary that he should im mediately quit Italy; and in the day and the hour that he wrote the song was labouring under an access of fever."-E

Siede la terra dove nata fui

Su la marina, dove il Po discende,
Per aver pace coi seguaci sui.

Amor, che al cor gentil ratto s' apprende,
Prese costui della bella persona

Che mi fu tolta; e il modo ancor in' offende. Amor, che a nullo amato amar perdona,

Mi prese del costui piacer si forte,

Che, come vedi, ancor non m' abbandona ; Amor condusse noi ad una morte:

Caina3 attende chi in vita ci spense.
Queste parole da lor ci fur porte.
Da ch' io intesi quell' anime offense
Chinai il viso, e tanto il tenni basso

Fin che il Poeta mi disse: "Che pense?"
Quando risposi incomminciai: "Ahi lasso!
Quanti dolci pensier, quanto desio
Meno costoro al doloroso passo!"
Poi mi rivolsi a loro, e parlai io,

E cominciai: Francesca, i tuoi martiri
A lagrimar mi fanno tristo e pio.
Ma dimmi: al tempo de' dolci sospiri
A che, e come concedette Amore
Che conosceste i dubbiosi desiri?
Ed ella a me: nessun maggior dolore
Che ricordarsi del tempo felice
Nella miseria; e cio sa il tuo dottore.
Ma se a conoscer la prima radice

Del nostro amor tu hai cotanto affetto
Faro come colui che piange e dice.
Noi leggevamo un giorno per diletto
Di Lancillotto, come Amor lo strinse:
Soli eravamo, e senza alcun sospetto.
Per piu fiate gli occhi ci sospinse
Quella lettura, e scolorocci il viso:
Ma solo un punto fu quel che ci vinse.
Quando leggemmo il disiato riso

1This transion, of what is generally considered the most exquisitely pathetic episode in the Divina Commedia, was executed in March, 1820, at Ravenna, where, just five centuries before, and in the very house in which the unfortunate lady was born, Dante's poem had been composed.-E.

2 Francesca, daughter of Guido da Polenta, Lord of Ravenna and of Cervia, was given by her father in marriage to Lanciotto, son of Malatesta, Lord of Rimini, a man of extraordinary courage, but deformed in his person. His brother, Paolo, who unhappily possessed those graces which the husband of Francesca wanted, engaged her affections;

FRANCESCA OF RIMINI.

FROM THE INFERNO OF DANTE.
CANTO V.

"The land where I was born4 sits by the seas,
Upon that shore to which the Po descends,
With all his followers, in search of peace.
Love, which the gentle heart soon apprehends,
Seized him for the fair person which was ta'en
From me, and me even yet the mode offends.
Love, who to none beloved to love again

Remits, seized me with wish to please, so strong, That, as thou seest, yet, yet it doth remain. Love to one death conducted us along,

But Caina waits for him our life who ended :" These were the accents utter'd by her tongue.Since I first listen'd to these souls offended,

[bended,

I bow'd my visage, and so kept it till "What think'st thou?" said the bard; when I unAnd recommenced: "Alas! unto such ill

How many sweet thoughts, what strong ecstasies,
Led these their evil fortune to fulfil!"
And then I turn'd unto their side my eyes,
And said, "Francesca, thy sad destinies
Have made me sorrow till the tears arise.
But tell me, in the season of sweet sighs,
By what and how thy love to passion rose,
So as his dim desires to recognise?"
Then she to me: "The greatest of all woes
Is to remind us of our happy days
In misery, and that thy teacher knows.
But if to learn our passion's first root preys
Upon thy spirit with such sympathy,
I will do even as he who weep s
sand
says.
We read one day for pastime, seated nigh,
Of Lancilot, how love enchain'd him too.
We were alone, quite unsuspiciously.
But oft our eyes met, and our cheeks in hue
All o'er discolour'd by that reading were;
But one point only wholly us o'erthrew;
When we read the long-sigh'd-for smile of her,

and being taken in adultery, they were both put to death by the enraged Lanciotto.

Guido was the son of Ostasio da Polenta, and made himself master of Ravenna in 1265. In 1322, he was deprived of his sovereignty, and died at Bologna in the year following. He is enumerated, by Tiraboschi, among the poets of his time.-E.

understand that part of the Inferno to which murderers 3 From Cain, the first fratricide. By Caina we are to are condemned.-- E.

4 Ravenna.

March 8-9, 1823. The Son of Love and Lord of War I sing; Him who bade England bow to Normandy, And left the name of conqueror more than king To his unconquerable dynasty.

Not fann'd alone by Victory's fleeting wing,

He rear'd his bold and brilliant throne on high: The Bastard kept, like lions, his prey fast, And Britain's bravest victor was the last.

THE IRISH AVATAR. 3

Is it madness or meanness which clings to thee now?
Were he God as he is but the commonest clay,
With scarce fewer wrinkles than sins on his brow-
Such servile devotion might shame him away.

Ay, roar in his train! let thine orators lash
Their fanciful spirits to pamper his pride-
Not thus did thy Grattan indignantly flash

His soul o'er the freedom implored and denied. 4
Ever glorious Grattan ! the best of the good!
So simple in heart, so sublime in the rest!
With all which Demosthenes wanted endued,
And his rival or victor in all he possess'd.

Ere Tully arose in the zenith of Rome,
Though unequall'd, preceded, the task was begun.--
But Grattan sprung up like a god from the tomb
Of ages, the first, last, the saviour, the one!

With the skill of an Orpheus to soften the brute;
With the fire of Prometheus to kindle mankind;
Even Tyranny listening sate melted or mute,
And Corruption shrunk scorch'd from the glance of

his mind.

Ere the daughter of Brunswick is cold in her grave,

And her ashes still float to their home o'er the tide, Lo! George the triumphant speeds over the wave, To the long-cherish'd isle which he loved like hisbride.

True, the great of her bright and brief era are gone, The rainbow like epoch where Freedom could pause For the few little years, out of centuries won,

Which betray'd not, or crush'd not, or wept not her

cause.

True, the chains of the Catholic clank o'er his rags,
The castle still stands, and the senate 's no more,
And the famine which dwelt on her freedomless crags
Is extending its steps to her desolate shore.

To her desolate shore- where the emigrant stands
For a moment to gaze ere he flies from his hearth;
Tears fall on his chain, though it drops from his hands,
For the dungeon he quits is the place of his birth.

But he comes! the Messiah of royalty comes!

L te a goodly Leviathan roll'd from the waves!
Then receive him as best such an advent becomes,
With a legion of cooks, and an army of slaves!

He comes in the promise and bloom of threescore,
To perform in the pageant the sovereign's part-
But long live the shamrock which shadows him o'er!
Could the green in his hat be transferr'd to his

heart!

1"Are you aware that Shelley has written an elegy on Keats, and accuses the Quarterly of killing him?".. Lord Byron to Mr. Murray, July 30, 1821.-E.

2 This fragment was found amongst Lord Byron's papers, after his departure from Genoa for Greece. --E.

3" The enclosed lines, as you will directly perceive, are written by the Rev. W. L. B. Of course it is for him to deny them, if they are not." Lord Byron to Mr. Moore, Sept. 17, 1821.--E.

(As the bankrupt's profusion his ruin would hide) Gild over the palace, Lo! Erin, thy lord! Kiss his foot with thy blessing, his blessings denied!

Or if freedom past hope be extorted at last,

If the idol of brass find his feet are of clay, Must what terror or policy wring forth be class'd With what monarchs ne'er give, but as wolves yield their prey?

Each brute hath its nature; a king's is to reign,

To reign in that word see, ye ages, comprised The cause of the curses all annals contain,

From Cæsar the dreaded to George the despised! Wear, Fingal, thy trapping! O'Connell, proclaim His accomplishments! His!!! and thy country

convince

Half an age's contempt was an error of fame,

And that "Hal is the rascaliest, sweetest young prince!"

Will thy yard of blue riband, poor Fingal, recall
The fetters from millions of Catholic limbs?
Or, has it not bound thee the fastest of all

The slaves, who now hail their betrayer with hymns? Ay! "Build him a dwelling!" let each give his mite! Till, like Babel, the new royal dome hath arisen! Let thy beggars and helots their pittance unite

And a palace bestow for a poor-house and prison! Spread-spread, for Vitellius, the royal repast, And the roar of his drunkards proclaim him at last Till the gluttonous despot be stuff'd to the gorge! The Fourth of the fools and oppressors call'd "George!"

Let the tables be loaded with feasts till they groan! Till they groan like thy people, through ages of woe! Let the wine flow around the old Bacchanal's throne,

Like their blood which has flow'd, and which yet has to flow.

But let not his name be thine idol alone

On his right hand behold a Sejanus appears! Thine own Castlereagh! let him still be thine own; A wretch never named but with curses and jeers!

4"After the stanza on Grattan, will it please you to cause to insert the following addenda, which I dreamed of during to-day's siesta."--Lord Byron to Mr. Moore Sept. 20, 1821.-E.

Till now, when the isle which should blush for his birth,

Deep, deep as the gore which he shed on her soil, Seems proud of the reptile which crawl'd from her earth,

And for murder repays him with shouts and a smile. Without one single ray of her genius, without

The fancy, the manhood, the fire of her race The miscreant who well might plunge Erin in doubt If she ever gave birth to a being so base.

If she did let her long-boasted proverb be hush'd, Which proclaims that from Erin no reptile can spring -

See the cold-blooded serpent, with venom full flush'd,
Still warming its folds in the breast of a king!
Shout, drink, feast, and flatter! Oh! Erin, how low
Wert thou sunk by misfortune and tyranny, till
Thy welcome of tyrants hath plunged thee below
The depth of thy deep in a deeper gulf still.
My voice, though but humble, was raised for thy right,
My vote, as a freeman's, still voted thee free,
This hand, though but feeble, would arm in thy fight,
And this heart, though outworn, had a throb still
for thee!

Yes, I loved thee and thine, though thou art not my land,

I have known noble hearts and great souls in thy

sons,

And I wept with the world, o'er the patriot band Who are gone, but I weep them no longer as once.

For happy are they now reposing afar,

Thy Grattan, thy Curran, thy Sheridan, all Who, for years, were the chiefs in the eloquent war, And redeem'd, if they have not retarded, thy fall. Yes, happy are they in their cold English graves!

Their shades cannot start to thy shouts of to-day-Nor the steps of enslavers and chain-kissing slaves Be stamp'd in the turf o'er their fetterless clay.

Till now I had envied thy sons and their shore, Though their virtues were hunted, their liberties filed;

There was something so warm and sublime in the core
Of an Irishman's heart, that I envy - thy dead.

Or, if aught in my bosom can quench for an hour
My contempt for a nation so servile, though sore,
Which though trod like the worm will not turn upon
power,

"T is the glory of Grattan, and genius of Moore ! September, 1821.

STANZAS

Oh! my lonely-lonely-lonely- Pillow!
Where is my lover? where is my lover?
Is it his bark which my dreary dreams discover?
Far far away! and alone along the billow?

Oh my lonely-lonely-lonely-Pillow!
Why must my head ache where his gentle brow lay?
How the long night flags lovelessly and slowly,

And my head droops over thee like the willow!
Oh! thou, my sad and solitary Pillow!

Send me kind dreams to keep my heart from breaking,
In return for the tears I shed upon thee waking;

Let me not die till he comes back o'er the billow.

Then if thou wilt-no more my lonely Pillow, In one embrace let these arms again enfold him, And then expire of the joy - but to behold him! Oh! my lone bosom!-oh! my lonely Pillow!

IMPROMPTU.3

Beneath Blessington's eyes
The reclaim'd Paradise

Should be free as the former from evil;
But if the new Eve

For an Apple should grieve,

What mortal would not play the Devil? 4

1823.

TO THE COUNTESS OF BLESSINGTON.
You have ask'd for a verse:- the request
In a rhymer 't were strange to deny ;
But my Hippocrene was but my breast,
And my feelings (its fountain) are dry.
Were I now as I was, I had sung

What Lawrence has painted so well;
But the strain would expire on my tongue,
And the theme is too soft for my shell.

I am ashes where once I was fire,
And the bard in my bosom is dead;
What I loved I now merely admire,
And my heart is as grey as my head.

My life is not dated by years

There are moments which act as a plough. And there is not a furrow appears

But is deep in my soul as my brow.

2 These verses were written by Lord Byron a little before he left Italy for Greece. They were meant to suit the Hindostanee air--"Alla Malla Punca," which the Countess Guiccioli was fond of singing. - E.

3 With a view of inducing Lord and Lady Blessington to prolong their stay at Genoa, Lord Byron suggested their taking a pretty villa called "Il Paradiso," in the neighbourhood of his own, and accompanied them to look at it. Upon that occasion it was that, on the lady expressing some intentions of residing there, he produced this impromptu.-MOORE.-E.

4 The Genoese wits had already applied this threadbare jest to himself. Taking it into their heads that this villa (which was also, I believe, a Casa Saluzzo) had been the one fixed on for his own residence, they said, "Il Diavolo e ancora entrato in Paradiso."-MOORE.-E.