Portend the deeds to come:-but he whose nod | Yet are Spain's maids no race of Amazons, Has tumbled feebler despots from their sway The West must own the Scourger of the Ah. Spain! how sad will be thy reckoning-day, When soars Gaul's Vulture, with his wings unfurl'd, But form'd for all the witching arts of love: And thou shalt view thy sons in crowds to The seal Love's dimpling finger hath im- And must they fall? the young, the proud, the brave, To swell one bloated Chief's unwholesome No step between submission and a grave? hood's heart of steel? bit for this the Spanish maid, aroused, And the, whom once the semblance of a scar dead pressed Denotes how soft that chin which bears his Her lips, whose kisses pout to leave their nest, Which glows yet smoother from his amorous Who round the North for paler dames would seek? How poor their forms appear! how languid, wan, and weak! Match me,yeclimes! which poets love to laud; To taste the gale lest Love should ride the Oh, thou Parnassus! whom I now survey, In the wild pomp of mountain-majesty! Though from thy heights no more one Muse Oft have I dream'd of Thee! whose glorious name Who knows not, knows not man's divinest When I recount thy worshippers of yore But ne'er didst thou, fair Mount! when Greece See round thy giant base a brighter choir, Behold a train more fitting to inspire As Greece can still bestow, though Glory fly Fair is proud Seville; let her country boast But Cadiz, rising on the distant coast, The fascination of thy magic gaze? shape. Yells the mad crowd o'er entrails freshly tor Nor shrinks the female eye, nor ev'n affec to mourn. Some o'er thy Thamis row the ribbon'd fai And many to the steep of Highgate hie. When Paphos fell by Time-accursed Time! And consecrate the oath with draught, a The queen who conquers all must yield to thee The Pleasures fled, but sought as warm a And Venus, constant to her native sea, dance till morn. All have their fooleries-not alike are thin The lists are oped, the spacious area clear'd, | He flies,he wheels, distracted with his throes; Thousands on thousands piled are seated Dart follows dart ; lance, lance; loud bellowings speak his woes. round; Longere the first loud trumpet's note is heard, Skill'd in the ogle of a roguish eye, As moon-struck bards complain, by Love's sad archery. hastly sheen and gaudy cloak array'd, all afoot, the light-limb'd Matadore Stands in the centre, eager to invade The lord of lowing herds; but not before The ground, with cautious tread, is traversed o'er, Lestaught unseen should lurk to thwart his speed: Harms a dart, he fights aloof, nor more Thrice sounds the clarion; lo! the signal falls, And, wildly staring, spurns, with sounding foot, The sand, nor blindly rushes on his foe: Here, there, he points his threatening front to suit His first attack, wide waving to and fro His angry tail; red rolls his eye's dilated glow. Sedden he stops; his eye is fix'd: away, ray, thou heedless boy! prepare the spear: w is thy time, to perish, or display The skill that yet may check his mad career. With veer; Foil'd, bleeding, breathless, furious to the last, Full in the centre stands the bull at bay, And foes disabled in the brutal fray: Once more through all he bursts his thundering way Vain rage! the mantle quits the conynge hand, Wraps his fierce eye-'tis past-he sinks upon the sand! Where his vast neck just mingles with the spine, Sheathed in his form the deadly weapon lies. Enough, alas! in humble homes remain, To meditate 'gainst friends the secret blow, For some slight cause of wrath, whence life's warm stream must flow. But Jealousy has fled: his bars, his bolts, His wither'd centinel, Duenna sage! Dn feams the bull, but not unscathed he goes; And all whereat the generous soul revolts. Mreams from his flank the crimson torrent Which the stern dotard deem'd he could clear: encage. Have pass'd to darkness with the vanish'd | It is that weariness which springs age. Who late so free as Spanish girls were seen (Ere War uprose in his volcanic rage), With braided tresses bounding o'er the green, While on the gay dance shone Night's loverloving Queen? Oh! many a time, and oft, had Harold loved, Or dream'd he loved, since Rapture is a dream; But now his wayward bosom was unmoved, For not yet had he drunk of Lethe's stream; And lately had he learn'd with truth to deem Love has no gift so grateful as his wings: How fair, how young, how soft soe'er he seem, Full from the fount of Joy's delicious springs Some bitter o'er the flowers its bubbling venom flings. Yet to the beauteous form he was not blind, Though now it moved him as it moves the wise; Not that Philosophy on such a mind Wrote on his faded brow curst Cain's unresting doom. Still he beheld, nor mingled with the throng; But view'd them not with misanthropic hate: Fain would he now have join'd the dance, the song; But who may smile that sinks beneath his fate? Nought that he saw his sadness could abate: Yet once he struggled 'gainst the demon's sway, And as in Beauty's bower he pensive sate, TO INEZ. NAY, smile not at my sullen brow, And dost thou ask, what secret woe It is not love, it is not hate, Nor low Ambition's honours lost, That bids me loathe my present state, And fly from all I prized the most: From all I meet, or hear, or see: It is that settled, ceaseless gloom What Exile from himself can flee? And taste of all that I forsake; So may he guard the sister and the wife, Flows there a tear of pity for the dead? Long mark the battle-field with hideous awe: Ner yet, alas! the dreadful work is done, Till my frail frame return to whence it rose, repose. Here is one fytte of Harold's pilgrimage: CANTO II. Comв, blue-eyed maid of heaven!—but thou, alas! Didst never yet one mortal song inspireGoddess of Wisdom! here thy temple was, More than her fell Pizarros once enchain'd: And is, despite of war and wasting fire, Strange retribution! now Columbia's ease And years, that bade thy worship to expire: Repairs the wrongs that Quito's sons sus-But worse than steel,and flame,and ages tain❜d, Thile o'er the parent clime prowls Murder unrestrain❜d. all the blood at Talavera shed, fat all the marvels of Barossa's fight, Ya Albuera, lavish of the dead, Have won for Spain her well asserted right. When shall her Olive-Branch be free from blight? The shall she breathe her from the blushing toil? many a doubtful day shall sink in night, de Frank robber turn him from his spoil, And Freedom's stranger-tree grow native of the soil! And thon, my friend!—since unavailing woe strain slow, Is the dread sceptre and dominion dire Ancient of days! august Athena! where, A school-boy's tale, the wonder of an hour! Are sought in vain, and o'er each mouldering tower, Dim with the mist of years, grey flits the Had the sword laid thee with the mighty low, plain : But thus unlaurel'd to descend in vain, Dear to rest? Oh known the earliest, and esteem'd the most! Come-but molest not yon defenceless urn: turn: 'Twas Jove's 'tis Mahomet's—and other creeds Will rise with other years, till man shall learn Vainly his incense soars, his victim bleeds; Poor child of Doubt and Death, whose hope is built on reeds. Bound to the earth,he lifts his eye to heaven — |