While others, fix'd as rocks, await the word At which their wrathful vials shall be pour'd.

No azure more shall robe the firmament, Nor spangled stars be glorious: Death hath risen:

In the sun's place a pale and ghastly glare Hath wound itself around the dying air. Aza. Come, Anah! quit this chaosfounded prison,

1080

To which the elements again repair,
To turn it into what it was: beneath
The shelter of these wings thou shalt be safe,
As was the eagle's nestling once within
Its mother's. Let the coming chaos chafe
With all its elements! Heed not their din !
A brighter world than this, where thou
shalt breathe

Hear not man only but all nature plead ! Raph. Farewell, thou earth! ye wretched sons of clay,

1069

I cannot, must not, aid you. "Tis decreed! [Exit RAPHAEL. Japh. Some clouds sweep on as vultures for their prey,

1130

The forest's trees (coeval with the hour When Paradise upsprung,

Ere Eve gave Adam knowledge for her dower,

Or Adam his first hymn of slavery sung), So massy, vast, yet green in their old age, Åre overtopp'd,

Their summer blossoms by the surges lopp'd,

Which rise, and rise, and rise.
Vainly we look up to the lowering skies
They meet the seas,

1140

And shut out God from our beseeching eyes.
Fly, son of Noah, fly! and take thine ease
In thine allotted ocean-tent;
And view, all floating o'er the element,
The corpses of the world of thy young days:
Then to Jehovah raise
Thy song of praise!

A Mortal. Blessed are the dead

Who die in the Lord!

And though the waters be o'er earth outspread,

1150

Yet, as his word,

Be the decree adored! He gave me life he taketh but The breath which is his own: And though these eyes should be for ever

shut,

Enter a Woman.

Woman. Oh, save me, save!
Our valley is no more:

My father and my father's tent,
My brethren and my brethren's herds,

The pleasant trees that o'er our noonday bent

1180

And sent forth evening songs from sweetest birds,

The little rivulet which freshen'd all
Our pastures green,

No more are to be seen.

When to the mountain cliff I climb'd this morn,

I turn'd to bless the spot,

And not a leaf appear'd about to fall; —
And now they are not!
Why was I born?

Japh.

To die! in youth to die; 1190 And happier in that doom, Than to behold the universal tomb Which I

Am thus condemn'd to weep above in vain. Why, when all perish, why must I remain ? [The waters rise: Men fly in every direction; many are overtaken by the waves; the Chorus of Mortals disperses in search of safety up the mountains; Japhet remains upon a rock, while the Ark floats towards him in the distance.

40

Of early delicacy render more
Needful than to the peasant, when the ebb
Of fortune leaves them on the shoals of
life?

Wer. It is not that, thou know'st it is
not; we

Have borne all this, I'll not say patiently,
Except in thee - but we have borne it.
Jos.
Well?
Wer. Something beyond our outward
sufferings (though

These were enough to gnaw into our souls)
Hath stung me oft, and, more than ever, now.
When, but for this untoward sickness,
which

Left the path open, yet not without snares. This cold and creeping kinsman, who so long

Kept his eye on me, as the snake upon
The fluttering bird, hath ere this time out-
stept me,
Become the master of my rights, and lord
Of that which lifts him up to princes in
Dominion and domain.

Jos.
Who knows? our son
May have return'd back to his grandsire, and
Even now uphold thy rights for thee?
Wer.
'Tis hopeless. 90
Since his strange disappearance from my
father's,

Entailing, as it were, my sins upon
Himself, no tidings have reveal'd his course.
I parted with him to his grandsire, on
The promise that his anger would stop short
Of the third generation; but Heaven seems
To claim her stern prerogative, and visit
Upon my boy his father's faults and follies.
Jos. I must hope better still, - at least
we have yet

My Werner, when you deign'd to choose for bride

Alas!

That bitter laugh!

Wer. Who would read in this form The high soul of the son of a long line? Who, in this garb, the heir of princely lands? Who, in this sunken, sickly eye, the pride Of rank and ancestry? in this worn cheek And famine-hollow'd brow, the lord of halls Which daily feast a thousand vassals?

Jos. You 120 Ponder'd not thus upon these worldly things,

And worthy by its birth to match with ours. Jos. Your father did not think so, though 't was noble;

But had my birth been all my claim to match

130

With thee, I should have deem'd it what it is.

Wer. And what is that in thine eyes? Jos. All which it Has done in our behalf, — nothing. Wer. How, nothing? Jos. Or worse; for it has been a canker in Thy heart from the beginning: but for this, We had not felt our poverty but as Millions of myriads feel it, cheerfully; But for these phantoms of thy feudal fathers,

Thou mightst have earn'd thy bread, as thousands earn it;

Or, if that seem too humble, tried by commerce,

140

Or other civic means, to amend thy fortunes. Wer. (ironically). And been an Hanseatic burgher? Excellent!

Jos. Whate'er thou mightst have been, to me thou art

What no state high or low can ever change, My heart's first choice; which chose thee, knowing neither

Thy birth, thy hopes, thy pride; nought save thy sorrows:

While they last, let me comfort or divide them;

When they end, let mine end with them, or thee!

Wer. My better angel! such I have ever found thee;

This rashness, or this weakness of my temper,

150

Ne'er raised a thought to injure thee or thine.

Thou didst not mar my fortunes: my own

nature In youth was such as to unmake an empire,