PRINCE ATHANASE. PART II. FRAGMENT 1. PRINCE Athanase had one beloved friend, An old, old man, with hair of silver white, And lips where heavenly smiles would hang and blend With his wise words; and eyes whose arrowy light Shone like the reflex of a thousand minds. He was the last whom superstition's blight Had spared in Greece-the blight that cramps and blinds,— And in his olive bower at Enoe Had sate from earliest youth. Like one who finds A fertile island in the barren sea, One mariner who has survived his mates With soul-sustaining songs, and sweet debates And thus Zonoras, by for ever seeing A bloodier power than ruled thy ruins then, Was grass grown-and the unremembered tears And as the lady looked with faithful grief And blighting hope, who with the news of death An old man toiling up, a weary wight; She saw his white hairs glittering in the light Of the wood fire, and round his shoulders fall; Yet calm and [ And Athanase, her child, who must have been Then three years old, sate opposite and gazed. FRAGMENT II. Such was Zonoras; and as daylight inds Thus had his age, dark, cold, and tempest-tost, The spirit of Prince Athanase, a child, And sweet and subtle talk they evermore, The youth, as shadows on a grassy hill Strange truths and new to that experienced man; Still they were friends, as few have ever been Who mark th' extremes of life's discordant span. And in the caverns of the forest green, By summer woodmen; and when winter's roar Hanging upon the peaked wave afar, Then saw their lamp from Laian's turret gleam, Which pours beyond the sea one steadfast beam, Whilst all the constellations of the sky Seemed wrecked. They did but seem For, lo! the wintry clouds are all gone by, And bright Arcturus through yon pines is glowing, And far o'er southern waves, immoveably Belted Orion hangs-warm light is flowing "On thine own bird the sweet enthusiasm Which overflows in notes of liquid gladness, "Of fevered brains, oppressed with grief and madness, Were lulled by thee, delightful nightingale! And these soft waves, murmuring a gentle sadness, "And the far sighings of yon piny dale Made vocal by some wind, we feel not here.- "To lighten a strange load!"-No human ear Of dark emotion, a swift shadow ran, Beheld his mystic friend's whole being shake, And, with a soft and equal pressure, prest "Paused in yon waves her mighty horns to wet, How in those beams we walked, half resting on the sea? 'Tis just one year-sure thou dost not forget "Then Plato's words of light in thee and me Lingered like moonlight in the moonless east, For we had just then read-thy memory "Is faithful now-the story of the feast; And Agathon and Diotima seemed 'Twas at the season when the Earth upsprings From slumber, as a sphered angel's child, Shadowing its eyes with green and golden wings, Stands up before its mother bright and mild, To see it rise thus joyous from its dreams, The fresh and radiant Earth. The hoary grove The Loves then the shade of his own soul, half seen In any mirror-or the spring's young minions, The winged leaves amid the copses green; How many a spirit then puts on the pinions |