Disconsolate will wander up and down, 'Mid many things unsightly to strange ee; For hut and palace show like filthily: The dingy denizens are rear'd in dirt; Ne personage of high or mean degree Doth care for cleanness of surtout or shirt, Though shent with Egypt's plague, unkempt, unwash'd; unhurt. XVIII. Poor, paltry slaves! yet born 'midst noblest scenes Why, Nature, waste thy wonders on such men? Through views more dazzling unto mortal ken Than those whereof such things the bard relates, Who to the awe-struck world unlock'd Elysium's gates? The horrid crags, by toppling convent crown'd, The cork-trees hoar that clothe the shaggy steep, The mountain-moss by scorching skies imbrown'd, The sunken glen, whose sunless shrubs must weep, The tender azure of the unruffled deep, The orange tints that gild the greenest bough, The torrents that from cliff to valley leap, The vine on high, the willow branch below, Mix'd in one mighty scene, with varied beauty glow. XX. Then slowly climb the many-winding way, And frequent turn to linger as you go, From loftier rocks new loveliness survey, And rest ye at our "Lady's house of woe;» 2) Where frugal monks their little relics show, And sundry legends to the stranger tell : Here impious men have punish'd been, and lo! Deep in yon cave Honorius long did dwell, In hope to merit Heaven by making earth a Hell. ΧΧΙ. And here and there, as up the crags you spring, Mart many rude-carved crosses near the path: Yet deem not these devotion's offering These are memorials frail of murderous wrath: For wheresoe'er the shrieking victim hath Pour'd forth his blood beneath the assassin's knife, Some hand erects a cross of mouldering lath; And grove and glen with thousand such are rife Throughout this purple land, where law secures not life. 3) XXII. On sloping mounds, or in the vale beneath, Once form'd thy Paradise, as not aware When wanton Wealth her mightiest deeds hath done, Meek Peace voluptuous lures was ever wont to shun. XXIII. Here didst thou dwell, here schemes of pleasure plan, Beneath yon mountain's ever beauteous brow: But now, as if a thing unblest by Man, Thy fairy dwelling is as lone as thou! Here giant weeds a passage scarce allow To halls deserted, portals gaping wide: Fresh lessons to the thinking bosom, how Vain are the pleasaunces on earth supplied; Swept into wrecks anon by Time's ungentle tide! XXIV. Behold the hall where chiefs were late conve ned! 4) Oh! dome displeasing unto British eye! With diadem hight foolscap, Io! a fiend, There sits in parchment robe array'd, and by Where blazon'd glare names known to chivalry, Whereat the Urchin points and laughs with all his soul. XXV. Convention is the dwarfish demon styled For chiefs like ours in vain may laurels bloom! Woe to the conqu'ring, not the conquer'd host, Since baffled Triumph droops on Lusitania's coast! XXVI. And ever since that martial synod met, shame. How will posterity the deed proclaim! Will not our own and fellow-nations sneer, To view these champions cheated of their fame, By foes in fight o'erthrown, yet victors here, Where Scorn her finger points through many a coming year? XXVII. So deem'd the Childe, as o'er the mountains he Did take his way in solitary guise: Sweet was the scene, yet soon he thought to flee, More restless than the swallow in the skies: Though here awhile he learn'd to moralize, For Meditation fix'd at times on him; And conscious Reason whisper'd to despise His early youth, misspent in maddest whim; But as he gazed on truth his aching eyes grew dim. XXVIII. To horse! to horse! he quits, for ever quits But seeks not now the harlot and the bowl. XXIX. Yet Mafra shall one moment claim delay, 5) Where dwelt of yore the Lusian's luckless queen; And church and court did mingle their array, And mass and revel were alternate seen; Lordlings and freres-ill-sorted fry I ween! But here the Babylonian whore hath built A dome, where flaunts she in such glorious sheen, That men forget the blood which she hath spilt, And bow the knee to Pomp that loves to varnish guilt. O'er vales that teem with fruits, romantic hills, (Oh, that such hills upheld a freeborn race!) Whereon to gaze the eye with joyaunce fills, Childe Harold wends through many a pleasant place. Though sluggards deem it but a foolish chase, And marvel men should quit their easy chair, The toilsome way, and long, long league to trace, Oh! there is sweetness in the mountain air, And life, that bloated Ease can never hope to share. More bleak to view the hills at length recede, tend Flocks, whose rich fleece right well the trader knows Now must the pastor's arm his lambs defend : For Spain is compass'd by unyielding foes, And all must shield their all, or share Subjection's woes. ΧΧΧΙΙ. Where Lusitania and her sister meet, Deem ye what bounds the rival realms divide? Or fence of art, like China's vasty wall?- Gaul: XXXIII. But these between a silver streamlet glides, And scarce a name distinguisheth the brook, Though rival kingdoms press its verdant sides. Here leans the idle shepherd on his crook, And vacant on the rippling waves doth look, That peaceful still 'twixt bitterest foemen flow; For proud each peasant as the noblest duke: Well doth the Spanish hind the difference know 'Twixt him and Lusian slave, the lowest of the low. 6) XXXIV. But ere the mingling bounds have far been pass'd, Dark Guadiana rolls his power along In sullen billows, murmuring and vast, Whilome upon his banks did legions throng The Paynim turban and the Christian crest Mix'd on the bleeding stream, by floating hosts oppress'd. |