THE GUERILLA LEADER'S VOW. All my pretty ones! Did you say all? Let us make medicine of this great revenge, Macbeth. My battle-vow!-no minster walls Gave back the burning word, Nor cross nor shrine the low deep tone Of smother'd vengeance heard: But the ashes of a ruin'd home Thrill'd, as it sternly rose, With the mingling voice of blood that shook The midnight's dark repose. I breathed it not o'er kingly tombs, And the startled vulture, at my step, Soar'd from their precious clay. I stood amidst my dead alone- In the strong silence of that hour, The roof-tree fall'n, the smouldering floor, The blacken'd threshold-stone, The bright hair torn, and soil'd with blood, Whose fountain was my own ; These, and the everlasting hills, Bore witness that wild night; Before them rose th' avenger's soul, The stars, the searching stars of heaven, With keen looks would upbraid, If from my heart the fiery vow, Sear'd on it then, could fade. They have no cause!-Go, ask the streams That by my paths have swept, The red waves that unstain'd were born How hath my faith been kept? And other eyes are on my soul, That never, never close, The sad, sweet glances of the lost They leave me no repose. Haunting my night-watch 'midst the rocks, And by the torrent's foam, Through the dark-rolling mists they shine, Full, full of love and home! Alas! the mountain eagle's heart, He seeks another nest. D But I-your soft looks wake the thirst That wins no quenching rain; Ye drive me back, my beautiful! To the stormy fight again! THEKLA AT HER LOVER'S GRAVE.* Thither where he lies buried! That single spot is the whole world to me. COLERIDGE'S Wallenstein. THY voice was in my soul! it call'd me on; my lost friend thy voice was in my soul: From the cold, faded world, whence thou art gone, To hear no more life's troubled billows roll, Now speak to me again! we loved so well— I have left all things with thy dust to dwell, Through these dim aisles in dreams of thee to rove : This is my home! * See Wallenstein, Act 6th. |