XLVI.

'Twas but a moment-but that moment brought

Pangs which he never dealt! there is a hell

Upon itself by the quick Spirit wrought,

That mocks imagination's baffled spell;
Whose retributive tortures none may tell!

The wild remorse-the curse of guilt unshriven:The old man turned-that hour repaid him well! Outcast from earth, without a hope from heaven, That night, the murderer's blow to him was mercy given!

XLVII.

Pass o'er-where buried in its leafy nest,
Like a lone cushat-dove, SORRENTO lies:
A mirror of the "Islands of the Blest;"
Or that unfound Hesperides, which lies
Beyond our life: that unseen Paradise,
Vision of hope, the glory, and the dream!
What living foliage of a thousand dyes

Shoots upward, shadowing o'er yon Ocean-Stream,

Braiding the rock-ribbed hills that rise to heaven

supreme:

XLVIII.

Which cast below the Shadows of their

power:

Their brows of majesty all softened, while
Beauty, the Spirit! sleeps away her hour,
Reposing at their feet; ye see her smile
In every flower;-each flower the happy isle
Of infinite existence! and ye feel

Her breath upon the sunny air beguile

The heart to its own happiness, and steal

Its anxious grief away, and softer hopes reveal.

XLIX.

Such are thy charms, SORRENTO! which before
Were yet too fair: behold, in yon deep bay,
The grey crag hurled beyond the pebbled shore:
Round which the blue waves chafe in idle play:
Know'st thou whose mighty Spirit casts a ray
O'er yon dim cavern? know'st thou who stood there,
Embodying in his everlasting lay,

Its tale?-whose genius fills-inspires the air,

Whose Phantoms round that spot for ever shall repair?

L.

Even now, while sitting on this mossy stone,

I see the sail spread from Lachæa's isle;
They scale the Cyclop's cave-a shout-a groan-
In his red eye is plunged the fiery pile!

Lo, with the morning's light, the goats defile
Slowly beneath the blinded monster's hand:

Free stands, at length, the hero of the wile,

And now the giant's clamours fill the strand,

As, shouting, bound from shore the Ulyssèan band!

LI.

O thou eternal Homer! every nook

Of this most wild yet lovely coast is thine : The Syrens yon dim islands have forsook, Yet is each vestige of their haunt divine! Doth not thy awful Genius o'er it shine, Bright, yet as softened as yon setting Sun, That floods them o'er with glory from its shrine? Empires have vanished like the Day when done, But with renewing time thy life is still begun.

LII.

How hath thy song the light of Truth arrayed!

Lo-yon blue promontory: Circe's spell

There changed to brutes the slaves who vice obeyed:

Speaks not the moral eloquently well?

What herb, save reason, could her power compel?

Why rather sought the hero o'er the foam

Death, than imprisoned in her chains to dwell?

Her charms unfelt, and loathed her starry dome?

'Twas Virtue pointed still, his wife-his child-his

home!

LIII.

Sorrento who that blesses thy soft brow,

Dreams of the scars which seam thy bosom o'er?

What awful scenes thy caverned depths avow! There, where the Lightning's scathing passage tore The very heart of Nature to its core :

How yawn her mighty sides opposing riven,

Frowning like foes whose wrath can meet no more :

Where, through their blackened fissures fiercely driven,

Ye mark how clove its track the fiery bolt of heaven!

LIV.

There was a dwelling on the sea-cliff's side,

Its vanished site no vestige doth attest,

Even such a nook as Love would choose to hide

Its loved one from the world: a very nest
Of Quiet, when, of all it asks, possessed,

The heart would find or make its earthly heaven
Where only found, in Woman's answering breast!
All other ties save that sole life's-tie riven :

The world's neglect forgot-its injuries forgiven.

LV.

A sacred spot-recal it to thine eye,

Each spot is sacred, hallowed by a tear!
And this is sanctified by Memory;

By those revering hearts to whom are dear
The martyrs of the past who suffered here:
O'er whom are shed the human sympathies

Like breath of flowers that consecrate the bier :
A Lady by its casements sits and sighs,

Watching a distant sail whose white wing homeward

flies;