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To weep a loss that turns their light to shade.
It is a woe too deep for tears,' when all
Is reft at once, when some surpassing Spirit,
Whose light adorned the world around it, leaves
Those who remain behind, nor sobs nor groans,
The passionate tumult of a clinging hope;
But pale despair and cold tranquillity,
Nature's vast frame, the web of human things,

Birth and the grave, that are not as they were.

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THE REVOLT OF ISLAM.

Dedication.

"There is no danger to a man, that knows
What life and death is: there's not any law
Exceeds his knowledge; neither is it lawful

That he should stoop to any other law."-CHAPMAN.

TO MARY

I.

So now my summer task is ended, Mary,
And I return to thee, mine own heart's home;
As to his Queen some victor Knight of Faëry,
Earning bright spoils for her enchanted dome;
Nor thou disdain, that ere my fame become
A star among the stars of mortal night,
If it indeed inay cleave its natai gloom,

Its doubtful promise thus I would unite

With thy belovèd name, thou Child of love and light.

H.

The toil which stole from thee so many an hour,

Is ended, and the fruit is at thy feet!

No longer where the woods to frame a bower
With interlaced branches mix and meet.

Or where with sound like many voices sweet,
Waterfalls leap among wild islands green,
Which framed for my lone boat a lone retreat
Of moss-grown trees and weeds, shall I be seen :
But beside thee, where still my heart has ever been.

III.

Thoughts of great deeds were mine, dear Friend, when first
The clouds which wrap this world from youth did pass.
I do remember well the hour which burst

My spirit's sleep: a fresh May-dawn it was,
When I walked forth upon the glittering grass,
And wept, I knew not why; until there rose
From the near schoolroom, voices, that, alas!
Were but one echo from a world of woes-
The harsh and grating strife of tyrants and of foes.

* Mrs. Shelley.

IV.

And then I clasped my hands and looked around-
But none was near to mock my streaming eyes,
Which poured their warm drops on the sunny ground—
So without shame, I spake "I will be wise,

And just, and free, and mild, if in me lies
Such power, for I grow weary to behold
The selfish and the strong still tyrannize

Without reproach or check." I then controlled

My tears, my heart grew calm, and I was meek and bold.

V.

And from that hour did I with earnest thought!
Heap knowledge from forbidden mines of lore,
Yet nothing that my tyrants knew or taught
I cared to learn, but from that secret store
Wrought linked armour for my soul, before
It might walk forth to war among mankind;

Thus power and hope were strengthened more and more
Within me, till there came upon my mind

A sense of loneliness, a thirst with which I pined.

VI.

Alas, that love should be a blight and snare
To those who seek all sympathies in one!-
Such once I sought in vain; then black despair,
The shadow of a starless night, was thrown
Over the world in which I moved alone :-

Yet never found I one not false to me,

Hard hearts, and cold, like weights of icy stone
Which crushed and withered mine, that could not be
Augh: but a lifeless clog, until revived by thee.

VII.

Thou Friend, whose presence on my wintry heart
Fell, like bright Spring upon some herbless plain;
How beautiful and calm and free thou wert
In thy young wisdom, when the mortal chain
Of Custom thou didst burst and rend in twain,
And walked as free as light the clouds among,
Which many an envious slave then breathed in vain
From his dim dungeon, and my spirit sprung
To meet thee from the woes which had begirt it long.

VIII.

No more alone through the world's wilderness,
Although I trod the paths of high intent,
I journeyed now: no more companionless,
Where solitude is like despair, I went.—
There is the wisdom of a stern content
When Poverty can blight the just and good,
When Infamy dares mock the innocent,

And cherished friends turn with the multitude

To trample: this was ours, and we unshaken stood !、

IX.

Now has descended a serener hour,

And with inconstant fortune, friends return;

Though suffering leaves the knowledge and the power
Which says:-Let scorn be not repaid with scorn.
And from thy side two gentle babes are born
To fill our home with smiles, and thus are we
Most fortunate beneath life's beaming morn;
And these delights, and thou, have been to me.
The parents of the Song I consecrate to thee.

X.

Is it, that now my inexperienced fingers
But strike the prelude of a loftier strain?
Or, must the lyre on which my spirit lingers
Soon pause in silence, ne'er to sound again,

Though it might shake the Anarch Custom's reign,
And charm the minds of men to Truth's own sway
Holier than was Amphion's? I would fain

Reply in hope-but I am worn away,

And Death and Love are yet contending for their prey.

XI.

And what art thou? I know, but dare not speak:
Time may interpret to his silent years.

Yet in the paleness of thy thoughtful cheek,
And in the light thine ample forehead wears,
And in thy sweetest smiles, and in thy tears,
And in thy gentle speech, a prophecy

Is whispered, to subdue my fondest fears:
And through thine eyes, even in thy soul I see
A lamp of vestal fire burning internally.

XII.

They say that thou wert lovely from thy birth,
Of glorious parents, thou aspiring Child.
I wonder not-for One then left this earth
Whose life was like a setting planet mild.
Which clothed thee in the radiance undefiled

Of its departing glory; still her fame

Shines on thee, through the tempests dark and wild
Which shake these latter days; and thou canst claim
The shelter, from thy Sire, of an immortal name.

XIII.

One voice came forth from many a mighty spirit,
Which was the echo of three thousand years;
And the tumultuous world stood mute to hear it,
As some lone man who in a desert hears

The music of his home :-unwonted fears

Fell on the pale oppressors of our race,

And Faith, and Custoin, and low-thoughted cares,

Like thunder-stricken dragons, for a space

Left the torn human heart, their food and dwelling-place.

XIV.

Truth's deathless voice pauses among mankind!
If there must be no response to my cry-

If men must rise and stamp with fury blind
On his pure name who loves them,-thou and I,
Sweet friend! can look from our tranquillity
Like lamps into the world's tempestuous night,-
Two tranquil stars, while clouds are passing by
Which wrap them from the foundering seaman's sight,
That burn from year to year with unextinguished light.

CANTO FIRST.

Όσαις δε βροτον εθνος αγλαίαις απτόμεσθα,

Περαινει προς έσχατον

Πλεον ναυσι δ' ουτε πεζοε των αν εύροις

Ες υπερβορέων αγωνα θαυματαν 'οδόν.

I.

PIND. Pyth. x.

WHEN the last hope of trampled France had failed
Like a brief dream of unremaining glory,

From visions of despair I rose, and scaled

The peak of an aerial promontory,

Whose caverned base with the vexed surge was hoary;
And saw the golden dawn break forth, and waken
Each cloud, and every wave-but transitory

The calm for sudden, the firm earth was shaken,
As if by the last wreck its frame were overtaken.

II.

So as I stood, one blast of muttering thunder
Burst in far peals along the waveless deep,
When, gathering fast, around, above and under,
Long trains of tremulous mist began to creep,
Until their complicating lines did steep

The orient sun in shadow :-not a sound

Was heard; one horrible repose did keep

The forests and the floods, and all around.

Darkness more dread than night was poured upon the ground.

III.

Hark! 'tis the rushing of a wind that sweeps

Earth and the ocean. See the lightnings yawn
Deluging Heaven with fire, and the lashed deeps
Glitter and boil beneath: it rages on,

One mighty stream, whirlwind and waves upthrown,
Lightning, and hail, and darkness eddying by.
There is a pause-the sea-birds, that were gone
Into their caves to shriek, come forth, to spy

What calm has fallen on earth, what light is in the sky.

.IV.

For, where the irresistible storm had cloven
That fearful darkness, the blue sky was seen

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