Poems, etc

Front matter

POEMS, BY JAMES G. PERCIVAL. NEW- YORK . CHARLES WILEY. 3 WALL STREET. WM. GRATTA-f, PRINTEn. !823. Seitthem District of Nevr-Yorlc . ss. BE IT KEMKMBEBED, That on the eleventh day of Novem ber in the forty-eighth year of the Independence ol* the United States of America, JAMES (i. I'EltCIVAL, of the said Distlict, has depo sited in this Office, the title 01 a Bock, the right whereof lie claims as author aud proprietor in the words following, to wit : '* Poems by James G. Percival." In conformity to the Act of . or>gress of the United States, entitled "An Act for the encouragement of Learning, by securing the copies of Maps, Charts, and Books, to the authors and proprietors of *uch copies, during the time therein mentioned." And also to an Act, en titled "An Act, supplementary to an act, entitled an Act for the en couragement ot Learning, by securing the* copies of Maps, Charts, and Books, to the authors and proprietors of such copies, during the times therein mentioned, and extending the benefits thereof to the arts of designing , engraving, and etching historical and other prints.'1 JAMES DILL, Clerk of the Southern District of ffav-Tork.

CONTENTS The Wreck, a Tale . **_ Prometheus, part 1, ...'.... 39 , part 2, 97 The Suicide, 168 •^Poetry, 191 Love of Study, . . . . . . . ... 197 [,Heaven, 201 A Picture, 2o6 Mental Beauty, ......... 209 Menial Harmony, . 212 R"'<is, . . 218 Maria, the Village Girl, 223 A Tale, ...... ... 233 Piigrht Watching 238 Pleasures of ( hildhood 241 Voyage of Life 245 A Picture, Cat-kill Valley 248 Spirit of Freedom, ........ 251 Home, 253 The Deserted Wife 255 Love at Evening, 256 " Silent she stood before me," 258 Star of the Pensive, 259 **•* 0 ! there is bliss in tears," 260 Vaucluse, • 261 Light of Love, 262 Flower of a Southern Garden, 264 Rose of my Heart, 266 The Queen of Flowers, 267 The Spirit of the Air, 269 Catania, 270 Sonnets, 272 Ode to Music, ......... 277 The Judgment, 284 Tribute to the Brave 287 Liberty to Athens, . . • 288 Senate of Callimachi, . . 290 Greek Emigrant's Sung, 292 Ode to Freedom, 294 Platonic Bacchanal Song, 301 " Here's to her," 303 Dithyrambic, 3o6 The Serenade, CONTENTS.

Consumption, ■ The Houstonia Cerulea _t\^ The Coral Grove, The Anemone, ...•.•■••■ ~ -j " A Tulip blossomed," f-} " I had found out a sweet green spot," .... 323 The Lake in Vermont, 3L4 The Mermaid, . 3'-7 The house of my Birth 329 The Broken Heart, 339 The parting of William and Mary 341 " Vanity of Vanities," S_\s The Fairest Rose is far awa', 353 The Flower of the Valley, ? 5*5 Montevideo, . . ........ 356 " Once on a cloudless summer day," - 357 " My heart too firmly trusted," . .... 358 To Seneca Lake, ......... 359 " How beautiful is Night," 361 u Often when at night delaying," 363 Song — " O ! pure is the wind," .... . . 364 " O ! had I the wings of a swallow," 367 The Land of the Blest, 368 Retrospection, 370 Calm at Sea 372 " Mv heart was a mirror," 373 " O ! now's the hour," 374 " O ! wilt thou go with me, love," 376 " Here the air is sweet," ........ 378 The Wandering Spirit, ... .... 379 Farewell to my Lyre, ........ 381 Despondency .......... 383 Anacreontics, 38S Horatian, .......... 388 The Paphian Doves, ... .... 388 Fragments of a Poem on the Incas, THE WRECK, A TALE. 'TWAS a calm summer evening — on the sea Spread out a perfect mirror, there was seen, In the blue hazy distance, one white sail, That caught the eye of hope and love.

Part I. They

talk of love and pleasure — but 'tis all A tale of falsehood. Life is made of gloom— The fairest scenes are clad in ruin's pall, The loveliest pathway leads but to the tomb; Alas ! destruction is man's only doom; We rise, and sigh our little lives away, A moment blushes beauty's vernal bloom, A moment brightens manhood's summer ray, Then all is wrapped in cold and comfortless decay And yet the busy insects sweat and toil, And struggle hard to heap the shining ore — How trifling seems their bustle and turmoil, And even how trifling seems the sage's lore; Even he, who buried in the classic store Of ancient ages, ponders o'er the page Of Tully or of Plato, does no more Than with his bosom's quiet warfare wage, And in an endless round of useless thought engage r, Then close thy ponderous folio, and retire To shady coverts, undisturbed retreats, And lay thy careless hand upon thy lyre, And call the muses from their woodland seats : But ah ! the Poet's pulse how vainly beats ; 'Tis but vexation to attune his strings.

Even he, who with the Chian bard competes, Had better close his fancy's soaring wings, And own, earth's highest bliss no true enjoyment brings. We find this earth a gloomy, dull abode, And yet we wish for pleasure — sense is keen, And so this life is but a toilsome road, That leads us to a more delightful scene: Well, if thou find'st a solace there, I ween, It is the only joy thou e'er can'st know; And yet it is but fancy, never seen By mortal eye was all that lovely show, That paradise where we so fondly wish to go. We have a body — and the wintry wind Will not respect the Poet. No ; the storm Beats heavy on the case that holds a mind Of heavenly mould, as on the vulgar form ; When bleak winds blow how can the soul be warm? Can fancy brighten in the cell of care ? Can inspiration's breath the soul inform, When the limbs shiver in the gusty air, And in the thin, pale face the fiends of hunger stare?

O ! they may tell me of the ethereal flame That burns and burns forever; — 'tis the dream Of those high intellects, who well may claim Relation to the pure, celestial beam : The life eternal — 'tis a glorious theme, Whereon bards, sages, have out-poured their fire; Yet view it narrowly, and it will seem But the wild mounting of unquenched desire, The long extended wish to raise our being higher. True — 'tis a mighty stretch, when unconfined The soul expatiates in imagined being, And where the vulgar eye can only find Dust, by a second sight strange visions seeing, And still from wonder on to wonder fleeing, By its enkindled feelings wildly driven, It leaps the walls of earth, but ill agreeing With those high-mounting thoughts to genius given, Nor rests till it has set its eagle-foot in heaven.

And there it culls the choicest fields of earth For all the pure, and beautiful, and bright, And gives a gay and odorous Eden birth, And rains around a flood of golden light, Where sun, moon, stars, no more awake the sight, But pouring from the Eternal's viewless throne, It fills us with ineffable delight, And every stain of earth forever flown, We bathe and bask in this ethereal fount alone. And flowers of every hue and scent are there; The laughing fields are one enamelled bed, Aid filled with sweetness breathes the fanning air, And soaring birds are singing overhead, And bubbling brooks, by living fountains fed, O'er pebbled gems and pearl sands winding play; One boundless beauty o'er creation shed, The storm, the cloud, the mist, have hied away, And nothing dims the blaze of this immortal day.

And man, a pure and quenchless beam of light, All eye, all ear, all feeling, reason, soul, He takes from good to good his tireless flight, And ever aiming at perfection's goal, Sees at one instant-glance the moral whole ; Powers ever kindling, always on the wing, The disembodied spark Prometheus stole, To science, virtue, love, devotion spring His fancy, reason, heart — creation's angel king. The whole machine of worlds before his eye Unfolded as a map, he glances through Systems in moments, sees the comet fly In its clear orbit through the fields of blue, And every instant gives him something new, Whereon his ever quenchless thirst he feeds; From star to insect, sun to falling dew, From atom to the immortal mind he speeds, And in the glow of thought the boundless volume reads Truth stands before him in a full, clear blaze, An intellectual sun-beam, and his eye Can look upon it with unbending gaze, And its minutest lineaments descry; No speck, nor line is passed unnoticed by, And the bright form perfection's image wears, And on its forehead sceptred majesty The calm, but awful port of justice bears, (she spares.

Who weeps, when she condemns, but smiles not, when Mercy ! thou dearest attribute of heaven, The attractive charm, the smile of Deity, To whom the keys of Paradise are given — Thy glance is love, thy brow benignity, And bending o'er the world with tender eye, Thy bright tears fall upon our hearts like dew, Aid melting at the call of clemency, We raise to God again our earth-fixed view, Aid in our bosom glows the living fire anew. The perfect sense of beauty — how the heart, Even in this low estate, with transport swells, When Nature's charms at once upon us start — The ocean's roaring waste, where grandeur dwells, The cloud-girt mountain, whose bald summit tells, Beneath a pure black sky the faintest star, The flowery maze of woods, and hills, and dells, The bubbling brook, the cascade sounding far, Robed in a mellow mist, as Evening mounts her car, And with her glowing pencil paints the skies In hues, transparent, melting, deep, and clear, The richest picture shown to mortal eyes, Aid lovelier when a dearer self is near, And we can whisper in her bending ear, " How fair are these, and yet how fairer thou," And pleased the artless flattery to hear, Her full blue eyes in meek confusion bow — That hour, that look, that eye, are living to me now.

But there the cloud of earth-born passion gone, Taste, quick, correct, exalted, raised, refined, Rears o'er the subject intellect her throne, The pure platonic extacy of mind ; By universal harmony defined, It feels the fitness of each tint and hue, Of every tone that breathes along the wind, Of every motion, form, that charm the view, And lives upon the grand, the beautiful, and new. The feelings of the heart retain their sway, But are ennobled — not the instinctive tie, The storge, that so often leads astray, And poisons all the springs of infancy, So that, thenceforth, to live is but to die, And linger with a venom at the heart, To feel the sinking of despondency, To writhe around the early planted dart, And burn and pant with thirst that never can depart. Such are the wounds indulgent parents give, Who slay the smiling blossom of their love ; And if the blighted plant should lingering live.

The spirit cannot wing its flight above, But in its restless agony will rove Still on and onward in forbidden joy, Till wildly, as a whirlwind's fury drove, He rushes to the foes that soon destroy, And then they weep, and curse their lost, deluded boy. His friendship warmed to love — all things, that feel, In all his tenderness of feeling share; His love, bright as devotion's holiest zeal, For sex, without its ill, has being there; All pleasure's smile and virtue's beauty wear, And kindred souls in dear communion blend, Love, purest love, without its sigh and care, Aid hand in hand their mounting way they wend, With hope that meets no chill, and joys that never end Devotion — 'tis an all-absorbing flame — The Omnipotent, all-perfect, endless Being, The builder of the universal frame, At one quick glance, past, present, future, seeing, By whom, hot, cold, moist, dry, good, ill, agreeing.

At last, the perfect birth of bliss comes forth. And evil to its native darkness fleeing, Virtue shines out in her unspotted worth, And blasts to meanest dust the proudest forms of earth Hark — hear the holy choir around the throne; Their lips are coals, their pæans vocal fire ; They sing the Eternal Lord, who sits alone, Aid still their swelling anthem rises higher, The warbling of the universal lyre, The harmony of hearts, and souls, and spheres — O ! how my bpsom burns with long desire, How flow my bitter, penitential tears; O ! 'tis a strain too loud and sweet for mortal ear.3. But stop, delirious fancy ! now awaking From thy enchanted dream, what meets thy sight ? The charmed spell, that bound thy senses, breaking, Thy Eden withers in a simoom's blight, And all its suns have set in endless night; Love, sanctity, and glory, all a gleam, Thy airy paradise has vanished quite, Aid falling, fading, flickering, dies life's beam, Thy visioned heaven has fled — alas ! 'twas but a dream !

O! for those early days, when patriarchs dwelt In pastoral tents, that rose beneath the palm, When life was pure, and every bosom felt Unwarped affection's sweetest, holiest balm, Aid like the silent scene around them, calm, Years stole along in one unruffled flow; Their hearts aye warbled with devotion's psalm, And as they saw their buds around them blow, Their keenly glistening eye revealed the grateful glow. They sat at evening, when their gathered flocks Bleated and sported by the palm-crowned well, The sun was glittering on the pointed rocks, And long and wide the deepening shadows fell; They sang their hymn, and in a choral swell They raised their simple voices to the Power, Who smiled along the fair sky ; they woidd dwell Fondly and deeply on his praise ; that hour (shower. Was to them, as to flowers that droop and fade, the He warmed them in the sunbeams, and they gazed In wonder on that kindling fount of light, And as, hung in the glowing west, it blazed In brighter glories, with a full delight They poured their pealing anthem, and when night Lifted her silver forehead, and the moon Rolled through the blue serenity, in bright But softer radiance, they blessed the boon (noon.

That gave those hours the charm without the fire of Spring of the living world, the dawn of nature, When Man walked forth the lord of all below, Erect and godlike in his giant stature, Before the tainted gales of vice 'gan blow ; His conscience spotless as the new-fallen snow, Pure as the crystal spouting from the spring, He aimed no murderous dagger, drew no bow, Biit at the soaring of the eagle's wing, (spring. The gaunt wolf's stealthy step, the lion's ravening With brutes alone he armed himself for war ; Free to the winds his long locks dancing flew, And at his prowling enemy afar, He shot his death-shaft from the nervy yew; In morning's mist his shrill-voiced bugle blew, And with the rising sun on tall rocks strode, And bounding through the gemmed and sparkling dew, The rose of health, that in his full cheek glowed, (flowed.

Told of the pure, fresh stream, that there enkindling This was the age, when mind was all on fire, The day of inspiration, when the soul, Warmed, heightened, lifted, burning with desire For all the great and lovely, to the goal Of man's essential glory rushed ; then stole The sage his spark from heaven, the prophet spake His deep-toned words of thunder, as when roll The peals amid the clouds — words that would break The spirit's leaden sleep, and all its terrors wake. He stood on Sinai, wrapped in storm-clouds, wild His loose locks streamed around him, and his eye Flashed indignation on a world defiled With sense and slavery, who lost the high Prerogative of power and spirit, by Their longings for their flesh-pots — O! 'tis lust, Which robs us of our freedom, makes us lie Wallowing in willing wretchedness, nor burst (curst.

That thraldom, of our woes, most foul, most hard, most He saw those Samsons by a harlot shorn, He saw them take the distaff, and assume The soft and tawdry tunics, which adorn The leering siren; all their flush and bloom, And might and vigour, all that can illume And blazon manhood, by the magic rod Of pleasure changed to weakness, squalor, gloom, And they, who erst with port majestic trod, (gic nod. Then drunk, and gorged, and numbed, in sleep lethar- He stood and raised his mighty voice in wrath, And sent it, like a whirlwind, o'er those ears, And thrilled them, like a simoom on its path Of havoc. See, the slumbering giant hears, And waked, and roused, and kindled by his fears, Starts into new life with an instant spring; This is no time for soft repentant tears; At once away their wine-drenched spoils they fling, Their energy is up, their souls are on the wing.

They did not lie, and wish, and long to break The manacles which clasped them; they did tear Cables as we would silk-threads, and did take An upward journey, where the world shines fair, The temple of true virtue, glory, where Man lives and glows in sunshine, where the prize, More rich than laurel wreaths, for all, who dare To reason's perfect, fearless freedom rise, (eyes. Sends forth bright beams, that dim and blind all meaner Go o'er the fields of Greece and see her towers Fallen, and torn, and crumbled — see her fanes Prostrate and weed-encircled; dimly lours Brute ignorance around them, slavery reigns And lords it o'er their sacred cities, chains Are riveted upon them, and they gall (strains Their cramped limbs to the bone, the lashed wretch To rend the gnawing iron — but his fall Is in himself — sleep on — ye well deserve your thrall.

This is the old age of our fallen race; We mince in steps correct, but feeble; creep By rule unwavering in a tortoise pace; We do not, like the new-born ancient, leap At once o'er mind's old barriers, but we keep Drilling and shaving down the wall; we play With stones, and shells, and flowers, and as we peep In nature's outward folds, like infants, say, How bright, and clear, and pure, our intellectual day. We let gorged despots rise and plant their foot Upon our prostrate necks, if they but give Their golden counters. Tyranny takes root In a rich soil of sloth and self — we live Like oysters in their closed shells — can we strive For freedom when this cobweb circle draws Its tangling coils around us ? let us give Our hearts to Nature and her sacred laws, (cause. And we can fight unharmed, unchecked in freedom's There are a few grand spirits who can feel The beauty of simplicity, and pour Their ardent wishes forth, and sternly deal Their crumbling blows around them; they would soar, Where man unfettered rises, proudly o'er The common herd of slaves to power and rule : Go, search the world, you cannot find a more Weak, drivelling subject for a despot's tool, Than him who dares not leave the lessons of his school.

Cast back your sickened eye upon the dawn Of Greek and Roman freedom — See their sons Before the bulwark of their dear rights drawn, Proud in their simple dignity, as runs The courser to the fair stream — on their thrones They sat, all kings, all people — they were free, For they were strong and temperate, and in tones Deep and canorous, nature's melody, They sung in one full voice the hymn of liberty. In Dorian mood they marched to meet their foes ; With measured step their awful front they bore, As when a mountain billow slowly flows, Rising and heaving onward to the shore, It rolls its mingled waters with a roar, That echoes through the mountains; wide they dash, Blue as the heavens they kiss, and tumbling o'er, They burst upon the coast, and foaming lash (crash. The rocks and splintered cliffs, Earth groans beneath the Then liberty and law were brightest — men Were not themselves — the city was their soul; They did not keep their treasures in a den, And brood them, as a fowl her eggs — the pole To which their hearts were pointed, and the goal Of all their strivings was the public good ; The sage, with naked brow and flowing stole, And snowy beard, and eye majestic, stood, And gave to willing minds their high but simple food.

It was not cates which pleased then — but they drew, And filled their brimming goblet from the stream, And plucked the fruits that overhung it; few But noble were their works — the living beam Of sun-light stamped their pages — we may dream Of monsters, till the brain is mad — the pure, Bright images, wherewith their volumes teem, The taste of nature always will allure, (endure. And while man reads and thinks, and feels and loves, Then wisdom crowned her head with stars, and smiled In Socrates, and glowed in Plato, shone Like Day's God in the Stagyrite, who piled A pyramid of high thoughts ; as a throne, It lorded o'er the world for ages ; grown Weak in a second childhood, they did count And nicely measure each minutest stone, And crawled around the base, but could not mount And taste, upon the top, the pure ethereal fount.

Then Eloquence was power — it was the burst Of seeling, clothed in words o'erwhelming, poured From mind's long cherished treasury, and nurst By virtue into Majesty; it soared And thundered in Pericles ; and was stored With fire that flashed, and kindled, in that soul, Who called, when Philip, with barbarian horde, Hung over Athens, and prepared to roll (whole. His deluge on her towers, and drown her freedom's Then Poetry was inspiration — loud, And sweet, and rich, in speaking tones it rung, As if a choir of muses from a cloud, Sun-kindled, on the bright horizon hung; Their voices harmonized, their lyres full strung, Rolled a deep descant o'er a listening world — There was a force, a majesty, when sung The bard of Troy — his living thoughts were hurled, Like lightnings, when the folds of tempests are unfurled.

Was it the tumult of contending powers, The clash of swords and shields, the rush of cars. Or when aloft in night's serenest hours, The moon, encircled by her train of stars, Poured her soft light around, and dewy airs (brow ; Breathed through the camp and cooled the warrior's Was it the mellow slumber, which repairs The languid limbs, or keen-edged words, that bow The soul in wondering awe ; or was it, round the prow. The purple wave disparting, and in foam Roaring behind the vessel, as she flew, A white-winged falcon, from her lessening home, Ploughing the sea's broad back, as loudly blew The winds among the cordage— Nature threw Her energy athwart his page, and shed Her blaze upon his mind, and there we view, If, chance, by taste, unwarped, unfettered, led, A new-made world, all life and light, around us spread.

The times are altered — man is now no more The being of his capabilities ; The days of all his energy are o'er ; Aid will those fallen demi-gods arise In all their panoply, and hear the cries Of king-crushed myriads, who wear the chain Of bondage ; will light dawn upon their eyes, And wake them from their iron sleep, again To bear their breast in strife on freedom's holy plain ? A trumpet echoes o'er their tombs — awake ! The long full peal is " vengeance! — sleep no more;" The marble walls, as by an earthquake, break, Aid, lo! an armed legion onward pour Bright casques and nodding plumes, and thirsting gore, The blood of awe-struck tyrants, flash their swords ; Their march is as a torrent river's roar, Aid with a waked slave's desperation, towards Their homes of icy gloom, they drive Sarmatia's hordes.

There is a flood of light rolled round the hill Of Jove, and from its cloudy brightness spring Spectres of long-departed greatness; still Their heart-felt homage to that shrine they bring, Which time has made all-sacred, where the king Of thunder sat upon his ivory throne, And by him stood his bird, with ready wing To pounce upon his foes. The days are flown, (own, When darkness ruled as God — Valour will claim his And Rome again is free, and from thy shore, Italia! Gaul, and Goth, and Hun, shall fly; Thy sons shall wash away their shame in gore, And once again the year of liberty, The mighty months of glory, they shall see, Along thy radiant Zodiac, on the path Of ages, warn the nations, " we are free" — O ! who can tell the madness and the wrath, The drunkenness of soul, a new-waked people hath ?

They stand for hearth and altar, wife and sire; Their lisping infants call them to the fight, And as they call, their eye-balls flashing fire, And shouting with a courser's wild delight, When loosed he bounds and prances in the might Of young life. There is in the sound of home A magic, and the patriot, in his right Strong-founded, meets the prowling foes, that come To waste his land — no threats his valour can benumb. R The torch that lights him in his high career, Was kindled at the purest, holiest flame ; He fights for all his bosom holds most dear, And O ! no voice so conquering as the claim Of filial tenderness and love ; no name So melting as sire, wife, and children — all Are hi those sweet words blended. What is fame, Though pealing with her trumpet, to the call Of kindred, bound and toiling in a tyrant's thrall ?

He sees the noble and the learned stoop, And kiss the feet that crush them, and the crowd. In hopeless, cureless, willing bondage, droop ; And yet he does not shrink beneath that cloud, But, muttering execrations deep, not loud, He whets his sword upon his heaped-up wrong ; And starting, like a spectre from his shroud, Stung by the lash of slavery's knotted thong, In all the might of wrath, he hurls his strength along. Even as a tigress, when her secret lair The hunter hath invaded — how she draws Her limbs to all their tenseness, points her hair, Gnashes her grinding teeth, and bares her claws, And breathes a stifled growl, and in a pause Of burning fury hangs upon the spring ; And nerved and heated in a parent's cause, Bounds roaring on the robber, like the wing (sling. Of pouncing hawk, or stone hurled whizzmg from the They meet at Tivoli — and night has spread Her curtain o'er those legions, who would quench The flame, that Brutus, Tully, Cato, fed; And from its lofty column madly wrench The new-raised statue.

Freemen will not blench, When they have broke their fetters ; but will arm Their nervy hands with vengeance, and will clench And grapple with their masters; for the charm Of liberty's sweet voice the coldest heart will warm. They meet, and they are victors — but the soul, Like his own mountain's lava glowing, dies, And falls with hand firm-grasped upon the goal Of all his longings. As he mounts the skies, He drops his mantle on the youth, who rise To give their lives, like him, to liberty ; Devoted to the noblest sacrifice, Like stars of purest brightness, they shall be (shall flee. The rallying point, where all the bruised and crushed A dream — a cruel dream — fair rose the sun Of freedom on that sky without a cloud ; Sweet was the dawn, when liberty was won By hands unweaponed ; and they hasted, proud Of bloodless conquest, in their pæans loud To those, who Samson-like had rent their chain ; Then heavenward shone the foreheads, which had bowed To foreign rule for ages, and again The people's majesty towered over hill and plain.

Aid we did hope the Roman had awaked, Aid ancient valour had revived anew, Aid that the Eagle's thirst of light unslaked. As when above the capitol she flew, Still sought her eyry in the boundless blue ; And we did hope a spirit had gone forth, Which tyrants and their parasites would rue, And, like a torrent rolling to the north, (worth. Would with it blend all hearts, that kept man's native It seemed the renovation of the world, The knell of despots, and the day when thrones Were tottering, and crowns falling, when Kings, hurled From their base height of lust, should leave their bones To moulder in their feudal filth ; the stones Which bound the arch of empire, lost their hold, And in the sudden crush were heard the groans Of gorged and pampered spoilers, who had rolled Like havoc on the dumb, weak tremblers of their fold.

And we did see a nation on their way To stop the invading torrent, ere it came Aid deluged their fair fields. It was a day Of breathless expectation, when the flame Of freedom burned the highest, for the game Of Man's emancipation was at stake. The heart that would not throb then, had no claim And place in Honor's column — 't would not wake, Even if a bolt from Heaven should by its pillow break. They hung upon the mountains, like a storm Crowning the Appenine with deep, dun shade, And o'er them towered the bold and ardent form, Who seemed in panoply of fire arrayed ; And from their pikes and bayonets there played A stream of lightnings on the advancing host, Which, trained and nurtured in the murdering trade, Like tempest-billows rolling to the coast, (post. Marched slow, and still, and sure, to storm that rocky In all the discipline of war they came; Their strong squared columns moved with heavy tread ; Their step, their bearing, even their breath the same, And not a murmur whispered through the dead And boding silence ; by a master led, Even as a rock, that fronts the infuriate wave, They saw them hanging on their mountain's head ; With cold, proud sneer they marked the untutored brave, And knew here lay wide-yawned Italian freedom's grave.