478

burst.

He turned away-not far, but silent still.
She now first shuddered; for in him, so nigh,
So long a silence seemed the approach of
death,

is wailing,

For all have heard the misery." Alas! alas for Celin!"

Him, yesterday, a Moor did slay, of Bencerraje's blood

'Twas at the solemn jousting-around the nobles stood;

prayer

The less to them; and purer can there be

bright and fair

Looked from their latticed windows, the haughty sight to share;

and flaming torch:

green and blue;

Because he answered, and because
He spake exceeding well of laws.
Wo is me, Alhama!

"There is no law to say such things
As may disgust the ear of kings: "-
Thus, snorting with his choler, said
The Moorish king, and doomed him dead.
Wo is me, Alhama!

Moor Alfaqui! Moor Alfaqui!
Though thy beard so hoary be,

The king hath sent to have thee seized,
For Alhama's loss displeased-

Wo is me, Alhama!

And to fix thy head upon
High Alhambra's loftiest stone;
That this for thee should be the law,
And others tremble when they saw.
Wo is me, Alhama!

Cavalier, and man of worth!
Let these words of mine go forth;
Let the Moorish monarch know
That to him I nothing owe.

Wo is me, Alhama!

"But on my soul Alhama weighs,
And on my inmost spirit preys;
And if the king his land hath lost,
Yet others may have lost the most.
Wo is me, Alhama!

"Sires have lost their children, wives
Their lords, and valiant men their lives;
One what best his love might claim
Hath lost; another, wealth or fame.
Wo is me, Alhama!

"I lost a damsel in that hour,
Of all the land the loveliest flower;
Doubloons a hundred I would pay,
And think her ransom cheap that day."
Wo is me, Alhama!

And as these things the old Moor said, They severed from the trunk his head; And to the Alhambra's walls with speed T was carried, as the king decreed.

Wo is me, Alhama!

And men and infants therein weep
Their loss, so heavy and so deep;
Granada's ladies, all she rears
Within her walls, burst into tears.
Wo is me, Alhama!

475

THREE fishers went sailing out into the west

Out into the west as the sun went down; Each thought of the woman who loved him the best,

And the children stood watching them out of the town;

For men must work, and women must weep; And there's little to earn, and many to keep, Though the harbor bar be moaning.

Three wives sat up in the light-house tower And trimmed the lamps as the sun went down;

And they looked at the squall, and they looked at the shower,

And the rack it came rolling up, ragged

THE PRISONER CF CHILLON.

ETERNAL spirit of the chainless mind!

II.

There are seven pillars, of Gothic mould,
In Chillon's dungeons deep and old;
There are seven columns, massy and gray,
Dim with a dull imprisoned ray—

A sunbeam which hath lost its way,
And through the crevice and the cleft
Of the thick wall is fallen and left-

gloom

Their country conquers with their martyrdom,

And freedom's fame finds wings on every

wind.

Chillon thy prison is a holy place,

And in each pillar there is a ring, And in each ring there is a chain; That iron is a cankering thing,

For in these limbs its teeth remain, With marks that will not wear away Till I have done with this new day,

I.

My hair is gray, but not with years, Nor grew it white

In a single night,

As men's have grown from sudden fears;
My limbs are bowed, though not with toil,
But rusted with a vile repose;
For they have been a dungeon's spoil,

And mine has been the fate of those
To whom the goodly earth and air
Are banned and barred-forbidden fare.
But this was for my father's faith
I suffered chains and courted death.
That father perished at the stake
For tenets he would not forsake;
And for the same his lineal race
In darkness found a dwelling-place.
We were seven, who now are one-
Six in youth, and one in age,
Finished as they had begun,
Proud of persecution's rage;
One in fire, and two in field,

Their belief with blood have sealed-
Dying as their father died,

For the God their foes denied;
Three were in a dungeon cast,

Of whom this wreck is left the ast

Which have not seen the sun so rise
For years I cannot count them o'er;
I lost their long and heavy score
When my last brother drooped and died.
And I lay living by his side.

III.

They chained us each to a column stone;
And we were three-yet, each alone
We could not move a single pace;
We could not see each other's face,
But with that pale and livid light
That made us strangers in our sight;
And thus together, yet apart-
Fettered in hand, but joined in neart;
'T was still some solace, in the dearth
Of the pure elements of earth,
To hearken to each other's speech,
And each turn comforter to each-
With some new hope, or legend old,
Or song heroically bold;
But even these at length grew cold.
Our voices took a dreary tone,
An echo of the dungeon-stone,

A grating sound-not full and free,
As they of yore were wont to be;
It might be fancy-but to me
They never sounded like our own.

IV.

I was the eldest of the three,

And to uphold and cheer the rest I ought to do, and did, my bestAnd each did well in his degree.

The youngest, whom my father loved, Because our mother's brow was given To him-with eyes as blue as heavenFor him my soul was sorely moved; And truly might it be distrest To see such bird in such a nest; For he was beautiful as day

(When day was beautiful to me As to young eagles, being free), A polar day, which will not see A sunset till its summer's gone

Its sleepless summer of long light, The snow-clad offspring of the sun:

And thus he was, as pure and bright, And in his natural spirit gay,

With tears for naught but other's ills; And then they flowed like mountain rills, Unless he could assuage the woe

Which he abhorred to view below.

V.

The other was as pure of mind,
But formed to combat with his kind;
Strong in his frame, and of a mood
Which 'gainst the world in war had stood,
And porished in the foremost rank

With joy; but not in chains to pine.
His spirit withered with their clank;
I saw it silently decline-

And so, perchance, in sooth, did mine!
But yet I forced it on, to cheer
Those relics of a home so dear.
He was a hunter of the hills,

Had followed there the deer and wolf;
To him this dungeon was a gulf,
And fettered feet the worst of ills.

VI.

Lake Leman lies by Chillon's walls. A thousand feet in depth below, Its massy waters meet and flow; Thus much the fathom-line was sent From Chillon's snow-white battlement, Which round about the wave enthrals; A double dungeon wall and wave Have made and like a living grave, Below the surface of the lake The dark vault lies wherein we lay; We heard it ripple night and day; Sounding o'er our heads it knocked. And I have felt the winter's spray

477

Wash through the bars when winds were high,

And wanton in the happy sky;

And then the very rock hath rocked,
And I have felt it shake, unshocked;
Because I could have smiled to see
The death that would have set me free.

VII.

I said my nearer brother pined;
I said his mighty heart declined.
He loathed and put away his food;
It was not that 't was coarse and rude,
For we were used to hunter's fare,
And for the like had little care.
The milk drawn from the mountain goat
Was changed for water from the moat;
Our bread was such as captives' tears
Have moistened many a thousand years,
Sinee man first pent his fellow-men,
Like brutes, within an iron den.
But what were these to us or him?
These wasted not his heart or limb;
My brother's soul was of that mould
Which in a palace had grown cold,
Had his free breathing been denied
The range of the steep mountain's side.
But why delay the truth ?-he died.
I saw, and could not hold his head,
Nor reach his dying hand-nor dead,
Though hard I strove, but strove in vain,
To rend and gnash my bonds in twain.
He died-and they unlocked his chain,
And scooped for him a shallow grave
Even from the cold earth of our cave.
I begged them, as a boon, to lay
His corse in dust whereon the day
Might shine-it was a foolish thought;
But then within my brain it wrought,
That even in death his freeborn breast
In such a dungeon could not rest.
I might have spared my idle prayer.
They coldly laughed, and laid him there,
The flat and turfless earth above
The being we so much did love;
His empty chain above it leant-
Such murder's fitting monument!

VIII.

But he, the favorite and the flower, Most cherished since his natal hour,