. “HENCE sable COAL his massy couch extends...

. “HENCE sable COAL his massy couch extends,

And stars of gold the sparkling Pyrite blends;

Hence dull-eyed Naphtha pours his pitchy streams,

And Jet uncolour'd drinks the solar beams,

Bright Amber shines on his electric throne,

And adds ethereal lustres to his own.

— Led by the phosphor-light, with daring tread

Immortal FRANKLIN sought the fiery bed;

Where, nursed in night, incumbent Tempest shrouds

The seeds of Thunder in circumfluent clouds,

Besieged with iron points his airy cell,

And pierced the monster slumbering in the shell.

“So, born on sounding pinions to the WEST,

When Tyrant-Power had built his eagle nest;

While from his eyry shriek'd the famish'd brood,

Clenched their sharp claws, and champ'd their beaks for blood,

Immortal FRANKLIN watch'd the callow crew,

And stabb'd the struggling Vampires, ere they flew.

— The patriot-flame with quick contagion ran,

Hill lighted hill, and man electrised man;

Her heroes slain awhile COLUMBIA mourn'd,

And crown'd with laurels LIBERTY return'd.

“The Warrior, LIBERTY, with bending sails

Helm'd his bold course to fair HIBERNIA'S vales;—

Firm as he steps, along the shouting lands,

Lo! Truth and Virtue range their radiant bands;

Sad Superstition wails her empire torn,

Art plies his oar, and Commerce pours her horn.

“Long had the Giant-form on GALLIA'S plains

Inglorious slept, unconscious of his chains;

Round his large limbs were wound a thousand strings

By the weak hands of Confessors and Kings;

O'er his closed eyes a triple veil was bound,

And steely rivets lock'd him to the ground;

While stern Bastile with iron cage inthralls

His folded limbs, and hems in marble walls.

— Touch'd by the patriot-flame, he rent amazed

The flimsy bonds, and round and round him gazed;

Starts up from earth, above the admiring throng

Lifts his Colossal form, and towers along;

High o'er his foes his hundred arms He rears,

Plowshares his swords, and pruning hooks his spears;

Calls to the Good and Brave with voice, that rolls

Like Heaven's own thunder round the echoing poles;

Gives to the winds his banner broad unfurl'd,

And gathers in its shade the living world!

VII. “GNOMES! YOU then taught volcanic airs to force

Through bubbling Lavas their resistless course,

O'er the broad walls of rifted Granite climb,

And pierce the rent roof of incumbent Lime,

Round sparry caves metallic lustres fling,

And bear phlogiston on their tepid wing.

“HENCE glows, refulgent Tin! thy chrystal grains,

And tawny Copper shoots her azure veins;

Zinc lines his fretted vault with sable ore,

And dull Galena tessellates the floor;

On vermil beds in Idria's mighty caves

The living Silver rolls its ponderous waves;

With gay refractions bright Platina shines,

And studs with squander'd stars his dusky mines;

Long threads of netted gold, and silvery darts,

Inlay the Lazuli, and pierce the Quartz;—

— Whence roof'd with silver beam'd PERU, of old,

And hapless MEXICO was paved with gold.

“Heavens! on my sight what sanguine colours blaze!

Spain's deathless shame! the crimes of modern days!

When Avarice, shrouded in Religion's robe,

Sail'd to the West, and slaughter'd half the globe;

While Superstition, stalking by his side,

Mock'd the loud groans, and lap'd the bloody tide;

For sacred truths announced her frenzied dreams,

And turn'd to night the sun's meridian beams.—

Hear, oh, BRITANNIA! potent Queen of isles,

On whom fair Art, and meek Religion smiles,

Now AFRIC'S coasts thy craftier sons invade

With murder, rapine, theft,— and call it Trade!

— The SLAVE, in chains, on supplicating knee,

Spreads his wide arms, and lifts his eyes to Thee;

With hunger pale, with wounds and toil oppress'd,

“ARE WE NOT BRETHREN?” sorrow choaks the rest;—

— AIR! bear to heaven upon thy azure flood

Their innocent cries!— EARTH! cover not their blood!

VIII. “When Heaven's dread justice smites in crimes o'ergrown

The blood-nursed Tyrant on his purple throne,

GNOMES! YOUR bold forms unnumber'd arms outstretch,

And urge the vengeance o'er the guilty wretch.—

Thus when CAMBYSES led his barbarous hosts

From Persia's rocks to Egypt's trembling coasts,

Defiled each hallowed fane, and sacred wood,

And, drunk with fury, swell'd the Nile with blood;

Waved his proud banner o'er the Theban states,

And pour'd destruction through her hundred gates;

In dread divisions march'd the marshal'd bands,

And swarming armies blacken'd all the lands,

By Memphis these to ETHIOP'S sultry plains,

And those to HAMMON'S sand-incircled fanes.—

Slow as they pass'd, the indignant temples frown'd,

Low curses muttering from the vaulted ground;

Long ailes of Cypress waved their deepen'd glooms,

And quivering spectres grinn'd amid the tombs;

Prophetic whispers breathed from S

And MEMNON'S lyre with hollow murmurs rung;

Burst from each pyramid expiring groans,

And darker shadows stretch'd their lengthen'd cones.—

Day after day their deathful rout They steer,

Lust in the van, and rapine in the rear.

“GNOMES! as they march'd, You hid the gathered fruits,

The bladed grass, sweet grains, and mealy roots;

Scared the tired quails, that journey'd o'er their heads,

Retain'd the locusts in their earthy beds;

Bade on your sands no night-born dews distil,

Stay'd with vindictive hands the scanty rill.—

Loud o'er the camp the Fiend of Famine shrieks,

Calls all her brood, and champs her hundred beaks;

O'er ten square leagues her pennons broad expand,

And twilight swims upon the shuddering sand;

Perch'd on her crest the Griffin Discord clings,

And Giant Murder rides between her wings;

Blood from each clotted hair, and horny quill,

And showers of tears in blended streams distil;

High-poised in air her spiry neck she bends,

Rolls her keen eye, her Dragon-claws extends,

Darts from above, and tears at each fell swoop

With iron fangs the decimated troop.

“Now o'er their head the whizzing whirlwinds breathe,

And the live desert pants, and heaves beneath;

Tinged by the crimson sun, vast columns rise

Of eddying sands, and war amid the skies,

In red arcades the billowy plain surround,

And stalking turrets dance upon the ground.

— Long ranks in vain their shining blades extend,

To Demon-Gods their knees unhallow'd bend,

Wheel in wide circle, form in hollow square,

And now they front, and now they fly the war,

Pierce the deaf tempest with lamenting cries,

Press their parch'd lips, and close their blood-shot eyes.

— GNOMES! o'er the waste YOU led your myriad powers,

Climb'd on the whirls, and aim'd the flinty showers!—

Onward resistless rolls the infuriate surge,

Clouds follow clouds, and mountains mountains urge;

Wave over wave the driving desert swims,

Bursts o'er their heads, inhumes their struggling limbs;

Man mounts on man, on camels camels rush,

Hosts march o'er hosts, and nations nations crush,—

Wheeling in air the winged islands fall,

And one great earthy Ocean covers all!—

Then ceased the storm,— NIGHT bow'd his Ethiop brow

To earth, and listen'd to the groans below,—

Grim HORROR shook,— awhile the living hill

Heaved with convulsive throes,— and all was still!

IX. “GNOMES! whose fine forms, impassive as the air,

Shrink with soft sympathy for human care;

Who glide unseen, on printless slippers borne,

Beneath the waving grass, and nodding corn;

Or lay your tiny limbs, when noon-tide warms,

Where shadowy cowslips stretch their golden arms,—

So mark'd on orreries in lucid signs,

Star'd with bright points the mimic zodiac shines;

Borne on fine wires amid the pictured skies

With ivory orbs the planets set and rise;

Round the dwarf earth the pearly moon is roll'd,

And the sun twinkling whirls his rays of gold.—

Call your bright myriads, march your mailed hosts,

With spears and helmets glittering round the coasts;

Thick as the hairs, which rear the Lion's mane,

Or fringe the Boar, that bays the hunter-train;

Watch, where proud Surges break their treacherous mounds,

And sweep resistless o'er the cultured grounds;

Such as erewhile, impell'd o'er Belgia's plain,

Roll'd her rich ruins to the insatiate main;

With piles and piers the ruffian waves engage,

And bid indignant Ocean stay his rage.

“Where, girt with clouds, the rifted mountain yawns,

And chills with length of shade the gelid lawns,

Climb the rude steeps, the granite-cliffs surround,

Pierce with steel points, with wooden wedges wound;

Break into clays the soft volcanic slaggs,

Or melt with acid airs the marble craggs;

Crown the green summits with adventurous flocks,

And charm with novel flowers the wondering rocks.

— So when proud Rome the Afric Warrior braved,

And high on Alps his crimson banner waved;

While rocks on rocks their beetling brows oppose

With piny forests, and unfathomed snows;

Onward he march'd, to Latium's velvet ground

With fires and acids burst the obdurate bound,

Wide o'er her weeping vales destruction hurl'd,

And shook the rising empire of the world.

X. “Go, gentle GNOMES! resume your vernal toil,

Seek my chill tribes, which sleep beneath the soil;

On grey-moss banks, green meads, or furrow'd lands

Spread the dark mould, white lime, and crumbling sands;

Each bursting bud with healthier juices feed,

Emerging scion, or awaken'd seed.

So, in descending streams, the silver Chyle

Streaks with white clouds the golden floods of bile;

Through each nice valve the mingling currents glide,

Join their fine rills, and swell the sanguine tide;

Each countless cell, and viewless fibre seek,

Nerve the strong arm, and tinge the blushing cheek.

“Oh, watch, where bosom'd in the teeming earth,

Green swells the germ, impatient for its birth;

Guard from rapacious worms its tender shoots,

And drive the mining beetle from its roots;

With ceaseless efforts rend the obdurate clay,

And give my vegetable babes to day!

— Thus when an Angel-form, in light array'd,

Like HOWARD pierced the prison's noisome shade;

Where chain'd to earth, with eyes to heaven upturn'd,

The kneeling Saint in holy anguish mourn'd;—

Ray'd from his lucid vest, and halo'd brow

O'er the dark roof celestial lustres glow,

“PETER, arise!” with cheering voice He calls,

And sounds seraphic echo round the walls;

Locks, bolts, and chains his potent touch obey,

And pleased he leads the dazzled Sage to day.

XI. “YOU! whose fine fingers fill the organic cells,

With virgin earth, of woods and bones and shells;

Mould with retractile glue their spongy beds,

And stretch and strengthen all their fibre-threads.—

Late when the mass obeys its changeful doom,

And sinks to earth, its cradle and its tomb,

GNOMES! with nice eye the slow solution watch,

With fostering hand the parting atoms catch,

Join in new forms, combine with life and sense,

And guide and guard the transmigrating Ens.

“So when on Lebanon's sequester'd hight

The fair ADONIS left the realms of light,

Bow'd his bright locks, and, fated from his birth

To change eternal, mingled with the earth;—

With darker horror shook the conscious wood,

Groan'd the sad gales, and rivers blush'd with blood;

On cypress-boughs the Loves their quivers hung,

Their arrows scatter'd, and their bows unstrung;

And BEAUTY'S GODDESS, bending o'er his bier,

Breathed the soft sigh, and pour'd the tender tear.—

Admiring PROSERPINE through dusky glades

Led the fair phantom to Elysian shades,

Clad with new form, with finer sense combined,

And lit with purer flame the ethereal mind.

— Erewhile, emerging from infernal night,

The bright Assurgent rises into light,

Leaves the drear chambers of the insatiate tomb,

And shines and charms with renovated bloom.—

While wondering Loves the bursting grave surround,

And edge with meeting wings the yawning ground,

Stretch their fair necks, and leaning o'er the brink

View the pale regions of the dead, and shrink;

Long with broad eyes ecstatic BEAUTY stands,

Heaves her white bosom, spreads her waxen hands;

Then with loud shriek the panting Youth alarms,

“My Life! my Love!” and springs into his arms.”

The GODDESS ceased,— the delegated throng

O'er the wide plains delighted rush along;

In dusky squadrons, and in shining groups,

Hosts follow hosts, and troops succeed to troops;

Scarce bears the bending grass the moving freight,

And nodding florets bow beneath their weight.

So when light clouds on airy pinions sail,

Flit the soft shadows o'er the waving vale;

Shade follows shade, as laughing Zephyrs drive,

And all the chequer'd landscape seems alive.