THE RESCUE

A ship comes foaming up the bay,

Along the pier she glides;

Before her furrow melts away,

A courier mounts and rides.

“Haste, Haste, post Haste!” the letters bear;

“Sir Harry Frankland, These.”

Sad news to tell the loving pair!

The knight must cross the seas.

“Alas! we part!” — the lips that spoke

Lost all their rosy red,

As when a crystal cup is broke,

And all its wine is shed.

“Nay, droop not thus,— where'er,” he cried,

“I go by land or sea,

My love, my life, my joy, my pride,

Thy place is still by me!”

Through town and city, far and wide,

Their wandering feet have strayed,

From Alpine lake to ocean tide,

And cold Sierra's shade.

At length they see the waters gleam

Amid the fragrant bowers

Where Lisbon mirrors in the stream

Her belt of ancient towers.

Red is the orange on its bough,

To-morrow's sun shall fling

O'er Cintra's hazel-shaded brow

The flush of April's wing.

The streets are loud with noisy mirth,

They dance on every green;

The morning's dial marks the birth

Of proud Braganza's queen.

At eve beneath their pictured dome

The gilded courtiers throng;

The broad moidores have cheated Rome

Of all her lords of song.

AH! Lisbon dreams not of the day —

Pleased with her painted scenes —

When all her towers shall slide away

As now these canvas screens!

The spring has passed, the summer fled,

And yet they linger still,

Though autumn's rustling leaves have spread

The flank of Cintra's hill.

The town has learned their Saxon name,

And touched their English gold,

Nor tale of doubt nor hint of blame

From over sea is told.

Three hours the first November dawn

Has climbed with feeble ray

Through mists like heavy curtains drawn

Before the darkened day.

How still the muffled echoes sleep!

Hark! hark! a hollow sound,—

A noise like chariots rumbling deep

Beneath the solid ground.

The channel lifts, the water slides

And bares its bar of sand,

Anon a mountain billow strides

And crashes o'er the land.

The turrets lean, the steeples reel

Like masts on ocean's swell,

And clash a long discordant peal,

The death-doomed city's knell.

The pavement bursts, the earth upheaves

Beneath the staggering town!

The turrets crack — the castle cleaves —

The spires come rushing down.

Around, the lurid mountains glow

With strange unearthly gleams;

While black abysses gape below,

Then close in jagged seams.

And all is over. Street and square

In ruined heaps are piled;

Ah! where is she, so frail, so fair,

Amid the tumult wild?

Unscathed, she treads the wreck-piled street,

Whose narrow gaps afford

A pathway for her bleeding feet,

To seek her absent lord.

A temple's broken walls arrest

Her wild and wandering eyes;

Beneath its shattered portal pressed,

Her lord unconscious lies.

The power that living hearts obey

Shall lifeless blocks withstand?

Love led her footsteps where he lay,—

Love nerves her woman's hand.

One cry,— the marble shaft she grasps,—

Up heaves the ponderous stone:—

He breathes,— her fainting form he clasps,—

Her life has bought his own!