CORFU:

WITH A DISTANT VIEW OF GREECE.

CORFU upon thy hills a host is waving
England's red flag of Freedom and of Fame :
Corfu upon thy shores a fleet is braving

Man and the elements, the storm and flame.
Albania's mountain amphitheatre,

Like her own thunders, hears the mighty roar: When shall thy Spirit, Greece! that summons hear? When shall thy day of toil and chains be o'er?

Land of the soul! whose wan cold light is gleaming From tombs, where sleep the mighty and the free; Like stars, their rays through cloud and tempest streaming; Like the last radiance of the sunset sea;

Like morning's pallid rose on vale and mountain,

When showers are sweeping thro' their forests hoar; Like moon-beams on the vine-embowered fountain! When shall thy day of toil and chains be o'er?

Shalt thou not rise? sovereign of heart and hand!
Shall not the Greece we loved, be Greece again?
Shall not thy warrior take his lion-stand,

To guard the entrance of his native glen?
Shall not the shout be borne upon the wind,

That tells the world thy men are men once more?

D

Queen of our mightiest might, immortal mind!
When shall thy day of toil and chains be o'er?

The world is waking; it has slept its sleep.

And thou! must thou be but a nobler slave ? Shall lands fore-doomed to fetters, scorn to weep, While thou! whose emblem was the ocean-wave, Obeying but Heaven's breath, resistless, grand,

Yet rolling gems and gold upon thy shoreMust Greece alone lie slumbering, cold, unmanned! When shall thy day of toil and chains be o'er?

Land of the poet, painter, hero, sage!

Shall not again thy native Genius rise,
In beauty, deathless as thy Homer's page,
As Sappho's living thoughts and burning sighs,
As his, who by the dead in Marathon,

While all the earth re-echoed, proudly swore,
Demosthenes, thy last, eclipsing sun!

When shall thy day of toil and chains be o'er?

What is thine emblem now? this ocean-lake,

Sheltered with many a cool and lilied bower, Where the rich sunbeam, like a golden snake, Winds through the labyrinth of fruit and flower;

Bright, deep, delicious, but forgotten all;

Waked by no trumpet's sound no galley's prore. Land of our love, ev'n in thy lowest fall!

When shall thy day of toil and chains be o'er ?

Αιων.