Then question not that, 'mid the austere Band

Who breathe the air he breathed, tread where he trod,

Some true partakers of his loving spirit

Do still survive, and, with those gentle hearts
Consorted, others, in the power, the faith,
Of a baptized imagination, prompt

To catch from Nature's humblest monitors
Whate'er they bring of impulses sublime.

Thus sensitive must be the Monk, though pale With fasts, with vigils worn, depressed by years, Whom in a sunny glade I chanced to see, Upon a pine-tree's storm-uprooted trunk, Seated alone, with forehead skyward raised, Hands clasped above the crucifix he wore Appended to his bosom, and lips closed By the joint pressure of his musing mood And habit of his vow. That ancient Man, Nor haply less the Brother whom I marked, As we approached the Convent gate, aloft Looking far forth from his aerial cell,

A young Ascetic, Poet, Hero, Sage,

He might have been, Lover belike he was,-
If they received into a conscious ear

The notes whose first faint greeting startled me, Whose sedulous iteration thrilled with joy

My heart, may have been moved like me to

think,

Ah! not like me who walk in the world's ways,

On the great Prophet, styled the Voice of One
Crying amid the wilderness, and given,

Now that their snows must melt, their herbs and flowers

Revive, their obstinate winter pass away,
That awful name to thee, thee, simple Cuckoo,
Wandering in solitude, and evermore
Foretelling and proclaiming, ere thou leave
This thy last haunt beneath Italian skies
To carry thy glad tidings over heights
Still loftier, and to climes more near the Pole.

Voice of the desert, fare thee well; sweet Bird! If that substantial title please thee more,

Farewell!

but go thy way; no need hast thou Of a good wish sent after thee; from bower To bower as green, from sky to sky as clear, Thee gentle breezes waft, or airs that meet Thy course and sport around thee softly fan, Till Night, descending upon hill and vale, Grants to thy mission a brief term of silence, And folds thy pinions up in blest repose.

XV.

AT THE CONVENT OF CAMALDOLI.

GRIEVE for the Man who hither came bereft,
And seeking consolation from above ;

Nor grieve the less that skill to him was left
To paint this picture of his lady-love:
Can she, a blessed saint, the work approve?
And O good Brethren of the cowl! a thing
So fair, to which with peril he must cling,
Destroy in pity, or with care remove.
That bloom,- those eyes,-

bind

can they assist to

Thoughts that would stray from Heaven? The dream must cease

To be; by Faith, not sight, his soul must live;
Else will the enamored Monk too surely find
How wide a space can part from inward peace
The most profound repose his cell can give.

XVI.

CONTINUED.

THE world forsaken, all its busy cares
And stirring interests shunned with desperate flight,
All trust abandoned in the healing might

Of virtuous action, all that courage dares,

Labor accomplishes, or patience bears,

Those helps rejected, they whose minds perceive How subtly works man's weakness, sighs may

heave

For such a one beset with cloistral snares.

Father of Mercy! rectify his view,

If with his vows this object ill agree ;

Shed over it thy grace, and thus subdue
Imperious passion in a heart set free:
That earthly love may to herself be true,
Give him a soul that cleaveth unto thee.*

XVII.

AT THE EREMITE OR UPPER CONVENT OF CAMALDOLI.

WHAT aim had they, the pair of Monks, in size
Enormous, dragged, while side by side they sat,
By panting steers up to this convent gate?
How, with empurpled cheeks and pampered eyes,
Dare they confront the lean austerities

Of Brethren who, here fixed, on Jesu wait
In sackcloth, and God's anger deprecate
Through all that humbles flesh and mortifies?
Strange contrast! —verily the world of dreams,
Where mingle, as for mockery combined,
Things in their very essences at strife,

Shows not a sight incongruous as the extremes
That everywhere, before the thoughtful mind,
Meet on the solid ground of waking life.*

* See Note.

XVIII.

AT VALLOMBROSA.

Thick as autumnal leaves that strew the brooks
In Vallombrosa, where Etrurian shades
High over-arched embower.*

PARADISE LOST.

"VALLOMBROSA, - I longed in thy shadiest wood To slumber, reclined on the moss-covered floor!" Fond wish that was granted at last, and the Flood, That lulled me asleep, bids me listen once more. Its murmur how soft! as it falls down the steep, Near that Cell-yon sequestered Retreat high in air

Where our Milton was wont lonely vigils to keep For converse with God, sought through study and

prayer.

The Monks still repeat the tradition with pride, And its truth who shall doubt? for his Spirit is

here;

In the cloud-piercing rocks doth her grandeur abide, In the pines pointing heavenward her beauty

austere ;

In the flower-besprent meadows his genius we trace Turned to humbler delights, in which youth might confide,

* See for the two first lines, "Stanzas composed in the Simplon Pass."