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Percy Bysshe Shelley - The Revolt Of Islam: Canto I-XII
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  On which its lustre streamed, whene`er it might
Through darkness wide and deep those trancèd spirits smite.


  Yes, many an eye with dizzy tears was dim,
    And oft I thought to clasp my own heart`s brother,
  When I could feel the listener`s senses swim,
    And hear his breath its own swift gaspings smother
    Even as my words evoked them—and another,
  And yet another, I did fondly deem,
    Felt that we all were sons of one great mother;
  And the cold truth such sad reverse did seem,
As to awake in grief from some delightful dream.


  Yes, oft beside the ruined labyrinth
    Which skirts the hoary caves of the green deep,
  Did Laon and his friend, on one gray plinth,
    Round whose worn base the wild waves hiss and leap,
    Resting at eve, a lofty converse keep:
  And that this friend was false, may now be said
    Calmly—that he like other men could weep
  Tears which are lies, and could betray and spread
Snares for that guileless heart which for his own had bled.


  Then, had no great aim recompensed my sorrow,
    I must have sought dark respite from its stress
  In dreamless rest, in sleep that sees no morrow—
    For to tread life`s dismaying wilderness
    Without one smile to cheer, one voice to bless,
  Amid the snares and scoffs of human kind,
    Is hard—but I betrayed it not, nor less
  With love that scorned return, sought to unbind
The interwoven clouds which make its wisdom blind.


  With deathless minds which leave where they have passed
    A path of light, my soul communion knew;
  Till from that glorious intercourse, at last,
    As from a mine of magic store, I drew
    Words which were weapons;—round my heart there grew
  The adamantine armour of their power,
    And from my fancy wings of golden hue
  Sprang forth—yet not alone from wisdom`s tower,
A minister of truth, these plumes young Laon bore.


  An orphan with my parents lived, whose eyes
    Were lodestars of delight, which drew me home
  When I might wander forth; nor did I prize
    Aught human thing beneath Heaven`s mighty dome
    Beyond this child: so when sad hours were come,
  And baffled hope like ice still clung to me,
    Since kin were cold, and friends had now become
  Heartless and false, I turned from all, to be,
Cythna, the only source of tears and smiles to thee.


  What wert thou then? A child most infantine,
    Yet wandering far beyond that innocent age
  In all but its sweet looks and mien divine:
    Even then, methought, with the world`s tyrant rage
    A patient warfare thy young heart did wage,
  When those soft eyes of scarcely conscious thought
    Some tale, or thine own fancies, would engage
  To overflow with tears, or converse fraught
With passion, o`er their depths its fleeting light had wrought.


  She moved upon this earth a shape of brightness,
    A power, that from its objects scarcely drew
  One impulse of her being—in her lightness
    Most like some radiant cloud of morning dew,
    Which wanders through the waste air`s pathless blue,
  To nourish some far desert: she did seem
    Beside me, gathering beauty as she grew,
  Like the bright shade of some immortal dream
Which walks, when tempest sleeps, the wave of life`s dark stream.


  As mine own shadow was this child to me,
    A second self, far dearer and more fair;
  Which clothed in undissolving radiancy
    All those steep paths which languor and despair
    Of human things, had made so dark and bare,
  But which I trod alone—nor, till bereft
    Of friends, and overcome by lonely care,
  Knew I what solace for that loss was left,
Though by a bitter wound my trusting heart was cleft.


  Once she was dear, now she was all I had
    To love in human life—this playmate sweet,
  This child of twelve years old—so she was made
    My sole associate, and her willing feet
    Wandered with mine where earth and ocean meet,
  Beyond the aëreal mountains whose vast cells
    The unreposing billows ever beat,
  Through forests wide and old, and lawny dells
Where boughs of incense droop over the emerald wells.


  And warm and light I felt her clasping hand
    When twined in mine: she followed where I went,
  Through the lone paths of our immortal land.
    It had no waste but some memorial lent
    Which strung me to my toil—some monument
  Vital with mind: then, Cythna by my side,
    Until the bright and beaming day were spent,
  Would rest, with looks entreating to abide,
Too earnest and too sweet ever to be denied.


  And soon I could not have refused her—thus
    For ever, day and night, we two were ne`er
  Parted, but when brief sleep divided us:
    And when the pauses of the lulling air
    Of noon beside the sea, had made a lair
  For her soothed senses, in my arms she slept,
    And I kept watch over her slumbers there,
  While, as the shifting visions o`er her swept,
Amid her innocent rest by turns she smiled and wept.


  And, in the murmur of her dreams was heard
    Sometimes the name of Laon:—suddenly
  She would arise, and, like the secret bird
    Whom sunset wakens, fill the shore and sky
    With her sweet accents—a wild melody!
  Hymns which my soul had woven to Freedom, strong
    The source of passion, whence they rose, to be;
  Triumphant strains, which, like a spirit`s tongue,
To the enchanted waves that child of glory sung—


  Her white arms lifted through the shadowy stream
    Of her loose hair—oh, excellently great
  Seemed to me then my purpose, the vast theme
    Of those impassioned songs, when Cythna sate
    Amid the calm which rapture doth create
  After its tumult, her heart vibrating,
    Her spirit o`er the ocean`s floating state
  From her deep eyes far wandering, on the wing
Of visions that were mine, beyond its utmost spring.


  For, before Cythna loved it, had my song
    Peopled with thoughts the boundless universe,
  A mighty congregation, which were strong
    Where`er they trod the darkness to disperse
    The cloud of that unutterable curse
  Which clings upon mankind:—all things became
    Slaves to my holy and heroic verse,
  Earth, sea and sky, the planets, life and fame
And fate, or whate`er else binds the world`s wondrous frame.


  And this beloved child thus felt the sway
    Of my conceptions, gathering like a cloud
  The very wind on which it rolls away:
    Hers too were all my thoughts, ere yet, endowed
    With music and with light, their fountains flowed
  In poesy; and her still and earnest face,
    Pallid with feelings which intensely glowed
  Within, was turned on mine with speechless grace,
Watching the hopes which there her heart had learned to trace.


  In me, communion with this purest being
    Kindled intenser zeal, and made me wise
  In knowledge, which, in hers mine own mind seeing,
    Left in the human world few mysteries:
    How without fear of evil or disguise
  Was Cythna!—what a spirit strong and mild,
    Which death, or pain or peril could despise,
  Yet melt in tenderness! what genius wild
Yet mighty, was enclosed within one simple child!


  New lore was this—old age, with its gray hair,
    And wrinkled legends of unworthy things,
  And icy sneers, is nought: it cannot dare
    To burst the chains which life for ever flings
    On the entangled soul`s aspiring wings,
  So is it cold and cruel, and is made
    The careless slave of that dark power which brings
  Evil, like blight, on man, who, still betrayed,
Laughs o`er the grave in which his living hopes are laid.


  Nor are the strong and the severe to keep
    The empire of the world: thus Cythna taught
  Even in the visions of her eloquent sleep,
    Unconscious of the power through which she wrought
    The woof of such intelligible thought,
  As from the tranquil strength which cradled lay
    In her smile-peopled rest, my spirit sought
  Why the deceiver and the slave has sway
O`er heralds so divine of truth`s arising day.


  Within that fairest form, the female mind
    Untainted by the poison-clouds which rest
  On the dark world, a sacred home did find:
    But else, from the wide earth`s maternal breast,
    Victorious Evil, which had dispossessed
  All native power, had those fair children torn,
    And made them slaves to soothe his vile unrest,
  And minister to lust its joys forlorn,
Till they had learned to breathe the atmosphere of scorn.


  This misery was but coldly felt, till she
    Became my only friend, who had endued
  My purpose with a wider sympathy;
    Thus, Cythna mourned with me the servitude
    In which the half of humankind were mewed
  Victims of lust and hate, the slaves of slaves,
    She mourned that grace and power were thrown as food
  To the hyaena lust, who, among graves,
Over his loathèd meal, laughing in agony, raves.


  And I, still gazing on that glorious child,
    Even as these thoughts flushed o`er her:—`Cythna sweet,
  Well with the world art thou unreconciled;
    Never will peace and human nature meet
    Till free and equal man and woman greet
  Domestic peace; and ere this power can make
    In human hearts its calm and holy seat,
  This slavery must be broken`—as I spake,
From Cythna`s eyes a light of exultation brake.


  She replied earnestly:—`It shall be mine,
    This task, mine, Laon!—thou hast much to gain;
  Nor wilt thou at poor Cythna`s pride repine,
    If she should lead a happy female train
    To meet thee over the rejoicing plain,
  When myriads at thy call shall throng around
    The Golden City.`—Then the child did strain
  My arm upon her tremulous heart, and wound
Her own about my neck, till some reply she found.


  I smiled, and spake not.—`Wherefore dost thou smile
    At what I say? Laon, I am not weak,
  And though my cheek might become pale the while,
    With thee, if thou desirest, will I seek
    Through their array of banded slaves to wreak
  Ruin upon the tyrants. I had thought
    It was more hard to turn my unpractised cheek
  To scorn and shame, and this beloved spot
And thee, O dearest friend, to leave and murmur not.


  `Whence came I what I am? Thou, Laon, knowest
    How a young child should thus undaunted be;
  Methinks, it is a power which thou bestowest,
    Through which I seek, by most resembling thee,
    So to become most good and great and free,
  Yet far beyond this Ocean`s utmost roar
    In towers and huts are many like to me,
  Who, could they see thine eyes, or feel such lore
As I have learnt from them, like me would fear no more.


  `Think`st thou that I shall speak unskilfully,
    And none will heed me? I remember now,
  How once, a slave in tortures doomed to die,
    Was saved, because in accents sweet and low
    He sung a song his Judge loved long ago,
  As he was led to death.—All shall relent
    Who hear me—tears, as mine have flowed, shall flow,
  Hearts beat as mine now beats, with such intent
As renovates the world; a will omnipotent!


  `Yes, I will tread Pride`s golden palaces,
    Through Penury`s roofless huts and squalid cells
  Will I descend, where`er in abjectness
    Woman with some vile slave her tyrant dwells,
    There with the music of thine own sweet spells
  Will disenchant the captives, and will pour
    For the despairing, from the crystal wells
  Of thy deep spirit, reason`s mighty lore,
And power shall then abound, and hope arise once more.


  `Can man be free if woman be a slave?
    Chain one who lives, and breathes this boundless air,
  To the corruption of a closèd grave!
    Can they whose mates are beasts, condemned to bear
    Scorn, heavier far than toil or anguish, dare
  To trample their oppressors? in their home
    Among their babes, thou knowest a curse would wear
  The shape of woman—hoary Crime would come
Behind, and Fraud rebuild religion`s tottering dome.


  `I am a child:—I would not yet depart.
    When I go forth alone, bearing the lamp
  Aloft which thou hast kindled in my heart,
    Millions of slaves from many a dungeon damp
    Shall leap in joy, as the benumbing cramp
  Of ages leaves their limbs—no ill may harm
    Thy Cythna ever—truth its radiant stamp
  Has fixed, as an invulnerable charm
Upon her children`s brow, dark Falsehood to disarm.


  `Wait yet awhile for the appointed day—
    Thou wilt depart, and I with tears shall stand
  Watching thy dim sail skirt the ocean gray;
    Amid the dwellers of this lonely land
    I shall remain alone—and thy command
  Shall then dissolve the world`s unquiet trance,
    And, multitudinous as the desert sand
  Borne on the storm, its millions shall advance,
Thronging round thee, the light of their deliverance.


  `Then, like the forests of some pathless mountain,
    Which from remotest glens two warring winds
  Involve in fire which not the loosened fountain
    Of broadest floods might quench, shall all the kinds
    Of evil, catch from our uniting minds
  The spark which must consume them;—Cythna then
    Will have cast off the impotence that binds
  Her childhood now, and through the paths of men
Will pass, as the charmed bird that haunts the serpent`s den.


  `We part!—O Laon, I must dare nor tremble
    To meet those looks no more!—Oh, heavy stroke!
  Sweet brother of my soul! can I dissemble
    The agony of this thought?`—As thus she spoke
    The gathered sobs her quivering accents broke,
  And in my arms she hid her beating breast.
    I remained still for tears—sudden she woke
  As one awakes from sleep, and wildly pressed
My bosom, her whole frame impetuously possessed.


  `We part to meet again—but yon blue waste,
    Yon desert wide and deep holds no recess,
  Within whose happy silence, thus embraced
    We might survive all ills in one caress:
    Nor doth the grave—I fear `tis passionless—
  Nor yon cold vacant Heaven:—we meet again
    Within the minds of men, whose lips shall bless
  Our memory, and whose hopes its light retain
When these dissevered bones are trodden in the plain.`


  I could not speak, though she had ceased, for now
    The fountains of her feeling, swift and deep,
  Seemed to suspend the tumult of their flow;
    So we arose, and by the starlight steep
    Went homeward—neither did we speak nor weep,
  But, pale, were calm with passion—thus subdued
    Like evening shades that o`er the mountains creep,
  We moved towards our home; where, in this mood,
Each from the other sought refuge in solitude.


CANTO III

  What thoughts had sway o`er Cythna`s lonely slumber
    That night, I know not; but my own did seem
  As if they might ten thousand years outnumber
    Of waking life, the visions of a dream
    Which hid in one dim gulf the troubled stream
  Of mind; a boundless chaos wild and vast,
    Whose limits yet were never memory`s theme:
  And I lay struggling as its whirlwinds passed,
Sometimes for rapture sick, sometimes for pain aghast.


  Two hours, whose mighty circle did embrace
    More time than might make gray the infant world,
  Rolled thus, a weary and tumultuous space:
    When the third came, like mist on breezes curled,
    From my dim sleep a shadow was unfurled:
  Methought, upon the threshold of a cave
    I sate with Cythna; drooping briony, pearled
  With dew from the wild streamlet`s shattered wave,
Hung, where we sate to taste the joys which Nature gave.


  We lived a day as we were wont to live,
    But Nature had a robe of glory on,
  And the bright air o`er every shape did weave
    Intenser hues, so that the herbless stone,
    The leafless bough among the leaves alone,
  Had being clearer than its own could be,
    And Cythna`s pure and radiant self was shown,
  In this strange vision, so divine to me,
That, if I loved before, now love was agony.


  Morn fled, noon came, evening, then night descended,
    And we prolonged calm talk beneath the sphere
  Of the calm moon—when suddenly was blended
    With our repose a nameless sense of fear;
    And from the cave behind I seemed to hear
  Sounds gathering upwards!—accents incomplete,
    And stifled shrieks,—and now, more near and near,
  A tumult and a rush of thronging feet
The cavern`s secret depths beneath the earth did beat.


  The scene was changed, and away, away, away!
    Through the air and over the sea we sped,
  And Cythna in my sheltering bosom lay,
    And the winds bore me—through the darkness spread
    Around, the gaping earth then vomited
  Legions of foul and ghastly shapes, which hung
    Upon my flight; and ever, as we fled,
  They plucked at Cythna—soon to me then clung
A sense of actual things those monstrous dreams among.


  And I lay struggling in the impotence
    Of sleep, while outward life had burst its bound,
  Though, still deluded, strove the tortured sense
    To its dire wanderings to adapt the sound
    Which in the light of morn was poured around
  Our dwelling—breathless, pale, and unaware
    I rose, and all the cottage crowded found
  With armèd men, whose glittering swords were bare,
And whose degraded limbs the tyrant`s garb did wear.


  And, ere with rapid lips and gathered brow
    I could demand the cause—a feeble shriek—
  It was a feeble shriek, faint, far and low,
    Arrested me—my mien grew calm and meek,
    And grasping a small knife, I went to seek
  That voice among the crowd—`twas Cythna`s cry!
    Beneath most calm resolve did agony wreak
  Its whirlwind rage:—so I passed quietly
Till I beheld, where bound, that dearest child did lie.


  I started to behold her, for delight
    And exultation, and a joyance free,
  Solemn, serene and lofty, filled the light
    Of the calm smile with which she looked on me:
    So that I feared some brainless ecstasy,
  Wrought from that bitter woe, had wildered her—
    `Farewell! farewell!` she said, as I drew nigh.
  `At first my peace was marred by this strange stir,
Now I am calm as truth—its chosen minister.


  `Look not so, Laon—say farewell in hope,
    These bloody men are but the slaves who bear
  Their mistress to her task—it was my scope
    The slavery where they drag me now, to share,
    And among captives willing chains to wear
  Awhile—the rest thou knowest—return, dear friend!
    Let our first triumph trample the despair
  Which would ensnare us now, for in the end,
In victory or in death our hopes and fears must blend.`


  These words had fallen on my unheeding ear,
    Whilst I had watched the motions of the crew
  With seeming-careless glance; not many were
    Around her, for their comrades just withdrew
    To guard some other victim—so I drew
  My knife, and with one impulse, suddenly
    All unaware three of their number slew,
  And grasped a fourth by the throat, and with loud cry
My countrymen invoked to death or liberty!


  What followed then, I know not—for a stroke
    On my raised arm and naked head, came down,
  Filling my eyes with blood—when I awoke,
    I felt that they had bound me in my swoon,
    And up a rock which overhangs the town,
  By the steep path were bearing me: below,
    The plain was filled with slaughter,—overthrown
  The vineyards and the harvests, and the glow
Of blazing roofs shone far o`er the white Ocean`s flow.


  Upon that rock a mighty column stood,
    Whose capital seemed sculptured in the sky,
  Which to the wanderers o`er the solitude
    Of distant seas, from ages long gone by,
    Had made a landmark; o`er its height to fly
  Scarcely the cloud, the vulture, or the blast,
    Has power—and when the shades of evening lie
  On Earth and Ocean, its carved summits cast
The sunken daylight far through the aërial waste.


  They bore me to a cavern in the hill
    Beneath that column, and unbound me there:
  And one did strip me stark; and one did fill
    A vessel from the putrid pool; one bare
    A lighted torch, and four with friendless care
  Guided my steps the cavern-paths along,
    Then up a steep and dark and narrow stair
  We wound, until the torch`s fiery tongue
Amid the gushing day beamless and pallid hung.


  They raised me to the platform of the pile,
    That column`s dizzy height:—the grate of brass
  Through which they thrust me, open stood the while,
    As to its ponderous and suspended mass,
    With chains which eat into the flesh, alas!
  With brazen links, my naked limbs they bound:
    The grate, as they departed to repass,
  With horrid clangour fell, and the far sound
Of their retiring steps in the dense gloom were drowned.


  The noon was calm and bright:—around that column
    The overhanging sky and circling sea
  Spread forth in silentness profound and solemn
    The darkness of brief frenzy cast on me,
    So that I knew not my own misery:
  The islands and the mountains in the day
    Like clouds reposed afar; and I could see
  The town among the woods below that lay,
And the dark rocks which bound the bright and glassy bay.


  It was so calm, that scarce the feathery weed
    Sown by some eagle on the topmost stone
  Swayed in the air:—so bright, that noon did breed
    No shadow in the sky beside mine own—
    Mine, and the shadow of my chain alone.
  Below, the smoke of roofs involved in flame
    Rested like night, all else was clearly shown
  In that broad glare, yet sound to me none came,
But of the living blood that ran within my frame.


  The peace of madness fled, and ah, too soon!
    A ship was lying on the sunny main,
  Its sails were flagging in the breathless noon—
    Its shadow lay beyond—that sight again
    Waked, with its presence, in my trancèd brain
  The stings of a known sorrow, keen and cold:
    I knew that ship bore Cythna o`er the plain
  Of waters, to her blighting slavery sold,
And watched it with such thoughts as must remain untold.


  I watched, until the shades of evening wrapped
    Earth like an exhalation—then the bark
  Moved, for that calm was by the sunset snapped.
    It moved a speck upon the Ocean dark:
    Soon the wan stars came forth, and I could mark
  Its path no more!—I sought to close mine eyes,
    But like the balls, their lids were stiff and stark;
  I would have risen, but ere that I could rise,
My parchèd skin was split with piercing agonies.


  I gnawed my brazen chain, and sought to sever
    Its adamantine links, that I might die:
  O Liberty! forgive the base endeavour,
    Forgive me, if, reserved for victory,
    The Champion of thy faith e`er sought to fly.—
  That starry night, with its clear silence, sent
    Tameless resolve which laughed at misery
  Into my soul—linkèd remembrance lent
To that such power, to me such a severe content.


  To breathe, to be, to hope, or to despair
    And die, I questioned not; nor, though the Sun
  Its shafts of agony kindling through the air
    Moved over me, nor though in evening dun,
    Or when the stars their visible courses run,
  Or morning, the wide universe was spread
    In dreary calmness round me, did I shun
  Its presence, nor seek refuge with the dead
From one faint hope whose flower a dropping poison shed.


  Two days thus passed—I neither raved nor died—
    Thirst raged within me, like a scorpion`s nest
  Built in mine entrails; I had spurned aside
    The water-vessel, while despair possessed
    My thoughts, and now no drop remained! The uprest
  Of the third sun brought hunger—but the crust
    Which had been left, was to my craving breast
  Fuel, not food. I chewed the bitter dust,
And bit my bloodless arm, and licked the brazen rust.


  My brain began to fail when the fourth morn
    Burst o`er the golden isles—a fearful sleep,
  Which through the caverns dreary and forlorn
    Of the riven soul, sent its foul dreams to sweep
    With whirlwind swiftness—a fall far and deep,—
  A gulf, a void, a sense of senselessness—
    These things dwelt in me, even as shadows keep
  Their watch in some dim charnel`s loneliness,
A shoreless sea, a sky sunless and planetless!


  The forms which peopled this terrific trance
    I well remember—like a choir of devils,
  Around me they involved a giddy dance;
    Legions seemed gathering from the misty levels
    Of Ocean, to supply those ceaseless revels,
  Foul, ceaseless shadows:—thought could not divide
    The actual world from these entangling evils,
  Which so bemocked themselves, that I descried
All shapes like mine own self, hideously multiplied.


  The sense of day and night, of false and true,
    Was dead within me. Yet two visions burst
  That darkness—one, as since that hour I knew,
    Was not a phantom of the realms accursed,
    Where then my spirit dwelt—but of the first
  I know not yet, was it a dream or no.
    But both, though not distincter, were immersed
  In hues which, when through memory`s waste they flow,
Make their divided streams more bright and rapid now.


  Methought that grate was lifted, and the seven
    Who brought me thither four stiff corpses bare,
  And from the frieze to the four winds of Heaven
    Hung them on high by the entangled hair:
    Swarthy were three—the fourth was very fair:
  As they retired, the golden moon unsprung,
    And eagerly, out in the giddy air,
  Leaning that I might eat, I stretched and clung
Over the shapeless depth in which those corpses hung.


  A woman`s shape, now lank and cold and blue,
    The dwelling of the many-coloured worm,
  Hung there; the white and hollow cheek I drew
    To my dry lips—what radiance did inform
    Those horny eyes? whose was that withered form?
  Alas, alas! it seemed that Cythna`s ghost
    Laughed in those looks, and that the flesh was warm
  Within my teeth!—A whirlwind keen as frost
Then in its sinking gulfs my sickening spirit tossed.


  Then seemed it that a tameless hurricane
    Arose, and bore me in its dark career
  Beyond the sun, beyond the stars that wane
    On the verge of formless space—it languished there,
    And dying, left a silence lone and drear,
  More horrible than famine:—in the deep
    The shape of an old man did then appear,
  Stately and beautiful; that dreadful sleep
His heavenly smiles dispersed, and I could wake and weep.


  And, when the blinding tears had fallen, I saw
    That column, and those corpses, and the moon,
  And felt the poisonous tooth of hunger gnaw
    My vitals, I rejoiced, as if the boon
    Of senseless death would be accorded soon;—
  When from that stony gloom a voice arose,
    Solemn and sweet as when low winds attune
  The midnight pines; the grate did then unclose,
And on that reverend form the moonlight did repose.


  He struck my chains, and gently spake and smiled:
    As they were loosened by that Hermit old,
  Mine eyes were of their madness half beguiled,
    To answer those kind looks—he did enfold
    His giant arms around me, to uphold
  My wretched frame, my scorchèd limbs he wound
    In linen moist and balmy, and as cold
  As dew to drooping leaves;—the chain, with sound
Like earthquake, through the chasm of that steep stair did bound,


  As, lifting me, it fell!—What next I heard,
    Were billows leaping on the harbour-bar,
  And the shrill sea-wind, whose breath idly stirred
    My hair;—I looked abroad, and saw a star
    Shining beside a sail, and distant far
  That mountain and its column, the known mark
    Of those who in the wide deep wandering are,
  So that I feared some Spirit, fell and dark,
In trance had lain me thus within a fiendish bark.


  For now indeed, over the salt sea-billow
    I sailed: yet dared not look upon the shape
  Of him who ruled the helm, although the pillow
    For my light head was hollowed in his lap,
    And my bare limbs his mantle did enwrap,
  Fearing it was a fiend: at last, he bent
    O`er me his aged face, as if to snap
  Those dreadful thoughts the gentle grandsire bent,
And to my inmost soul his soothing looks he sent.


  A soft and healing potion to my lips
    At intervals he raised—now looked on high,
  To mark if yet the starry giant dips
    His zone in the dim sea—now cheeringly,
    Though he said little, did he speak to me.
  `It is a friend beside thee—take good cheer,
    Poor victim, thou art now at liberty!`
  I joyed as those a human tone to hear,
Who in cells deep and lone have languished many a year.


  A dim and feeble joy, whose glimpses oft
    Were quenched in a relapse of wildering dreams,
  Yet still methought we sailed, until aloft
    The stars of night grew pallid, and the beams
    Of morn descended on the ocean-streams,
  And still that aged man, so grand and mild,
    Tended me, even as some sick mother seems
  To hang in hope over a dying child,
Till in the azure East darkness again was piled.


  And then the night-wind steaming from the shore,
    Sent odours dying sweet across the sea,
  And the swift boat the little waves which bore,
    Were cut by its keen keel, though slantingly;
    Soon I could hear the leaves sigh, and could see
  The myrtle-blossoms starring the dim grove,
    As past the pebbly beach the boat did flee
  On sidelong wing, into a silent cove,
Where ebon pines a shade under the starlight wove.


CANTO IV

  The old man took the oars, and soon the bark
    Smote on the beach beside a tower of stone;
  It was a crumbling heap, whose portal dark
    With blooming ivy-trails was overgrown;
    Upon whose floor the spangling sands were strown,
  And rarest sea-shells, which the eternal flood,
    Slave to the mother of the months, had thrown
  Within the walls of that gray tower, which stood
A changeling of man`s art, nursed amid Nature`s brood.


  When the old man his boat had anchorèd,
    He wound me in his arms with tender care,
  And very few, but kindly words he said,
    And bore me through the tower adown a stair,
    Whose smooth descent some ceaseless step to wear
  For many a year had fallen.—We came at last
    To a small chamber, which with mosses rare
  Was tapestried, where me his soft hands placed
Upon a couch of grass and oak-leaves interlaced.


  The moon was darting through the lattices
    Its yellow light, warm as the beams of day—
  So warm, that to admit the dewy breeze,
    The old man opened them; the moonlight lay
    Upon a lake whose waters wove their play
  Even to the threshold of that lonely home:
    Within was seen in the dim wavering ray
  The antique sculptured roof, and many a tome
Whose lore had made that sage all that he had become.


  The rock-built barrier of the sea was past,—
    And I was on the margin of a lake,
  A lonely lake, amid the forests vast
    And snowy mountains:—did my spirit wake
    From sleep as many-coloured as the snake
  That girds eternity? in life and truth,
    Might not my heart its cravings ever slake?
  Was Cythna then a dream, and all my youth,
And all its hopes and fears, and all its joy and ruth?


  Thus madness came again,—a milder madness,
    Which darkened nought but time`s unquiet flow
  With supernatural shades of clinging sadness;
    That gentle Hermit, in my helpless woe,
    By my sick couch was busy to and fro,
  Like a strong spirit ministrant of good:
    When I was healed, he led me forth to show
  The wonders of his sylvan solitude,
And we together sate by that isle-fretted flood.


  He knew his soothing words to weave with skill
    From all my madness told; like mine own heart,
  Of Cythna would he question me, until
    That thrilling name had ceased to make me start,
    From his familiar lips—it was not art,
  Of wisdom and of justice when he spoke—
    When mid soft looks of pity, there would dart
  A glance as keen as is the lightning`s stroke
When it doth rive the knots of some ancestral oak.


  Thus slowly from my brain the darkness rolled,
    My thoughts their due array did re-assume
  Through the enchantments of that Hermit old;
    Then I bethought me of the glorious doom
    Of those who sternly struggle to relume
  The lamp of Hope o`er man`s bewildered lot,
    And, sitting by the waters, in the gloom
  Of eve, to that friend`s heart I told my thought—
That heart which had grown old, but had corrupted not.


  That hoary man had spent his livelong age
    In converse with the dead, who leave the stamp
  Of ever-burning thoughts on many a page,
    When they are gone into the senseless damp
    Of graves;—his spirit thus became a lamp
  Of splendour, like to those on which it fed:
    Through peopled haunts, the City and the Camp,
  Deep thirst for knowledge had his footsteps led,
And all the ways of men among mankind he read.


  But custom maketh blind and obdurate
    The loftiest hearts:—he had beheld the woe
  In which mankind was bound, but deemed that fate
    Which made them abject, would preserve them so;
    And in such faith, some steadfast joy to know,
  He sought this cell: but when fame went abroad,
    That one in Argolis did undergo
  Torture for liberty, and that the crowd
High truths from gifted lips had heard and understood;


  And that the multitude was gathering wide,—
    His spirit leaped within his aged frame,
  In lonely peace he could no more abide,
    But to the land on which the victor`s flame
    Had fed, my native land, the Hermit came:
  Each heart was there a shield, and every tongue
    Was as a sword, of truth—young Laon`s name
  Rallied their secret hopes, though tyrants sung
Hymns of triumphant joy our scattered tribes among.


  He came to the lone column on the rock,
    And with his sweet and mighty eloquence
  The hearts of those who watched it did unlock,
    And made them melt in tears of penitence.
    They gave him entrance free to bear me thence.
  `Since this,` the old man said, `seven years are spent,
    While slowly truth on thy benighted sense
  Has crept; the hope which wildered it has lent
Meanwhile, to me the power of a sublime intent.


  `Yes, from the records of my youthful state,
    And from the lore of bards and sages old,
  From whatsoe`er my wakened thoughts create
    Out of the hopes of thine aspirings bold,
    Have I collected language to unfold
  Truth to my countrymen; from shore to shore
    Doctrines of human power my words have told,
  They have been heard, and men aspire to more
Than they have ever gained or ever lost of yore.


  `In secret chambers parents read, and weep,
    My writings to their babes, no longer blind;
  And young men gather when their tyrants sleep,
    And vows of faith each to the other bind;
    And marriageable maidens, who have pined
  With love, till life seemed melting through their look,
    A warmer zeal, a nobler hope now find;
  And every bosom thus is rapt and shook,
Like autumn`s myriad leaves in one swoln mountain-brook.


  `The tyrants of the Golden City tremble
    At voices which are heard about the streets,
  The ministers of fraud can scarce dissemble
    The lies of their own heart; but when one meets
    Another at the shrine, he inly weets,
  Though he says nothing, that the truth is known;
    Murderers are pale upon the judgement-seats,
  And gold grows vile even to the wealthy crone,
And laughter fills the Fane, and curses shake the Throne.


  `Kind thoughts, and mighty hopes, and gentle deeds
    Abound, for fearless love, and the pure law
  Of mild equality and peace, succeeds
    To faiths which long have held the world in awe,
    Bloody and false, and cold:—as whirlpools draw
  All wrecks of Ocean to their chasm, the sway
    Of thy strong genius, Laon, which foresaw
  This hope, compels all spirits to obey,
Which round thy secret strength now throng in wide array.


  `For I have been thy passive instrument`—
    (As thus the old man spake, his countenance
  Gleamed on me like a spirit`s)—`thou hast lent
    To me, to all, the power to advance
    Towards this unforeseen deliverance
  From our ancestral chains—ay, thou didst rear
    That lamp of hope on high, which time nor chance
  Nor change may not extinguish, and my share
Of good, was o`er the world its gathered beams to bear.


  `But I, alas! am both unknown and old,
    And though the woof of wisdom I know well
  To dye in hues of language, I am cold
    In seeming, and the hopes which inly dwell,
    My manners note that I did long repel;
  But Laon`s name to the tumultuous throng
    Were like the star whose beams the waves compel
  And tempests, and his soul-subduing tongue
Were as a lance to quell the mailèd crest of wrong.


  `Perchance blood need not flow, if thou at length
    Wouldst rise, perchance the very slaves would spare
  Their brethren and themselves; great is the strength
    Of words—for lately did a maiden fair,
    Who from her childhood has been taught to bear
  The tyrant`s heaviest yoke, arise, and make
    Her sex the law of truth and freedom hear,
  And with these quiet words—"For thine own sake
I prithee spare me;"—did with ruth so take


  `All hearts, that even the torturer who had bound
    Her meek calm frame, ere it was yet impaled,
  Loosened her, weeping then; nor could be found
    One human hand to harm her—unassailed
    Therefore she walks through the great City, veiled
  In virtue`s adamantine eloquence,
    `Gainst scorn, and death and pain thus trebly mailed,
  And blending, in the smiles of that defence,
The Serpent and the Dove, Wisdom and Innocence.


  `The wild-eyed women throng around her path:
    From their luxurious dungeons, from the dust
  Of meaner thralls, from the oppressor`s wrath,
    Or the caresses of his sated lust
    They congregate:—in her they put their trust;
  The tyrants send their armèd slaves to quell
    Her power;—they, even like a thunder-gust
  Caught by some forest, bend beneath the spell
Of that young maiden`s speech, and to their chiefs rebel.


  `Thus she doth equal laws and justice teach
    To woman, outraged and polluted long;
  Gathering the sweetest fruit in human reach
    For those fair hands now free, while armèd wrong
    Trembles before her look, though it be strong;
  Thousands thus dwell beside her, virgins bright,
    And matrons with their babes, a stately throng!
  Lovers renew the vows which they did plight
In early faith, and hearts long parted now unite,


  `And homeless orphans find a home near her,
    And those poor victims of the proud, no less,
  Fair wrecks, on whom the smiling world with stir,
    Thrusts the redemption of its wickedness:—
    In squalid huts, and in its palaces
  Sits Lust alone, while o`er the land is borne
    Her voice, whose awful sweetness doth repress
  All evil, and her foes relenting turn,
And cast the vote of love in hope`s abandoned urn.


  `So in the populous City, a young maiden
    Has baffled Havoc of the prey which he
  Marks as his own, whene`er with chains o`erladen
    Men make them arms to hurl down tyranny,—
    False arbiter between the bound and free;
  And o`er the land, in hamlets and in towns
    The multitudes collect tumultuously,
  And throng in arms; but tyranny disowns
Their claim, and gathers strength around its trembling thrones.


  `Blood soon, although unwillingly, to shed,
    The free cannot forbear—the Queen of Slaves,
Source
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