Classic Poem

From sea's wild fury, and the wilder rage
Of faithless Turks, two noble strangers freed,
Let courtesy their grateful souls engage
To such a debt as doth obstruct their speed.

Were they to fill those scenes' inactive rest,
Would tedious make in fair description saw,
How Sparta's Prince, for his queen's loss opprest,
Found all those ills cured in Pharonnida.

The earth, which lately lay, like nature's tomb,
Marbled in frosts, had from her pregnant womb
Displayed the fragrant spring; when, courted by
A calm fresh morning, ere heaven's brightest eye
Adorned the east, a Spartan lord, (whom fame,
Taught from desert, made glorious by the name
Of Aminander), with a noble train,
Whose active youth did sloth, like sin, disdain,
Attended, had worn out the morning in
Chase of a stately stag; which, having been
Forced from the forest's safe protection to
Discovering plain, his clamorous foes had drew
Up to a steep cliff's lofty top; where he,
As if grown proud so sacrificed to be
To man's delight, 'mongst the pursuing cry,
Who make the vallies echo victory,
Sinks weeping; whilst exalted shouts did tell
The distant herds — their antient leader fell.
The half-tired hunters, their swift game stopt here
By death, like noble conquerors appear
To give that foe, which now resistless lies,
With their shrill horns his funeral obsequies;
Which whilst performing, their diverted sight
Turns to behold a far more fatal fight —
That since-famed gulf, (where the brave Austrian made
The Turkish crescents an eternal shade
Beneath dishonor seek) Lepanto, lay
So near, that from their lofty station they,
A ship upon whose streamers there were fixt
The Christian badge, saw in fierce battle mixt
With a prevailing Turkish squadron, that
With shouts assault what now lay only at
That feeble guard, which, under the pretence
Of injuring others, seeks its own defence.
Clear was the day, and calm the sea so long,
Till now the Turks, whose numbers grew too strong
For all that could no other help afford
But human strength, within their view did board
The wretched Christians; to whose sufferings they
Can lend no comfort, but what prayers convey
To helpful heaven; by whose attentive ear,
Both heard and pitied, mercy did appear
In this swift change: — A hollow wind proclaims
Approaching storms, the black clouds burst in flames,
Imprisoned thunder roars, and in a shower,
Dark as the night, dull sweaty vapors pour
Themselves on the earth, to enrich whom nature vents
The ethereal fabric's useless excrements,
Whose flatuous pride, as if it did disdain
Such base descents, rolling the liquid plain
Into transparent mountains, hurls them at
The brow of heaven, whose lamps, by vapors that
Their influence raised, are crampt; whilst the sick day
Was languishing to such a night, as lay
O'er the first matter, when confusion dwelt
In the vast chaos, ere the rude mass felt
Heaven's segregating breath — but long this fierce
Conflict endures not, ere the sun-beams pierce
The scattered clouds, which, whilst wild winds pursue,
Through sullied air in reaking vapors flew.
In this encounter of the storm, before
Its sable veil let them discover more
Than contained horror, a loud dreadful shriek,
Piercing the thick air, at their ears did seek
For trembling entrance: being transported by
Uncertain drifts, rent sails and tackling fly
Amongst the towering cliffs, — a sure presage
That adverse winds did in that storm engage
Some vessel, which did from her cordage part,
With such sad pangs — as from the dying heart
Convulsions tear the fibres. But the day,
Recovering her lost reign, made clearer way
For a more sad discovery. They behold
The brackish main in funeral pomp unfold
The trophies of her cruelty. Her brow,
Uncurled with waves, was only spotted now
With scattered ruins; here, engaged within
The ruffled sails, some sad souls that had been,
For life long struggling, tired, at length are forced
To sink and die; yonder, a pair, divorced
From all the warm society of flesh,
With cold stiff arms embrace their fate; — the fresh
And tender virgin in her lover's sight,
The sea-gods ravish, and the enthean light
Of those bright orbs, her eyes, which could by nought
But seas be quenched, t' eternal darkness brought.
Whilst pitying these, a sudden noise, whose strange
Confusion did their passion's object change,
Assaults their wonder; which, by this surprise
Amazed, persuades them to inform their eyes
With its obscure original: when, led
By sounds that might in baser souls have bred
A swift aversion, clashing weapons they
Might soon behold — upon the sands that lay
Beneath the rock a troop of desperate men,
Unstartled with those dangers (which e'en then
Their ruined ship and dropping garments showed
Heaven freed them from — what mercy had bestowed)
Let their own anger loose; which, flaming in
A fatal combat, had already been
In blood disfigured: but when now so near
Them drawn, that every object did appear
In true distinction, they, with wonder raised
To such a height as poets would have praised
Their heroes in, a noble Christian saw,
Whose sword (as if, by the eternal law
Of Providence, to punish infidels,
Directed) with each falling stroke expels
A Turk's black soul: yet valour, being opprest
By multitudes, must have at length sought rest
From death, had not brave Ariamnes, by
His hunters followed, brought him victory;
Whilst the approaching danger did exclude
E'en hope, the last support of fortitude.
The desperate Turks, that chose the sea to be
Their sad redeemer of captivity,
Though from that fear they fled to death, had now
Upon the shore left none life could allow
But motion to; though, stopped by death such store,
All the escaped appeared — but such as bore
The fatal story of destruction to
Their distant friends. When now a serious view,
By Ariamnes and that noble youth,
(Whose actions, honored as authentic truth,
Made all admire him), of their pitied dead
With sorrow took, one worthy soul unfled
From life they found, which, by Argalia seen,
With joy recals those spirits that had been
In busy action lost; but danger, that
Toward the throne of life seemed entering at
Too many wounds, denies him to enlarge
The stream of love, as noble Virtue's charge
To him, her follower. Ariamnes, by
His goodness and their sad necessity
Prompted to pity, fearing slow delays
As danger's fatal harbinger, conveys
The wounded strangers to the place where he
His palace made the throne of charity.
'Twas the short journey twixt the day and night,
The calm fresh evening, time's hermaphrodite,
The sun, on light's dilated wings, being fled,
To call the western villagers from bed,
Ere at his castle they arrive, which stood
Upon a hill, whose basis, fringed with wood,
Shadowed the fragrant meadows; thorough which
A spacious river, striving to enrich
The flowery valleys with whatever might
At home be profit, or abroad delight,
With parted streams that pleasant islands made,
Its gentle current to the sea conveyed.
In the composure of this happy place
Wherein he lived, as if framed to embrace
So brave a soul as now did animate
It with its presence, strength and beauty sat
Combined in one: 'twas not so vastly large,
But fair convenience countervailed the charge
Of reparations, all that modest art
Affords to sober pleasure's every part,
More for its ornament; but none were drest
In robes so rich, but what alone exprest
Their master's providence and care to be,
A prop to falling hospitality.
For he, not comet-like, did blaze out in
This country sphere what had extracted been
From the court's lazy vapors, but had stood
There like a star of the first magnitude,
With a fixed constancy so long, that now,
Grown old in virtue, he began to bow
Beneath the weight of time; and, since the calm
Of age had left him nothing to embalm
His name but virtue, strives in that to be
The glorious wonder of posterity:
Each of his actions being so truly good,
That, like the ground where hallowed temples stood,
Although by age the ruins ruined seem,
The people bear a reverend esteem
Unto the place; so they preserve his name —
A yet unwasted pyramid of fame.
Rich were his public virtues, but the price
Of those was but the world to paradise,
Compared with that rare harmony that dwells
Within his walls; each servant there excels
All but his fellows in desert; each knew —
First, when, — then, how his lord's commands to do;
None more enjoyed than was enough, none less,
All did of plenty taste, none of excess;
Riot was here a stranger, but far more,
Repining penury; ne'er from that door
The poor man went denied, nor did the rich
Ere surfeit there; 'twas the blest medium which,
Extracted from all compound virtues, we
Make, and then Christian mediocrity.
Within the compass of his spacious hall,
Stood no vain pictures to obscure the wall,
Which useful arms adorned; and such as when
His prince required assistance, his own men,
Valiant and numerous, managed to defend
That righteous cause, but never to attend
A popular faction, whose corrupted seed
Hell did engender, and ambition feed.
His judgment, that, like life's attendant — sense,
To try each object's various difference,
Fit mediums chose, (which he made virtue), here
Beholding (though these wandering stars appear
Now in their greatest detriment) the rays
Of perfect worth, he to that virtue pays
Those attributes of honor, which unto
Their births, though now in coarse disguise, was due.
To Aphron's wounds successful art applies
Prevailing medicines, whilst invention flies
To the aphelion of her orb to seek
Such modest pleasures as might smooth the cheek
Of ruffled passion; which, being found, are spent
To cure the sad Argalia's discontent:
Which, long being lost to all delight, at length
Revives again his friend's recovered strength.
They, having now no remora to stay
Them here but what their gratitude did pay
To his desires, (whose courtesy had made
Those bonds of love with as much zeal obeyed
As those which duty locks), preparing are
To take their leave; even in whose civil war
Whilst they contend with courtesies, as sent
To rescue, when his eloquence was spent,
Brave Aminander, with such haste as shewed
His speed to some supreme injunction owed
Such diligence, a messenger brings in
A packet, which that noble lord had been
Too frequently acquainted with to fear
The unseen contents, which opened did appear —
A mandate from his royal master to
Attend him ere the next day's beauties grew
Deformed with age; which honored message read,
To banish what suspicion might have bred
In 's doubtful friends, he, the enclosed contents,
With cheerful haste, unto their view presents.
Their fear thus cured by information, he,
That his appearance in the court might be
More glorious made by such attendants, to
Incite in them a strong desire to view
Those royal pastimes, thus relates that story,
Whose fatal truth transferred the Morea's glory
So often thither. " 'Twas, my honored friends,
My fate ('mongst some that yet his court attends)
Then to be near my prince, when what now draws
Him to these parts did prove at once the cause
Of joy and grief. Not far from hence removed
The vale of Ceres lies, where his beloved
Pharonnida remains; a lady that
Nature ordained for man to wonder at,
She not being more the comfort of his age
Than glory of her sex: but I engage
Myself to a more large discovery, which
Thus take in brief — When youth did first enrich
Beauty with manly strength, his happy bed
Was with her royal mother blest; who fed
A flame of virtue in her soul, that lent
Light to a beauty, which, being excellent,
In its own sphere by that reflection shone
So heavenly bright — perfection's height of noon
Dwelt only there. Some years had circled in
Time's revolutions, since they first had been
Acquainted with those private pleasures that
Attend a nuptial bed, ere she did at
Lucina's temple offer; whose barred gate,
Once open flow, both their good angels sat
In council for her safety. Hopes of a boy,
To be Morea's heir, fill high with joy
The ravished parents; subjects did no less,
In the loud voice of triumph, their's express.
" But when the active pleasures of their love,
Which filled her womb, had taught the babe to move
Within the morys mount, preceding pains
Tell the fair queen, that the dissolving chains,
Nature enclosed it in, were grown so weak
That the imprisoned infant soon would break.
Those slender guards. The gravest ladies were
Called to assist her, whose industrious care
Lend nature all the helps of art, but in
Despair of safety send their prayers to win
Relief from heaven, which swift assistance lent
To unload the burthen; but those cordials sent
By harbingers, with whom the fair queen fled
To deck the silent dwellings of the dead,
And lodge in sheets of lead; o'er which were cast
A coverlet of the spring's infants past
From life like her — e'en whilst Earth's teeming womb,
Promised the world, and not a silent tomb,
That beauteous issue. But those nymphs, which spun
Her thread of life, the slender twine begun
Too fine to last long, undenied by
The ponderous burthen of mortality;
Beneath whose weight, she sinking now to death,
The unhappy babe was by the mother's breath
No sooner welcomed into life before
She bids farewell; of power to do no more
But, whilst her spirit with each word expires,
Thus to her lord express her last desires. —
" Receive this infant from thy dying queen,
Name her Pharonnida." — At which word between
His trembling arms she sunk; and had e'en then
Breathed forth her soul, if not recalled again
By their loud mournings from the icy sleep,
Which, like a chilling frost, did softly creep
Through the cold channels of her blood to bar
The springs of life; in which defensive war,
The hasty summons, sent by death, allow
Her giddy eyes, whose heavy lids did bow
Toward everlasting slumber, no more light
Than what affords a dim imperfect sight, —
Such as the troubled optics, being by
Dying convulsions wrested, could let fly
Thorough their sullied crystals, to behold
Her woeful lord, whilst she did thus unfold
Her dying thoughts: — " O hear, (quoth she) I do
By all our mutual vows conjure thee to
Let this sweet babe — all thou hast left of me,
Within thy thoughts preserve my memory.
And since, poor infant, she must lose her mother,
To beg an entrance here, oh let no other
Have more command o'er her than what may bear
An equal poise with thy paternal care.
This, this is all that I shall leave behind;
An earnest of our loves here thou may'st find,
Perhaps, my image may'st behold, whilst I,
Resolving into dust, embraced do lie
By crawling worms — followers that nature gave
To attend mortality, whilst the tainted grave
Is ripening us for judgment. O my lord,
Death were the smile of fate, would it afford
Me time to see this infant's growth, but oh!
I feel life's cordage crackt, and hence must go
From time and flesh, — like a lost feather, fall
From th' wings of vanity, forsaking all
The various business of the world, to see
What wondrous change dwells in eternity."

" This said, she faintly bids farewell, then darts
An eager look on all; but, ere she parts,
E'en whilst the breath, with which in thin air slips
Departing spirits, on her then cold lips
In clammy dews did hang, she of them takes
Her last farewell, whilst her pure soul forsakes
Its brittle cabinet, and those orbs of light,
That swam in death, sunk in eternal night.
" Thus died the queen; Pharonnida thus lost,
Ere knew her mother, when her birth had cost
A price so great, that brought her infancy
In debt to grief, until maturity
Ripened her age to pay it. After long
And vehement lamentation, such whose strong
Assaults had almost shook his soul into
A flight from the earth, her father doth renew
His long lost mirth, at the delight he took
In his soul's darling; whose each cheerful look
Crimsoned those sables, which e'en whilst he wore,
A flood of woes his head had silvered o'er,
Had not this comfort stopt them, which beguiles
Sorrow of some few hours; those pretty smiles
That drest her fair cheeks, like a gentle thief,
Stealing his heart through all the guards of grief.
" But when that time's expunging hand had more
Defaced those sable characters he wore
For sorrow's livery o'er his soul, and she,
Having out-grown her tender infancy,
Did now (her thoughts composed of heavenly seed)
To guide her life no other guardian need,
But native virtue; for her calm retreat,
When burthened Corinth was with throngs replete,
He chose this seat, whose venerable shade,
(Waving what blind antiquity had made)
For sacred held, is not so slighted, but
A custom, antient as our law, hath shut
Hence (as the hateful marks of servitude)
All that unbounded power did e'er obtrude
On suffering subjects; which this happy place
Fits so serene a blessing to embrace
As is this lady: whose illustrious court,
Though now augmented by the full resort
Of her great father's train, doth still appear
This happy kingdom's brightest hemisphere.
" A hundred noble youths in Sparta bred,
Of valour high as e'er for beauty bled,
All loyal lovers, and that love confined
Within the court, are for her guard assigned.
But what (if aught in such an orb of all
That's great or good may low as censure fall)
The court hath questioned, is — the cause that moved
The prince to give a party so beloved
Into his hands that leads them; being one,
Whose birth excepted, (that being near a throne),
Those virtues wants, on whose foundation, wise
Considerate princes let their favors rise.
Like the abortive births of vapors, by
Their male-progenitors enforced to fly
Above the earth their proper sphere, and there
Lurk in imperfect forms, his breast doth bear
Some seeds of goodness, which the soil, too hot
With rank ambition, doth in ripening rot.
Yet, though from those that praise humility
He merits not, a dreaded power, (which he
Far more applauds) raised on the wings of's own
Experienced valour, hath so long been known
His foes' pale terror, that 'tis feared he bends
That engine to the ruin of his friends,
Whose equal merits claim as much of fame
As e'er was due to proud Almanzor's name.
" Yet what may raise more strong desires to see
Her court than valour's wished society,
Is one unusual custom, which the love
Of her kind father hath so far above
All past example raised — that, for the time
He here resides, no cause, although a crime
Which death attends, but is by her alone
Both heard and judged, he seeming to unthrone
His active power, whilst justice doth invest
His beauteous daughter; which, to the opprest,
Whose hopes e'en shrunk into despair, hath in
That harsh extreme their safe asylum been:
So that e'en those that feared the event could now
Mix their desires, — the custom would allow
Her reign a longer date. But that I may
Illustrate this by a more full survey
Of her excelling virtues, no pretence
Of harsh employment shall command you hence,
Till you have been spectators of that court,
Whose glories are too spacious for report. "

The noble youths, beholding such a flame
Of virtue shewn them through the glass of Fame,
First gaze with wonder on it, which ascends
Into desire, a rivulet which ends
Not till its swelling streams had drawn them through
All weak excuses, and engaged them to
Attend on Ariamnes: when, to show
How much man's vain intentions fall below
Mysterious fate, e'en in the height of all
Their full resolves, her countermands thus call
Back their intentions, by a summons that
The uncertain world hath often trembled at. —
The late recovered Aphron, whether by
Too swift a cure, life's springs, being raised too high,
Flowed to a dangerous plethora, or whe'er
Some cause occult the humors did prepare
For that malignant ill, did, whilst he lay
In tedious expectation of the day,
Shook with a shivering numbness, first complain
Through all his limbs of a diffusive pain:
Which, searching each to find the fittest part
For its contagion, on the laboring heart
Fixes at length; which, being with grief opprest,
By the extended arteries to the rest
O' the body sends its flames. The poisoned blood
Through every vein streams in a burning flood;
His liver broils, and his scorched stomach turns
The chyle to cinders; in each cold cell burns
The humid brains. A violent earthquake shakes
The crackling nerves, sleep's balmy dew forsakes
The shrivelled optics; in which trembling fits,
'Mongst tortured senses, troubled Reason sits
So long opprest with passion, till at length,
Her feeble mansion, battered by the strength
Of a disease, she leaves to entertain
The wild chimeras of a sickly brain.
And, what must yet to's friend's affliction add
More weights of grief, their courteous host, which had
Stayed to the latest step of time, must now
Comply with those commands, which could allow
No more delays, and leave Argalia to
Be the sole mourner for his friend, which drew
(As far as human art could guess) so near
His end, that life did only now appear
In thick, short sobs, — those frequent summons that
Souls oft forsake their ruined mansions at.