Classic Poem

AS HORT Strain OF MUSIC FROM THE ORCHESTRA .

There breathes a language known and felt
Far as the pure air spreads its living zone;
Wherever rage can rouse, or pity melt,
That language of the soul is felt and known.
From those meridian plains,
Where oft, of old, on some high tower
The soft Peruvian poured his midnight strains,
And called his distant love with such sweet power,
That, when she heard the lonely lay,
Not worlds could keep her from his arms away,
To the bleak climes of polar night,
Where blithe, beneath a sunless sky,
The Lapland lover bids his reindeer fly,
And sings along the lengthening waste of snow,
Gayly as if the blessed light
Of vernal Phaebus burned upon his brow;
Oh Music! thy celestial claim
Is still resistless, still the same;
And, faithful as the mighty sea
To the pale star that o'er its realm presides,
The spell-bound tides
Of human passion rise and fall for thee!

GREEK AIR

List! 't is a Grecian maid that sings,
While, from Ilissus' silvery springs,
She draws the cool lymph in her graceful urn;
And by her side, in Music's charm dissolving,
Some patriot youth, the glorious past revolving,
Dreams of bright days that never can return;
When Athens nurst her olive bough
With hands by tyrant power unchained;
And braided for the muse's brow
A wreath by tyrant touch unstained.
When heroes trod each classic field
Where coward feet now faintly falter;
When every arm was Freedom's shield,
And every heart was Freedom's altar!

FLOURISH OF TRUMPETS .

Hark, 't is the sound that charms
The war-steed's wakening ears! —
Oh! many a mother folds her arms
Round her boy-soldier when that call she hears;
And, tho' her fond heart sink with fears,
Is proud to feel his young pulse bound
With valor's fever at the sound.
See, from his native hills afar
The rude Helvetian flies to war;
Careless for what, for whom he fights,
For slave or despot, wrongs or rights:
A conqueror oft — a hero never —
Yet lavish of his life-blood still,
As if 't were like his mountain rill,
And gushed forever!

Yes, Music, here, even here,
Amid this thoughtless, vague career,
Thy soul-felt charm asserts its wondrous power. —
There 's a wild air which oft, among the rocks
Of his own loved land, at evening hour,
Is heard, when shepherds homeward pipe their flocks,
Whose every note hath power to thrill his mind
With tenderest thoughts; to bring around his knees
The rosy children whom he left behind,
And fill each little angel eye
With speaking tears, that ask him why
He wandered from his hut for scenes like these.
Vain, vain is then the trumpet's brazen roar;
Sweet notes of home, of love, are all he hears;
And the stern eyes that looked for blood before
Now melting, mournful, lose themselves in tears.

SWISS AIR — " RANZ DES VACHES . "

But wake the trumpet's blast again,
And rouse the ranks of warrior-men!
Oh War, when Truth thy arm employs,
And Freedom's spirit guides the laboring storm,
'T is then thy vengeance takes a hallowed form,
And like Heaven's lightning sacredly destroys.
Nor, Music, thro' thy breathing sphere,
Lives there a sound more grateful to the ear
Of Him who made all harmony,
Than the blest sound of fetters breaking,
And the first hymn that man awaking
From Slavery's slumber breathes to Liberty.

SPANISH CHORUS .

Hark! from Spain, indignant Spain,
Burst the bold, enthusiast strain,
Like morning's music on the air;
And seems in every note to swear
By Saragossa's ruined streets,
By brave Gerona's deathful story,
That, while one Spaniard's lifeblood beats,
That blood shall stain the conqueror's glory.

SPANISH AIR . — " YA DESPERTO . "

But ah! if vain the patriot's zeal,
If neither valor's force nor wisdom's light
Can break or melt that blood-cemented seal
Which shuts so close the books of Europe's right —
What song shall then in sadness tell
Of broken pride, of prospects shaded,
Of buried hopes, remembered well,
Of ardor quenched, and honor faded?
What muse shall mourn the breathless brave.
In sweetest dirge at Memory's shrine?
What harp shall sigh o'er Freedom's grave?
Oh Erin, Thine!