The Poetical Works of Beattie, Blair, and Falconer Part 39

CANTO III.

THE SCENE IS EXTENDED FROM THAT PART OF THE ARCHIPELAGO WHICH LIES TEN MILES TO THE NORTHWARD OF FALCONERA, TO CAPE COLONNA IN ATTICA.

THE TIME, ABOUT SEVEN HOURS; FROM ONE UNTIL EIGHT IN THE MORNING.

THE ARGUMENT.

I. The beneficial influence of poetry in the civilisation of mankind.

Diffidence of the author.

II. Wreck of the mizen-mast cleared away.

Ship put before the wind--labours much.

Different stations of the officers.

Appearance of the island of Falconera.

III. Excursion to the adjacent nations of Greece renowned in antiquity.

Athens.

Socrates, Plato, Aristides, Solon.

Corinth--its architecture.

Sparta.

Leonidas.

Invasion by Xerxes.

Lycurgus.

Epaminondas.

Present state of the Spartans.

Arcadia.

Former happiness, and fertility.

Its present distress the effect of slavery.

Ithaca.

Ulysses and Penelope.

Argos and Mycaene.

Agamemnon.

Macronisi.

Lemnos.

Vulcan.

Delos.

Apollo and Diana.

Troy.

Sestos.

Leander and Hero.

Delphos.

Temple of Apollo.

Parna.s.sus.

The Muses.

IV. Subject resumed.

Address to the spirits of the storm.

A tempest, accompanied with rain, hail, and meteors.

Darkness of the night, lightning and thunder.

Daybreak. St George's cliffs open upon them.

The ship, in great danger, pa.s.ses the island of St George.

V. Land of Athens appears.

Helmsman struck blind by lightning.

Ship laid broadside to the sh.o.r.e.

Bowsprit, foremast, and main top-mast carried away.

Albert, Rodmond, Arion, and Palemon strive to save themselves on the wreck of the foremast.

The ship parts asunder.

Death of Albert and Rodmond.

Arion reaches the sh.o.r.e.

Finds Palemon expiring on the beach.

His dying address to Arion, who is led away by the humane natives.

I. When, in a barbarous age, with blood defiled, The human savage roam'd the gloomy wild; When sullen ignorance her flag display'd, And rapine and revenge her voice obey'd; Sent from the sh.o.r.es of light, the Muses came The dark and solitary race to tame, The war of lawless pa.s.sions to control, To melt in tender sympathy the soul; The heart's remote recesses to explore, And touch its springs, when prose avail'd no more: 10 The kindling spirit caught the empyreal ray, And glow'd congenial with the swelling lay; Roused from the chaos of primeval night, At once fair truth and reason sprung to light.

When great Maeonides, in rapid song, The thundering tide of battle rolls along, Each ravish'd bosom feels the high alarms, And all the burning pulses beat to arms; Hence, war's terrific glory to display, Became the theme of every epic lay: 20 But when his strings with mournful magic tell What dire distress Laertes' son befell, The strains, meandering through the maze of woe Bid sacred sympathy the heart o'erflow: Far through the boundless realms of thought he springs, From earth upborne on Pegasean wings, While distant poets, trembling as they view His sunward flight, the dazzling track pursue; His magic voice, that rouses and delights, Allures and guides to climb Olympian heights. 30 But I, alas! through scenes bewilder'd stray, Far from the light of his unerring ray; While, all unused the wayward path to tread, Darkling I wander with prophetic dread.

To me in vain the bold Maeonian lyre Awakes the numbers fraught with living fire; Full oft indeed that mournful harp of yore Wept the sad wanderer lost upon the sh.o.r.e; 'Tis true he lightly sketch'd the bold design, But toils more joyless, more severe are mine; 40 Since o'er that scene his genius swiftly ran, Subservient only to a n.o.bler plan: But I, perplex'd in labyrinths of art, Anatomize and blazon every part; Attempt with plaintive numbers to display, And chain the events in regular array; Though hard the task to sing in varied strains, When still unchanged the same sad theme remains: O could it draw compa.s.sion's melting tear For kindred miseries, oft beheld too near! 50 For kindred wretches, oft in ruin cast On Albion's strand beneath the wintry blast; For all the pangs, the complicated woe, Her bravest sons, her guardian sailors know; Then every breast should sigh at our distress-- This were the summit of my hoped success!

For this, my theme through mazes I pursue, Which nor Maeonides, nor Maro knew.

II. Awhile the mast, in ruins dragg'd behind, Balanced the impression of the helm and wind; 60 The wounded serpent, agonized with pain, Thus trails his mangled volume on the plain: But now, the wreck, dissever'd from the rear, The long reluctant prow began to veer; While round before the enlarging wind it falls, "Square fore and aft the yards," the master calls, "You, timoneers, her motion still attend, For on your steerage all our lives depend: So, steady! [1] meet her! watch the curving prow, And from the gale directly let her go." 70 "Starboard again!" the watchful pilot cries, "Starboard!" the obedient timoneer replies: Then back to port, revolving at command, The wheel [2] rolls swiftly through each glowing hand.

The ship no longer, foundering by the lee, Bears on her side the invasions of the sea; All lonely o'er the desert waste she flies, Scourged on by surges, storms, and bursting skies.

As when enclosing harpooneers a.s.sail In Hyperborean seas the slumbering whale, 80 Soon as their javelins pierce his scaly side, He groans, he darts impetuous down the tide; And rack'd all o'er with lacerating pain, He flies remote beneath the flood in vain-- So with resistless haste the wounded ship Scuds from pursuing waves along the deep; While, dash'd apart by her dividing prow, Like burning adamant the waters glow; Her joints forget their firm elastic tone, Her long keel trembles, and her timbers groan: 90 Upheaved behind her in tremendous height The billows frown, with fearful radiance bright; Now quivering o'er the topmost waves she rides, While deep beneath the enormous gulf divides; Now launching headlong down the horrid vale, Becalm'd she hears no more the howling gale; Till up the dreadful height again she flies, Trembling beneath the current of the skies.

As that rebellious angel, who, from heaven, 100 To regions of eternal pain was driven, When dreadless he forsook the Stygian sh.o.r.e The distant realms of Eden to explore; Here, on sulphureous clouds sublime upheaved, With daring wing the infernal air he cleaved; There, in some hideous gulf descending p.r.o.ne, Far in the void abrupt of night was thrown-- Even so she climbs the briny mountain's height, Then down the black abyss precipitates her flight: The mast, about whose tops the whirlwinds sing, 110 With long vibration round her axle swing.

To guide her wayward course amid the gloom, The watchful pilots different posts a.s.sume: Albert and Rodmond on the p.o.o.p appear, There to direct each guiding timoneer; While at the bow the watch Arion keeps, To shun what cruisers wander o'er the deeps: Where'er he moves Palemon still attends, As if on him his only hope depends; While Rodmond, fearful of some neighbouring sh.o.r.e, 120 Cries, ever and anon, Look out afore!

Thus o'er the flood four hours she scudding flew, When Falconera's rugged cliffs they view Faintly along the larboard bow descried, As o'er its mountain tops the lightnings glide; High o'er its summit, through the gloom of night, The glimmering watch-tower casts a mournful light: In dire amazement riveted they stand, And hear the breakers lash the rugged strand; But scarce perceived, when past the beam it flies, 130 Swift as the rapid eagle cleaves the skies: That danger past reflects a feeble joy, But soon returning fears their hope destroy.

As in the Atlantic ocean, when we find Some Alp of ice driven southward by the wind, The sultry air all sickening pants around, In deluges of torrid ether drown'd; Till when the floating isle approaches nigh, In cooling tides the aerial billows fly: Awhile deliver'd from the scorching heat, 140 In gentler tides our feverish pulses beat: Such transient pleasure, as they pa.s.s'd this strand, A moment bade their throbbing hearts expand; The illusive meteors of a lifeless fire, Too soon they kindle, and too soon expire.

III. Say, Memory! thou, from whose unerring tongue Instructive flows the animated song, What regions now the scudding ship surround?

Regions of old through all the world renown'd; That, once the poet's theme, the Muses' boast, 150 Now lie in ruins, in oblivion lost!

Did they whose sad distress these lays deplore, Unskill'd in Grecian or in Roman lore, Unconscious pa.s.s along each famous sh.o.r.e?

They did: for in this desert, joyless soil, No flowers of genial science deign to smile; Sad Ocean's genius, in untimely hour, Withers the bloom of every springing flower; For native tempests here, with blasting breath, Despoil, and doom the vernal buds to death; 160 Here fancy droops, while sullen clouds and storm, The generous temper of the soul deform: Then if, among the wandering naval train, One stripling, exiled from the Aonian plain, Had e'er, entranced in fancy's soothing dream, Approach'd to taste the sweet Castalian stream (Since those salubrious streams, with power divine, To purer sense the soften'd soul refine); Sure he, amid unsocial mates immured, To learning lost, severer grief endured; 170 In vain might Phoebus' ray his mind inspire, Since fate with torrents quench'd the kindling fire: If one this pain of living death possess'd, It dwelt supreme, Arion! in thy breast; When, with Palemon, watching in the night Beneath pale Cynthia's melancholy light, You oft recounted those surrounding states, Whose glory Fame with brazen tongue relates.

Immortal Athens first, in ruin spread, Contiguous lies at Port Liono's head; 180 Great source of science! whose immortal name Stands foremost in the glorious roll of fame.

Here G.o.dlike Socrates and Plato shone, And, firm to truth, eternal honour won: The first in virtue's cause his life resign'd, By Heaven p.r.o.nounced the wisest of mankind: The last proclaim'd the spark of vital fire, The soul's fine essence, never could expire: Here Solon dwelt, the philosophic sage That fled Pisistratus' vindictive rage: Just Aristides here maintain'd the cause, 190 Whose sacred precepts shine through Solon's laws.

Of all her towering structures, now alone Some columns stand, with mantling weeds o'ergrown; The wandering stranger near the port descries A milk-white lion of stupendous size, Of antique marble; hence the haven's name.

Unknown to modern natives whence it came.

Next, in the gulf of Engia, Corinth lies, Whose gorgeous fabrics seem'd to strike the skies; Whom, though by tyrant victors oft subdued, 200 Greece, Egypt, Rome, with admiration view'd: Her name, for architecture long renown'd, Spread like the foliage which her pillars crown'd; But now, in fatal desolation laid, Oblivion o'er it draws a dismal shade.

Then further westward, on Morea's land, Fair Misitra! thy modern turrets stand: Ah! who, unmoved with secret woe, can tell That here great Lacedaemon's glory fell?

Here once she flourish'd, at whose trumpet's sound 210 War burst his chains, and nations shook around; Here brave Leonidas from sh.o.r.e to sh.o.r.e Through all Achaia bade her thunders roar: He, when imperial Xerxes from afar Advanced with Persia's sumless hosts to war, Till Macedonia shrunk beneath his spear, And Greece all shudder'd as the chief drew near; He, at Thermopylae's decisive plain, Their force opposed with Sparta's glorious train; Tall Oeta saw the tyrant's conquer'd bands 220 In gasping millions bleed on hostile lands: Thus vanquish'd, haughty Asia heard thy name, And Thebes and Athens sicken'd at thy fame: Thy state, supported by Lycurgus' laws, Gain'd, like thine arms, superlative applause; Even great Epaminondas strove in vain To curb thy spirit with a Theban chain.

But ah! how low that free-born spirit now!

Thy abject sons to haughty tyrants bow; A false, degenerate, superst.i.tious race 230 Invest thy region, and its name disgrace.

Not distant far, Arcadia's blest domains Peloponnesus' circling sh.o.r.e contains: Thrice happy soil! where, still serenely gay, Indulgent Flora breathed perpetual May; Where buxom Ceres bade each fertile field Spontaneous gifts in rich profusion yield: Then, with some rural nymph supremely blest, While transport glow'd in each enamour'd breast, Each faithful shepherd told his tender pain, 240 And sung of sylvan sports in artless strain; Soft as the happy swain's enchanting lay That pipes among the shades of Endermay.

Now, sad reverse! oppression's iron hand Enslaves her natives, and despoils her land; In lawless rapine bred, a sanguine train, With midnight ravage, scour the uncultured plain.

Westward of these, beyond the Isthmus, lies The long-sought isle of Ithacus the wise; Where fair Penelope, of him deprived, 250 To guard her honour endless schemes contrived: She, only shielded by a stripling son, Her lord Ulysses long to Ilion gone, Each bold attempt of suitor-kings repell'd, And undefiled her nuptial contract held; True to her vows, and resolutely chaste, Met arts with art, and triumph'd at the last.