VI. Such is the refuge of our youth and age, And the strange constellations which the Muse They came like truth, and disappear'd like dreams; And whatsoe'er they were are now but so: I could replace them if I would, still teems My wind with many a form which aptly seems Such as I sought for, and at moments found; Let these too go for waking Reason deems Such overweening phantasies unsound, And other voices speak, and other sights surround. VIII. I've taught me other tongues and in strange eyes. IX. Perhaps I loved it well: and should I lay if we may Unbodied choose a sanctuary. I twine My hopes of being remember'd in my line. X. My name from out the temple where the dead Are honour'd by the nations let it be And light the laurels on a loftier head! I should have known what fruit would spring from such a seed. XI. The spouseless Adriatic mourns her lord; St. Mark yet sees his lion where he stood s XII. The Suabian sued, and now the Ausrian reigns- 6, An Emperor tramples where an Emperor knelt; Kingdoms are shrunk to provinces, and chains Clank over sceptred cities; nations melt From power's high pinnacle, when they have felt The sunshine for a while, and downward go Like lauwine loosen'd from the mountain's belt; Oh for one honr of blind old Dandolo! 7 Th' octogenarian chief, Byzantium's conquering foe. XIII. Before St. Mark still glow his steeds of brass, Their gilded collars glittering in the sun; But is not Doria's menace come to pass? 8 Are they not bridled? Venice, lost and won, Her thirteen hundred years of freedom done, Sinks, like a sea-weed, into whence she rose! Better be whelm'd beneath the waves, and shun, Even in destruction's depth, her foreign foes, From whom submission wrings an infamous repose. XIV. a new Tyre, In youth she was all glory, Her very by-word sprung from victory, The "Planter of the Lion," 9 which through fire And blood she bore o'er subject carth and sea; Though making many slaves, herself still free, And Europe's bulwark 'gainst the Ottomite; Witness Troy's rival, Candia! Vouch it, ye Immortal waves that saw Lepanto's fight! For ye are names no time nor tyranny can blight. Statues of glass XV. all shiver'd the long file Of her dead Doges are declined to dust; But where they dwelt, the vast and sumptuous pile Bespeaks the pageant of their splendid trust; Their sceptre broken, and their sword in rust, Have yielded to the stranger: empty halls, Thin streets, and foreign aspects, such as must Too oft remind her who and what enthrals, 10 Have flung a desolate cloud o'er Venice' lovely walls. |