XLVII. Yet, Italy! through every other land Thy wrongs should ring, and shall, from side to side; Was then our guardian, and is still our guide; Shall yet redeem thee, and, all backward driven, XLVIII. But Arno wins us to the fair white walls, And buried Learning rose, redeem'd to a new morn. XLIX. There, too, the Goddess loves in stone, and fills (') The ambrosial aspect, which, beheld, instils Part of its immortality; the veil Of heaven is half undrawn; within the pale We stand, and in that form and face behold What mind can make, when Nature's self would fail'; Envy the innate flash which such a soul could mould: L. We gaze and turn away, and know not where, for ever there Chain'd to the chariot of triumphal Art, We stand as captives, and would not depart. Away! there need no words, nor terms precise, The paltry jargon of the marble mart, Where Pedantry gulls Folly- we have eyes: Blood-pulse and breast, confirm the Dardan Shepherd's prize. (1) See "Historical Notes," at the end of this canto, No. XIV. LI. Appear'dst thou not to Paris in this guise? Feeding on thy sweet cheek! (') while thy lips are Shower'd on his eyelids, brow, and mouth, as from an urn: LII. Glowing, and circumfused in speechless love, Their full divinity inadequate. That feeling to express, or to improve, The gods become as mortals, and man's fate We can recall such visions, and create, From what has been, or might be, things which grow Into thy statue's form, and look like gods below. LIII. I leave to learned fingers, and wise hands, The artist and his ape, to teach and tell I would not their vile breath should crisp the stream The unruffled mirror of the loveliest dream LIV. In Santa Croce's holy precincts lie (") Ashes which make it holier, dust which is Even in itself an immortality, Though there were nothing save the past, and this Which have relapsed to chaos : here repose Angelo's, Alfieri's bones, and his, (3) · The starry Galileo, with his woes; Here Machiavelli's earth return'd to whence it rose. (^) (1) Οφθαλμοὺς ἐστιᾶν "Atque oculos pașcat uterque suos."- Ovid. Amor lib. 1. (2, 3, 4) See "Historical Notes," at the end of this canto, Nos. XV. XVI. XVII. LV. These are four minds, which, like the elements, Time, which hath wrong'd thee with ten thousand rents And hath denied, to every other sky, Spirits which soar from ruin : - thy decay 1 LVI. But where repose the all Etruscan three LVII. Ungrateful Florence! Dante sleeps afar, (') His life, his fame, his grave, though rifled—not thine own. LVIII. Boccaccio to his parent earth bequeath'd (*) With many a sweet and solemn requiem breathed (1, 2, 3, 4) See "Historical Notes," at the end of this canto, Nos. XVIII. XIX. XX. and XXI. TIX. And Santa Croce wants their mighty dust; While Florence vainly begs her banish'd dead and weeps. LX. What is her pyramid of precious stones? (1) LXI. paves the princely head. There be more things to greet the heart and eyes Less than it feels, because the weapon which it wields LXII. Is of another temper, and I roam By Thrasimene's lake, in the defiles Fatal to Roman rashness, more at home; For there the Carthaginian's warlike wiles Come back before me, as his skill beguiles The host between the mountains and the shore, Where Courage falls in her despairing files, And torrents, swoln to rivers with their gore, Reek through the sultry plain, with legions scatter'd o'er. (1) See "Historical Notes," at the end of this Canto, No. XXII. LXIII. Like to a forest fell'd by mountain winds; Such is the absorbing hate when warring nations meet! LXIV. The Earth to them was as a rolling bark From their down-toppling nests; and bellowing herds Stumble o'er heaving plains, and man's dread hath no words LXV. Far other scene is Thrasimene now; Her lake a sheet of silver, and her plain Rent by no ravage save the gentle plough; Her aged trees rise thick as once the slain Lay where their roots are; but a brook hath ta'en A little rill of scanty stream and bed A name of blood from that day's sanguine rain; And Sanguinetto tells ye where the dead Made the earth wet, and turn'd the unwilling waters red. LXVI. But thou, Clitumnus! in thy sweetest wave (2) · Of the most living crystal that was e'er The haunt of river nymph, to gaze and lave A mirror and a bath for Beauty's youngest daughters! (1) Seo "Ilistorical Notes," at the end of this Canto, No. XXIII. (2) No book of travels has omitted to expatiate on the temple of the Clitumnus between Foligno and Spoleto; and no sito, or scenery, even in Italy, is more worthy a description. For an account of the dilapidation of this temple, the reader is refer red to "Historical Illustrations of the Fourth Canto of Childe Harold," p. 35. |