WRITTEN IN THE MOUNTAINS OF THE TYROL.
A HEART the world of men had bound and sealed
With shameful stamp and miserable chain,
Here, mother Nature! is to Thee revealed,
Open to Thee; oh! be it not in vain.
Flow over it, ye Torrents !-though I fear,
That be your course as fierce as e'er it may,
The sorrow-stains engrained there many a year
Your force can never, never, wash away:
Then come, ye Mountains! ye half-heavenly Forms!
Based in deep lakes and woods, and crowned with storms,
Close on it,-cover,-seal it up again,
But with the signet of your own pure power,
So that unbroken, till the all-searching hour
Of Death, that impress may on it remain.
"In the treasury of the Benedictine Monastery of St. Peter at Salzburg, I was shown a gold and jewel-studded pen, with which every brother, on his entrance into the order, signed his name. This had been the custom for many centuries."-MS. JOURNAL.
THIS dainty instrument, this table-toy,
Might seem best fitted for the use and joy
Of some high Ladie in old gallant times,
Or gay-learned weaver of Provençal rhymes :
With such a pen did sweet Francesca trace
Some hurried lines beneath her blushing face,
And hid them in her lover's doublet sleeve,
To let him know, that, ere to-morrow eve,
They would enjoy the luscious summer-weather,
And read their favourite Launcelot together;
With such a pen did tremulous Mary write
To bid good Chatelet come and play to-night;
And so we might go on for hours, and fold
Our colouring fancies round this ancient gold;
But here one stern Reality appears,
And leaves no place for other dreams or tears, -
The simple record, that, with this one pen,
Have hundreds of our brothers, fellow-men,
Signed by their names the awfullest decree
That between them and all the world could be
Those few small letters, when thus written, said-
"The writer, though he live, is living dead;
The world of man, of beauty, and of bloom,
This visible earth, but serves him for a tomb,-
He feels no more its glories or its gains,
His soul can only know its purging pains,-
Here from the trails of sin however sure,
He needs that suffering to be perfect-pure."
Think of the fingers that have dared to hold
This fateful relic! Some with grasp so bold,
You would believe that nothing but the pride
Of glory won, ambition satisfied,
Or joy of meed long toiled for, could command
Such full composure in an aged hand :
And yet the most of those, who hither brought
Their Being's sacrifice were men well taught
In the world's wisdom, men who had lived through
All that life gives to suffer and to do
Who had grown old in wars of spirit and arm,
But found in Victory no victorious charm
Against the clouding armament of Ill,
Licensed on earth by God's unsounded will.
Some might be young,-by strange heart-prescience led. To know that Life is but a sick man's bed,
On which, with aching head and limbs, we lie
Through the hot Night of our humanity,
Waiting for Death, our Lucifer,-so blest
Is he, through whose deep-drugged and senseless rest
No Dreams can pierce,—and thus they did but crave
To seek this stupor in the cloisteral grave;
These held the Pen, as valour holds a sword
Against the foe that doubted of its word;
Yet others still might be,-young too and fair,
Strong too, but only strengthened by Despair,
Who, when that closing moment came at last,
That one thin line, which lay between the Past
And the unknown bleak Future, -that deep trench,
Which, now leapt over, by a fearful wrench
Of almost natural instincts, held the soul,
Once the world's freeman, once without controul
Working and wandering, bound to a new law,
Captive in Faith and prisoner in Awe,-
Caught up this Pen, and quiveringly traced
he names, that thence could never be effaced, With moveless eyes and pale-blue lips convulsed, As if the salient blood were all repulsed
To its free source, as if within their clutch
They had a poisoned dagger, and its touch
Was on their living flesh;—yet they, even they,
Found in these precincts Joy, we will not say,
But, what is better, Peace ;-they asked no more;
Happy the wave that breaks upon the shore !
The Traun rises in the mountains of Upper Austria, and loses itself in the Danube above Linz. Its course is remarkable for the combination of the best features of Alpine scenery with the grace and elegance of the Southern landscape.
My heart is in a mountain mood,
Though I am bound to tread the plain,
She will away for ill or good,-
I cannot lure her back again;
So let her go,-God speed her flight
O'er teeming glebe and columned town,
I know that she will rest ere night,
By the remembered banks of Traun.
And she will pray her sister Muse,
Sister, companion, friend, and guide,
Her every art and grace to use,
For love of that well-cherished tide;
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