A Day At Tivoli - Prologue

ARGUMENT. Morning. Ancient olive grove. Cascatelle. Ruined Villa. Its objects of Art, and Library. Musings therefrom. Lizards. Italian climate, and landscape, and peasants, male and female. How modified by social position. Address to Italy. Great cascade at mid-day. Italian and Swiss scenery, how differing. River Anio. Antiquarian estimate of time. Route to Italy. Ruins of Rome, and thoughts and feelings thence arising. Tivoli resumed. Italy everywhere abounding in picture, modern or ancient, or combined. Illustrated by farm house. Fountains—Vintage scene—Street Music. Reflections. A modern Roman Catholic church. Foreign travel and its proper result. Afternoon-refreshment at hostel. Horace and Virgil. Mecænas and Augustus. Ruined palace of the Cæsars. Horace and Virgil resumed. Temple of Tivoli at evening. Critics. Coming on of night over Campagna.

  Fair blows the breeze—depart—depart—
  And tread with me th' Italian shore;
  And feed thy soul with glorious art;
  And drink again of classic lore.
  Nor sometime shalt thou deem it wrong,
  When not in mood too gravely wise,
  At idle length to lie along,
  And quaff a bliss from bluest skies.
 
  Or, pleased more pensive joy to woo,
  At twilight eve, by ruin grey,
  Muse o'er the generations, who
  Have passed, as we must pass, away.
  Or mark o'er olive tree and vine
  Steep towns uphung; to win from them
  Some thought of Southern Palestine;
  Some dream of old Jerusalem.

  Come, Pilgrim-Friend! At last our sun outbreaks,
  And chases, one by one, dawn's lingering flakes.
  Come, Pilgrim-Friend! and downward let us rove
  (Thy long-vow'd vow) this old Tiburtian grove.
  See where, beneath, the jocund runnels play,
  All cheerly brighten'd in the brightening day.
  E'en in the far-off years when Flaccus wrote,
  ('Tis here, I ween, no pedantry to quote,)
  Thus led, they gurgled thro' those orchard-bowers
  To feed the herb—the fruitage—and the flowers.

  Come, then, and snatch Occasion; transient boon!
  And sliding into Future all too soon.
  That Future's self possession just as brief,
  And stolen, soon as given, by Time—the Thief.
  Well! if such filching knave we needs must meet,
  Let us, as best we may, the Cheater cheat;
  And, since the Then, the Now, will flit so fast,
  Look back, and lengthen life into the Past.

  That Past is here; where old Tiburtus found
  Mere mountain-brow, and fenc'd with walls around;
  And for his wearied Argives reared a home
  Long ere yon seven proud hills had dream'd of Rome.
  'Tis here, amid these patriarch olive trees,
  Which Flaccus saw, or ancestry of these;
  Oft musing, as he slowly strayed him past,
  How here his quiet age should close at last.
 
  And here behold them, still! Like ancient seers
  They stand; the dwellers of a thousand years.
  Deep-furrow'd, strangely crook'd, and ashy-grey,
  As ghost might gleam beneath the touch of day.
  All strangely perforate too; with rounded eyes,
  That ever scan the traveller as he hies:
  Fit guardians of the spot they seem to be,
  With centuries seen, and centuries yet to see.

  Who treads this pallid grove, by moonlight pale,
  Might half believe the peasant's spectre tale
  Of Latian heroes old, that come to glide
  Along these silent paths at even-tide;
  Or Sibyl, wan with ghastly prophecy,
  From her near fane, as whilom, wandering by.
  But Morning, now, and sunny vines are here,
  From tree to tree gay-gadding without fear;
 
  Or else in verdant rope their fibres string,
  As if to tempt the little Loves to swing;
  Or, tricking silvery head and wrinkled stem
  With tendril-curl, or leafy diadem;
  A sportive war of graceful contrast wage,
  The Grave and Gay—green Youth and hoary Age.
  Hence we may feel Resounding Anio's shock,
  As his full river thunders from his rock.
  Yet mark! meanwhile adown its own small dell
  How falls or winds each little cascatelle.

  With no rude sound—with no impetuous rush;
  But blandly—fondly—or by bank or bush.
  Or floats in air; as when mild mermaid frees
  (Or so they feign) her tresses to the breeze;
  And careless, for a while, of coral bower,
  Basks on the sunny sands till noontide's scorching hour.
  How sweet! to have such gentle waters near;
  Just soothing, ne'er disturbing eye nor ear.
  Nor deem I those unblest, whom choice—or fate—
  Leads to prefer the Lesser to the Great.

  "Repose, thou better privilege than fame."—
  So felt, we know, the great historic name,
  Mecænas; he who owned those villa-halls,
  All stately once, tho' now but rifted walls.
  And hither, wisely truant, oft would come,
  Forth from the smokes, the toils, the strifes of Rome.
  For, tho' defaced, discolour'd, broken, bow'd,
  Yet were they then of gold and ivory proud.
  Or far beyond what proudest wealth might do,
  From thoughtful art a nobler triumph drew.
 
  There, dark-hued urns, with mythic picture fraught,
  Time's treasures! stood, from old Etruria brought;
  Which even then had claim'd uncounted date,
  When you great Rome was yet a struggling state.
  Or marble vases there, in white array,
  Beam'd back an added lustre to the day.
  Or, better, when the gladly-welcom'd guest
  Came to the banquet, rich with every zest,
  From lamp of chisell'd bronze, adjusted light
  Threw out some Phidian marvel on the night;
  Evoking, heightening thus, in form or face,
  Each subtler beauty or diviner grace.

  Nor yet, when hours of feast had found their close,
  Or jaded statesman sighed for short repose,
  Was wanting, there, some well-befitting room,
  Nor all-too bright, nor quite subdued to gloom,
  Whose odoriferous cedar-shelves along
  Fair scrolls were ranged; philosophy or song.
  There, all our Lost might be. All Livy told,
  (Where now?) and all Menander limned of old,
  Fresh from the life; with sweet Simonides;
  And glorious Sappho, —greater yet than These.

  And then, perchance, you small and sinuous rill,
  In open day now glittering down the hill,
  Slid underground its tube-directed path,
  To feed or sculptured fount or perfumed bath.
  Their graceful rites, their gorgeous prides are gone;
  Their proudest monument a crumbled stone!
  Yet if the marble and the bronze decay,
  Their storied memories fade not thus away;
  But cluster still, tho' dying centuries toll,
  Beadrolls for thought, and relics for the soul.
 
  Hence here have bowed, thro' farthest tracts of time,
  Genius and Lore, from every cultured clime.
  And hence, no less, thro' many a countless year,
  Like us, shall unborn pilgrims worship here.
  And how may pilgrim stand on spot like this,
  Nor feel what flitting wayfarer he is?
  Here, where the joys, the griefs, the hopes, the fears,
  The busy doings of three thousand years,
  Since first Tiburtus made these hills his hold,
  Have dreamed their dream, and mingle with the mould.
  Men pass like cloud, or wave, or morning dew:
  A thought nor very deep, nor very new.
  Yet who, as here, shall find him, face to face,
  In presence of that Mighty Commonplace,
  And not imbibe the moral of the spot,
  Accept the general doom—and murmur not? 

  Yet, if All die, there are who die not All;
  (So Flaccus hoped), and half escape the pall.
  The Sacred Few! whom love of glory binds,
  "That last infirmity of noble minds,
  "To scorn delights, and live laborious days,"

  And win thro' lofty toil undying praise.
  What if for These, now verging to the tomb,
  As yet, nor laurels spread nor myrtles bloom;
  Proud mortgagees they stand of Fame's estate,
  And for the brave reversion bear to wait.
  Nay, what tho' never from th' ungrateful soil
  Green chaplets spring, for guerdon of the toil;
  In calm content their avarice sublime
  May well forego those unpaid debts of Time;
  Who, e'en while clutching at the generous pelf,
  Priz'd ever, most, the virtue for itself. 

  So go we musing on. But, as we go,
  Just glimpse yon lizard frisking to and fro.
  Now here—now there—now straightly fixed he lies;
  Then turns him sudden in a mock surprise.
  Give him this southern wall, this sprightly sun,
  And Past and Future are to him as One.
  Tell him of either, (for he loves to talk
  With loiterer, pausing on his easy walk,)
  Tell him of either, and, with eyes that glisten,
  And head aslant, awhile he seems to listen,
  Then jerks him merry off, as if to say,
  "Good Sirs! for me sufficient is the day."
  So, should grave memories ever come to press
  Life's present hour with thought of past distress;
  Or future years o'erhang us, vague or dim,
  Why, we may come and take a hint from him.
  And who not thus delights him, who or what,
  In such a clime, or animate or not?
 
  These hill-side vines; this wide expanding plain;
  These fields—of pasture, here; and there, of grain;
  These twisted chesnuts, with their cheery green;
  Yon darker cypress, spired above them seen;
  Which, many a century, land-mark, there, hath stood,
  Self-lifted obelisk, immortal wood;
  Those aloes, that with sworded panoply
  Still warn the pilgrim, who would dare too nigh;
  Yon steeply climbing town; that rocky height;
  Seem they not living in the living light?
  For each grey flake hath faded from the view,
  And all around is one Ausonian Blue.
  Not the fresh dawn, not evening's tenderest hour,
  Speak to the spirit with a deeper power.
  As eye and heart strain up that azure air,
  What light—what love—what fixedness is there!
  Transient—we know—Eternal—let it seem!
  With such blue sky we only ask to dream. 

  E'en he, (behold! him in that shaggy coat)—
  Yon goat-herd, with his only browsing goat,
  On the hill-slope; beside that humming stream;
  This heaven above; how can he help but dream!
  He ne'er was train'd in thronging city vast,
  For some huge deck to shape the mighty mast;
  To face, in ship, the deadly Afran breeze;

  Or drop the anchor deep in Arctic seas,
  Like our stern sons. Yet not for this despise,
  Albeit in seeming vacancy he lies.
  Not idle they the most, who idlest seem;
  Nor lost are all the hours in which we dream.
  In trade's dim workshops all unused to moil,
  Small share is his of luxuries won by toil.
  But luxuries he hath not unrefin'd,
  That please, perchance, yet more his southern mind.
 
  Mere idlesse pleases; as supine he lies,
  And gazing upward thro' the blazing skies,
  Wins shifting colours to his dazzl'd eyes;
  Or red or azure. And delights to see
  The brilliant mockeries as they come and flee;
  And wonders, why? Or makes of each a gem,
  Such as might grace a pontiff's diadem;
  Ruby or sapphire. Strange to me—or you;
  But, here, All love this dreamy "Nought-to-do."
  Or by tradition's tongue, or ruin old,
  Of his own land's great deeds hath he been told;
  And asks himself, erewhile, with wishful pain,
  Why may not those brave days return again?
  And tho' still mingling in confusion quaint
  Profane and Sacred; Warrior and Saint;
  Yet each in turn hath taught him, if need were,
  Like This, to suffer—or, like That, to dare.
 
  Think too that These were they, whose flags, unfurl'd
  Beneath Rome's eagle crest, once shook the world.
  Yon peasant-girl, —you mark'd her where she stood,
  In her just pride of conscious womanhood—
  (Against yon column now she leans awhile,
  Graceful, you'll own, as milkmaid by a stile.)
  Behold her in her country's old costume;
  Is lady statelier in a palace room?
  Too poor, we know; perchance, too inly great,
  The town's last mode to wish to imitate.
  Barefooted—but with no submissive mien;
  In beauty's regal right—a lawful queen.
  Such type to Michael's chisel had given a law;
  And Raphael's self but painted what he saw.
  In region, where not oft the Dryad charms
  Town-loving Signor to his woods and farms;
 
  And palaces, within proud city shut,
  But rarely neighbour on the peasant's hut;
  (He"privileg"d—or doom'd—by lot of birth
  To see, but seldom, these the Lords of earth
  'Mid equals rear'd, what other should he be
  But equal too—a freeman 'mid the free?
  Our nobler civil rights to him unknown,
  Yet all his social freedom—all his own.
  But where wealth's stringent or out-doling hand
  From point to point wide stretches o'er a land;
  In power or bounty ever seen or felt,
  Like lictor's fasces or an almsman's belt;
  Tho' order hence, with all its blessings, flow, —
  As fertilizing waters guided go—
  Yet as, henceforth, we lose the stream that played
  Thro' its own runnels, free and not afraid;
 
  So there, by wealth or purchased or controlled,
  Word—gesture—look—in native frankness bold—
  Are quelled, like sprite, beneath the Wand of Gold.
  Again—(prolix beyond the thing I ought,
  You kindly bear, and let me speak my thought)
  In land—where from the plough men rushed to arms,
  Just saved a state, and then re-sought their farms—
  I love these breathings free; these heads erect;
  I love, in look and speech, this brave neglect.
  With ancient memories they better suit
  Than balanced phrases or observance mute.
  Nay, for a spot like this seem least unmeet,
  As in high natures Grand and Simple greet.
  Is this the race down-dwindled to a weed?
  A rotted trunk? or but a buried seed?
 
  Which, if the storm should rise and floods up-tear
  The shrouding soil, and give it back to air,
  Shall sprout again; no longer matter brute;
  But gladden'd with green leaves and its own glorious fruit.
  Oh Italy! if fallen (as some delight
  To say thou art), yet fallen from what vast height;
  Oh Italy! thou land of memories dear,
  Yet not for these alone we prize thee here;
  But gladly take thee, with acceptive heart,
  Not for thy "hast been," but for what thou art.
  For who that knows thy seas of brightest wave,
  Their shelving shores or rocky steeps that lave;
  Thy lakes, 'mid mountains laid, in soft blue length,
  Like Beauty guarded at the feet of Strength;
  Thy landscape, seen at morn or evening hour,
  Town—village—cresting chapel—arch or tower;
 
  Rich art—rich nature—each on each that press,
  Till the sense aches with very loveliness;
  Thy corn with fruitage mixed; thy realms of vine,
  For ever beauteous—if they droop, or twine;
  Thy balmiest clime, which daily tasks can leaven
  With bliss, from out the common air of heaven;
  Man's natural bearing; woman's easy grace;
  From very rags—in gesture and in face;
  Thy dark-eyed childhood's ever-ready smile
  Of playful innocence or playful wile;
  Or knows thy human nature's better part,
  Swift thought, swift feeling, and the kindly heart;
  And knows, beside, what thousand pulses beat
  To win thy glories back, with generous heat;
  Who but for thee must fervent vows forecast,
  And hope thy Future, while he dreams thy Past?
  But now 'tis Mid-day! and the deep retreat
  Of Anio's grot must shield us from the heat.
 
  'Twas in such deep recess Salvator's touch
  Won its dark truth, and Gaspar fed on such.
  Lo! the rapt river along its channel'd ledge
  Precipitous hurrying to that dizzy edge.
  Now, for one breathless moment, high uphung,
  Like curled sea-wave; then—forth, as foamy, flung.
  Here—in long lance-like flakes—straight down; while, there—
  As if were all uncoiled Medusa's hair,
  The serpent-waters twirl and hiss in air.
  Or else, in black and rocky cauldron bound,
  For ever eddy round and round and round;
  Wakening the thought, or sadden'd or sublime,
  Of endless toil, or never-ending time.
  All types from clashing waters—all are here;
  All types and all emotions; sound and fear;
 
  Pent agonies, that struggle for relief;
  Free gushing tears; dishevelled locks of grief;
  Mad angers; sullen pause; re-bursting ire;
  With flood still swifter than pursuing fire.

  Yet beauty too. But such as poets shed
  Round the great vision of that snake-tress'd head,
  Perplexing beauty—beauty wreathed with dread.
  'Tis a great scene! Yet, not by it opprest,
  We feel its greatness in a buoyant breast.
  For (not as when some wild Helvetian flood
  Dives down its sombre depth of piny wood)
  Here, all around, hath Gladness flung her braid
  Of green festoons, and scattered light and shade.
 
  Or rather—if the word were fitlier won—
  Not shade, but shadow—playmate of the sun.
  Gloom glorified! as suits a southern clime;
  And (bear the phrase) a Cheerfuller Sublime.
  E'en far within the grot Light sports with Dark;
  Here—a long arrowy streak; and there—a spark.
  If disappearing, soon to re-illume;
  Like festive fire-fly, glancing thro' the gloom;
  Or old Venetian masquer, richly dight,
  Who, 'neath his waxen torches' orange light,
  With gems and spangles glitters on the night.
  Who, Anio! that hath come, or soon or late,
  To this thy shrine, but deems the day—a date;
  Whence to recal at will, his whole life's length,
  Thy voice—thy speed—thy beauty and thy strength?
 
  Whether thou tinklest from some mountain-rest,—
  Thy birth-place—where the eagle builds his nest;
  Or cruel bandit plants him; thence to strain

  His greedy vision o'er the cowering plain;
  Or whether, wandered from thy native hills,
  (As strong and stronger grown from clustering rills)
  Thou pausest for a while in silent lake,

  Where that she-wolf her passing thirst might slake,
  Who (prowled to Tiber down and destined thus)
  Suckled great Rome in infant Romulus;
  Or holdest on by feudal tower, or hall
  From Cæsars named, or nameless ruined wall;
  Or by quaint villa; such as after days
  For Este's princely line made pride to raise;
  Where, many a time, thy rushing wave would roll
  Intenser power o'er Ariosto's soul;
  Brightening, thro' secret sympathies, the lay,
  Which here he loved to weave (or so they say);
 
  And which for aye—like thee—shall flow along
  As wild—as smooth—as playful and as strong;
  Whether thou speak of simple Sabine farms,
  Or call, as now, to song—or art—or arms;
  Be welcome every dream thou waftest down,
  And every tale; but most of old renown.
  Tell us of statesman—warrior—bard—or sage—
  Wonder or love of many a famous age—
  What time, by seas shut in and rocky strand,

  And all-undreaming of the Roman brand,
  Our Britain lay, a yet unhistoried land.
  Hail and Farewell! Resounding Anio!
  And now, Fair Stream! with milder current flow
  On 'mid thy vines and pasture; till thou come
  'Neath the proud walls of twice Imperial Rome.
 
  Thence, with old Tiber, soon to sport thee free
  'Mid the blue waters of the Tyrrhene sea.
  Thou, Pilgrim-Friend! (we know) wert never one,
  Mere idle praiser of the days foregone;

  Nor striving still to shroud with poor pretence
  Of classic feeling gap of week-day sense;
  But ever, in thy wisdom, taking heed
  That worthy life is made of daily deed.
  And tho' (by shrewd Saint Stephen stolen, of late,
  From converse of thy friends—to serve the state)
  It thee befits to pay thy studious vow
  To Hansard rather than to Livy—now;
  Yet hence, methinks, 'tis joyance doubly sweet
  In this, the dream-land of our youth to meet;
  Together turn again the classic page,
  And win us back our boyhood's loftier age;
  And church and state for some brief weeks eschew;
  And make again this Ancient World our New.
  But, here, far back the scroll must be unroll'd;
  Here, where ten centuries do not make the Old.

  Where old they deem in antiquarian thought
  Some work by Ancus or by Tarquin wrought.
  That tunnel huge, or prison Mammertine;
  Or old may grant the Fabian—Julian—line;
  But half a Modern make our Constantine;
  And, as they pass his structures, on their way,
  Scarce note them—as but things of yesterday.
  Small matter! Old or new, we'll list the while,
  As Ciceroni teach us—or beguile.
  And, if some tales for question seem to call,
  In sifting Niebuhr's spite, accept them all.
  Where Curtius leapt, believe the very spot;
  Or muse with Numa in th' Egerian grot.
  Yea—sweet for him, by parent doomed to court—
  Unwilling suitor—ancient law-report;
  Awhile to snatch him from the hated thrall
  Of pleader's desk, or point-contesting hall;
  And sweet, not less, for thee, who legislate,
  To 'scape committee-room and dull debate;
  Corn question—currency—and funded debt;
  French marriage—and the treaty of Utretcht;
  And leaving—not too long—our own dear land,
  To hail—as we of late—the Belgic strand;
  Thence, o'er their ill-laid rail, right glad to roll,—
  Tho' shaken sore—to this Ausonian Goal.
  Not stately Bruges might detain us, now,
  Nor Meuse, soft-gliding 'neath her fortress'd brow;
 
  More pleased some while to thrust from off the scene
  Battles and sieges, Marlborough and Eugene.
  Nay, prizing thee, old Legendary Rhine!
  Less for thy legends than thy climbing vine.
  Nor yet in famed Helvetia tarrying long,
  Tho' there green vales and glittering mountains throng;
  And We aye pleased to feel the bosom swell,
  By Uris rock, at thought of William Tell.
  But onward still our purposed way we take
  O'er tall Gothard and by Locarno's lake;
  Or climbing slow, or if in full career,
  With Rome! Rome! Rome! in heart and eye and ear.
  Still thirsting; till at last we came to stand,
  Glad Exodites! in it—our Promised Land. 

  And what our Pisgah view? Crushed piles of state
  The walls within; and dun and desolate
  Campagna round; with bridge and tower destruct
  By age or war; and ruined aqueduct
  Athwart the fading twilight. And is this
  A Forum? or a vast Necropolis?
  Temples—for tombs; a nation's dust beneath;
  With silence round, that fears almost to breathe;
  And city-solitude, so strangely drear,
  The Living seem to have no business—here.
  If in some vineyard ground our step be stayed,
  Awhile, beside the peasant's delving spade;
  (Now—vineyard; once—Patrician's client court,
  When that near Forum was a world's resort)
  As up and up the rank black mould is cast,
  The very earth seems odorous of the Past.
 
  Each after each, behold in turn out-thrown
  Tile—faded stucco—scrap of sculptured stone.
  Anon—some shattered urn, or broken frieze;
  Power—turned to skeleton! His fragments—These.
  Ruins and fragments! Is it these that Ye
  From your own thriving land come forth to see?
  We answer, "Yea;" these are the things that We
  From our own thriving land come forth to see.
  We come to see how ancient power may die,
  And ponder on a realm's mortality.
  Yet, seeing how survive the Good—the Just;
  In goodness and in justice learn to trust.
  We come, as in fond youth, to sympathize,
  Thro' backward ages, with the Great and Wise;
 
  And feel—as then—some throb thro' inner heart,
  Where life's low interests claim no smallest part.
  We come from restless plan and restless deed,
  Ambition's instrument, or habit's need,
  To find the Calm which generous leisures give,
  And less in act than meditation live.
  We come from wit's and jest's enlivening strife,
  And all the dearer bliss of household life,
  To feed on pensive thoughts; yet not the less
  To win a pleasure from our pensiveness.
  And if those grave and pensive thoughts (and such
  Our case may be) should press the heart too much;
  'Twere not so very far to find our way
  Mid glorious art, that tells of no decay.
  Where beams each high conception just the same
  As when from Grecian chisel first it came.
 
  Tho' mortal-born, of beauty that might mate
  With archetype celestial increate.
  Nay, beauteous more than in their glittering prime,
  Tinged softly by the sun-set hues of Time.
  Then, if some friend should come, with best intent,
  To warn of hours all uselessly misspent;
  He too may learn (nor is the lore abstruse)
  That uselessness, like this, is noblest use.
  That while the busy serfs of wealth and power
  Fawn only on the Present's sordid hour,
  (No lofty thought or back—or forward—cast)
  We pluck our nobler Present from the Past.
  Nor pause we there, but, starting forth anew,
  From thence shape out a nobler Future too.
  This long discourse hath led us far away
  'Mid other themes from our Tiburtian day,
 
  But now again, with renovated grace,
  We bow before the Genius of the Place,
  Full of the scene around; and all-intent,
  As slow we travel up this steep ascent,
  To win the passing pictures, as they rise
  From present hour, or ancient memories.
  For here, glance where eye may, or footstep fall,
  Or new or old, 'tis picture—picture—All.
  This structure near, mere peasant's dwelling-place,
  Is not itself without some claim of grace.
  Its terraced roof, square tower, and arching gate
  To Art, long since, thro' picture consecrate.
  For Creed of Art hath not alone to do
  With reason'd faith, but with tradition too;
  And Beauty's self we hold for most divine,
  When Memory stands Priestess at her shrine. 

  Behold! its sunward wall. How all-ablaze
  With one full glow of ripest, yellowest maize;
  Whose rich-ribbed cylinders, in order strung,
  Seem tassels, for some festal rite uphung.
  Or each might be fit cresting ornament
  For regal canopy, or warrior-tent.
  No brighter hues hath Ceres in her horn;
  No cheerier ever broke from saffron morn.
  More golden—ne'er from furnace-fires were rolled
  Than these, sun-wrought in vegetable gold.
  Which almost might requite his absent ray,
  Themselves a sun-shine for each clouded day.
  While yon ripe gourds, that strew the court-yard floor,
  Beam upward, each a mass of glittering ore.
  But now, with these our rural splendours done,
  And we, like them, full-saturate with sun; 
  How fresh it is, as, step by step, we mount,
  To watch the gushings of that marble fount.

  Its cistern—some antique sarcophagus;
  (Here, Old and New for ever mingle—thus)
  While its raised cup, whenceforth the Naiads toss
  O'erbrimming wave, is fringed with greenest moss.
  (For, in these lands comes oft from mere neglect,
  What art long while might ponder to effect.)
  Each pendent tuft, with sparkling spray bedript,
  Seems it not emerald, with diamond tipt?
  And then those female forms, with braided hair,
  And heads erect, that classic urns up-bear;
  (From forth whose shapely rims dewed vine-leaves drop;—
  Thrust partly in, escaping lymph to stop.)
  These, as around the cistern's edge they throng,
  Say, might not These to Grecian Art belong?

  Whoe'er from life's mere prose awhile would flee,
  Should roam with us this land of reverie.
  Where museful fancy needeth not the aid
  Of cloister dim, or silent colonnade,
  Or solitary shore, or moonlight glen,
  But meets her visions 'mid the haunts of men;
  And feels in broadest sun-light round her stream
  From every waking fact some answering dream.
  And how that lofty Past exalts the Now!
  That churl—a Cincinnatus at the plough!
  Yon kite, slow circling up the Blue—afar—
  An augury! or be it peace or war.
  Those very geese, out clamouring, one and all,
  The Sacred Birds that saved the Capitol!
  And lo! thro' yonder arch those oxen twain;
  On slowly swaying that grape-loaded wain.
 
  Right goodly creatures, beautiful to view!
  Dark-hoofed—dark-maned—the rest of creamy hue;
  With large soft eyes. All soft as Here's were,
  ('Tis Homer's simile, so we may dare)—
  When their pride slept, and love alone was there.
  Now, thro' the spacious court behold they go;
  Now, pause beside the pillared portico.
  With foliage drest, and that rich ruby freight,
  Nay—draw they not, in sacrificial state,
  A Bacchic offering to some temple's gate?
  Mark the broad wheels—but two! That yoking bar,
  Just as of old! No wain—but ancient car!
  And they, above the piled up grapes who ride,
  Their naked limbs with purpling vintage dyed,
  The Fauns! And here, ere long, the rest shall be:
  Look with poetic eyes and thou shalt see
 
  Bacchante lithe; and jesting Satyr near;
  With broad Silenus, staggering in the rear,
  Tho' doubly propped; while gay goat-footed Pan
  'Mid pipe and cymbal triumphs in the van.
  Then that old Crone, with lifted tambourine,
  Which still she smites; and some strange rhythm between,
  Or, rather, mixed; while to the double sound
  A dark-tress'd girl is dancing round and round,
  That Crone, with hair unkempt, yet scarce uncouth,
  (So well it suits) and that fore-thrusting tooth,
  Keen—almost prescient—tooth of prophetess;
  (A flitting fancy, which I may not press)
  That Crone shall be our Sibyl! And that Girl,
  Still hurried round and round in dizzier whirl;
  With her wild eye almost to frenzy fired,
  (Such look in Delphi had been held inspired)
 
  And flashing locks, and every flashing limb,
  She shall be Priestess! and that Song—the Hymn!
  And wherefore, "No?" Why may not this be chaunt
  From Pythian tripod or Dodona's haunt?
  For, as some stream, by ancient fragments hid,
  From earthquake—flung; or mighty hill—down slid;
  (That cumber, many a league, the valleys round

  With huge grey rock or grass-grown earthy mound
  Still holds its silent way 'neath all that hides,
  Then at some far-off point once more outglides,
  Another stream; another, yet the same;
  E'en those, who quaff, may guess not whence it came;
  No otherwise this mystic rhythm may flow,
  Far winding on, from ages long ago;
  Some Grecian chaunt, its secret course unknown,
  And heard, at last, in region not its own. 

  Old customs die not, but sprout forth again;
  The names distorted, while the things remain.
  Fane, "Church" baptized, sees new-named votaries vow,
  And old Chief Augur is Prime Pontiff, now.
  E'en Jove himself, Great Jove Capitoline,

  Rules in strange semblance o'er a later shrine.
  His twice-fused bronze transformed, by pious feint,
  From Pagan Deity to Christian Saint.
  At this you smile; and who would smile refuse?
  But when the smile is o'er, 'twere well to muse.
  Olympian Zeus, upon his golden throne;
  Calm Pallas, glorious in her Parthenon;
  Or rudest Sibyl, from her rocky cave,
  Mid spiky aloes, issued forth to rave;
  Or curling smokes, o'er Judah wont to rise
  From bull or goat, in barbarous sacrifice;
 
  These, for rank falsehoods, while the most eschew,
  In stern contempt for Gentile and for Jew;
  These, for imperfect truths, let us accept;
  Instalments of the universal debt;
  Acknowledgment, we know, far off and dim;
  Yet, not the less, acknowledgment of Him,
  "In every age, in every clime adored;
  (So sang the bard,) Jehovah—Jove—or Lord."
  This preachment o'er, (which yet you mildly bear,
  Of preachments all-impatient as you are),
  Yon church, whence now intones the holy mass,
  If so you please, we'll enter as we pass.
  For churches here (with reverence be it said)
  Are not too holy held for week-day tread.
  But each, at will and unrebuked for wrong,
  May come and muse their column'd aisles along:
 
  And some high influence win, or grave delight
  From picture, incense, or the chaunted rite;
  Or find fit hour, as every passing day
  Its joy or sorrow brings—to praise or pray.
  But now with festal silks the shafts are bound,
  And glittering fringes edge the arches round.
  Of granites red, or cippolino grey,
  Or carvings quaint, small sight for us—to-day.
  We quarrel not. There are, we know, who hate,
  Or half unchristian deem such pious fête.
  Yet silvered Saints, and Virgin fancy-drest
  For peasant-worshipper may be the best.
  Rare entrance his, or none, thro' palace gate;
  Be this his palace hall—his room of state.
  Or let him bring his humble sorrows here,
  Secure, at least, of one Great Listener's ear.
 
  These types, so falsified, from earliest youth
  Have been to him the very types of truth;
  And his own toil hath helped the monthly dole
  That gilds the shrine, and bids the organ roll.
  Worships—like tastes—have each their power and tone;
  Church ne'er was meant for Dilletant' alone.
  And Christians, such as would all rites confine
  To their own forms, are Christians none of mine.
  Then spare him, Critic! as he kneels in this
  His ill-drest fane, and loves for God's—and his.
  "Of all the ills unhappy mortals know,
  A life of wandering is the greatest woe."
  So thought Ulysses; but we think not so.
  And blest it is, with pilgrim-staff in hand,
  At our own will to roam each ancient land,
 
  (Of which in school-boy volume first we read,
  Yet never dared to hope our feet should tread)
  And test with manhood's sense the dreams of youth,
  Nor lose the vision, and yet win the truth.
  If nature-led; to track with pleasant pains
  Their mountain-wilds and cultivated plains.
  If student; in some shy monastic crypt,
  To try old text by new found manuscript.
  If vowed to art; its each attempt explore,
  From primal Ægypt, or the Xanthian shore,
  To where in Greece it triumphed; deified
  And deifying; then like mortal died.
  In this bright land again to spring to life,
  And strive again; scarce conquered in the strife.
  But he who to the land, that sent him forth,
  Brings back but this, brings product little worth.
  Huge virtuoso—true! But driveller blind
 
  Beside the larger soul—the deeper mind—
  Which, learning man, hath learnt to love mankind.
  Our hostel hold us now; not undistrest
  By pleasant toil; for pleasures must have rest.
  Here, sit—or sleep—or scrawl the pane—your fill;
  Or rhyme—like me, (against Minerva's will!)
  Who for sublimer flight nor bold nor strong,
  May just achieve to journalize in song.
  Yet for brief space. For now, it seems, we dine:
  Lo! here, wild boar—and, here, Falernian wine;
  With figs—ripe grapes—and rarest wheaten bread.
  And who may tell but here the board was spread
  For genial Flaccus and for Maro—thus—
  Two thousand years ago, as now for us?
  Just fancy! when they sat, as here we sit,
  The frolic—and the wisdom—and the wit.
 
  And here came he, the blood of ancient kings,
  To find the joyance equal converse brings.
  With them gay chatting, as the whim might be,
  Of one's arch Phillis, one's sweet Lalage.
  Or last year's visit to Bandusia's fount;
  Or journey planned to yon Soractes' mount.
  Or laughing back, with still-recurring glee,
  Those sparkling days from Rome to Brindisi.
  Here too the Cæsar might consort with them;—
  His Purple laid aside and Diadem—
  Well-pleased, amid their talk and easy cheer,
  To glimpse his own great Rome—yet feel it not too near.
  What glimpse (had glimpse been given) of years to come!
  The conquering Goth; and that twice pillaged Rome.
 
  Gone! eagles—banners—lances—lictors' rods;
  The temples crumbling o'er their crumbled Gods.
  All steadfast as they seemed, his ancient stock
  Uprooted from their Capitolian rock.
  The far-off realms, they swayed but with the sword,
  Crouched at a swordless pontiff's slightest word.
  Their mighty palace (of each glory reft,
  Nor marble frieze, nor porphyry pillar left;
  Nor floor, as once, with rich mosaic spread;
  Nor hues cerulean arching overhead)
  Roofless and void; and only, now, renowned
  As larger ruin 'mid the ruins round.
  The baths with rubbish choked; the fountains dry;
  The green acanthus, as in mockery,
  (And wild, as when by chance in wicker sown,
  It gave, of old, its graceful hint to stone)
  Wandering, at will, amid those very halls,
  Where once 'twas carved for golden capitals.
 
  Some lingering terrace but a loftier spot,
  Whence to discern that his own Rome was not.
  Thee, Flaccus! the self-promised not to die,
  A kindlier star hath sped thy prophecy.
  Or song itself fulfils its own desire;
  Realms fade away, and dynasties expire;
  Yet on from age to age sounds thine—with Maro's lyre.
  But here, by rightful and peculiar lot,
  Ye hover most, the Genii of the spot.
  Of memory—vision—feeling—thought—a part;
  Heard from each lip, or borne in every heart.
  Brave bliss! What braver may to bard belong?
  Save its own joy from self-requiting song.
  Diverse the strains. Yet would we figure how
  Together oft ye trod this favorite brow.
 
  Not now in jocund converse, as of late,
  But each his inner theme to meditate.
  Thou, it might be, some polished lyric verse;
  Now, fondly dallying; now, brightly terse.
  Or precept, each with its own wisdom rife,
  That models—here—a poem; there—a life.
  Or else wouldst hie thee to the busy street,
  To sketch some silly pride or grave conceit.
  Then round to us the playful picture turn,
  And bid us in that glass ourselves re-learn.
  Meanwhile (so dream we on) the Mantuan Bard
  To yon tall peak hath paced the silent sward.
  Thenceforth to scan, in prospect calm and free,
  The various plain, from hill to circling sea.

  Pale region, now; with culture ill be-sped;
  Then, one wide Georgic, bright beneath him spread. 
  Or, not unprompted by that far sea-line,
  Would ponder o'er th' Eneian tale divine;
  Till clear before him, and in perfect plan,
  The Heroic Vision stood — "Arms and the Man."
  Once more I move you (our third flask is done,
  And lo! the shadows lengthen in the sun)
  To view yon time-hued fane, at this soft hour,
  When eye and spirit best may feel its power.
  Laud we the Gods! No connoisseur is near,
  With his clipp'd talk our frank delight to sear.
  Who, while a thousand admirations crave,
  Still harps and harps on arch and architrave;
  And, vowed to his five orders, fain would school
  Our kindling spirits with his three-foot rule. 

  Scarce more, if we might choose our time and place,
  Here would we wish that nobler critic race,
  Esthetical; who stand on tiptoe still,
  And see far less with eyesight than with will.
  Would-be discoverers, on vague voyage bent;
  Interpreters "of meanings never meant;"

  Of the true creed, but whose ecstatic faith
  O'erpasseth ever what the Gospel saith;
  These, while the smaller critics tease or vex,
  With their dim dreams disturb us—or perplex;
  Or, if such comment sound not civil quite,
  Daze out our clearness with their too much light.

  Digressive thus, ere passing thoughts be gone,
  I crave your leave, and idly ramble on,
  (You still indulging) till I bring you near
  Our famous temple—and behold it!—here.

  Amid these varying tales of ruin old,—
  Some, scantly gathered up; some, falsely told—
  Sibyl's or Vesta's we may hardly tell:
  But he, who first devised, devised it well,
  Here, where it stands, with circling columns bound,
  And placed—how calm! above the gulf profound,
  To tame these rugged rocks—this torrent's stress—
  With power of Beauty and of Gentleness.
  So might we feign, some fair high-lineaged queen
  Rules o'er a raging crowd with look serene.
  So too, when some great Master hath designed
  To paint in human form th' Eternal Mind;
  And humbly dares essay that lofty brow,
  Which holds the Past—the Future—and the Now;
  Awhile we pause before his art severe;
  Then, reverent bend; yet less in love than fear.
 
  But when, ere long, around those awful brows
  In graceful curve his cherub-group he throws;
  Each with its little arms—beneath—above—
  Outstretch'd to clasp, and childhood's look of love;
  Behold! those awful brows no longer lower,
  But Sense of Love hath soothed the Sense of Power.
  So—Pilgrim-Friend! our pleasant day is sped:
  "To-morrow, to fresh woods;" to-night, to bed.
  Yet from these heights throw one more glance abroad,
  And some few moments dream with dreamy Claude.
  Beneath—are field and stream and lake and wood,
  And site, where ancient city stands—or stood.
  Around—the hills. That—here—in bay recede,
  As if for nestling culture taking heed;
  Or boldly—there—indent the level plain,
  Like promontory pronged into the main.
 
  As parts for other clime th' unwilling day,
  See! how that far Campagna sinks away.
  A sea of purpled land, now, seems to be;
  Now, scarce distinguished from the purple sea.
  E'en while we gaze, how vanish on the view
  Each bright—each fair—each fading—faded—hue!
  A pensive light, while aught of light remains;
  Then—pensive veil for these Deserted Plains!