A New Pilgrimage: Sonnet XXX

'Tis time I stepped from Horeb to the plain.
Mountains, farewell. I need a heavier air.
Youth's memories are not good for souls in pain,
And each new age has its own meed of care.
Farewell, sad Alps, you are my barrier
Now to the North, and hold my passions slain
For all life's vultures, as I downward fare
To a new land of love which is not vain.
How staid is Italy! No gardened rose
Scattering its leaves is chaster than she is.
No cloister stiller, no retreat more close.
There is a tameness even in her seas
On which white towns look down, as who should say,
``Here wise men long have lived, and live to--day.''