Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine. Volume 55, No. 343, May 1844

Sail’d on till Ocean seem’d to be
All shoreless as Eternity,
Till, from its long-loved Star estranged,
At last the constant Needle changed,[20 - “On the 13th September, in the evening, being about two hundred leagues from the island of Ferro, he, for the first time, noticed the variation of the needle, a phenomenon which had never before been remarked. Struck with the circumstance, he observed it attentively for three days, and found that the variation increased as he advanced. It soon attracted the attention of the pilots, and filled them with consternation. It seemed as if the very laws of nature were changing as they advanced, and that they were entering another world subject to unknown influences.”—Ibid.]

And fierce amid his murmuring crew
Prone terror into treason grew;
While on his tortured spirit rose,
More dire than portents, toils, or foes,
The awaiting World’s loud jeers and scorn
Yell’d o’er his profitless Return;
No—none through that dark watch may trace
The feelings wild beneath whose swell,
As heaves the bark the billows’ race,
His Being rose and fell!
Yet over doubt, and pride, and pain,
O’er all that flash’d through breast and brain,
As with those grand, immortal eyes
He stood—his heart on fire to know
When morning next illumed the skies,
What wonders in its light should glow—
O’er all one thought must, in that hour,
Have sway’d supreme—Power, conscious Power—
The lofty sense that Truths conceived,
And born of his own starry mind,
And foster’d into might, achieved
A new Creation for mankind!
And when from off that ocean calm
The Tropic’s dusky curtain clear’d,
All those green shores and banks of balm
And rosy-tinted hills appear’d
Silent and bright as Eden, ere
Earth’s breezes shook one blossom there—
Against that hour’s proud tumult weigh’d,
Love, Fame, Ambition, how ye fade!

VI

Thou Luther of the darken’d Deep!
Nor less intrepid, too, than He
Whose courage broke Earth’s bigot sleep
Whilst thine unbarr’d the Sea—
Like his, ’twas thy predestined fate
Against your grin benighted age,
With all its fiends of Fear and Hate,
War, single-handed war, to wage,
And live a conqueror, too, like him,
Till Time’s expiring lights grow dim!
O, Hero of my boyish heart!
Ere from thy pictured looks I part,
My mind’s maturer reverence now
In thoughts of thankfulness would bow
To the Omniscient Will that sent
Thee forth, its chosen instrument,
To teach us hope, when sin and care,
And the vile soilings that degrade
Our dust, would bid us most despair—
Hope, from each varied deed display’d
Along thy bold and wondrous story,
That shows how far one steadfast mind,
Serene in suffering as in glory,
May go to deify our kind.

TO SWALLOWS ON THE EVE OF DEPARTURE

BY THE SAME

“The day before V–’s departure for the last time from the country—it was the 4th of August, one of the hottest days of the season—as evening fell, he strolled with an old school-fellow through the cool green avenues and leafy arcades of the neighbouring park, where his friend amused him by pointing out to his attention vast multitudes of Swallows that came swarming from all directions to settle on the roofs and gables of the manor-house. This they do for several days preparatory to their departing, in one collected body, to more genial climates.”—MS. Memoir.

I

Joyous Birds! preparing
In the clear evening light
To leave our dwindled summer day
For latitudes more bright!
How gay must be your greeting,
By southern fountains meeting,
To miss no faithful wing of all that started in your flight!

II

Every clime and season
Fresh gladness brings to you,
Howe’er remote your social throngs
Their varied path pursue;
No winds nor waves dissever—
No dusky veil’d for ever,
Frowneth across your fearless way in the empyrean blue.[21 - “They all quit together; and fly for a time east or west, possibly in wait for stragglers not yet arrived from the interior—they then take directly to the south, and are soon lost sight of altogether for the allotted period of their absence. Their rapidity of flight is well known, and the ‘murder-aiming eye’ of the most experienced sportsman will seldom avail against the swallow; hence they themselves seldom fall a prey to the raptorial birds.”—Cuvier, edited by Griffiths. Swallows are long-lived; they have been known to live a number of years in cages.]

III

Mates and merry brothers
Were ye in Arctic hours,
Mottling the evening beam that sloped
Adown old Gothic towers!
As blythe that sunlight dancing
Will see your pinions’ glancing
Scattering afar through Tropic groves the spicy bloom in showers!

IV