No More Learning

Afar, the city-walls were thronged on high,
And myriads on each giddy turret clung,
And to each spire far lessening in the sky
Bright pennons on the idle winds were hung;
As we approached, a shout of joyance sprung _1850
At once from all the crowd, as if the vast
And peopled Earth its boundless skies among
The sudden clamour of delight had cast,
When from before its face some general wreck had passed.

16.
Our armies through the City's hundred gates _1855
Were poured, like brooks which to the rocky lair
Of some deep lake, whose silence them awaits,
Throng from the mountains when the storms are there
And, as we passed through the calm sunny air
A thousand flower-inwoven crowns were shed, _1860
The token flowers of truth and freedom fair,
And fairest hands bound them on many a head,
Those angels of love's heaven that over all was spread.

17.
I trod as one tranced in some rapturous vision:
Those bloody bands so lately reconciled, _1865
Were, ever as they went, by the contrition
Of anger turned to love, from ill beguiled,
And every one on them more gently smiled,
Because they had done evil:--the sweet awe
Of such mild looks made their own hearts grow mild, _1870
And did with soft attraction ever draw
Their spirits to the love of freedom's equal law.

18.
And they, and all, in one loud symphony
My name with Liberty commingling, lifted,
'The friend and the preserver of the free! _1875
The parent of this joy! ' and fair eyes gifted
With feelings, caught from one who had uplifted
The light of a great spirit, round me shone;
And all the shapes of this grand scenery shifted
Like restless clouds before the steadfast sun,-- _1880
Where was that Maid? I asked, but it was known of none.

19.
Laone was the name her love had chosen,
For she was nameless, and her birth none knew:
Where was Laone now? --The words were frozen
Within my lips with fear; but to subdue _1885
Such dreadful hope, to my great task was due,
And when at length one brought reply, that she
To-morrow would appear, I then withdrew
To judge what need for that great throng might be,
For now the stars came thick over the twilight sea. _1890

20.
Yet need was none for rest or food to care,
Even though that multitude was passing great,
Since each one for the other did prepare
All kindly succour--Therefore to the gate
Of the Imperial House, now desolate, _1895
I passed, and there was found aghast, alone,
The fallen Tyrant!
--Silently he sate
Upon the footstool of his golden throne,
Which, starred with sunny gems, in its own lustre shone.

21.
Alone, but for one child, who led before him _1900
A graceful dance: the only living thing
Of all the crowd, which thither to adore him
Flocked yesterday, who solace sought to bring
In his abandonment! --She knew the King
Had praised her dance of yore, and now she wove _1905
Its circles, aye weeping and murmuring
Mid her sad task of unregarded love,
That to no smiles it might his speechless sadness move.

22.
She fled to him, and wildly clasped his feet
When human steps were heard:--he moved nor spoke, _1910
Nor changed his hue, nor raised his looks to meet
The gaze of strangers--our loud entrance woke
The echoes of the hall, which circling broke
The calm of its recesses,--like a tomb
Its sculptured walls vacantly to the stroke _1915
Of footfalls answered, and the twilight's gloom
Lay like a charnel's mist within the radiant dome.

23.
The little child stood up when we came nigh;
Her lips and cheeks seemed very pale and wan,
But on her forehead, and within her eye _1920
Lay beauty, which makes hearts that feed thereon
Sick with excess of sweetness; on the throne
She leaned;--the King, with gathered brow, and lips
Wreathed by long scorn, did inly sneer and frown
With hue like that when some great painter dips _1925
His pencil in the gloom of earthquake and eclipse.

24.
She stood beside him like a rainbow braided
Within some storm, when scarce its shadows vast
From the blue paths of the swift sun have faded;
A sweet and solemn smile, like Cythna's, cast _1930
One moment's light, which made my heart beat fast,
O'er that child's parted lips--a gleam of bliss,
A shade of vanished days,--as the tears passed
Which wrapped it, even as with a father's kiss
I pressed those softest eyes in trembling tenderness. _1935

25.
The sceptred wretch then from that solitude
I drew, and, of his change compassionate,
With words of sadness soothed his rugged mood.
But he, while pride and fear held deep debate,
With sullen guile of ill-dissembled hate _1940
Glared on me as a toothless snake might glare:
Pity, not scorn I felt, though desolate
The desolator now, and unaware
The curses which he mocked had caught him by the hair.

26.
I led him forth from that which now might seem _1945
A gorgeous grave: through portals sculptured deep
With imagery beautiful as dream
We went, and left the shades which tend on sleep
Over its unregarded gold to keep
Their silent watch. --The child trod faintingly, _1950
And as she went, the tears which she did weep
Glanced in the starlight; wildered seemed she,
And, when I spake, for sobs she could not answer me.