No More Learning

No meadows thrown between, the giddy steeps
Tower, bare or sylvan, from the narrow deeps. 80
--To towns, whose shades of no rude noise [19] complain,
From ringing team apart [20] and grating wain--
To flat-roofed towns, that touch the water's bound,
Or lurk in woody sunless glens profound,
Or, from the bending rocks, obtrusive cling, 85
And o'er the whitened wave their shadows fling--
The pathway leads, as round the steeps it twines; [21]
And Silence loves its purple roof of vines.
The loitering traveller [22] hence, at evening, sees
From rock-hewn steps the sail between the trees; 90
Or marks, 'mid opening cliffs, fair dark-eyed maids
Tend the small harvest of their garden glades;
Or stops the solemn mountain-shades to view
Stretch o'er the pictured mirror broad and blue,
And track the yellow lights from steep to steep, 95
As up the opposing hills they slowly creep. [23]
Aloft, here, half a village shines, arrayed
In golden light; [24] half hides itself in shade:
While, from amid the darkened roofs, the spire,
Restlessly flashing, seems to mount like fire: [25] 100
There, all unshaded, blazing forests throw
Rich golden verdure on the lake [26] below.
Slow glides the sail along the illumined shore,
And steals into the shade the lazy oar;
Soft bosoms breathe around contagious sighs, 105
And amorous music on the water dies.

How blest, delicious scene! the eye that greets
Thy open beauties, or thy lone retreats;
Beholds the unwearied sweep of wood that scales
Thy cliffs; the endless waters of thy vales; [27] 110
Thy lowly cots that sprinkle all the shore, [28]
Each with its [29] household boat beside the door;
[30] Thy torrents shooting from the clear-blue sky;
Thy towns, that cleave, like swallows' nests, on high; [31]
That glimmer hoar in eve's last light descried 115
Dim from the twilight water's shaggy side,
Whence lutes and voices down the enchanted woods
Steal, and compose the oar-forgotten floods;
[32]--Thy lake, that, streaked or dappled, blue or grey,
'Mid smoking woods gleams hid from morning's ray [33] 120
Slow-travelling down the western hills, to' enfold [34]
Its green-tinged margin in a blaze of gold;
Thy glittering steeples, whence the matin bell
Calls forth the woodman from his desert cell,
And quickens the blithe sound of oars that pass 125
Along the steaming lake, to early mass. [35]
But now farewell to each and all--adieu
To every charm, and last and chief to you, [36]
Ye lovely maidens that in noontide shade
Rest near your little plots of wheaten glade; [37] 130
To all that binds [38] the soul in powerless trance,
Lip-dewing song, and ringlet-tossing dance;
Where sparkling eyes and breaking smiles illume
The sylvan cabin's lute-enlivened gloom.
--Alas! the very murmur of the streams 135
Breathes o'er the failing soul voluptuous dreams,
While Slavery, forcing the sunk mind to dwell
On joys that might disgrace the captive's cell,
Her shameless timbrel shakes on Como's marge,
And lures [39] from bay to bay the vocal barge. 140

Yet are thy softer arts with power indued
To soothe and cheer the poor man's solitude.
By silent cottage-doors, the peasant's home
Left vacant for the day, I loved to roam. [40]
But once I pierced the mazes of a wood 145
In which a cabin undeserted stood; [41]
There an old man an olden measure scanned
On a rude viol touched with withered hand. [42]
As lambs or fawns in April clustering lie [43]
Under a hoary oak's thin canopy, 150
Stretched at his feet, with stedfast upward eye,
His children's children listened to the sound; [44]
--A Hermit with his family around!

But let us hence; for fair Locarno smiles
Embowered in walnut slopes and citron isles: 155
Or seek at eve the banks of Tusa's stream,
Where, [45] 'mid dim towers and woods, her [M] waters gleam.
From the bright wave, in solemn gloom, retire
The dull-red steeps, and, darkening still, aspire
To where afar rich orange lustres glow 160
Round undistinguished clouds, and rocks, and snow:
Or, led where Via Mala's chasms confine
The indignant waters of the infant Rhine,
Hang o'er the abyss, whose else impervious gloom [46]
His burning eyes with fearful light illume. 165

The mind condemned, without reprieve, to go
O'er life's long deserts with its charge of woe,
With sad congratulation joins the train
Where beasts and men together o'er the plain
Move on--a mighty caravan of pain: 170
Hope, strength, and courage, social suffering brings,
Freshening the wilderness with shades and springs.
--There be whose lot far otherwise is cast:
Sole human tenant of the piny waste, [47]
By choice or doom a gipsy wanders here, 175
A nursling babe her only comforter;
Lo, where she sits beneath yon shaggy rock,
A cowering shape half hid in curling smoke! [48]

When lightning among clouds and mountain-snows
Predominates, and darkness comes and goes, 180
And the fierce torrent, at the flashes broad
Starts, like a horse, beside the glaring road--
She seeks a covert from the battering shower
In the roofed bridge [N]; the bridge, in that dread hour,
Itself all trembling at the torrent's power. [49] 185

Nor is she more at ease on some _still_ night,
When not a star supplies the comfort of its light;
Only the waning moon hangs dull and red
Above a melancholy mountain's head,
Then sets. In total gloom the Vagrant sighs, 190
Stoops her sick head, and shuts her weary eyes;
Or on her fingers counts the distant clock,
Or, to the drowsy crow of midnight cock,
Listens, or quakes while from the forest's gulf
Howls near and nearer yet the famished wolf. [50] 195

From the green vale of Urseren smooth and wide
Descend we now, the maddened Reuss our guide; [51]
By rocks that, shutting out the blessed day,
Cling tremblingly to rocks as loose as they;
By cells [P] upon whose image, while he prays, 200
The kneeling peasant scarcely dares to gaze;
By many a votive death-cross [Q] planted near,
And watered duly with the pious tear,
That faded silent from the upward eye
Unmoved with each rude form of peril nigh; [52] 205
Fixed on the anchor left by Him who saves
Alike in whelming snows, and roaring waves.

But soon a peopled region on the sight
Opens--a little world of calm delight; [53]
Where mists, suspended on the expiring gale, 210
Spread roof like o'er the deep secluded vale, [54]
And beams of evening slipping in between,
Gently illuminate a sober scene:--[55]
Here, on the brown wood-cottages [R] they sleep, [56]
There, over rock or sloping pasture creep. [57] 215
On as we journey, in clear view displayed,
The still vale lengthens underneath its shade
Of low-hung vapour: on the freshened mead
The green light sparkles;--the dim bowers recede. [58]
While pastoral pipes and streams the landscape lull, 220
And bells of passing mules that tinkle dull,
In solemn shapes before the admiring eye
Dilated hang the misty pines on high,
Huge convent domes with pinnacles and towers,
And antique castles seen through gleamy [59] showers. 225

From such romantic dreams, my soul, awake!
To sterner pleasure, where, by Uri's lake
In Nature's pristine majesty outspread,
Winds neither road nor path for foot to tread: [60]
The rocks rise naked as a wall, or stretch, 230
Far o'er the water, hung with groves of beech; [61]
Aerial pines from loftier steeps ascend,
Nor stop but where creation seems to end. [62]
Yet here and there, if 'mid the savage scene
Appears a scanty plot of smiling green, 235
Up from the lake a zigzag path will creep
To reach a small wood-hut hung boldly on the steep. [63]
--Before those thresholds (never can they know [64]
The face of traveller passing to and fro,)
No peasant leans upon his pole, to tell 240
For whom at morning tolled the funeral bell;
Their watch-dog ne'er his angry bark foregoes,
Touched by the beggar's moan of human woes;
The shady porch ne'er offered a cool seat
To pilgrims overcome by summer's heat. [65] 245
Yet thither the world's business finds its way
At times, and tales unsought beguile the day,
And _there_ are those fond thoughts which Solitude, [66]
However stern, is powerless to exclude. [67]
There doth the maiden watch her lover's sail 250
Approaching, and upbraid the tardy gale;
At midnight listens till his parting oar,
And its last echo, can be heard no more.