“'TIS STRANGE, BUT TRUE; FOR TRUTH IS ALWAYS STRANGE, STRANGER THAN FICTION."—GEORGE GORDON, LORD BYRON.

66

'THE TREE WILL WITHER LONG BEFORE IT FALL!"-BYRON.

THOMAS CAMPBELL.

THE HOMEWARD-BOUND SHIP.
ES-she is ours-a home-returning bark—

Blow fair, thou breeze!—she anchors ere the dark.
Already doubled is the cape-our bay
Receives that prow which proudly spurns the spray.
How gloriously her gallant course she goes!
Her white wings flying-never from her foes!
She walks the waters like a thing of life,
And seems to dare the elements to strife.
Who would not dare the battle-fire, the wreck,
To move the monarch of her peopled deck?

[From "The Corsair," canto i., 3.]

99

Thomas Campbell.

["WHAT," remarks Professor Wilson-" what shall we say of the 'Pleasures of Hope'? That the harp from which that music breathed was an Eolian harp, placed in the window of a high hall, to catch airs from heaven when heaven was glad, as well she might be with such moon and such stars, and streaming half the region with a magnificent aurora borealis. Now the music deepens into a majestic march-now it swells into a holy hymn-and now it dies away, elegiac-like, as if mourning over a tomb. Vague, indefinite, uncertain, dream-like, and visionary all; but never else than beautiful; and ever and anon, we know not why, sublime. It ceases in the hush

of night-and

we awaken as if from a dream. Is it not even so? In his

youth, Campbell lived where 'distant isles could hear the loud Corbrechtan

roar;

and sometimes his poetry is like that whirlpool-the sound as of the

wheels of many chariots. Yes, happy was it for him that he had liberty to
roam along the many-based, hollow-rumbling western coast of that unac-

Countable
musical ear,
county, Argyllshire. The sea-roar cultivated his naturally fine
and it sank too into his heart. Hence is his prime poem bright

are

with hope, as is the sunny sea, when sailors' sweethearts on the she

looking

Out for ships; and from a foreign station down comes the fleet

before the wind, and the very shells beneath their footsteps seem to sing

for joy.

As for 'Gertrude of Wyoming,' we love her as if she were our

own only daughter-filling our life with bliss, and then leaving it desolate.

THE BARS SURVIVE THE CAPTIVE THEY ENTHRALL."-BYRON.

"WERE THINGS BUT ONLY CALLED BY THEIR RIGHT NAME, CAESAR HIMSELF WOULD BE ASHAMED OF FAME."-BYRON.

"CAN WISDOM LEND, WITH ALL HER HEAVENLY POWER, THE PLEDGE OF JOY'S ANTICIPATED POWER?"-CAMPBELL.

SONG IS BUT THE ELOQUENCE OF TRUTH."-THOMAS CAMPBELL.

THOMAS CAMPBELL.

Even now we see her ghost gliding through those giant woods! As for
'Lochiel's Warning,' there was heard the voice of the Last of the Seers.
The Second Sight is now extinguished in the Highland glooms-the lament
wails no more,

'That man may not hide what God would reveal!'

The Navy owes much to 'Ye Mariners of England!' Sheer hulks often
seemed ships till that strain arose-but ever since in our imagination have
they brightened the roaring ocean."

Thomas Campbell, the author of these admirable poems, was born in Glas-
gow, July 27, 1777. He received a good education, and won distinction at
the university of his native city. After a residence of some years among
the romantic scenery of the Western Highlands, he repaired to Edinburgh
and entered upon the life of a man of letters. In April 1797 appeared his
"Pleasures of Hope," and he sprang at once into popularity and fame.
Four editions were called for in a twelvemonth, and every reader was en-
chanted by its sparkle and its glow, its vivid descriptions, musical lan-
guage, and generous sentiments. Campbell afterwards visited the Conti-
nent, and on the Danube and the Elbe wrote some of his deathless lyrics,
those "perfect chrysolites" which will perpetuate to all time his renown as
a poet. "Lochiel's Warning" and "Hohenlinden" were written in 1802.

In 1803 Campbell returned to England, and soon afterwards received a
pension from Government in acknowledgment of his services as the national
Tyrtæus. In 1809 appeared his "Gertrude of Wyoming." From 1820 to
1830 he edited the New Monthly Magazine, to which he contributed some
of his finest ballads. In 1819 he gave to the world his " Specimens of
the British Poets," which are interspersed with critical disquisitions of
great eloquence and discrimination. "Theodric, and other Poems," ap-
peared in 1824.

Thomas Campbell died at Boulogne, on the 15th of June 1844. His remains were carrie to England, and interred in Westminster Abbey. In our English poetry he may be considered the lineal successor of Gray, whom, however, he surpassed in depth of pathos, in earnestness of feeling, and vividness of description.]

THE ATHEIST'S CREED.

H! lives there, Heaven, beneath thy dread expanse,
One hopeless, dark idolater of chance,
Content to feed, with pleasures unrefined,

The lukewarm passions of a lowly mind;
Who, mouldering earthward, 'reft of every trust,
In joyless union wedded to the dust,

66 WATCH THE BRIGHTENING ROSES OF THE SKY."-T. CAMPBELL.

"AH, NO! SHE DARKLY SEES THE FATE OF MAN; HER DIM HORIZON BOUNDED TO A SPAN."-THOMAS CAMPBELL.

"CONGENIAL HOPE! THY PASSION-KINDLING POWER, HOW STRONG IN YOUTH'S UNTROUBLED HOUR!"-T. CAMPBELL.

AUSPICIOUS HOPE! IN THY SWEET GARDEN GROW-(T. CAMPBELL)

THE ATHEIST'S CREED.

Could all his parting energy dismiss,

And call this barren world sufficient bliss?
There live, alas! of Heaven-directed men,
Of cultured soul, and sapient eye serene,
Who hail thee, Man! the pilgrim of a day,
Spouse of the worm, and brother of the clay!
Frail as the leaf in autumn's yellow bower,
Dust in the wind, or dew upon the flower!
A friendless slave, a child without a sire,
Whose mortal life, and momentary fire,
Light to the grave his chance-created form,
As ocean-wrecks illuminate the storm,

And, when the gun's tremendous flash is o'er,
To night and silence sink for evermore !

IOI

Are these the pompous tidings ye proclaim,
Lights of the world and demigods of Fame?
Is this your triumph-this your proud applause,
Children of truth, and champions of her cause?
For this hath science searched on weary wing,
By shore and sea-each mite and living thing?
Launched with Iberia's pilot * from the steep,
To worlds unknown, and isles beyond the deep?
Or round the Cape her living chariot driven,
And wheeled in triumph through the signs of heaven?
Oh! star-eyed science, hast thou wandered there,
To waft us home the message of despair?

Then bind the palm thy sage's brow to suit,
Of blasted leaf, and death-distilling fruit !

Ah me! the laurelled wreath that murder rears,
Blood-nursed, and watered by the widow's tears,

* "Iberia's pilot: "-Christopher Columbus. Iberia was the Roman name for the country now called Spain.

WREATHS FOR EACH TOIL, A CHARM FOR EVERY WOE. -CAMPBELL.

"LO, NEWTON, PRIEST OF NATURE, SHINES AFAR, SCANS THE WIDE WORLD, AND NUMBERS EVERY STAR!"-CAMPBELL.

"WHERE IS THE TROUBLED HEART, CONSIGNED TO SHARE TUMULTUOUS TOIL OR SOLITARY CARE, CAMPBELL)

66 COME, BRIGHT IMPROVEMENT, IN THE CAR OF TIME, -(T. Campbell)

Seems not so foul, so tainted, and so dread

As waves the night-shed round the sceptic head.
What is the bigot's torch, the tyrant's chain?

I smile on death if heavenward Hope remain !
But, if the warring winds of Nature's strife
Be all the faithless charter of my life,
If chance awaked, inexorable power!
This frail and feverish being of an hour,
Doomed o'er the world's precarious scene to sweep,
Swift as the tempest travels on the deep,
To know delight but by her parting smile,
And know, and wish, and weep a little while;
Then melt, ye elements, that formed in vain
This troubled pulse, and visionary brain!
Fade, ye wild flowers, memorials of my doom!
And sink, ye stars, that light me to the tomb!
Truth, ever lovely since the world began,
The foe of tyrants and the friend of man,—
How can thy words from balmy slumber start
Reposing virtue pillowed on the heart!
Yet if thy voice the note of thunder rolled,
And that were true which nature never told;
Let wisdom smile not on her conquered field;
No rapture dawns, no treasure is revealed!
Oh! let her read, nor loudly, nor elate,
The doom that bars us from a better fate;
But sad as angel's for the good man's sin,
Weep to record, and blush to give it in!

[From the "Pleasures of Hope," Part ii.]

AND RULE THE SPACIOUS WORLD FROM CLIME TO CLIME!"-CAMPBELL.

UNBLEST BY VISIONARY THOUGHTS THAT STRAY TO COUNT THE JOYS OF FORTUNE'S BETTER DAY?"-CAMPBELL.

STILL MUST WE LIVE A BLOT ON NATURE'S BROW?"-THOMAS CAMPBELL.

"MAN, CAN THY DOOM NO BRIGHTER SOUL ALLOW?

"'TIS DISTANCE LENDS ENCHANTMENT TO THE VIEW."-CAMPBELL.

"But thee, my flower! whose breath was given
By milder genii o'er the deep,

The spirits of the white man's heaven
Forbid not thee to weep!—

Nor will the Christian host,

Nor will thy father's spirit grieve
To see thee on the battle's eve
Lamenting take a mournful leave
Of her who loved thee most:
She was the rainbow of thy sight!
Thy sun-thy heaven-of lost delight!

"To-morrow let us do or die!
But when the bolt of death is hurled,
Ah! whither then with thee to fly,
Shall Outalissi roam the world?
Seek we thy once-loved home?

103

* Outalissi, chief of the Oneyda Indians, a North American tribe, one of the characters in Campbell's poem.

+ Areouski, the Indian god of war.

HOPE, THE CHARMER, LINGERED STILL BEHIND."-T. CAMPBELL.

SHALL CRIMES AND TYRANTS CEASE BUT WITH THE WORLD?"-IBID.

"SHALL WAR'S POLLUTED BANNER NE'ER BE FURLED?