Page:Complete Poetical Works of John Greenleaf Whittier (1895).djvu/73

Rh Slaves rise up men; the olive waves, With roots deep set in battle graves!

“Through the harsh noises of our day A low, sweet prelude finds its way; Through clouds of doubt, and creeds of fear, A light is breaking, calm and clear.

“That song of Love, now low and far, Erelong shall swell from star to star! That light, the breaking day, which tips The golden-spired Apocalypse!”

Then, when my good friend shook his head, And, sighing, sadly smiled, I said: “Thou mind’st me of a story told In rare Bernardin’s leaves of gold.”

And while the slanted sunbeams wove The shadows of the frost-stained grove, And, picturing all, the river ran O’er cloud and wood, I thus began:—

In Mount Valerien’s chestnut wood The Chapel of the Hermits stood; And thither, at the close of day, Came two old pilgrims, worn and gray.

One, whose impetuous youth defied The storms of Baikal’s wintry side, And mused and dreamed where tropic day Flamed o’er his lost Virginia’s bay.

His simple tale of love and woe All hearts had melted, high or low;— A blissful pain, a sweet distress, Immortal in its tenderness.

Yet, while above his charmëd page Beat quick the young heart of his age, He walked amidst the crowd unknown, A sorrowing old man, strange and lone.

A homeless, troubled age,—the gray Pale setting of a weary day; Too dull his car for voice of praise, Too sadly worn his brow for bays.

Pride, lust of power and glory, slept; Yet still his heart its young dream kept, And, wandering like the deluge-dove, Still sought the resting-place of love.

And, mateless, childless, envied more The peasant’s welcome from his door By smiling eyes at eventide, Than kingly gifts or lettered pride.

Until, in place of wife and child, All-pitying Nature on him smiled, And gave to him the golden keys To all her inmost sanctities.

Mild Druid of her wood-paths dim! She laid her great heart bare to him, Its loves and sweet accords;—he saw The beauty of her perfect law.

The language of her signs he knew, What notes her cloudy clarion blew; The rhythm of autumn’s forest dyes, The hymn of sunset’s painted skies.

And thus he seemed to hear the song Which swept, of old, the stars along; And to his eyes the earth once more Its fresh and primal beauty wore.

Who sought with him, from summer air, And field and wood, a balm for care, And bathed in light of sunset skies His tortured nerves and weary eyes?

His fame on all the winds had flown; His words had shaken crypt and throne; Like fire on camp and court and cell They dropped, and kindled as they fell.

Beneath the pomps of state, below The mitred juggler’s masque and show, A prophecy, a vague hope, ran His burning thought from man to man.

For peace or rest too well he saw The fraud of priests, the wrong of law, And felt how hard, between the two, Their breath of pain the millions drew.

A prophet-utterance, strong and wild, The weakness of an unweaned child, A sun-bright hope for human-kind, And self-despair, in him combined.

He loathed the false, yet lived not true To half the glorious truths he knew; The doubt, the discord, and the sin, He mourned without, he felt within.