Page:Livingstone in Africa.djvu/74

52 Lead poor, mad mortals to the wilds alone, Into a barren wilderness of souls; Mask'd in stern iron, prison'd in adamant, A fiery gulf between them and the world; Forbidden dear embracings of their kind, And mutually yielding thoughts of all? Though girt with kindly, once familiar faces, Lonelier they than are the lonely dead; Or haunted only by fell fiends that scowl Out of the very eyes of sleepless love! God whirls them forth, and sets them in a cleft Of some ice-armour'd, cloud-robed precipice: It snows, it howls; the everlasting mountains Reel, crashing downward in the lightning's eye: God murmurs in their ears a Mystery In tongues unknown, of import terrible, That none may hear or comprehend but they; Nor even they, but in maim'd cadences; Wind-wilder'd murmurs of a music wild. Ah! we all wander blindly in a dream! Save for a revelation from the Lord.