Page:The Works of Lord Byron (ed. Coleridge, Prothero) - Volume 5.djvu/651

CANTO II.] Roused millions do what single Brutus did—

Sweep these mere mock-birds of the Despot's song

From the tall bough where they have perched so long,—

Still are we hawked at by such mousing owls,

And take for falcons those ignoble fowls,

When but a word of freedom would dispel

These bugbears, as their terrors show too well.

XIV.

Rapt in the fond forgetfulness of life,

Neuha, the South Sea girl, was all a wife,

With no distracting world to call her off

From Love; with no Society to scoff

At the new transient flame; no babbling crowd

Of coxcombry in admiration loud,

Or with adulterous whisper to alloy

Her duty, and her glory, and her joy:

With faith and feelings naked as her form,

She stood as stands a rainbow in a storm,

Changing its hues with bright variety,

But still expanding lovelier o'er the sky,

Howe'er its arch may swell, its colours move,

The cloud-compelling harbinger of Love.

XV.

Here, in this grotto of the wave-worn shore,

They passed the Tropic's red meridian o'er;

Nor long the hours—they never paused o'er time,

Unbroken by the clock's funereal chime,

Which deals the daily pittance of our span,

And points and mocks with iron laugh at man.

What deemed they of the future or the past?

The present, like a tyrant, held them fast:

Their hour-glass was the sea-sand, and the tide,

Like her smooth billow, saw their moments glide;