Page:The Works of Lord Byron (ed. Coleridge, Prothero) - Volume 5.djvu/654

614 As, far divided from his parent deep,

The sea-born infant cries, and will not sleep,

Raising his little plaint in vain, to rave

For the broad bosom of his nursing wave:

The woods drooped darkly, as inclined to rest,

The tropic bird wheeled rockward to his nest,

And the blue sky spread round them like a lake

Of peace, where Piety her thirst might slake.

XVIII.

But through the palm and plantain, hark, a Voice!

Not such as would have been a lover's choice,

In such an hour, to break the air so still;

No dying night-breeze, harping o'er the hill,

Striking the strings of nature, rock and tree,

Those best and earliest lyres of Harmony,

With Echo for their chorus; nor the alarm

Of the loud war-whoop to dispel the charm;

Nor the soliloquy of the hermit owl,

Exhaling all his solitary soul,

The dim though large-eyed wingéd anchorite,

Who peals his dreary Pæan o'er the night;

But a loud, long, and naval whistle, shrill

As ever started through a sea-bird's bill;

And then a pause, and then a hoarse "Hillo!

Torquil, my boy! what cheer? Ho! brother, ho!"

"Who hails?" cried Torquil, following with his eye

The sound. "Here's one," was all the brief reply.