"THE GOD OF NATURE AND OF GRACE IN ALL HIS WORKS APPEARS ;-(JAMES MONTGOMERY)

STRANGERS AND PILGRIMS HERE BELOW,-(MONTGOMERY)

HIS GOODNESS THROUGH THE EARTH WE TRACE, HIS GRANDEUR IN THE SPHERES."-MONTGOMERY.

"FULL OF THOSE DREAMS OF GOOD THAT, VAINLY GRAND, HAUNT THE YOUNG HEART;

310

"LIKE ECHO, SENDING BACK SWEET MUSIc, fraught—(Moore)

THOMAS MOORE.

Thomas Moore.

[THE characteristics of Moore's poetry have been described by William Hazlitt in terms not less brilliant than accurate.

His verse, he says, is like a shower of beauty; a dance of images; a stream of music; or like the spray of the waterfall, tinged by the morning beam with rosy light. The peculiar distinction of his style is this continuous and incessant flow of voluptuous thoughts and shining allusions. He ought to write with a crystal pen on silver paper. His subject is set off by a dazzling veil of poetic diction, like a wreath of flowers gemmed with innumerous dew-drops, that weep, tremble, and glitter in liquid softness and pearly light, while the song of birds ravishes the ear, and languid odours breathe around, and Aurora opens Heaven's smiling portals, peris and nymphs peep through the golden glades, and an angel's wing glances over the glossy scene. In Milton we meet with many prosaic lines, either because the subject does not require raising, or because they are necessary to connect the story, or serve as a relief to other passages; there is not such a thing to be found in all Mr. Moore's writings. His volumes present us with "a perpetual feast of nectared sweets," but we cannot add, "where no crude surfeit reigns."

Still it would be unfair to deny that in some of his minor poems Moore has opened the very springs of pathos, and that in his music there is occasionally a pathetic cadence which moves to tears. His "Lalla Rookh" is an Oriental beauty, loaded with ornament, and flashing with jewellery ; but many of his "Irish Melodies are like the maidens of his own green isle-artlessly beautiful, with a strange power over the heart. His satires, moreover, are inspired by the most exquisite wit-the shafts discharged from his bow are all tipped with diamonds.

His life was undistinguished by notable events. Born at Dublin, May 28, 1779, of respectable parents, he received a careful education; began to rhyme almost as soon as he could read and write; in 1793 was entered at Trinity College, Dublin; in 1799 proceeded to London, studied law, and translated Anacreon. In 1802 he issued a volume of amatory poems, under the nom de plume of Thomas Little, of which he had the grace in later life to be ashamed. He was plunged into some pecuniary embarrassments of a deputy whom he had appointed to discharge his duties in an official situation at Bermuda; they acted as a stimulus to his facile and fertile genius, and in 1806 he published a collection of "Odes and Epistles," whose mellifluous versification and happy descriptive power immediately gained the public ear. Embracing Whig politics, he issued a succession of light, airy, and sparkling satires, such as English literature had never before seen, and such as no foreign literature sui generis excels. In 1806 he commenced the publication of his "Irish Melodies," the work on which, we think, his fame will principally depend. "Lalla Rookh," an Oriental romance of dazzling gorgeousness, which literally wearies the reader by its very excess of sweetness, appeared in 1817. Then came The Fudge Family in Paris;"

""

WITH TWICE TH' AERIAL SWEETNESS IT HAD BROUGHT!"-MOORE.

PROUD VIEWS OF HUMANKIND, OF MEN TO GODS EXALTED AND REFINED."-MOORE.

O REASON! WHO SHALL SAY WHAT SPELLS RENEW,-(MOORE)

Rhymes on the Road," the result of a Continental tour; "The Loves of the Angels ;""The Fables of the Holy Alliance;" and the prose tale of "The Epicurean." He was also the author of Lives of Sheridan and Byron, of a History of Ireland, and of numerous other works both in prose and poetry; for though fond of society-in which his wit, his manners, and his musical talent eminently fitted him to shine-he was an industrious labourer; and if his biographer must regret his adulation of rank and fashion, he must also do justice to his integrity and indefatigable energy. The last years of his life were overshadowed with mental disease, and the wit and poet was reduced to a condition of imbecility from which death was a happy release. He expired on the 26th of February 1852.]

"THIS SPECK OF LIFE IN TIME'S GREAT WILDERNESS,-THIS NARROW ISTHMUS-(MOORE)

'TWIXT TWO BOUNDLESS SEAS-THE PAST, THE FUTURE; TWO ETERNITIES!"-MOORE.

B

THE DEATH OF HAFED.

UT vainly hundreds, thousands bleed,

Still hundreds, thousands more succeed!-
Countless, as towards some flame at night,
The north's dark insects wing their flight,
And quench or perish in its light;
To this terrific spot they pour,
Till, bridged with Moslem bodies o'er,
It bears aloft their slippery tread,
And o'er the dying and the dead—
Tremendous causeway!—on they pass.
Then, hapless Gebirs, then, alas!
What hope was left for you?-for you,
Whose yet warm pile of sacrifice
Is smoking in their vengeful eyes;
Whose swords how keen, how fierce they knew,
And burn with shame to find how few.
Crushed down by that vast multitude,

Some found their graves where first they stood;
While some with harder struggle died,

And still fought on by Hafed's side,

Who, fronting to the foe, trod back
Towards the high towers his gory track;

WHEN LEAST WE LOOK FOR IT, THY BROKEN CLEW!"-MOORE.

"FORMS SUCH AS NATURE MOULDS, WHEN SHE WOULD VIE WITH FANCY'S PENCIL,

"LIKE THE FAINT EXQUISITE MUSIC OF A DREAM."-THOMAS MOORE.

312

THOMAS MOORE.

And, as a lion, swept away

By sudden swell of Jordan's pride
From the wild covert where he lay,

Long battles with th' o'erwhelming tide,
So fought he back with fierce delay,

And kept both foes and fate at bay.
But whither now? their track is lost,

Their prey escaped-guide, torches gone-
By torrent-beds and labyrinths crossed,
The scattered crowd rush blindly on-
"Cursed be those tardy lights that wind,"
The panting cry,
66 'so far behind;

Oh! for a bloodhound's precious scent,
To track the way the Gebir went!"
Vain wish-confusedly along

They rush, more desperate as more wrong;
Till, wildered by the far-off lights,
Yet glittering up those gloomy heights,
Their footing, mazed and lost, they miss,
And down the darkling precipice
Are dashed into the deep abyss ;-
Or midway hang, impaled on rocks,
A banquet, yet alive, for flocks
Of ravening vultures ;- while the dell
Re-echoes with each horrible yell.

Those sounds-the last, to vengeance dear,
That e'er shall ring in Hafed's ear--
Now reached him, as, aloft, alone,
Upon the steep way breathless thrown,
He lay beside his reeking blade,
Resigned, as if life's task were o’er,

Its last blood-offering amply paid,

And Iran's self could claim no more.

FROM LIFE WITHOUT FREEDOM, OH, WHO WOULD NOT FLY!"-Moore.

AND GIVE BIRTH TO THINGS LOVELY BEYOND ITS FAIREST PICTURINGS."-MOORE.

"THERE'S NOTHING DARK, BELOW, ABOVE, BUT IN ITS GLOOM I TRACE THY LOVE,-(MOORE)

66 HOW DEAR TO ME THE HOUR WHEN DAYLIGHT DIES!

One only thought, one lingering beam
Now broke across his dizzy dream
Of pain and weariness-'twas she,

His heart's pure planet, shining yet
Above the waste of memory,

When all life's other lights were set.
And never to his mind before

Her image such enchantment wore.

It seemed as if each thought that stained,
Each fear that chilled their loves was past,
And not one cloud of earth remained
Between him and her glory cast;
As if, to charms before so bright,
New grace from other worlds was given,
And his soul saw her by the light

Now breaking o'er itself from heaven!
A voice spoke near him-'twas the tone
Of a loved friend, the only one
Of all his warriors left with life,

--

From that short night's tremendous strife,-
"And must we then, my chief, die here?
Foes round us, and the shrine so near!
These words have roused the last remains
Of life within him-" What, not yet
Beyond the reach of Moslem chains?"
The thought could make even death forget
His icy bondage-with a bound

He springs, all bleeding, from the ground,
And clasps his comrade's arm, now grown

Even feebler, heavier than his own,
And up the painful pathway leads,
Death gaining on each step he treads,

Speed them, thou God, who heard'st their vow!
They mount-they bleed-oh, save them now-

FOR THEN SWEET DREAMS OF OTHER DAYS ARISE."-MOORE.

and meeklY WAIT THAT MOMENT WHEN THY TOUCH SHALL TURN ALL BRIGHT AGAIN."-MOORE.