Again, the unpretentious poem, The Fringed Gentian, reflects the modest charm of the flower, and has a distinctive elegance of style. More difficult in performance, Catterskill Falls is aërially light in fancy. Poems of a larger horizon are the imaginative Hunter's Vision and The Prairies; with breadth, height is combined in the two kindred pieces, The Firmament and When the Firmament Quivers with Daylight's Young Beam. Of the rest, O Mother of a Mighty Race blends imagination with patriotic pride; A Hymn of the Sea is powerfully conceived; and spiritual truth infuses The Land of Dreams and The Conqueror's Grave.
Thirty Poems, in Bryant's seventieth year, is remarkable chiefly for containing political verse of vigor, together with gentler poems dealing with the mysterious region of fairy-land.
Among the pieces of this period, Italy exhibits Bryant's reach of sympathy at its widest. He was especially interested in Italian independence, and this confident burst of prophecy was followed about a decade later by his address on the attainment of Italian unity. Among poems on America, Not Yet is admirable for its energy and firmness; The Death of Slavery, full of passion and sublimity.
Of his lighter, more graceful product, the unfinished poem, A Tale of Cloudland, suggests an intention on his part of an extended treatment of the supernatural. Sella, a simple idyl, strange and wonderful, and Little People of the Snow are artistic stories for children; the former tinged with classic as well as modern color, the latter much resembling the German folk-lore.
A version of the fifth book of the Odyssey included in Thirty Poems led Bryant to undertake the whole of the Odyssey and the Iliad. As an English translation, Bryant's Homer is one of the best.
Another of the collection, Waiting by the Gate, portrays the grand equanimity of the sage as he muses on the approach of death. A still more universal song, almost terrible in its bold dealing with the fate of mankind, and irresistible in its sweep, is The Flood of Years, one of Bryant's last. Not long after this came his death, which occurred in New York, June 12, 1878.
Special references: Parke Godwin's editions of Bryant's Poems and of his Prose Writings, and Godwin's Life of Bryant-all published by Appleton.
To him who in the love of nature holds
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks
A various language; for his gayer hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile
And eloquence of beauty, and she glides
Into his darker musings, with a mild
And healing sympathy, that steals away
Their sharpness ere he is aware. When thoughts
Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images
Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,
And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,
Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart ;—
Go forth, under the open sky, and list
To Nature's teachings, while from all around-
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air,-
Comes a still voice.-Yet a few days, and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no more
In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground,
Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears,
Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist
Thy image. Earth that nourished thee, shall claim
Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again,
And, lost each human trace, surrendering up
Thine individual being, shalt thou go
To mix forever with the elements,
To be a brother to the insensible rock
And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain
Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak
Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould.
Yet not to thine eternal resting-place
Shalt thou retire alone-nor couldst thou wish
Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down
With patriarchs of the infant world—with kings,
The powerful of the earth-the wise, the good,
Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,
All in one mighty sepulchre.-The hills
Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun,—the vales
Stretching in pensive quietness between ;
The venerable woods-rivers that move
In majesty, and the complaining brooks
That make the meadows green; and, poured round all, Old ocean's gray and melancholy waste,
Are but the solemn decorations all
Of the great tomb of man. The golden sun,
The planets, all the infinite host of heaven,
Are shining on the sad abodes of death,
Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread
The globe are but a handful to the tribes
That slumber in its bosom.-Take the wings
Of morning and the Barcan1 desert pierce,
Or lose thyself in the continuous woods
Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound,
Save his own dashings-yet-the dead are there;
And millions in those solitudes, since first
The flight of years began, have laid them down
In their last sleep-the dead reign there alone.
So shalt thou rest-and what if thou withdraw
Unheeded by the living-and no friend
Take note of thy departure? All that breathe
Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh
When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care
Plod on, and each one as before will chase
His favorite phantom; yet all these shall leave
Their mirth and their employments, and shall come
And make their bed with thee. As the long train
Of ages glide away, the sons of men,
The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes
In the full strength of years, matron, and maid,
And the sweet babe, and the gray-headed man,—
Shall one by one be gathered to thy side,
By those, who in their turn shall follow them.
So live that when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan, that moves
To that mysterious realm, where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,
Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,
1 Barca, a maritime region of North Africa, forming the eastern division of Tripoli.
2 Oregon, the Columbia River, which lies partly in Oregon.
Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave,
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.
INSCRIPTION FOR THE ENTRANCE TO A WOOD.
Stranger, if thou hast learned a truth which needs
No school of long experience, that the world
Is full of guilt and misery, and hast seen
Enough of all its sorrows, crimes, and cares,
To tire thee of it, enter this wild wood
And view the haunts of Nature. The calm shade
Shall bring a kindred calm, and the sweet breeze
That makes the green leaves dance, shall waft a balm
To thy sick heart. Thou wilt find nothing here
Of all that pained thee in the haunts of men
And made thee loathe thy life. The primal curse
Fell, it is true, upon the unsinning earth,
But not in vengeance. God hath yoked to Guilt
Her pale tormentor, Misery. Hence, these shades
Are still the abodes of gladness; the thick roof
Of green and stirring branches is alive
And musical with birds, that sing and sport
In wantonness of spirit; while below,
The squirrel, with raised paws and form erect,
Chirps merrily. Throngs of insects in the shade
Try their thin wings and dance in the warm beam
That waked them into life. Even the green trees
Partake the deep contentment; as they bend
To the soft winds, the sun from the blue sky
Looks in and sheds a blessing on the scene.
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