LINES SUGGESTED BY THE VIEW OF THE ALPS

AT

SUNRISE FROM THE RIGHI

ON THE BORDERS OF THE LAKE OF LUCERNE.

O GOD! upon the mountains, in the calm

And beauty of the morning, where each sound

Seems like the accents of an holy psalm

Swept from the lyre of Nature, and the ground

Offers its matin incense wide around,

Oh God! upon the mountains is there one,

Whose heart receives not, like yon lake profound,

The imaged beauty,-sends not back a tone

With Nature's solemn voice in gentlest unison ?

Thy mighty Presence is around us,-felt,

Not in its terrors, earthquake, storm and fire,

In sights and sounds of harmony, that melt

Into the spirit's depths, 'till each desire

Rises to Thee; as yonder clouds aspire

To the huge mountains' summits, from below

Issuing in mist and dampness,-but as higher

They climb the everlasting peaks of snow,

Touched with the hues of heaven, and melting in its glow.

And there ye stand, majestic Alps! which never

By foot of man were trod,―ye stand, and smile

In calm derision at his weak endeavour

To touch the confines of each sky-girt isle;

'Tis well! albeit his chainless soul the while

Can make your peaks her stepping-stones to climb
Heights that look down upon your giant pile,
Where she shall rest immortally sublime,

When

ye

have crumbled down amid the wrecks of time.

THE EXECUTION OF A MURDERER.

THEY led him forth!-'tis not for words to speak

The horrid hue that settled on his cheek,

As all the blood that flushed that face of fear

Had gathered into blue stagnation there,

And left his lip and brow;-e'en death might fail

To paint thereon a tint more ashy pale.

A faintness fell upon him as he came

To that dark place of suffering and of shame;

For though he spake not aught, nor changed his look, His weight fell heavier, and his strong frame shook.

"Oh God!" he moaned, and darted his fierce eye

Up to the clouds that frowned along the sky,

"I thought they said, that mighty One above Was something full of pity and of love :

I showed no mercy-well deserve to see

The friend of all a bitter foe to me!

The sky feels hot above me-and my fate

Flares in my face. Oh, mercy!-'tis too late!"
This to himself; he saw, heard, spake to none;

He seemed to stand before his God alone.

He tried the stairs and reeled,-they dragged him on,
And there he stood-the fatal goal was won!

Then burst in one wild, deafening, maddening yell

The voice of execration; winged from hell

Rained the hot curses round him far and near,

Pealed from its thousand tongues a city's damning prayer.

And he the wretched being, on whose path

Burst that fell storm of vengeance and of wrath,

Who caught from manhood's shout and childhood's cry,

In one full curse, his death-sleep's lullaby,

He was low kneeling when that fierce yell rang

Upon his ear-a moment-up he sprang!

But oh, how changed! no longer feeble, tame,

Death in his eye, and palsy in his frame—

The demon, checked and cowed and trampled, now
Resumed his throne upon his lip and brow,

And both were crimsoned ;-from his dark eye broke
Glances that blasted like the lightning stroke:
He strode across the platform, and low bowed
His head the while to hide him from the crowd.
The false boards, as he passed the fatal spot,
Rocked to so fierce a tread; he heeded not:-
He reach'd the palisade—the indignant cry
Assailed him, as he paused, more furiously:
Then to his height he drew him, and at once
Let loose the gathered lightning of his glance;
His high-raised brow-his lip that wore the while

A sneer contempt had curled into a smile;
The reckless stern defiance of his look

Silenced the loudest, and the boldest shook.

Abrupt he turned on me :-I felt each sense
Quail to that terrible brow's magnificence;