d Wisdom errs,
Too fondly gazing on that grief of hers!
What lost a world, and bade a hero fly?
The timid tear in Cleopatra's eye.
Yet be the soft Triumvir's fault forgiven;
By this--how many lose not earth--but Heaven!
Consign their souls to Man's eternal foe,
And seal their own to spare some Wanton's woe! 1160

XVI.

'Tis Morn--and o'er his altered features play
The beams--without the Hope of yesterday.
What shall he be ere night? perchance a thing
O'er which the raven flaps her funeral wing,
By his closed eye unheeded and unfelt;
While sets that Sun, and dews of Evening melt,
Chill, wet, and misty round each stiffened limb,
Refreshing earth--reviving all but him!

CANTO THE THIRD.

"Come vedi--ancor non m'abbandona"
Dante, _Inferno_, v. 105.

I.

Slow sinks, more lovely ere his race be run,[224]
Along Morea's hills the setting Sun; 1170
Not, as in Northern climes, obscurely bright,
But one unclouded blaze of living light!
O'er the hushed deep the yellow beam he throws,
Gilds the green wave, that trembles as it glows.
On old AEgina's rock, and Idra's isle,[225]
The God of gladness sheds his parting smile;
O'er his own regions lingering, loves to shine,
Though there his altars are no more divine.
Descending fast the mountain shadows kiss
Thy glorious gulf, unconquered Salamis! 1180
Their azure arches through the long expanse
More deeply purpled met his mellowing glance,
And tenderest tints, along their summits driven,
Mark his gay course, and own the hues of Heaven;
Till, darkly shaded from the land and deep,
Behind his Delphian cliff he sinks to sleep.

On such an eve, his palest beam he cast,
When--Athens! here thy Wisest looked his last.
How watched thy better sons his farewell ray,
That closed their murdered Sage's[226] latest day! 1190
Not yet--not yet--Sol pauses on the hill--
The precious hour of parting lingers still;
But sad his light to agonising eyes,
And dark the mountain's once delightful dyes:
Gloom o'er the lovely land he seemed to pour,
The land, where Phoebus never frowned before:
But ere he sunk below Cithaeron's head