sk now sheds no parting rays,
And through thy trophied hall the burnished shield
Disperses wide the swiftly mounting blaze.
II.
Thy pious paladins from Jordan's shore,
And all thy steel-clad barons are at rest;
Thy turrets sound to warder's tread no more;
Beneath their brow the dove hath hung her nest;
High on thy beams the harmless falchion shines;
No stormy trumpet wakes thy deep repose;
Past are the days that, on the serried lines
Around thy walls, saw the portcullis close.
III.
The bitter feud was quell'd, the culverin
No longer flash'd, us blighting mischief round,
But many an age was on those ivies green,
Ere Taste's calm eye had scann'd the gifted ground;
Bade the fair path o'er glade or woodland stray,
Bade Avon's swans through new Rialtos glide,
Forced through the rock its deeply channell'd way,
And threw, to Arts of peace, the portals wide.
IV.
But most to Her, whose light and daring hand
Can swiftly follow Fancy's wildest dream!
All times and nations in whose presence stand,
All that creation owns, her boundless theme!
And with her came the maid of Attic stole,
Untaught of dazzling schools the gauds to prize,
Who breathes in purest forms her calm control,
Heroic strength, and grace that never dies!
V.
Ye that have linger'd o'er each form divine,
Beneath the vault of Rome's unsullied sky,
Or where Bologna's cloister'd walls enshrine
Her martyr Saint--her mystic Rosary--
Of Arragon the hapless daughter view!
Scan, for ye may, that fine enamel near!
Such Catherine was, thus Leonardo drew--
Discern ye not the "Jove of painters" here?
VI.
Discern ye not the mighty master's power
In yon devoted Saint's uplifted eye?
That clouds the brow and bids already lour
O'er the First Charles the shades of sorrows nigh?
That now on furrow'd front of Rembrandt gleams,
Now breathes the rose of life and beauty there,
In the soft eye of Henrietta dreams,
And fills with fire the glance of Gondomar?
VII.
Here to Salvator's solemn pencil true,
Huge oaks swing rudely in the mountain blast;
Here grave Poussin on gloomy canvass threw
The lights that steal from clouds of tempest past;
And see! from Canaletti's glassy wave,
Like Eastern mosques, patrician Venice rise;
Or marble moles that rippling waters lave,
Where Claude's warm sun
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