Fare ye well, old crags and castles! now with me for ever dwells, Twined with many a freakish joy, the stately front of Drachenfels. O'er thy viny cliffs we rambled, where the patient peasant toils, Where the rugged copse scarce shelters from the sun that broadly smiles, And the fresh green crown is plaited from the German's oaken bower: Here we wandered, social pilgrims, careless as the sunny hour, Gay and free, nor touched with horror of the legendary wood, Harnessed priests and iron knights, and dragons banqueting on blood. Praise who will the mail-clad epoch, when the princes all were reivers, Every maundering monk a god, and all who heard him dumb believers; Me, the peaceful present pleases, and the sober rule of law, Quiet homes, and hearths secure, and creeds redeemed from idiot-awe; Peopled cities' din; and where then tolled the cloister's languid chime, Now the hum of frequent voices from each furthest human clime, Every form of various life beneath the crag that bears the vine, Borne upon the steam-ploughed current of the placid-rolling Rhine. Fare thee well, thou kingly river! while the sun thy vineyards cheers, I will not behold thy glory through a cloud of feeble tears. Bring the purple Walportzheimer, pour the Rudesheimer clear, In the green and vine-clad arbour spread the goodly German cheer; Call the friends who love me dearly, call the men of sense and soul, Call the hearts whose blithe blood billows like the juice that brims the bowl; With free cheer free thoughts be wedded; high as heaven, deep as hell, Wide as are the dark blue spaces where the starry tenants dwell. Let the German hymn, that echoes from the Sound to Adria's Sea, Ring damnation to the despot, peal salvation to the free; And when I from vine-clad mountains and from sunny woods am far, By the cold bleak coast of Buchan, where wild Winter loves to war, In my memory crag and castle, church and learned hall, shall shine Brightly, with the seven hills glorious of fair Bonn upon the Rhine. J. S. B. FAHRGASSE BONN, _August 1851_. THE REFORM MEASURES OF 1852.