These might have been her destiny; but no, Our hearts deny it: and so young, so fair, Good without effort, great without a foe; But now a bride and mother--and now THERE! How many ties did that stern moment tear! From thy Sire's to his humblest subject's breast Is linked the electric chain of that despair, Whose shock was as an earthquake's, and oppressed The land which loved thee so, that none could love thee best. CLXXIII. Lo, Nemi! navelled in the woody hills So far, that the uprooting wind which tears The oak from his foundation, and which spills The ocean o'er its boundary, and bears Its foam against the skies, reluctant spares The oval mirror of thy glassy lake; And, calm as cherished hate, its surface wears A deep cold settled aspect nought can shake, All coiled into itself and round, as sleeps the snake. CLXXIV. And near Albano's scarce divided waves Shine from a sister valley;--and afar The Tiber winds, and the broad ocean laves The Latian coast where sprung the Epic war, 'Arms and the Man,' whose reascending star Rose o'er an empire,--but beneath thy right Tully reposed from Rome;--and where yon bar Of girdling mountains intercepts the sight, The Sabine farm was tilled, the weary bard's delight. CLXXV. But I forget.--My pilgrim's shrine is won, And he and I must part,--so let it be,-- His task and mine alike are nearly done; Yet once more let us look upon the sea: The midland ocean breaks on him and me, And from the Alban mount we now behold Our friend of youth, that ocean, which when we Beheld it last by Calpe's rock unfold Those waves, we followed on till the dark Euxine rolled CLXXVI. Upon the blue Symplegades: long years-- Long, though not very many--since have done Their work on both; some suffering and some tears Have left us nearly where we had begun: Yet not in vain our mortal race hath run, We have had our reward--and it is here; That we can yet feel gladdened by the sun, And reap from earth, sea, joy almost as dear As if there were no man to trouble what is clear. CLXXVII. Oh! that the Desert were my dwelling-place, With one fair Spirit for my minister, That I might all forget the human race, And, hating no one, love but only her! Ye Elements!--in whose ennobling stir I feel myself exalted--can ye not Accord me such a being? Do I err In deeming such inhabit many a spot? Though with them to converse can rarely be our lot. CLXXVIII. There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore, There is society where none intrudes, By the deep Sea, and music in its roar: I love not Man the less, but Nature more, From these our interviews, in which I steal From all I may be, or have been before, To mingle with the Universe, and feel What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal. CLXXIX.