Fair was the scene around; an ample vale Whose mountain circle at the distant verge Lay softened on the sight; the near ascent Rose bolder up, in part abrupt and bare, Part with the ancient majesty of woods Adorn’d, or lifting high its rocks sublime. The river’s liquid radiance roll’d beneath, Beside the bower of Madelon it wound A broken stream, whose shallows, tho’ the waves Roll’d on their way with rapid melody, A child might tread. Behind, an orange grove Its gay green foliage starr’d with golden fruit; But with what odours did their blossoms load The passing gale of eve! less thrilling sweet Rose from the marble’s perforated floor, Where kneeling at her prayers, the Moorish queen Inhaled the cool delight,[8] and whilst she asked The Prophet for his promised paradise, Shaped from the present scene its utmost joys. A goodly scene! fair as that faery land Where Arthur lives, by ministering spirits borne From Camlan’s bloody banks; or as the groves Of earliest Eden, where, so legends say, Enoch abides, and he who rapt away By fiery steeds, and chariotted in fire, Past in his mortal form the eternal ways; And John, beloved of Christ, enjoying there The beatific vision, sometimes seen The distant dawning of eternal day, Till all things be fulfilled. “Survey this scene!” So Theodore address’d the Maid of Arc, “There is no evil here, no wretchedness, It is the Heaven of those who nurst on earth Their nature’s gentlest feelings. Yet not here Centering their joys, but with a patient hope, Waiting the allotted hour when capable Of loftier callings, to a better state They pass; and hither from that better state Frequent they come, preserving so those ties That thro’ the infinite progressiveness Complete our perfect bliss. “Even such, so blest, Save that the memory of no sorrows past Heightened the present joy, our world was once, In the first æra of its innocence Ere man had learnt to bow the knee to man. Was there a youth whom warm affection fill’d, He spake his honest heart; the earliest fruits His toil produced, the sweetest flowers that deck’d The sunny bank, he gather’d for the maid, Nor she disdain’d the gift; for Vice not yet Had burst the dungeons of her hell, and rear’d Those artificial boundaries that divide Man from his species. State of blessedness! Till that ill-omen’d hour when Cain’s stern son Delved in the bowels of the earth for gold, Accursed bane of virtue! of such force As poets feign dwelt in the Gorgon’s locks, Which whoso saw, felt instant the life-blood Cold curdle in his veins, the creeping flesh Grew stiff with horror, and the heart forgot To beat. Accursed hour! for man no more To Justice paid his homage, but forsook Her altars, and bow’d down before the shrine Of Wealth and Power, the Idols he had made. Then Hell enlarged herself, her gates flew wide, Her legion fiends rush’d forth. Oppression came Whose frown is desolation, and whose breath Blasts like the Pestilence; and Poverty,