We come not, fair one! to thy hand of snow From the soft scenes by Culture’s hand array’d; Not rear’d in bowers where gales of fragrance blow, But in dark glens, and depths of forest shade! There once, as Venus wander’d, lost in woe, To seek Adonis through th’ entangled wood, Piercing her foot, a thorn that lurk’d below With print relentless drew celestial blood! Then our light stems, with snowy blossoms fraught, Bending to earth, each precious drop we caught, Imbibing thence our bright purpureal dyes; We were not foster’d in our shadowy vales By guided rivulets or summer gales-- Our dew and air have been Love’s balmy tears and sighs! PINDEMONTE. ON THE HEBE OF CANOVA. “Dove per te, celeste ancilla, or vassi?” Whither, celestial maid, so fast away? What lures thee from the banquet of the skies? How canst thou leave thy native realms of day For this low sphere, this vale of clouds and sighs? O thou, Canova! soaring high above Italian art--with Grecian magic vying! We knew thy marble glow’d with life and love, But who had seen thee image footsteps flying? Here to each eye the wind seems gently playing With the light vest, its wavy folds arraying In many a line of undulating grace; While Nature, ne’er her mighty laws suspending, Stands, before marble thus with motion blending, One moment lost in thought, its hidden cause to trace. [A volume of translations published in 1818, might have been called by anticipation, “Lays of many Lands.” At the time now alluded to, her inspirations were chiefly derived from classical subjects. The “graceful superstitions” of Greece, and the sublime patriotism of Rome, held an influence over her thoughts which is evinced by many of the works of this period--such as “The Restoration of the Works of Art to Italy,” “Modern Greece,” and several of the poems which formed the volume entitled “Tales and Historic Scenes.”