But oh! to him, whose self-accusing thought Whispers ’twas _he_ that desolation wrought; He who his country and his faith betray’d, And lent Castile revengeful, powerful aid; A voice of sorrow swells in every gale, Each wave low rippling tells a mournful tale: And as the shrubs, untended, unconfined, In wild exuberance rustle to the wind, Each leaf hath language to his startled sense, And seems to murmur--“Thou hast driven her hence!” And well he feels to trace her flight were vain, --Where hath lost love been once recall’d again? In her pure breast, so long by anguish torn, His name can rouse no feeling now--but scorn. O bitter hour! when first the shuddering heart Wakes to behold the void within--and start! To feel its own abandonment, and brood O’er the chill bosom’s depth of solitude. The stormy passions that in Hamet’s breast Have sway’d so long, so fiercely, are at rest; The avenger’s task is closed:[100]--he finds too late It hath not changed his feelings, but his fate. He was a lofty spirit, turn’d aside From its bright path by woes, and wrongs, and pride, And onward, in its new tumultuous course, Borne with too rapid and intense a force To pause one moment in the dread career, And ask if such could be its native sphere. Now are those days of wild delirium o’er, Their fears and hopes excite his soul no more; The feverish energies of passion close, And his heart sinks in desolate repose, Turns sickening from the world, yet shrinks not less From its own deep and utter loneliness. There is a sound of voices on the air, A flash of armour to the sunbeam’s glare, Midst the wild Alpuxarras;[101]--there, on high, Where mountain-snows are mingling with the sky, A few brave tribes, with spirits yet unbroke, Have fled indignant from the Spaniard’s yoke. O ye dread scenes! where nature dwells alone, Severely glorious on her craggy throne; Ye citadels of rock, gigantic forms, Veil’d by the mists and girdled by the storms,-- Ravines, and glens, and deep resounding caves, That hold communion with the torrent-waves; And ye, th’ unstain’d and everlasting snows, That dwell above in bright and still repose; To you, in every clime, in every age, Far from the tyrant’s or the conqueror’s rage, Hath Freedom led her sons--untired to keep Her fearless vigils on the barren steep. She, like the mountain-eagle, still delights To gaze exulting from unconquer’d heights, And build her eyrie in defiance proud, To dare the wind, and mingle with the cloud.