III.

The sunbeams are my shafts, with which I kill
Deceit, that loves the night and fears the day;
All men who do or even imagine ill

Fly me, and from the glory of my ray
Good minds and open actions take new might,
Until diminished by the reign of night.

IV.

I feed the clouds, the rainbows and the flowers With their ætherial colours; the Moon's globe And the pure stars in their eternal bowers

Are cinctured with my power as with a robe; Whatever lamps on Earth or Heaven may shine, Are portions of one power, which is mine.

V.

I stand at noon upon the peak of Heaven,
Then with unwilling steps I wander down
Into the clouds of the Atlantic even;

For grief that I depart they weep and frown:
What look is more delightful than the smile
With which I soothe them from the western isle?

VI.

I am the eye with which the Universe
Beholds itself and knows itself divine;

All harmony of instrument or verse,

All prophecy, all medicine are mine,
All light of art or nature;-to my song,
Victory and praise in their own right belong.

1 So in Mrs. Shelley's editions: Mr. Rossetti substitutes its.

HYMN OF PAN.

I.

FROM the forests and highlands

We come, we come;
From the river-girt islands,

Where loud waves are dumb

Listening to my sweet pipings.

The wind in the reeds and the rushes,
The bees on the bells of thyme,
The birds on the myrtle bushes,
The cicale above in the lime,
And the lizards below in the grass,
Were as silent as ever old Tmolus1 was,
Listening to my sweet pipings.

II.

Liquid Peneus was flowing,

And all dark Tempe lay

In Pelion's shadow, outgrowing

The light of the dying day,

Speeded by my sweet pipings.

The Sileni, and Sylvans, and Fauns,

And the Nymphs of the woods and waves,

To the edge of the moist river-lawns,

And the brink of the dewy caves,

And all that did then attend and follow
Were silent with love, as you now, Apollo,
With envy of my sweet pipings.

1 The note referred to at p. 34 explains that "Apollo and Pan contended before Tmolus for the prize in

music."

2 So in the Posthumous Poems, but with in the editions of 1839.

III.

I sang of the dancing stars,

I sang of the dædal Earth,
And of Heaven-and the giant wars,
And Love, and Death, and Birth,-

And then I changed my pipings,——
Singing how down the vale of Menalus
I pursued a maiden and clasped a reed:
Gods and men, we are all deluded thus!

It breaks in our bosom and then we bleed: All wept, as I think both ye now would, If envy or age had not frozen your blood, At the sorrow of my sweet pipings.

ΤΟ

I.

I FEAR thy kisses, gentle maiden,
Thou needest not fear mine;
My spirit is too deeply laden

Ever to burthen thine.

II.

I fear thy mien, thy tones, thy motion,
Thou needest not fear mine;

Innocent is the heart's devotion

With which I worship thine.

1 First given in the Posthumous Poems,- -as was also the next.

THE TWO SPIRITS.

AN ALLEGORY.

FIRST SPIRIT.

O THOU, who plumed with strong desire
Wouldst float above the earth, beware!
A Shadow tracks thy flight of fire-

Night is coming!

Bright are the regions of the air,
And among the winds and beams
It were delight to wander there-
Night is coming!

SECOND SPIRIT.

The deathless stars are bright above;

If I would cross the shade of night,
Within my heart is the lamp of love,

And that is day!

And the moon will smile2 with gentle light
On my golden plumes where'er they move;
The meteors will linger round my flight,
And make night day.

FIRST SPIRIT.

But if the whirlwinds of darkness waken
Hail, and lightning, and stormy rain;
See, the bounds of the air are shaken-
Night is coming!

1 Would in the Posthumous Poems, but Wouldst in the editions of 1839.

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5

15

20

2 So in Mrs. Shelley's editions; but shine in Mr. Rossetti's.

The red swift clouds of the hurricane

Yon declining sun have overtaken,

The clash of the hail sweeps over the plain-
Night is coming!

SECOND SPIRIT.

I see the light, and I hear the sound;

I'll sail on the flood of the tempest dark,
With the calm within and the light around
Which makes night day:

And thou, when the gloom is deep and stark,
Look from thy dull earth, slumber-bound,

My moon-like1 flight thou then may'st mark
On high, far away.

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30

Some say there is a precipice

Where one vast pine is frozen to ruin

O'er piles of snow and chasms of ice

'Mid Alpine mountains;

And that the languid storm pursuing

That winged shape, for ever flies

Round those hoar branches, aye renewing
Its aëry fountains.

Some say when nights are dry and clear,

And the death-dews sleep on the morass,

Sweet whispers are heard by the traveller,
Which make night day:

And a silver shape like his early love doth pass
Upborne by her wild and glittering hair,

And when he awakes on the fragrant grass,
He finds night day.

1 In the Posthumous Poems, moonlike; but moonlight in the editions of

1839.

2 In Mrs. Shelley's editions, makes.

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40

46