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This occurred many years ago.  Well, time has brought its compensating comforts, and I am at least able to exclaim, “Quum multa injusta ac prava fiunt moribus!” without being guilty of using a false quantity!

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“IN THE AIR!”

A PARABLE FOR THE PERIOD.

  “A course precipitous, of dizzy speed
  Suspending thought and breath; a monstrous sight! 
  For in the air do I behold indeed
  An Eagle and a Serpent wreathed in fight. 
    —­SHELLEY’s Revolt of Islam.

      A monstrous sight!  Through SHELLEY’s vision rare
      Of high Revolt one mighty image glows,
      This pregnant symbol of the struggling pair,
      So strangely matched, and wildly-warring foes,
      Filling the startled air with Titan throes. 
      Interpret as you will that Winged Form,
      High-soaring, keen-eyed, of imperial pose,
      Or that close-clinging, coiled Colossal Worm;
  ’Tis an eternal type of strife amidst the storm.

      The symbol speaks, though variously applied,
      Of snaking sleight that soaring strength assails,
      And strives to drag it from its place of pride,
      And, after cruel conflict, faints and fails. 
      Sometimes it seems the air’s strong monarch vails
      His crest awhile, as, hampering coil on coil,
      Insidious knot on pinion proud prevails;
      Yet towering greatness crawling hate shall foil,
  Nor shall the Bird of Jove be long the Python’s spoil.

      Strong-winged this Eagle, either wafter ready
      To buoy and to upbear that body great. 
      Potent of beak and claw, of eye-glance steady,
      Lord of the air, and master of its fate,
      It seems, it seems, sailing in splendid state
      Athwart the stretches of the skyey blue. 
      Yet what might be the fleet-winged wanderer’s fate. 
      Did either pinion fail?  Its flight is true
  Only when level buoyed upon the plumy two.

      “A shaft of light upon its wings descended. 
      And every golden feather gleamed therein.” 
      Ay! and their fate’s inextricably blended;
      Let either faint or flag, they shall not win
      Athwart the aerial azure clear and thin. 
      Brothered in use are they, in use and need. 
      See how the Serpent’s many-coloured skin
      Writhes hither, thither, with insidious heed,
  Striving to maim one pinion.  Shall the pest succeed?

      Bred far below, in dank malarious slime,
      That Serpent hath no power to soar in air,
      Save clinging to winged creatures that can climb
      The empyrean; yet from its foul lair
      It sprang to the broad wings it would ensnare,
      Encoil, enshackle, hamper, break, drag down. 
      How swept the Bird so low that it should dare,
      That Worm, to wriggle midst its plumes full grown,
  And with the Air’s sole monarch thus dispute the crown?