Hark, o’er the busy mead the shell [Footnote 8] proclaim
Triumphs, and masques, and high heroic games. 
And now the old sit round; and now the young
Climb the green boughs, the murmuring doves among. 
Who claims the prize, when winged feet contend;
When twanging bows the flaming arrows [Footnote 9] send? 
Who stands self-centred in the field of fame,
And, grappling, flings to earth a giant’s frame? 
Whilst all, with anxious hearts and eager eyes,
Bend as he bends, and, as he rises, rise! 
And CORA’S self, in pride of beauty here,
Trembles with grief and joy, and hope and fear! 
(She who, the fairest, ever flew the first,
With cup of balm to quench his burning thirst;
Knelt at his head, her fan-leaf in her hand,
And humm’d the air that pleas’d him, while she fann’d)
How blest his lot!—­tho’, by the Muse unsung,
His name shall perish, when his knell is rung.

That night, transported, with a sigh I said
“’Tis all a dream!”—­Now, like a dream, ’tis fled;
And many and many a year has pass’d away,
And I alone remain to watch and pray! 
Yet oft in darkness, on my bed of straw,
Oft I awake and think on what I saw! 
The groves, the birds, the youths, the nymphs recall,
And CORA, loveliest, sweetest of them all!

[Footnote 1:  P. Martyr, dec. i. 5.]

[Footnote 2:  They believed that the souls of good men were conveyed to a pleasant valley, abounding in guavas and other delicious fruits.  Herrera, I. iii. 3.  F Columbus, c. 62.]

[Footnote 3:  “The dead walk abroad in the night, and feast with the living;” (F.  Columbus, c. 62) and “eat of the fruit called Guannaba.”  P. Martyr, dec.  I. 9.]

[Footnote 4:  An antient Cacique, in his life-time and after his death, employed by the Zemi to alarm his people.  See F. Columbus, c. 62.]

[Footnote 5:  The Author is speaking in his inspired character.  Hidden things arc revealed to him, and placed before his mind as if they were present.]

[Footnote 6:  Nor could they (the Powers of Darkness) have more effectually prevented the progress of the Faith, than by desolating the New World; by burying nations alive in mines, or consigning them in all their errors to the sword.  Relacion de B. de las Casas.]

[Footnote 7:  Not man alone, but many other animals became extinct there.]

[Footnote 8:  P. Martyr, dec. iii. c. 7.]

[Footnote 9:  Rochefort. c. xx. p. 559.]

CANTO XII. 
A Vision.

Still would I speak of Him before I went,
Who among us a life of sorrow spent, [u]
And, dying, left a world his monument;
Still, if the time allow’d!  My Hour draws near;
But He will prompt me when I faint with fear.
—–­Alas, He hears me not!  He cannot hear!

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