“O de la liberte vieille et sainte patrie! 
Terre autrefois feconde en sublimes vertus! 
Sous d’indignes Cesars maintenant asservie
Ton empire est tombe! tes heros ne sont plus! 
Mais dans son sein l’ame aggrandie
Croit sur leurs monumens respirer leur genie,
Comme on respire encore dans un temple aboli
La Majeste du Dieu dont il etait rempli.”

DE LA MARTINE.

THE SONG OF THE SYREN PARTHENOPE.

A RHAPSODY,

WRITTEN AT NAPLES.

Mine are these waves, and mine the twilight depths
O’er which they roll, and all these tufted isles
That lift their backs like dolphins from the deep,
And all these sunny shores that gird us round!

    Listen!  O listen to the Sea-maid’s shell! 
    Ye who have wander’d hither from far climes,
    (Where the coy summer yields but half her sweets,)
    To breathe my bland luxurious airs, and drink
    My sunbeams! and to revel in a land
    Where Nature—­deck’d out like a bride to meet
    Her lover—­lays forth all her charms, and smiles
    Languidly bright, voluptuously gay,
    Sweet to the sense, and tender to the heart.

    Listen!  O listen to the Sea-maid’s shell;
    Ye who have fled your natal shores in hate
    Or anger, urged by pale disease, or want,
    Or grief, that clinging like the spectre bat,
    Sucks drop by drop the life-blood from the heart,
    And hither come to learn forgetfulness,
    Or to prolong existence! ye shall find
    Both—­though the spring Lethean flow no more,
    There is a power in these entrancing skies
    And murmuring waters and delicious airs,
    Felt in the dancing spirits and the blood,
    And falling on the lacerated heart
    Like balm, until that life becomes a boon,
    Which elsewhere is a burthen and a curse.

    Hear then—­O hear the Sea-maid’s airy shell,
    Listen, O listen! ’tis the Syren sings,
    The spirit of the deep—­Parthenope—­
    She who did once i’ the dreamy days of old
    Sport on these golden sands beneath the moon,
    Or pour’d the ravishing music of her song
    Over the silent waters; and bequeath’d
    To all these sunny capes and dazzling shores
    Her own immortal beauty, and her name.

* * * * *

This is the last day of the Carnival, the last night of the opera; the people are permitted to go in masks, and after the performances there will be a ball.  To-day, when Baldi was describing the excesses which usually take place during the last few hours of the Carnival, he said, “the man who has but half a shirt will pawn it to-night to buy a good supper and an opera-ticket:  to-morrow for fish and soup-maigre—­fasting and repentance!”

* * * * *