Yet mark their mirth—ere
lenten days begin,
That penance which their holy rites
prepare
To shrive from man his weight of
mortal sin,
By daily abstinence and nightly
prayer;
But ere his sackcloth garb Repentance
wear,
Some days of joyaunce are decreed
to all,
To take of pleasaunce each his secret
share,
In motley robe to dance at masking
ball,
And join the mimic train of merry Carnival.
LXXIX.
And whose more rife with merriment
than thine,
O Stamboul! once the empress of
their reign?
Though turbans now pollute Sophia’s
shrine
And Greece her very altars eyes
in vain:
(Alas! her woes will still pervade
my strain!)
Gay were her minstrels once, for
free her throng,
All felt the common joy they now
must feign;
Nor oft I’ve seen such sight,
nor heard such song,
As wooed the eye, and thrilled the Bosphorus along.
LXXX.
Loud was the lightsome tumult on
the shore;
Oft Music changed, but never ceased
her tone,
And timely echoed back the measured
oar,
And rippling waters made a pleasant
moan:
The Queen of tides on high consenting
shone;
And when a transient breeze swept
o’er the wave,
’Twas as if, darting from
her heavenly throne,
A brighter glance her form reflected
gave,
Till sparkling billows seemed to light the banks they
lave.
LXXXI.
Glanced many a light caique along
the foam,
Danced on the shore the daughters
of the land,
No thought had man or maid of rest
or home,
While many a languid eye and thrilling
hand
Exchanged the look few bosoms may
withstand,
Or gently pressed, returned the
pressure still:
Oh Love! young Love! bound in thy
rosy band,
Let sage or cynic prattle as he
will,
These hours, and only these, redeemed Life’s
years of ill!
LXXXII.
But, midst the throng in merry masquerade,
Lurk there no hearts that throb
with secret pain,
E’en through the closest searment
half-betrayed?
To such the gentle murmurs of the
main
Seem to re-echo all they mourn in
vain;
To such the gladness of the gamesome
crowd
Is source of wayward thought and
stern disdain:
How do they loathe the laughter
idly loud,
And long to change the robe of revel for the shroud!
LXXXIII.
This must he feel, the true-born
son of Greece,
If Greece one true-born patriot
can boast:
Not such as prate of war but skulk
in peace,
The bondsman’s peace, who
sighs for all he lost,
Yet with smooth smile his tyrant
can accost,
And wield the slavish sickle, not
the sword:
Ah, Greece! they love thee least
who owe thee most —
Their birth, their blood, and that
sublime record
Of hero sires, who shame thy now degenerate horde!