SHAKSPEARE ODE.

BY CHARLES SPRAGUE.

GOD of the glorious Lyre!
Whose notes of old on lofty Pindus rang,
While Jove's exulting choir

Caught the glad echoes and responsive sang-
Come! bless the service and the shrine,

We consecrate to thee and thine.

Fierce from the frozen north,

When havoc led his legions forth,

O'er Learning's sunny groves the dark destroyer spread:

In dust the sacred statue slept,

Fair Science round her altars wept,
And Wisdom cowled his head.

At length, Olympian Lord of morn,

The raven veil of night was torn,

When, through golden clouds descending,

Thou didst hold thy radiant flight,

O'er nature's lovely pageant bending,

Till Avon rolled, all-sparkling, to thy sight!

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SHAKSPEARE

ODE.

There, on its bank, beneath the mulberry's shade,
Wrapp'd in young dreams, a wild-eyed minstrel strayed

Lighting there and lingering long,
Thou didst teach the bard his song;

Thy fingers strung his sleeping shell,
And round his brows a garland curled;
On his lips thy spirit fell,

And bade him wake and warm the world!

Then Shakspeare rose!
Across the trembling strings

His daring hand he flings,

And lo! a new creation glows!

There, clustering round, submissive to his will,
Fate's vassal train his high commands fulfil.

Madness, with his frightful scream,

Vengeance, leaning on his lance,

Avarice, with his blade and beam,

Hatred, blasting with a glance;

Remorse, that weeps, and Rage, that roars,

And Jealousy, that dotes, but dooms, and murders, yet

adores.

Mirth, his face with sun-beams lit,
Waking laughter's merry swell,

Arm in arm with fresh-eyed Wit,

That waves his tingling lash, while Folly shakes his bell.

SHAKSPEARE ODE.

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Despair, that haunts the gurgling stream,
Kissed by the virgin moon's cold beam,

Where some lost maid wild chaplets wreathes,
And swan-like, there her own dirge breathes,
Then, broken-hearted, sinks to rest,

Beneath the bubbling wave, that shrouds her maniac breast.

Young Love, with eye of tender gloom,
Now drooping o'er the hallowed tomb,
Where his plighted victims lie,

Where they met, but met to die:

And now, when crimson buds are sleeping,
Through the dewy arbor peeping,

Where beauty's child, the frowning world forgot,
To youth's devoted tale is listening,

Rapture on her dark lash glistening,

While fairies leave their cowslip cells and guard the happy spot.

Thus rise the phantom throng,

Obedient to their Master's song,

And lead in willing chain the wondering soul along.
For other worlds war's Great One sighed in vain,—
O'er other worlds see Shakspeare rove and reign!

The rapt magician of his own wild lay,
Earth and her tribes his mystic wand obey.

Old ocean trembles, thunder cracks the skies,

Air teems with shapes, and tell-tale spectres rise:

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SHAKSPEARE ODE.

Night's paltering hags their fearful orgies keep,
And faithless guilt unseals the lip of sleep:
Time yields his trophies up, and death restores
The mouldered victims of his voiceless shores.
The fire-side legend and the faded page,

The crime that cursed, the deed that blessed an age,
All, all come forth-the good to charm and cheer,
To scourge bold Vice, and start the generous tear;
With pictured Folly gazing fools to shame,
And guide young Glory's foot along the path of fame.

Lo! hand in hand,

Hell's juggling sisters stand,

To greet

their victim from the fight;

Grouped on the blasted heath,

They tempt him to the work of death,

Then melt in air and mock his wondering sight.

In midnight's hallowed hour,

He seeks the fatal tower,

Where the lone raven, perched on high,

Pours to the sullen gale

Her hoarse prophetic wail,

And croaks the dreadful moment nigh.

See, by the phantom dagger led,

Pale, guilty thing,

Slowly he steals with silent tread, .

And grasps his coward steel to smite his sleeping king.

Hark! 'tis the signal bell,