| |
| THROUGH that celestial forest, whose thick shade | |
| With lively greenness the new-springing day | |
| Attemper’d, eager now to roam, and search | |
| Its limits round, forthwith I left the bank; | |
| Along the champain leisurely my way | 5 |
| Pursuing, o’er the ground, that on all sides | |
| Delicious odour breathed. A pleasant air, | |
| That intermitted never, never veer’d, | |
| Smote on my temples, gently, as a wind | |
| Of softest influence: at which the sprays, | 10 |
| Obedient all, lean’d trembling to that part 1 | |
| Where first the holy mountain casts his shade; | |
| Yet were not so disorder’d, but that still | |
| Upon their top the feather’d quiristers | |
| Applied their wonted art, and with full joy | 15 |
| Welcomed those hours of prime, and warbled shrill | |
| Amid the leaves, that to their jocund lays | |
| Kept tenour; even as from branch to branch, | |
| Along the piny forests on the shore | |
| Of Chiassi, rolls the gathering melody, | 20 |
| When Eolus hath from his cavern loosed | |
| The dripping south. Already had my steps, | |
| Though slow, so far into that ancient wood | |
| Transported me, I could not ken the place | |
| Where I had enter’d; when, behold! my path | 25 |
| Was bounded by a rill, which, to the left, | |
| With little rippling waters bent the grass | |
| That issued from its brink. On earth no wave | |
| How clean soe’er, that would not seem to have | |
| Some mixture in itself, compared with this, | 30 |
| Transpicuous clear; yet darkly on it roll’d, | |
| Darkly beneath perpetual gloom, which ne’er | |
| Admits or sun or moon-light there to shine. | |
| My feet advanced not; but my wondering eyes | |
| Pass’d onward, o’er the streamlet to survey | 35 |
| The tender May-bloom, flush’d through many a hue, | |
| In prodigal variety: and there, | |
| As object, rising suddenly to view, | |
| That from our bosom every thought beside | |
| With the rare marvel chases, I beheld | 40 |
| A lady 2 all alone, who, singing, went, | |
| And culling flower from flower, wherewith her way | |
| Was all o’er painted. “Lady beautiful! | |
| Thou, who (if looks, that use to speak the heart, | |
| Art worthy of our trust) with love’s own beam | 45 |
| Dost warm thee,” thus to her my speech I framed; | |
| “Ah! please thee hither toward the streamlet bend | |
| Thy steps so near, that I may list thy song. | |
| Beholding thee and this fair place, methinks, | |
| I call to mind where wander’d and how look’d | 50 |
| Proserpine, in that season, when her child | |
| The mother lost, and she the bloomy spring.” | |
| As when a lady, turning in the dance, | |
| Doth foot it featly, and advances scarce | |
| One step before the other to the ground; | 55 |
| Over the yellow and vermilion flowers, | |
| Thus turn’d she at my suit, most maiden-like | |
| Valing her sober eyes; and came so near, | |
| That I distinctly caught the dulcet sound. | |
| Arriving where the limpid waters now | 60 |
| Laved the greensward, her eyes she deign’d to raise, | |
| That shot such splendour on me, as I ween | |
| Ne’er glanced from Cytherea’s, when her son | |
| Had sped his keenest weapon to her heart. | |
| Upon the opposite bank she stood and smiled; | 65 |
| As through her graceful fingers shifted still | |
| The intermingling dyes, which without seed | |
| That lofty land unbosoms. By the stream | |
| Three paces only were we sunder’d: yet, | |
| The Hellespont, where Xerxes pass’d it o’er, | 70 |
| (A curb for ever to the pride of man, 3) | |
| Was by Leander not more hateful held | |
| For floating, with inhospitable wave, | |
| ’Twixt Sestos and Abydos, than by me | |
| That flood, because it gave no passage thence. | 75 |
| “Strangers ye come; and haply in this place, | |
| That cradled human nature in its birth, | |
| Wondering, ye not without suspicion view | |
| My smiles: but that sweet strain of psalmody, | |
| ‘Thou, Lord! hast made me glad,’ 4 will give ye light, | 80 |
| Which may uncloud your minds. And thou, who stand’st | |
| The foremost, and didst make thy suit to me, | |
| Say if aught else thou wish to hear: for I | |
| Came prompt to answer every doubt of thine.” | |
| She spake; and I replied: “I know not how | 85 |
| To reconcile this wave, and rustling sound | |
| Of forest leaves, with what I late have heard | |
| Of opposite report.” She answering thus: | |
| “I will unfold the cause, whence that proceeds, | |
| Which makes thee wonder; and so purge the cloud | 90 |
| That hath enwrapt thee. The First Good, whose joy | |
| Is only in Himself, created man, | |
| For happiness; and gave this goodly place, | |
| His pledge and earnest of eternal peace. | |
| Favour’d thus highly, through his own defect | 95 |
| He fell; and here made short sojourn; he fell, | |
| And, for the bitterness of sorrow, changed | |
| Laughter unblamed and ever-new delight. | |
| That vapours none, exhaled from earth beneath, | |
| Or from the waters, (which, wherever heat | 100 |
| Attracts them, follow), might ascend thus far | |
| To vex man’s peaceful state, this mountain rose | |
| So high toward the Heaven, nor fears the rage | |
| Of elements contending; from that part | |
| Exempted, where the gate his limit bars. | 105 |
| Because the circumambient air, throughout, | |
| With its first impulse circles still, unless | |
| Aught interpose to check or thwart its course; | |
| Upon the summit, which on every side | |
| To visitation of the impassive air | 110 |
| Is open, doth that motion strike, and makes | |
| Beneath its sway the umbrageous wood resound: | |
| And in the shaken plant such power resides, | |
| That it impregnates with its efficacy | |
| The voyaging breeze, upon whose subtle plume | 115 |
| That, wafted, flies abroad; and the other land, 5 | |
| Receiving, (as ’tis worthy in itself, | |
| Or in the clime, that warms it,) doth conceive; | |
| And from its womb produces many a tree | |
| Of various virtue. This when thou hast heard, | 120 |
| The marvel ceases, if in yonder earth | |
| Some plant, without apparent seed, be found | |
| To fix its fibrous stem. And further learn, | |
| That with prolific foison of all seeds | |
| This holy plain is fill’d, and in itself | 125 |
| Bears fruit that ne’er was pluck’d on other soil. | |
| “The water, thou behold’st, springs not from vein, | |
| Restored by vapour, that the cold converts; | |
| As stream that intermittently repairs | |
| And spends his pulse of life; but issues forth | 130 |
| From fountain, solid, undecaying, sure: | |
| And, by the Will Omnific, full supply | |
| Feeds whatsoe’er on either side it pours; | |
| On this, devolved with power to take away | |
| Remembrance of offence; on that, to bring | 135 |
| Remembrance back of every good deed done. | |
| From whence its name of Lethe on this part; | |
| On the other, Eunoë: both of which must first | |
| Be tasted, ere it work; the last exceeding | |
| All flavours else. Albeit thy thirst may now | 140 |
| Be well contented, if I here break off, | |
| No more revealing; yet a corollary | |
| I freely give beside: nor deem my words | |
| Less grateful to thee, if they somewhat pass | |
| The stretch of promise. They, whose verse of yore | 145 |
| The golden age recorded and its bliss, | |
| On the Parnassian mountain, of this place | |
| Perhaps had dream’d. Here was man guiltless; here | |
| Perpetual spring, and every fruit; and this | |
| The far-famed nectar.” Turning to the bards, | 150 |
| When she had ceased, I noted in their looks | |
| A smile at her conclusion; then my face | |
| Again directed to the lovely dame. | |
