k>\ ii /?.2'?6 6'31 as limiu '' ;.^5-/ :/'; V^'^*^^ \ Cornell University Library The original of tinis bool< is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013456623 ■b^ ""."^'"rM M4 " To abstract the mind from all local emotion would be impossible were it endeavoured, and would be foolish if it were possible. Whatever withdraws us from the power of our senses, whatever makes the past, the distant, or the future, predominate over the present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings. Far from me, and from my friends, be such frigid philosophy as may conduct us indififerent and unmoved over any ground which has been dignified by wisdom, bravery, or virtue: That man is little to be envied, whose patriotism would not gain force upon the plain of Marathon, or whose piety would not grow warmer among the ruins of lona." — Johnson's Toor in the Hebrides. Wi)t f ilffn'mase* CONTENTS. THE APPROACH. — JERUSALEM. — RIJAH, ELISHA'S SPRING. — THE DEAD 8EA.- THE ENCAMPMENT. — ESDRAELON, TIBERIAS. — LEBANON. — THE CONVENT.- CONCI.USION. 1. Another mom ! — Land should be near us now. If chart and sextant tell their message true. Twice in such dawn's reflected blaze our prow Has bathed, since Ida faded from our view ; And lo ! a cloud-speck on the horizon blue ! Our goal, our dream by night, our waking thought. Fervent as his, who, first of all his crew. Tracked in his midnight watch the hght which brought That mutinous crew's rebuke, proof of the world he sought. ( ' ) THE PILGRIMAGE. II. High thoughts were douhtless his, whose toil severe The barrier pierced of the mysterious West, Traced the full round of Earth's completed sphere. And brought her argued balance to the test ; High thoughts were his. — But could the rising crest E'en of a new and nameless world combine. Though fair as fabled islands of the blest, Such themes for thought, as round the bosom's shrine Crowd at thy hallowed name, immortal Palestine ? III. And would the sage, our country's pride, who bore To ruder chmes, o'er rougher waves than these, The torch of wisdom, where the Atlantic's roar Reverberates through the storm-swept Hebrides, Were near me now ! From shores of Syrian seas His mind had drawn a moral more profound Than from lona's ruin ; while the breeze From Sharon's plain (") shed holier influence round Than Persian's grave exhales, or Greek's sepulchral mound. IV. For not on Marathon the prize was gained By man, which none but Heaven for man could win ; Freed from the Persian's yoke, the soul remained The unenfranchised serf of death and sin ; Not by terrestrial champion, in the din Of war, the shackles of that slave were riven ; And if to men that cloistered pUe within. While darkness dwelt around, some light was given. On Calvary first it dawned, fresh from its native heaven. THE PILGRIMAGE. V. And, Byron ! thou, whose eagle eye and wing No sun could dazzle and no flight could tire, Was it enough a careless hand to fling In fancy's wajrward mood o'er Judah's lyre ? To bid some transient gleam of hght aspire, In doubt and darkness only to subside, Which, kindled here at founts of living fire. Had spread perennial lustre far and wide. And made thy Christian song a Christian country's pride ? VI. For thee the powers of evil and of good, Which o'er the Hebrew prophet's corse of old On Horeb's chfi^ in balanced conflict stood. Renewed their strife. (') — Enough ! — Thy days are told : Greece shook to hear thy funeral thunders rolled From Missolonghi's rampart, when she paid Her warrior requiem to thy relics cold : The scales of heaven in which thy deeds are weighed Are not for us to poise : — peace to thy mighty shade ! Heaven seemed to smile upon our joyous band Through Jaffa's portal as our course we sped ; For Spring -with verdure decked our promised land. The cistus flower beneath our camels' tread Gave its crushed odours forth, and o'er our head The tree whieh Zaccheus chmbed, C) a grateful screen. Between us and the sun o'er-arching spread. Tin day light died, and evening's star serene. Ere Ramla's tower we reached, shone through that vault of green. THE PILGRIMAGE. VIll. And sweet our rest and pleasant were our dreams In Ramla's convent cell ; but with the sun We needs must onward. Loitering ill beseems The pilgrim band, whose task is only done At Zion's barrier when their course is run. Emblem of human life the path which leads To Zion's courts : friends leave us one by one ; The landscape saddens, and to flowery meads The mountain's toilsome pass and dark ravine succeeds. IX. Down yonder path, which now the Armenian horde Chokes with its Tartar march for many a mile. How many a pilgrim stream of life has poured For centuries past ! From northern Iceland's isle To the far founts of Abyssinian Nile, C) Monk, warrior, bigot, saint, have urged their way. And thronged and jostled in that close defile. To brave the Moslem's might, or ovsm his sway. In peaceful palmer's guise, or harnessed war's array. On yonder summit (*) desolate and bare. His barbed war-horse Enghsh Richard reined. And halted to survey ■with hon glare The bourne, which fields of slaughter fought and gained. And toU, and fiery courage, ne'er attained ; For though in mid career none ever met That steed, so mounted, who the shock sustained. Yet jealous Gaul and Austria could beset And foil with treacherous wiles thy force, Plantagenet ! THE PILGEIMAGE. XI. One last ascent, and lo ! our sight to bound, A few grey towers and an embattled wall : Northward a height by feathering olives crowned, O'erlooks a deep ravine. (') And this is all Which aids a stranger's fancy to recall The glorious memories of the past, and trace, Beneath the folds of desolation's pall. The hneaments of God's peculiar place. Where once His blessing crowned the abode of Abraham's race ! XII. Pause here ! — ^The bird of highest flight requires Some moments' space to rise upon the wing ; And thought, collected in itself, retires Back from the brink, before it take the spring Athwart the gulf of ages ; nor can fling At once aside the load of dust and clay Which earthward binds its best imagining. Pause then a moment, pilgrim, on thy way ! Wait, as the Magian waits the expected burst of day — XIII. To kneel — to worship ! — This is hallowed ground. Names awful yet familiar to thine ear Each object boasts ; and storied scenes surrotind. Fain would I rest in solitude, nor hear A voice to break the silence stem and drear. Speed on, my Arab escort, fast and far ; Spurn the hot sand, and couch the black-plumed spear ! Girt with thy cumbrous implements of war. Spur to the gate thy steed, ride on, my janissar ! 1 THE PILGRIMAGE. XIV. Ride on, where rest and luxury wait thy need, Such luxury as thy simple tastes allow ; The Arahian herry's juice, the perfumed weed ; Nor deem it strange thy master loiters now And checks his steed upon this summit's brow : Thy scanty lore would fail thee to divine What friends I left, what seas I dared to plough. What pain to part, what toils to face were mine. All for this hour, and thee, sad Queen of Palestine ! XV. This hour repays them all. — What dream could vie. Were slumber's vision realized at mom. With this illustrious scene's reality ? Scan this one page, albeit defaced and torn ; Trace its sad characters, and leave, with scorn. All that remains of history's scroll unread. — Can aught, on wings of human fame upborne. Rival this desolate scene of glory fled. Or Tiber's stream compete with Kidron's torrent-bed ? XVI. Can strains of Pindus or Dodona's grove. By fraud invented and by fools beheved. Match the high tale of superhuman love Beneath yon olives' reverend shade achieved ? The grave's defeat ; a world from death reprieved ; When He, the Sinless, sin's vast ransom payed ; — Tracked by His murderers, of His friends bereaved. Kept His lone vigil in Gethsemane's shade. And, while the guilty slept, the Guiltless watched and prayed ! THE PILGBIMAGE. 9 XVII. What though the Frank (^ ) has crowned with towers yon height, And veiled with mural art the sacred hill Whence David drove the insulting Jebusite ; Around His throne His glories hnger stiU. Down yonder vale is winding Siloa's rill ; Those gnarled trunks are scions of the stem Which with a Saviour's tears for human iU Were watered once. I kiss the sackcloth's hem Which wraps thy widowed form, forlorn Jerusalem ! XVIII. But, with no visions of the past beguiled. My wearied courser paws the ground to tell Through David's gate our rearward march has filed. Eager to share the Latin father's cell. Beside that gate the Nubian sentinel Keeps sullen watch, and, as he eyes our train. Scowls curses at the wandering infidel. Nor deems the hour is near when o'er the main Shall England send her sons to break the oppressor's chain. XIX. But the gaunt peasant, crouching there the while. In other guise would greet us, if the slave Beneath the master's frown could dare to smUe : He trusts that England's sons shall cross the wave ; That her right arm, of power to smite and save. Shall fall in wrath on Ibrahim's blood-died crest ; Dig in a plundered soil the plunderer's grave And purge the land of its Egyptian pest : — And how his prayer was heard let Acre's walls attest! 10 THE PILGEIMAGE. XX. I grudge not those their faith, the credulous train Who tread the path enthusiasts trod before, Dupes of the convent's legendary strain For pious Helena forged in days of yore ; Who fix each spot, each fancied site explore Of every deed in Scriptural annals read : — 'Tis thus, when life's pulsation beats no more. Misjudging friends o'er wasted features spread Imposture's mask to cheat the mourners for the dead. XXI. I bow not, therefore, in the gorgeous pile Where golden lamps irradiate the gloom. And monks their votaries and themselves beguile To think they worship at their Saviour's tomb. For rites like theirs let annual crowds iUume Their odorous censers, scattering far and wide Their fumes : I doubt the tale which monks assume For gospel truth, and, were not this denied. Much they misuse the spot where their Redeemer died. XXII. Well may the Turk, when Easter-tide collects Its thousands for the Christian's hohest week. Scowl in contempt upon the wrangling sects Who desecrate the shrines at which they seek To bid their rival clouds of incense reek ; If to the grave, whence angels rolled the stone, Ahke by Latin, Copt, Armenian, Greek, This be the reverence paid, the homage shovsTi, — Well had its site remained unnoticed and unknown ! THE PILGRIMAGE. 11 XXIII. Rather than join in rites like these, he mine To linger near the Temple's mighty base, Where the sad remnant left of Judah's line In weekly conclave weep its vanished grace. Here paused the Roman, powerless to deface The quarried structure's stones, whose wondrous girth Might argue that the giant's hybrid race. Which half from angel sires derived its birth. Had planted here their throne, kings of an infant earth. XXIV. Must Israel's children thus be doomed to weep Beyond the precincts of their fathers' fane ? God of those fathers, do Thy thunders sleep ? Wilt Thou not loose the avenging hurricane On Omar's dome, — bid Judah's lion mane Shake off the dew-drops of its long repose ? Is there no hour shall see the crescent wane ; And Judah's star ascend the skies, and close The echpse of centuries past, the night of Israel's woes ? Vain thought ! the Almighty's thunders are not slow ; True to His bidding still they smite from far : The Power which laid the triple rampart low. And chained a people to the conqueror's car. Was not the human might of Roman war. Her disciplined strength or unexhausted hate : — It is not now the Moslem's scimitar Which guards the Temple's desecrated gate ; — Nor yet that phantom power, the heathenish poet's Fate. 12 THE PILGRIMAGE. XXVI. It is the living anger of the Lord For oracles unheard and wamings braved. A mightier weapon than the Moslem's sword Denies a people, blinded and depraved. Their Temple's entrance. 'Tis the sword which waved O'er Eden's portal in the cherub's hand. When our first parents, for their fault enslaved To sin's sad bondage, issued, hand in hand. To roam, with God their Guide, the yet unpeopled land. XXVII. Yes ! God was still their Father and their Guide ; And will be yours. It is His wiU to lead By mazed paths, to mortal sight denied, His erring children. Ages may succeed On ages, ere the term of old decreed For Israel's woes and wanderings shall be nigh ; And oft impatient man shall think to read Its advent in the scroU of prophecy ; But vain his hope to pierce the counsels of the sky. XXVIII. Waiting that hour, to scenes, by Scripture's muse Immortal made, be mine my course to bend ; Nor doubt lest fraud the confidence abuse Faith loves to give, though reason fear to lend. What mighty memories on his steps attend. Who from Jehosophat's vale by Bethany's town Has climbed to heights which saw our Lord ascend, And, breathless, from their loftiest cliff looks down On Zion's outstretched courts, ( ' ) and Moriah's mural crown ! THE PILGRIMAGE. 13 XXIX. And cold the Christian heart could scan unmoved The cave, which echoed to the word of power By Jesus uttered o'er the dust He loved. Wresting from Death's unsated jaws the dower Conveyed by Sin. Oh ! in that fated hour What thoughts were theirs, who round that cavern's lair. But half believing yet, were seen to cower, — Till near and nearer on the winding stair The footstep's gradual fall arose to upper air ! XXX. To many a scene like these due reverence paid. Then be the pilgrim's staiF resumed, the steed Again caparisoned, and in arms arrayed Its rider. He may chance their aid to need. Should the dark sons of wandering Ishmael's seed Hang on his path in such sequestered spot As where the good Samaritan checked his speed. And, while he cheered the wounded Hebrew's lot. In generous mercy's task sectarian zeal forgot. XXXI. E'en danger has its charm, the unequal price Of memory's after store paid in advance ; We do not count with calculation nice The carats of the jewels which enhance Life's value. Dazzled by the diamond glance Of strange adventure, we pursue the gleam ; And, heroes of reahty's romance. Find waking hfe surpassing slumber's dream. And weighed with sober truth how fancy kicks the beam. 14 THE PILGRIMAGE. XXXII. And thus we owned it when by Rijah's site, ('") Beneath the fig tree's shade reclined, we kept Watch, lest the booty-loving Moabite, The harrier frail of Jordan's stream o'erleapt, With stealthy march upon our camp had crept. The shout of " Moab to the spoil ! " had found But feeble answer, if the swart adept In plunder's wUes unseen had closed us round. And in the hunter's toils his sleeping quarry wound. XXXIII. Yet, with fair numbers in an equal field, M''e scarce had shunned a skirmish but to taste The stream, whose briny deeps Ehsha healed,(") Fresh from its source, — the diamond of the waste. For never Nature more profusely graced In Grecian climes the fabulous Naiad's cell ; And poet never sung, nor pencil traced In Fancy's hues, a scene might suit so well Where nymph of classic song or northern fay might dwell. With stem of silver, shining through the night Of its dense fohage, o'er the chrystal deeps. Impervious to the sun's meridian hght. From its gnarled roots the giant fig tree weeps. — Wlule evening's shade in deepening purple creeps O'er Moab's distant hiUs, with nostrU wide And ear erect the Arab courser leaps. And snuffs the promised luxury ; in that tide The day's long thirst to quench, and lave his reeking hide. THE PILGRIMAGE. 15 XXXV. Nor did the rider of the desert check That steed. Dismounted, to the bank he trode And led him onward, that with arched neck He might quaff best the current where it flowed Round his parched fetlocks deepest. Fair it showed Those mirrored forms' wild beauty. In the throng One pilgrim from the Western world there rode. In whom that vision's memory, cherished long. His toils and dangers past, at length broke forth in song : — " How thick yon fig tree's foliage weeps O'er yonder glassy stream ! Reflected from its chrystal deeps How pure yon planets gleam ! " Pause, Arab, pause ! our pilgrim train To-day has travelled far. And oft thy foaming courser's rein Was slacked for mimic war. " He wheeled, he charged for many a mUe, As though a foe were near ; Here let him quaiF, and thou the while Lean on the planted spear. " E'en hot pursuit or hastier flight That stream might lure to taste ; — The star of widowed Rijah's night. The diamond of the waste. 16 THE PILGRIMAGE. ' Not always thus ; — that stream for years Beneath the curse divine Ran, like repentant Nature's tears. In bitterness and brine. ' For, ere to Rahab's window bound The scarlet sign was hung, WhUe tower and rampart crumbled round As Joshua's trumpet rung, ■ The curse which broods on Sodom's lake By yonder rill was shared, TiU scarcely there his thirst to slake The way-worn camel dared ; ' But still with gaunt neck, travel bowed. To Jordan onward strayed ; — TiU Rijah's sons invoked aloud God and Elisha's aid. ' The prophet heard, — the waters knew The sacred sign he showed ; And sweet as Hermon's holiest dew Through all their channels flowed. ' And sweetly still those waters run. But, ah ! through wasted lands ; Of Rijah's thousand palms but one Springs from her sterile sands. THE PILGRIMAGE. 17 ' Yet in that blighted waste, no more By earthly prophet trod, — Greater than all who went before Of Israel's men of God ; ' Than him who saw from Gilgal's plain The Tishbite's car ascend, And sought with bursting heart again A world without a friend ; ' Than him, whom Heaven, too good for earth Pronouncing, claimed its own ; Than all who since Creation's birth In heaven or earth were known, — " That Prophet dwells, whose power, confessed Through wide Creation's plan. Can cleanse that poison deep, the breast Of unconverted man. " Then, Christian ! in the record trace The types of things to be ; The cruse — of Christ's absolving grace. The bitter spring — of thee." As fevered sleepera^wake from dreams of bliss To stem realities of gloom and pain. 18 THE PILGaiMAeE. So sudden pass we to the near abyss Where sleep entombed the cities of the plain : Where the hot gush of heaven's bituminous rain O'er Nature's form its withering bhght has shed, And scored her forehead with the brand of Cain ; And in that gloomy gulph's asphaltine bed For judgment's final hour embalmed the sinful dead : — The dead, with all their implements of life. Their banquet halls, their gardens' cultured ground. Their arts of luxury, and their arms for strife. Inventions for dehght of sight and sound. — No storied pile, no monumental mound Preserves the trace of power or wealth's decay ; At eve they flourished ; — in yon blue profound. When morning called the patriarch forth to pray, ('^) Quenched in its smouldering caves the guilty cities lay. XXXVIII. Pause we not here ! To Santa Saba's towers The ways are rough. The path to Salem's town Is one of dark defiles and sultry hours. Pause we not here ! From yonder mountain's crown Perhaps e'en now the Ishmaehte looks do^^Ti And counts our numbers. Quit this awful shore. Where never Spring relaxes Nature's frovni, For fairer visions ; turn we to explore Some brighter legend's page in sacred Scripture's lore. THE PILGRIMAGE. 19 XXXIX. Rude is the pilgrim's shelter, scant his fare For one on sensual luxury's pleasures bent ; But who that home was ever known to share. But for the moment deemed those Eirts misspent Which gild the crowded city's banishment .'' Who ever left, that longed not to resume The simple shelter of the Arab's tent. Spoil of the dark-fleeced herd, whose hues of gloom Outshine to him the tints of Ind or Persia's loom. XL. Now practised hands have pitched the wanderer's home And spread the carpet's many textured dies. The lamp, suspended from its tapering dome. Swings to the night wind. Near its portal lies On dewy couch the steed. The starry skies By glimpses through the fissured curtain dart Supernal brightness, such as Beauty's eyes. In joy at meeting or in pain to part. Flash to the goal they seek, the trembling lover's heart. XLI. Can joys in bacchanalian revel found Match vidth this midnight scene of silence still } Can Europe's vrine cup when it goes its round Surpass the lucid nectar of the rUl, From whose pure breast at eve all drank their fill ; Nor felt the rising vapours of excess Obscure their reason and control their will ? All, save the wanderers of the wilderness. The patient camel's tribe, who know not thirst's distress. 20 THE PILGRIMAGE. XLII. Slave to mankind ! is there a region, say, Beyond the bounds of his dominion placed. Where thou in Nature's guise art free to stray Unguided and ungoaded, and to taste From Nature's hand her banquet of the waste. Mimosa's thorn, or tamarisk's sapless bough ? — The lineage of man's other slaves is traced To freedom's wilds on mount or plain, but thou ! Wherever known, thy neck to sei-vitude must bow. XLIII. Yet, tamed to burthens and inured to blows. From birth to death on man's rough mercies thrown, Pride may be thine : the Arab verse that flows In beauty's praise still makes thy praises known. And beauty's name synominous with thine o\Yn.(") Could flattery cancel destiny's decree Which bows thy neck to bondage, or atone For man's harsh usage, it were well for thee. Poor wanderer of the waste, ship of the desert's sea ! XLIV. Romid yonder watch-fire's blaze the muleteers In circle close. — The leader of the throng Fluent and fast, to never sated ears The tale recites, or chaunts the Arab song, — Wild stanzas, strange adventures. Loud and long The applause resounds, as each invented sleight Of magic art, or fate of Afrite strong By Genii queUed in preternatural fight. Fills as the story rolls each breast with fresh delight. THE PILQEIMAGE. 21 XLV. He little thinks, the tale he loves to tell Which cheats his willing comrades of their rest. Through many a midnight hour defrauds as weU, In foreign garb and other language dressed, Of slumber's boon the children of the West ; How many a sad or vacant mind the page. With the same legendary lore impressed. Has cheered, assuaged life's ills through every stage. Given youth one smile the more, one wrinkle snatched from age. XLVI. For not alone beneath her palm-tree's shade. Amid the nargilfe's (") ascending cloud. Does Eastern fiction dwell, or Scherezade Dispense her favours to the listening crowd. AH ranks, all nations at her shrine have bowed : The pictured forms her lively pencil drew Please in all climes cdike ; and statesmen proud In grave debate have owned her lessons true. Finding how ancient lamps sometimes excel the new. XLVI I. Far other task meanwhile for me delays The needful gift of well-earned sleep's repose ; The beam that from my tremulous cresset plays Its light upon the sacred volume throws. Oh ! who in distant climes the rapture knows. E'en on the spot of which the tale is told. To mark where Tabor frowns or Jordan flows. To feel, at morn our steps shall print the mold Where Grideon pitched his camp or Sisera's chariot rolled ! 22 THE PILGRIMAGE. XLVIII. Such rapture ours, when, on Esdraelon's plain, Tabor in front and Jezreel left behind. By Kishon's source we pitched. Oh ! ne'er again Shall joys of power lUve these to fill the mind Rise in the civilized haunts of human kind. How went I forth to watch the shivering ray On Carmel's crest ; to hear upon the wind The jackal's howl ; or rippling sounds betray Where Kishon's ancient stream roUed on to Acre's bay ! XLIX. How, to our tents when morning's moisture clung. Our memory turned to that oracular dew From the fuU fleece which pious Gideon wrung ! 'Twas here perchance that Israel's champion knew The sign which spoke his high commission true ; Down yonder vale perhaps, by Kishon's ford. Towards the slumbering heathen's camp he drew His chosen hundreds, silent — till the sword Flashed to the frightened skies, of Gideon cind the Lord. L. Egypt, the Mede, the Amalekite's locust swarm Have poured successive o'er the wasted land, SpoUing man's works, without the power to harm The lasting traces of his Maker's hand. With front unchanged the enduring rocks command The pass from whence the storm of battle broke On Jabin's host and heathen Hazor's band. When at the word the Hebrew sybil spoke, " Up, Barak, up !" he rose, and spurned the oppressor's yoke. THE PILGRIMAGE. 23 LI. Still o'er thy watered meads, Esdraelon, Crowned with its forest garland Tabor towers ; And Kishon mirrors as its stream flows on Its reddening fringe of oleander flowers. Still on that soil abundant Nature showers Her gifts, and o'er it wafts her breath of balm ; And fair the land as in its earher hours. When Deborah judged the tribes beneath her palm, Or Ephraim's echoing mount gave back her victor psalm. Was not the pilgrim's toil twice paid to stand Upon the famous shore of Galilee ; Tracing a Saviour's foot-prints on its strand. His path upon its waters ? O'er that sea. From the hot chambers of the South set free, The desert wind in fitful gusts was hurled. Making the waves dance with demoniac glee. High as in empty menace once they curled Round the frail bark which held the Saviour of the world. LIII. Oh ! but for thoughts which hallow scenes hke these, For the high charm which wraps each sacred name. Our strength had wasted ; and the desert breeze Had parched our sinews with its breath of flame. Languid the halt, and sad our march became ; Arab and steed, twin children of the wild, Ahke before that furnace breath grew tame. No shout betrayed, no song our march beguiled, As by Tabaria's ('^) walls our way-worn train defiled. 24 THE PIL&RIMAGE. LIV. Yet here, when vulture sickness hovering o'er. Prepared to chuse his victim from our brood. In the rich memories of that haunted shore The mind, unconquered, gathered strength renewed. Here, where the howling demon fled subdued. Conscious Incarnate Mercy's power was near ; Where Jesus hstened as the soldier sued. And heard the vndow's prayer, and from the bier Bade Nain's dead rise up, could faith give way to fear ? LV. On shores a Saviour chiefly loved to tread. Where one bright cycle of His course was run. Where Jesus healed the hving, raised the dead. And from the grave's defeated tyrant won The soldier's servant and the widow's son ; Where every name of river, mount, or plain, Recals some deed of love and wonder done ; What Christian heart could faint, what voice arraign His power to save, or deem His promised mfercy vain ? ivi. And did not Hermon's snow-clad summit shine. And Lebanon wear his ■wintry garb, to fill Our hearts with hope, like beacons o'er the brine. Which aid the storm-tossed pilot's failing skOl ? The promised sparkle of the ice-cold rill. The shade the mountain's forest-girdle cast. Though distant yet, with life and hope could thriU The exhausted breast, while stUl that fiery blast Hung on our weary flight as Houlfe's swamps we passed. THE PILGRIMAGE. 25 LVII. On Lebanon's side, where with precipitous sweep His furrowed flanks descend to DjoJgjii's bay, P> r o '-- - A sea-mark to the wanderer of the deep, A convent stands ; and, traveller, if thy way. Beneath the heat of Syria's summer ray. To Baalbec's pile or far Damascus lies. Ask entrance there, and from its roof of clay Look round ; but chuse that hour when earth and skies Seem in one golden haze to melt as daylight dies. Mark where beneath its vault of mellowest green The pine-tree stem in deeper glory glows Than the red soil it springs from, while between In sheets of bloom the rhododendron blows. And, far below, the mulberry's terraced rows The labours of the sturdy Druse attest. Or Maronite father's toil, who better knows That soil to till than in the human breast His Scriptural seed to sow, the Gospel of the blest. LIX. Within those walls two rival sects reside ; Chuse thou the host who ovstis Byzantium's rite ; To female guest his door is not denied Should such thy train include ; the Maronite, Wiser or fraUer, shuns the dangerous Hght Of beauty's eyes. 1 may not blame the rule Ordained to fence the Latin cenobite From sinful snare, and keep the passions cool Which else might break the laws of Rome's severer school. 26 THE PILGBIMAGE. Then pass the wealthier structure's portal by ; But at this humble door, whate'er thy need. From heat to harbour or from foes to fly, Knock and find entrance. Sex, or race, or creed Pass here unquestioned. ToU or hunger plead Persuasive here the wayworn stranger's cause ; And the kind fathers practise here, unfeed. The code of Charity's universal laws, Nor seek the world's rewards, nor ask the world's applause. If Syria's suns their brand of fire have left Upon the wasted frame or fevered cheek, The breeze that sweeps the neighbouring glacier's cleft Or snows which cap El Sannin's loftiest peak Shall fan thy temples. Here no vapours reek Hot from the marsh's pestilential bed. Here fever's throes shall find the rest they seek, Kind hearts and hospitable hands to spread The fainting wanderer's couch, and raise his drooping head. LXII. I speak who know them. — ^That the golden bowl For me remained unbroken at the well, The silver cord unloosed which links the soul To its frail mansion, — that I live to tell My wanderings o'er, — to charities which dwell In that sequestered convent's rugged lair I own the debt. Long may their vesper bell Pour privileged music ('') on the mountain air. And call the faithful few to unmolested prayer ! THE PILGRIMAGE. 27 LXIII. Seas roll between us ; and the hope were vain That bark of mine her anchor e'er should heave. Or spread the sail, to plough those seas again. Yet, though we meet on earth no more, 'twould grieve The guest they saved and sheltered, to believe In those bright mansions that we ne'er might meet, Where angel hosts the expected guests receive. And nations of the earth with pilgrim feet Shall tread the glassy gold of Heaven's translucent street. (") LXIV. May Heaven forgive that hope ! — If I too much And far have ventured ; if the cherub's wing Wliich shades the ark, I have presumed to touch ; With voice profane if I have dared to sing Of themes too high ; and swept the sacred string To none but masters of the lyre allowed ; — Then may this world's neglect or censure fling Its shadow o'er the faults it blames, and shroud The rhymer and the rhime in one oblivious cloud. Yet, if the world reject the Pilgrim's muse. Wilt thou, the Erminia of his brief crusade. The tribute of the Wanderer's song refuse. Too feebly uttered and too long delayed ? Whose voice could cheer him ; and whose accents made. Like sound of waters bubbling from the sand. The desert smile ; whose presence, undismayed By toil or danger, o'er our fainting band Spread, like the prophet's rock, shade in a weary land. 28 THE PILGRIMAGE. LXVI. O guide, companion, monitress, and friend ! — And dearer words than these remain behind, — If, in the strain in which I fain would blend Thy name, some charm to which the world were bhnd, Some dream of past enjoyment thou canst find ; If, to thine ear addressed and only thine. One note of music murmur on the wind ; If in this wreath one flower he found to t\\'ine And thou pronounce it sweet, all that I ask is mine. Worsley, November 16, 1841. ^otes* Note 1, Page 3. If I remember right, Columbus himself wa§ the first to observe a light on the coast of San Salvador, 'whicb was the earliest certain indication of land and inhabitants. ^ Note 2, Page 4. It is supposed that one of the varieties of the cystus whicb abounds in the plain of Sharon is the rose of Scripture. The perfume wafted seaward from the Syrian coast as we approached it was powerfully sweet, especially at night. It brought Milton's magnificent lines to our recollection. Note 3, Page 5. Epistle OF JuDE, verse 9. — "Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him any railing accusation, but said, The Loed rebuke thee." Note 4, Page 5. The sycamore, which is designated as the species climbed by Zaccheus, flou- rishes in great beauty near Jaffa. Note 5, Page 6. Some of the pilgrims we encountered were from Abyssinia. Note 6, Page 6. The summit is shown from -which Richard Coeur de Lion is supposed to have looked down on Jerusalem, like Moses on the promised land, and with a like result. 30 Note 7, Page 7- True, but not the Mount of Olives, which is on the other and eastern side of the city. Note 8, Page Q. The Castle of David, so called, is, I believe, aVenetian work on avery ancient substruction. Note 9, Page 12. Tor a description of this splendid view see De Lamartine. Also Roberts's Picture, of the Exhibition of 1841. Note 10, Page 14. Rijah, the Arabic name for Jericho. Buckingham and Robinson both doubt the identity of this site with that of Jericho. Note u. Page U, II Kings, ii. 19 — 22. "And the men of the city said unto Elisha, Behold, I pray thee, the situation, of the city is pleasant, as my lord seeth : but the water is naught, and the ground barren. " And he said, Bring me a new cruse, and put salt therein. And they brought it to him. "And he went forth unto the spring of the waters, and cast tlie salt in there, and said, Thus saith the Lord, I have healed these waters ; there shall not be from thence any more death or barren land. " So the waters were healed unto this day, according to the saying of Elisha which he spake." Note 12, Page 18. Genesis xix. 27, 28. — "And Abraham gat up early in the morning to the place where he stood before the Lord : and he looked toward Sodom and Gomorrah, and toward all the land of the plain, and beheld, and lo, the smoke of the country went up as the smoke of a furnace." Note 13, Page 20. Djemal, the Arabic name for camel, most in use out of the six hundred which that language possesses, also signifies beautiful. When the young ladies of Hasbya became troublesome by their incursions, I asked my interpreter for a term of compliment, and he suggested this. It had the effect I expected, for they giggled and retu'ed. Many of them deserved the title. 31 Note 14, Page 21, The nargile is a contrivance for passing smoke over water, less complicated than the Indian hookah, and much used in Syria, though it must be fatal to the lun-gs. Note 15, Page 23. I am afraid that TabSrta, not Ta.barla, is the proper pronunciation, but I have sinned in good company : — E'en tender maids assume The weiglity morion and the dancing plume, And smile to see their armour's iron gleam In the blue waters of Tabaria's stream. Hcber's Palestine. Note i6. Page 26. It is only in the district of Lebanon that the Christian subjects of the Ottoman empire are allowed the privilege which has been so poetically extolled by Shaks- pere and Cowper. Note 17, Page 27. Revelations, xxi. 21 .—"And the street of the city was pure gold as it were transparent glass." MANCHESTER : TRINTED BY SIMMS AND DINHAM, EXCHANGE STREET Cornell University Library PR4699.F4P5 1856 The pilgrimage. 3 1924 013 456 623 m ?:^