But hallow'd by that instinct which reveres
Things fraught with characters of elder years.
And such are these. Long centuries are flown,
Bow'd many a crest, and shatter'd many a throne,
Mingling the urn, the trophy, and the bust,
With what they hide—their shrined and treasured dust.
Men traverse Alps and oceans, to behold
Earth's glorious works fast mingling with her mould;
But still these nameless chronicles of death,
Midst the deep silence of the unpeopled heath,
Stand in primeval artlessness, and wear
The same sepulchral mien, and almost share
Th' eternity of nature, with the forms
Of the crown'd hills beyond, the dwellings of the storms.
Yet what avails it if each moss-grown heap
Still on the waste its lonely vigils keep,
Guarding the dust which slumbers well beneath
(Nor needs such care) from each cold season’s breath?
Where is the voice to tell their tale who rest,
Thus rudely pillow'd, on the desert's breast?
Doth the sword sleep beside them? Hath there been
A sound of battle midst the silent scene
Where now the flocks repose?—did the scythed car
Here reap its harvest in the ranks of war?
And rise these piles in memory of the slain,
And the red combat of the mountain-plain?
It may be thus:—the vestiges of strife,
Around yet lingering, mark the steps of life,
And the rude arrow's barb remains to tell[1]
How by its stroke, perchance, the mighty fell
To be forgotten. Vain the warrior's pride,
The chieftain's power—they had no bard, and died. [2]
But other scenes, from their untroubled sphere,
The eternal stars of night have witness'd here.
There stands an altar of unsculptured stone,[3]
Far on the moor, a thing of ages gone,
Propp'd on its granite pillars, whence the rains
And pure bright dews have laved the crimson stains
Left by dark rites of blood: for here, of yore,
When the bleak waste a robe of forest wore,
And many a crested oak, which now lies low,
Waved its wild wreath of sacred mistletoe—
- ↑ Flint arrow-heads have occasionally been found upon Dartmoor.
- ↑
"Vixere fortes ante Agamemnona
Multi; sed omnes illachrymabiles
Urgentur, ignotique longá
Nocte, carent quia vate sacro."—Horace.
"They had no poet, and they died."—Pope's Translation.
- ↑ On the east of Dartmoor are some Druidical remains, one
