354
JOAN OF ARC.
One universal Family of Love."
The Maiden, musing on the Warriors words, 745
Turn'd from the Hall of Glory. Now they reach'd
A cavern, at whose mouth a Genius stood,
In front, a beardless youth, whose smiling eye
Beam'd promise, but behind withered and old,
And all unlovely. Underneath his feet 750
Lay records trampled, and the laurel wreath
Now rent and faded: in his hand he held
An hour-glass, and, as fall the restless sands,
So pass the lives of men. By him they past
Along the darksome cave, and reach'd a stream, 755
Aye rolling onward its perpetual waves,
Noiseless and undisturb'd. Here they ascend
A Bark unpiloted, that down the flood,
Borne by the current, rush'd. The circling stream,
Returning to itself, an island form'd; 760
Nor had the Maiden's footsteps ever reach'd
The insulated coast, eternally
Turn'd from the Hall of Glory. Now they reach'd
A cavern, at whose mouth a Genius stood,
In front, a beardless youth, whose smiling eye
Beam'd promise, but behind withered and old,
And all unlovely. Underneath his feet 750
Lay records trampled, and the laurel wreath
Now rent and faded: in his hand he held
An hour-glass, and, as fall the restless sands,
So pass the lives of men. By him they past
Along the darksome cave, and reach'd a stream, 755
Aye rolling onward its perpetual waves,
Noiseless and undisturb'd. Here they ascend
A Bark unpiloted, that down the flood,
Borne by the current, rush'd. The circling stream,
Returning to itself, an island form'd; 760
Nor had the Maiden's footsteps ever reach'd
The insulated coast, eternally
Rapt
