Childe Harold's Pilgrimage

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore, There is society, where none intrudes, By the deep Sea, and music in its roar: I love not Man the less, but Nature more, From these our interviews, in which I steal From all I may be, or have been before, To mingle with the Universe, and feel What I can ne’er express, yet cannot all conceal.

Then stirs the feeling infinite, so felt In solitude, where we are least alone.

I live not in myself, but I become Portion of that around me: and to me High mountains are a feeling, but the hum of human cities torture.

On with the dance! let joy be unconfin'd

On with the dance! let joy be unconfin'd; No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure meet To chase the Glowing Hours with Flying feet.

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore.

Can tyrants but by tyrants conquered be

Ye stars! which are the poetry of heaven! If in your bright leaves we would read the fate Of men and empires,-'tis to be forgiven, That in our aspirations to be great, Our destinies o'erleap their mortal state, And claim a kindred with you; for ye are A beauty and a mystery, and create In us such love and reverence from afar, That fortune, fame, power, life, have named themselves a star.

and what is writ, is writ, Would it were worthier! but I am not now That which I have been

8. "For who would trust the seeming sighs Of wife or paramour? Fresh feres will dry the bright blue eyes We late saw streaming o'er. For pleasures past I do not grieve, Nor perils gathering near; My greatest grief is that I leave No thing that claims a tear. 9. "And now I'm in the world alone, Upon the wide, wide sea: But why should I for others groan, When none will sigh for me? Perchance my dog will whine in vain, Till fed by stranger hands; But long ere I come back again, He'd tear me where he stands. 10. "With thee, my bark, I'll swiftly go Athwart the foaming brine; Nor care what land thou bear'st me to, So not again to mine. Welcome, welcome, ye dark blue waves! And when you fail my sight, Welcome, ye deserts, and ye caves! My native Land — Good Night!

There is a moral of all human tales: 'Tis but the same rehearsal of the past, First Freedom, and then Glory; when that fails, Wealth, Vice, Corruption, barbarism at last. And History, with all her volumes vast, Hath but one page.

But I have lived, and have not lived in vain: My mind may lose its force, my blood its fire, And my frame perish even in conquering pain, But there is that within me that shall tire Torture and Time, and breathe when I expire.

But pomp and power alone are woman's care, And where these are light Eros finds a feere; Maidens, like moths, are ever caught by glare, And Mammon wins his way where Seraphs might despair.

There is the moral of all human tales:    ’Tis but the same rehearsal of the past,    First Freedom, and then Glory - when that fails,    Wealth, vice, corruption - barbarism at last.    And History, with all her volumes vast,    Hath but one page,

Man! Thou pendulum betwixt a smile and tear.

The moon is up, and yet it is not night, The sun as yet divides the day with her.

Though sluggards deem it but a foolish chase, And marvel men should quit their easy chair, The toilsome way, and long, long leagues to trace, Oh! there is sweetness in the mountain air, And life that bloated Ease can never hope to share.

For pleasures past I do not grieve, Nor perils gathering near; My greatest grief is that I leave No thing that claims a tear. And now I'm in the world alone, Upon the wide, wide sea; But why should I for others groan, When none will sigh for me? Perchance my dog will whine in vain Till fed by stranger hands; But long ere I come back again He'd tear me where he stands.

For there was soft remembrance, and sweet trust In one fond breast, to which his own would melt, And in its tenderer hour on that his bosom dwelt.

Are not the mountains, waves, and skies a part Of me and of my soul, as I of them? Is not the love of these deep in my heart With a pure passion? should I not contemn All objects, if compared with these? and stem A tide of suffering, rather than forego Such feelings for the hard and worldly phlegm Of those whose eyes are only turned below, Gazing upon the ground, with thoughts which dare not glow?

LXXII In sooth, it was no vulgar sight to see Their barbarous, yet their not indecent, glee, And as the flames along their faces gleam’d, Their gestures nimble, dark eyes flashing free, The long wild locks that to their girdles stream’d, While thus in concert they this lay half sang, half scream’d: Tambourgi! Tambourgi! thy ’larum afar Gives hope to the valiant, and promise of war; All the sons of the mountains arise at the note, Chimariot, Illyrian, and dark Suliote! Oh! who is more brave than a dark Suliote, To his snowy camese and his shaggy capote? To the wolf and the vulture he leaves his wild flock, And descends to the plain like the stream from the rock. Shall the sons of Chimari, who never forgive The fault of a friend, bid an enemy live? Let those guns so unerring such vengeance forego? What mark is so fair as the breast of a foe? Macedonia sends forth her invincible race; For a time they abandon the cave and the chase: But those scarves of blood-red shall be redder, before The sabre is sheathed and the battle is o’er. Then the pirates of Parga that dwell by the waves, And teach the pale Franks what it is to be slaves, Shall leave on the beach the long galley and oar, And track to his covert the captive on shore. I ask not the pleasure that riches supply, My sabre shall win what the feeble must buy; Shall win the young bride with her long flowing hair, And many a maid from her mother shall tear. I love the fair face of the maid in her youth, Her caresses shall lull me, her music shall soothe; Let her bring from her chamber the many-toned lyre, And sing us a song on the fall of her sire. Remember the moment when Previsa fell, The shrieks of the conquer’d, the conquerors’ yell; The roofs that we fired, and the plunder we shared, The wealthy we slaughter’d, the lovely we spared. I talk not of mercy, I talk not of fear; He neither must know who would serve the Vizier: Since the days of our prophet, the Crescent ne’er saw A chief ever glorious like Ali Pasha. Dark Muchtar his son to the Danube is sped, Let the yellow-haired Giaours view his horsetail with dread; When his Delhis come dashing in blood o’er the banks, How few shall escape from the Muscovite ranks! Selictar, unsheath then our chief’s scimitar: Tambourgi! thy ’larum gives promise of war; Ye mountains, that see us descend to the shore, Shall view us as victors, or view us no more!

But I, who am of lighter mood, Will laugh to flee away.' For who would trust the seeming sighs Of wife or paramour?

The starry fable of the milky way Has not the story's purity; it is A constellation of a sweeter ray, And sacred Nature triumphs more in this Reverse of her decree, that in the abyss Where sparkle distant worlds: -- Oh, holiest nurse! No drop of that clear stream its way shall miss To thy sire's heart, replenishing its source With life, as our freed souls rejoin the universe.

Not in those climes where I have late been straying, Though Beauty long hath there been matchless deemed, Not in those visions to the heart displaying Forms which it sighs but to have only dreamed, Hath aught like thee in truth or fancy seemed: Nor, having seen thee, shall I vainly seek To paint those charms which varied as they beamed— To such as see thee not my words were weak; To those who gaze on thee, what language could they speak?

none are left to please when none are left to love.

To fly from, need not be to hate, mankind;    All are not fit with them to stir and toil,    Nor is it discontent to keep the mind    Deep in its fountain, lest it overboil    In one hot throng, where we become the spoil    Of our infection, till too late and long    We may deplore and struggle with the coil,    In wretched interchange of wrong for wrong Midst a contentious world, striving where none are strong.

And this is in the night: Most glorious night! Thou wert not sent for slumber! let me be A sharer in thy fierce and far delight

Existence may be borne, and the deep root Of life and sufferance make its firm abode In bare and desolated bosoms: mute The camel labours with the heaviest load, And the wolf dies in silence, -- not bestow'd In vain should such example be; if they, Things of ignoble or of savage mood, Endure and shrink not, we of nobler clay May temper it to bear, -- it is but for a day.