High in her wither'd arms she wields her rod,
With adders curl'd, and dropping gore; and points
To the dead walls, besmear'd with cursed tales
Of Plagues red-spotted, of blue Pestilence,
Walking in darkness; Havoc at their heels;
Lean Famine, gnawing in despite her arm:
Whatever Egypt, Athens, or Messine,
Constantinople, Troynovant, Marseilles,
Or Cairo felt, or Spagnolet could paint.
A sickly taper, glimmering feeble rays
Across the gloom, makes horror visible,
And punishes, while it informs, the eye.
A thousand and ten thousand monstrous shapes
Compose the group; the execrable crew
Which Michael, in vision strange, disclosed
To Adam, in the lazar-house of woe;
A colony from Hell.
The bloated Dropsy, and the racking Stone
Rolling her eyes in anguish; Lepra foul;
Strangling Angina; Ephialtic starts;
Unnerved Paralysis; with moist Catarrhs;
Pleuritis bending o'er its side, in pain;
Vertigo; murderous Apoplexy, proud
With the late spoils of Clayton's honour'd life:
Clayton the good, the courteous, the humane;
Tenacious of his purpose, and his word
Firm as the fabled throne of Grecian Jove.
Be just, O Memory! again recall
Those looks illumined by his honest heart,
That open freedom and that cheerful ease,
The bounteous emanations of his soul:
His British honour, Christian charity,
And mild benevolence for humankind.
From every quarter lamentations loud
And sighs resound, and rueful peals of groans
Roll echoing round the vaulted dens, and screams
Dolorous, wrested from the heart of Pain,
And brain-sick Agony. Around her throne
Six favourite Furies, next herself accursed,
Their dismal mansions keep; in order each,
As most destructive. In the foremost rank,
Of polish'd steel, with armour blood-distain'd,
Helmets and spears and shields and coats of mail,
With iron stiff, or tin, or brass, or gold,
Swells a triumphal arch; beneath, grim War
Shakes her red arm: for War is a disease,
The fellest of the fell! Why will mankind,
Why will they, when so many plagues involve
This habitable globe (the curse of Sin),
Invent new desolations to cut off
The Christian race? At least in Christian climes
Let olives shade your mountains, and let Peace
Stream her white banner o'er us, bless'd from War,
And laurels only deck your poets' brows.
Or, if the fiery metal in your blood
And thirst of human life your bosom sting,
Too savage! let the fury loose of War,
And bid the battle rage against the breasts
Of Asian infidels: redeem the towers
Where David sung, the Son of David bled;
And warm new Tassos with the epic flame.
Right opposite to War a gorgeous throne
With jewels flaming, and emboss'd with gold
And various sculpture, strikes the wondering eye
With jovial scenes (amid destruction gay)
Of instruments of mirth, the harp, the lute,
Of costly viands, of delicious wines,
And flowery wreaths to bind the careless brow
Of Youth or Age; as Youth or Age demand
The pleasing ruin from the' enchantress, vile
Intemperance: than Circè subtler far,
Only subdued by Wisdom; fairer far
Than young Armida, whose bewitching charms
Rinaldo fetter'd in her rosy chains;
Till, by Ubaldo held, his diamond shield
Blazed on his mind the virtues of his race,
And, quick, dissolved her wanton mists away.
See, from her throne, slow-moving, she extends
A poison'd goblet! fly the beauteous bane;
The adder's tooth, the tiger's hungry fang
Are harmless to her smiles: her smiles are death.
Beneath the foamy lustre of the bowl,
Which sparkles men to madness, lurks a snake
Of mortal sting: fly: if you taste the wine,
Machaon swears that moly cannot cure.
Though innocent and fair her looks, she holds
A lawless commerce with her sister Pests,
And doubly whets their darts: away-and live.
Next, in a low-brow'd cave, a little hell,
A pensive hag, moping in darkness, sits
Dolefully sad: her eyes (so deadly dull!)
Stare from their stonied sockets, widely wild;
For ever bent on rusty knives and ropes;
On poniards, bowls of poison, daggers red
With clotted gore. A raven by her side
Eternal croaks; her only mate Despair;
Who, scowling in a night of clouds, presents
A thousand burning hells, and damned souls,
And lakes of stormy fire, to mad the brain
Moon-strucken. Melancholy is her name;
Britannia's bitter bane. Thou gracious Power
(Whose judgments and whose mercies who can tell!)
With bars of steel, with hills of adamant
Crush down the sooty fiend; nor let her blast
The sacred light of heaven's all-cheering face,
Nor fright, from Albion's isle, the angel Hope.
Fever the fourth: adust as Afric wilds,
Chain'd to a bed of burning brass: her eyes
Like roving meteors blaze, nor ever close
Their wakeful lids: she turns, but turns in vain,
Through nights of misery. Attendant Thirst
Grasps hard an empty bowl, and shrivel'd strives
To drench her parched throat.
Not louder groans
From Phalaris's bull, as fame reports,
Tormented with distressful din the air,
And drew the tender tear from pity's eye.
Consumption near; a joyless, meagre wight,
Panting for breath, and shrinking into shade,
Eludes the grasp: thin as the' embodied air
Which, erst, deceived Ixion's warm embrace,
Ambitious of a goddess! scarce her legs
Feebly she drags, with wheezing labour, on,
And motion slow: a willow wand directs
Her tottering steps, and marks her for the grave.
The last, so turpid to the view, affrights
Her neighbour hags. Happy herself is blind,
Or madness would ensue; so bloated black,
So loathsome to each sense, the sight or smell,
Such foul corruption on this side the grave;
Variola ycleped; ragged, and rough, [scenes
Her couch perplex'd with thorns.-What heavy
Hang o'er my heart to feel the theme is mine!
But Providence commands; His will be done!
She rushes through my blood; she burns along,
And riots on my life.-Have mercy, Heaven!—-
Variola, what art thou? whence proceeds
This virulence, which all, but we, escape?
Thou nauseous enemy to humankind;
In man, and man alone, thy mystic seeds,
Quiet, and in their secret windings hid,
Lie unprolific; till Infection rouse
Her poisonous particles, of proper size,
Figure, and measure, to exert their power
Of impregnation; atoms subtle, barb'd,
Infrangible, and active to destroy;
By geometric or mechanic rules
Yet undiscover'd: quick the leaven runs
Destructive of the solids, spirits, blood
Of mortal man, and agitates the whole
In general conflagration and misrule.
As when the flinty seeds of fire embrace
Some fit materials, stubble, furze, or straw,
The crackling blaze ascends; the rapid flood
Of ruddy flames, impetuous o'er its prey,
Rolls its broad course, and half the field devours.
THE DESCENT OF HYGEIA.
WHILE on this isthmus of my fate I lie,
Jutting into Eternity's wide sea,
And leaning on this habitable globe,
The verge of either world! dubious of life,
Dubious, alike, of death; to Mercy thus,
Inspirited with supplicating zeal,
My guardian angel raised his potent prayer:
(For angels minister to man, intent
On offices of gentleness and love).
'Hear, Mercy! sweetest daughter of the skies,
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