Ode to Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire [;] On the Twenty-Fourth Stanza in her 'Passage Over Mount Gouthard'

1. 1And hail the Chapel! hail the Platform wild!
2. 2Where Tell directed the avenging dart,
3. 3With well-strung arm, that first preservst his child,
4. 4Then aim'd the arrow at the tyrant's heart.

1. 5Splendour's fondly-fostered child!
2. 6And did you hail the platform wild,
3. 7Where once the Austrian fell
4. 8Beneath the shaft of Tell!
5. 9O Lady, nursed in pomp and pleasure!
6. 10Whence learn'd you that heroic measure?

1. 11Light as a dream your days their circlets ran,
2. 12From all that teaches brotherhood to Man
3. 13Far, far removed! from want, from hope, from fear!
4. 14Enchanting music lulled your infant ear,
5. 15Obeisance, praises soothed your infant heart:
6. 16Emblazonments and old ancestral crests,
7. 17With many a bright obtrusive form of art,
8. 18Detained your eye from Nature: stately vests,
9. 19That veiling strove to deck your charms divine,
10. 20Rich viands, and the pleasurable wine,
11. 21Were yours unearned by toil; nor could you see
12. 22The unenjoying toiler's misery.
13. 23And yet, free Nature's uncorrupted child,
14. 24You hailed the Chapel and the Platform wild,
15. 25Where once the Austrian fell
16. 26Beneath the shaft of Tell!
17. 27O Lady, nursed in pomp and pleasure!
18. 28Whence learn'd you that heroic measure?

1. 29There crowd your finely-fibred frame
2. 30All living faculties of bliss;
3. 31And Genius to your cradle came,
4. 32His forehead wreathed with lambent flame,
5. 33And bending low, with godlike kiss
6. 34Breath'd in a more celestial life;
7. 35But boasts not many a fair compeer
8. 36A heart as sensitive to joy and fear?
9. 37And some, perchance, might wage an equal strife,
10. 38Some few, to nobler being wrought,
11. 39Corrivals in the nobler gift of thought.
12. 40Yet these delight to celebrate
13. 41Laurelled War and plumy State;
14. 42Or in verse and music dress
15. 43Tales of rustic happiness--
16. 44Pernicious tales! insidious strains!
17. 45That steel the rich man's breast,
18. 46And mock the lot unblest,
19. 47The sordid vices and the abject pains,
20. 48Which evermore must be
21. 49The doom of ignorance and penury!
22. 50But you, free Nature's uncorrupted child,
23. 51You hailed the Chapel and the Platform wild,
24. 52Where once the Austrian fell
25. 53Beneath the shaft of Tell!
26. 54O Lady, nursed in pomp and pleasure!
27. 55Whence learn'd you that heroic measure?

1. 56You were a Mother! That most holy name,
2. 57Which Heaven and Nature bless,
3. 58I may not vilely prostitute to those
4. 59Whose infants owe them less
5. 60Than the poor caterpillar owes
6. 61Its gaudy parent fly.
7. 62You were a mother! at your bosom fed
8. 63The babes that loved you. You, with laughing eye,
9. 64Each twilight-thought, each nascent feeling read,
10. 65Which you yourself created. Oh! delight!
11. 66A second time to be a mother,
12. 67Without the mother's bitter groans:
13. 68Another thought, and yet another,
14. 69By touch, or taste, by looks or tones,
15. 70O'er the growing sense to roll,
16. 71The mother of your infant's soul!
17. 72The Angel of the Earth, who, while he guides
18. 73His chariot-planet round the goal of day,
19. 74All trembling gazes on the eye of God
20. 75A moment turned his awful face away;
21. 76And as he viewed you, from his aspect sweet
22. 77New influences in your being rose,
23. 78Blest intuitions and communions fleet
24. 79With living Nature, in her joys and woes!
25. 80Thenceforth your soul rejoiced to see
26. 81The shrine of social Liberty!
27. 82O beautiful! O Nature's child!
28. 83'Twas thence you hailed the Platform wild,
29. 84Where once the Austrian fell
30. 85Beneath the shaft of Tell!
31. 86O Lady, nursed in pomp and pleasure!
32. 87Thence learn'd you that heroic measure.