It bears the date of that fatal hour when the king of Naples, after a
brief show of liberality, recalled his troops from Bologna, where they
had been acting against Austria with the confederated forces of the
other Italian states, and when every man lost to Italy was as an
ebbing drop of her life's blood.
THE DESERTER.
(Bologna, May, 1818.)
Never did grain grow out of frozen earth;
From the dead branch never did blossom start:
If thou lovest not the land that gave thee birth,
Within thy breast thou bear'st a frozen heart;
If thou lovest not this land of ancient worth,
To love aught else, say, traitor, how thou art!
To thine own land thou could'st not faithful be,--
Woe to the woman that puts faith in thee!
To him that trusteth in the recreant, woe!
Never from frozen earth did harvest grow:
To her that trusteth a deserter, shame!
Out of the dead branch never blossom came.
And this song, so fine in its picturesque and its dramatic qualities,
is not less true to the hope of the Venetians when they rose in 1848,
and intrusted their destinies to Daniele Manin.
THE RING OF THE LAST DOGE.
I saw the widowed Lady of the Sea
Crowned with corals and sea-weed and shells,
Who her long anguish and adversity
Had seemed to drown in plays and festivals.
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