And a spirit of the air
Hath begirt thee with a snare;
In the wind there is a voice
Shall forbid thee to rejoice;
And to thee shall Night deny
All the quiet of her sky;
And the day shall have a sun,
Which shall make thee wish it done.

From thy false tears I did distil

*. An essence which hath strength to kill;
From thy own heart I then did wring
The black blood in its blackest spring;
From thy own smile I snatch'd the snake,
For there it coil'd as in a brake;
From thy own lip I drew the charm
Which gave all these their chiefest harm;
In proving every poison known,
I found the strongest was thine own.

By thy cold breast and serpent smile,
By thy unfathom'd gulfs of guile,
By that most seeming virtuous eye,

By thy shut soul's hypocrisy;

By the perfection of thine art

Which pass'd for human thine own heart;

By thy delight in others' pain,
And by thy brotherhood of Cain,
I call upon thee! and compel
Thyself to be thy proper Hell!

And on thy head I pour the vial
Which doth devote thee to this trial;
Nor to slumber, nor to die,
Shall be in thy destiny;

Though thy death shall still seem near
To thy wish, but as a fear;

Lo! the spell now works around thee,
And the clankless chain hath bound thee;
O'er thy heart and brain together

Hath the word been pass'd - now wither!

SCENE II.

The Mountain of the Jungfrau. - Time, Morning.MANFRED alone upon the Cliffs.

MAN. The spirits I have raised abandon me The spells which I have studied baffle me The remedy I reck'd of tortured me; I lean no more on super-human aid, It hath no power upon the past, and for The future, till the past be gulf'd in darkness,

It is not of my search. - My mother Earth! And thou, fresh breaking Day, and you, ye

Mountains,

Why are ye beautiful? I cannot love ye.
Aud thou, the bright eye of the universe,
That openest over all, and unto all

Art a delight - thou shin'st not on my heart.
And you, ye crags, upon whose extreme edge
I stand, and on the torrent's brink beneath
Behold the tall pines dwindled as to shroubs
In dizziness of distance; when a leap,
A stir, a motion, even a breath, would bring
My breast upon its rocky bosom's bed
To rest for ever wherefore do I pause?
I feel the impulse - yet I do not plunge;
I see the peril - yet do not recede;

And my brain reels

and yet my foot is firm:

There is a power upon me which withholds

And makes it my fatality to live;
If it be life to wear within myself
This barrenness of spirit, and to be
My own soul's sepulchre, for I have ceased
To justify my deeds unto myself -
The last infirmity of evil. Ay,

Thou winged and cloud-cleaving minister,

[An eagle passes.

Whose happy flight is highest into heaven,
Well may'st thou swoop so near me - I should be

Thy prey, and gorge thine eaglets; thou art gone
Where the eye cannot follow thee; but thine

Yet pierces downward, onward, or above

With a pervading vision.

Beautiful!

How beautiful is all this visible world!
How glorious in its action and itself;
But we, who name ourselves its sovereigns, we,
Half dust, half deity, alike unfit

To sink or soar, with our mix'd essence make
A conflict of its elements, and breathe
- The breath of degradation and of pride,
Contending with low wants and lofty will
Till our mortality predominates,
And men are - what they name not to themselves,
And trust not to each other. Hark! the note,

[The Shepherd's pipe in the distance is heard. The natural music of the mountain reed For here the patriarchal days are not A pastoral fable pipes in the liberal air, Mix'd with the sweet bells of the sauntering herd; My soul would drink those echoes.-Oh, that I wore The viewless spirit of a lovely sound, A living voice, a breathing harmony,

A bodiless enjoyment - born and dying
With the blest tone which made me!

Enter from below a CHAMOIS HUNTER.

CHAMOIS HUNTER.

Even so

This way the chamois leapt: her nimble feet Have baffled me: my gains to-day will scarce

Repay my break - neck travail.
What is here?
Who seems not of my trade, and yet hath reach'd
A height which none even of our mountaincers,
Save our best hunters, may attain: his garb
Is goodly, his mien manly, and his air

Proud as a free-born peasant's, at this distance.-
I will approach him nearer.

MAN. (not perceiving the other.) To be thus Grey-hair'd with anguish, like these blasted pines, Wrecks of a single winter, barkless, branchless, A blighted trunk upon a cursed root, Which but supplies a feeling to decay And to be thus, eternally but thus,

Having been otherwise! Now furrow'd o'er With wrinkles plough'd by moments, not by years; And hours

all tortured into ages hours Which I outlive! - Ye toppling crags of ice! Ye avalanches, whom a breath draws down In mountainous o'erwhelming, coine and crush me!