The midnight chimes rang out: the startled air

Was freighted with the peals from spire and tower,

Till the spent echoes died within their lair.

Softly the dew slept in each folded flower,

The wild bird brooded on her summer nest,

And worn sad eyes were closed in blissful rest.

Darkly the river surged upon its way,

Turbid and rank and grim—a venomed snake

Gliding with stealthy tread—the foul murk spray

Flecking with slime each object in its wake.

Like charnel lights, the lamps’ dull glare came back,

Reflected from the waters’ loathsome track.

O'er many a fair young head the stream swept on,

Mid golden locks the ghastly tangles wreathed;

The conflict o'er, the weary guerdon won—

By hidden graves the waters foamed and seethed,

Rich laden argosies sailed to and fro,

Unheeded slept the buried wrecks below!

Darkly the waters flowed with sullen swoop

Through the blank arches, hurrying feet o'er head,

And grating wheels the ponderous fabric shook;

Beneath reigned silence, drear and dumb and dead.

An ebbless tide, like some ill–omened bird,

Swept mid the darkness, though no sound was heard.

I said the darkling river poured its flood

Through the dim arches—one was bare and dry,

A ghastly grotto by the wave withstood,

A dismal vault black as the blinded sky:

Gaunt, spectral, shorn of even the pale lamp's glare,

And yet the pulse of life was throbbing there!

A pallid child stretched on the naked stones,

Begrimmed and fouled—the bleeding blistered feet

Shivered with pain, and low half–sobbing moans

Broke from the dreamer in his strange retreat.

Poor blossom! sin and blight with baleful power

Robbed of his heritage the human flower.

Mid misty hills, deep glens, the river rose,

Pure, sweet, and chill, reflecting from the stream

The golden sunset at the day's soft close,

The fern's green plumage, and the Mayflower's gleam;

Catching no fouler blot, no darker stain,

Than the cloud's shadow, and the falling rain.

Unsullied fount from whence the waters sprung,

Pure source that gave the blighted spirit life…