I
On thy couch of cloud reclined,Wake, O soft and sacred Wind!Soft and sacred will we name thee,Whosoe’er the sire that claim thee—Whether old Auster’s dusky child,Or the loud son of Eurus wild;Or his who o’er the darkling deeps,From the bleak North, in tempest sweeps;Still shalt thou seem as dear to usAs flowery-crowned Zephyrus,When, through twilight’s starry dew,Trembling, he hastes his nymph to woo.
II
Lo! our silver censers swinging,Perfumes o’er thy path are flinging—Ne’er o’er Tempe’s breathless valleys,Ne’er o’er Cypria’s cedarn alleys,Or the Rose-isle’s moonlit sea,Floated sweets more worthy thee.Lo! around our vases sendingMyrrh and nard with cassia blending:Paving air with odorous meet,For thy silver-sandall’d feet!
III
August and everlasting air!The source of all that breathe and be,From the mute clay before thee bearThe seeds it took from thee!Aspire, bright Flame! aspire!Wild wind!—awake, awake!Thine own, O solemn Fire!O Air, thine own retake!
IV
It comes! it comes! Lo! it sweeps,The Wind we invoke the while!And crackles, and darts, and leapsThe light on the holy pile!It rises! its wings interweaveWith the flames—how they howl and heave!Toss’d, whirl’d to and fro,How the flame-serpents glow!Rushing higher and higher,On—on, fearful Fire!Thy giant limbs twinedWith the arms of the Wind!Lo! the elements meet on the throneOf death—to reclaim their own!
V
Swing, swing the censer round—Tune the strings to a softer sound!From the chains of thy earthly toil,From the clasp of thy mortal coil,From the prison where clay confined thee,The hands of the flame unbind thee!O Soul! thou art free—all free!As the winds in their ceaseless chase,When they rush o’er their airy sea,Thou mayst speed through the realms of space,No fetter is forged for thee!Rejoice! o’er the sluggard tideOf the Styx thy bark can glide,And thy steps evermore shall roveThrough the glades of the happy grove;Where, far from the loath’d Cocytus,The loved and the lost invite us.Thou art slave to the earth no more!O soul, thou art freed!—and we?—Ah! when shall our toil be o’er?Ah! when shall we rest with thee?
And now high and far into the dawning skies broke the fragrant fire; it flushed luminously across the gloomy cypresses—it shot above the massive walls of the neighboring city; and the early fisherman started to behold the blaze reddening on the waves of the creeping sea.
But Ione sat down apart and alone, and, leaning her face upon her hands, saw not the flame, nor heard the lamentation of the music: she felt only one sense of loneliness—she had not yet arrived to that hallowing sense of comfort, when we know that we are not alone—that the dead are with us!
The breeze rapidly aided the effect of the combustibles placed within the pile. By degrees the flame wavered, lowered, dimmed, and slowly, by fits and unequal starts, died away—emblem of life itself; where, just before, all was restlessness and flame, now lay the dull and smouldering ashes.
The last sparks were extinguished by the attendants—the embers were collected. Steeped in the rarest wine and the costliest odorous, the remains were placed in a silver urn, which was solemnly stored in one of the neighboring sepulchres beside the road; and they placed within it the vial full of tears, and the small coin which poetry still consecrated to the grim boatman. And the sepulchre was covered with flowers and chaplets, and incense kindled on the altar, and the tomb hung round with many lamps.
But the next day, when the priest returned with fresh offerings to the tomb, he found that to the relics of heathen superstition some unknown hands had added a green palm-branch. He suffered it to remain, unknowing that it was the sepulchral emblem of Christianity.
When the above ceremonies were over, one of the Praeficae three times sprinkled the mourners from the purifying branch of laurel, uttering the last word, ‘Ilicet!’—Depart!—and the rite was done.
But first they paused to utter—weepingly and many times—the affecting farewell, ‘Salve Eternum!’ And as Ione yet lingered, they woke the parting strain.