STANZAS WRITTEN AT THE ISLAND OF MADEIRA[182]
On the fatal and unprecedented torrents of water which collected from the mountains on the ninth of October, 1803, and destroyed a considerable part of the city of Funchal, drowned a vast number of people, and damaged, to a great amount, several plantations and villages in that neighborhood.
The rude attack, if none will tell, On Bacchus, in his favorite isle; If none in verse describe it well, If none assume a poet's style These devastations to display;-- Attend me, and perhaps I may.
To those who own the feeling heart This tragic scene I would present, No fiction, or the work of art, Nor merely for the fancy meant: Twas all a shade, a darken'd scene, Old Noah's deluge come again!
From hills beyond the clouds that soar, The vaults of heaven, the torrents run, And rushing with resistless power, Assail'd the island of the sun: Fond nature saw the blasted vine, And seem'd to sicken and repine.
As skyward stream'd the electric fire The heavens emblazed, or wrapt in gloom; The clouds appear, the clouds retire And terror said, "the time is come When all the groves, and hill, and plain Will sink to ocean's bed again."
The cheery god, who loves to smile And gladness to the heart bestows, Almost resolved to quit his isle, And in unwonted passion rose; He sought his caves in wild dismay And left the heavens to have their way.
The whistling winds had ceased to blow; Not one, of all the aerial train-- No gale to aid that night of wo Disturb'd the slumbers of the main; In distant woods they silent slept; Or, in the clouds, the tempest kept.
The bursting rains in seas descend, Machico[A] heard the distant roar, And lightnings, while the heavens they rend, Show'd ruin marching to the shore: Egyptian darkness brought her gloom And fear foreboded nature's doom.
[A] A distant village on the island.--_Freneau's note._
The heavens on fire, an ocean's force Seized forests, vineyards, herds, and men, And swelling streams from every source Bade ancient chaos come again: Through Fonchal's[B] road their courses held And ocean saw his waves repell'd.
[B] The capital town of the island.--_Ibid._
Ill fated town!--what works of pride In one short hour were swept away! Huge piles that time had long defy'd, In ruthless ruin scatter'd lay: Some buried in the opening deep-- With crowds dismiss'd to endless sleep,