Avenues of broad white houses, Basking in the noontide glare;— Streets, which foot of traveller shrinks from, As on hot plates shrinks the bear;—
Elsewhere lawns, and vista’d gardens, Statues white, and cool arcades, Where at eve the German warrior Winks upon the German maids;—
Such is Munich:—broad and stately, Rich of hue, and fair of form; But, towards the end of August, Unequivocally _warm_.
There, the long dim galleries threading, May the artist’s eye behold, Breathing from the “deathless canvass” Records of the years of old:
Pallas there, and Jove, and Juno, “Take” once more “their walks abroad,” Under Titian’s fiery woodlands And the saffron skies of Claude:
There the Amazons of Rubens Lift the failing arm to strike, And the pale light falls in masses On the horsemen of Vandyke;
And in Berghem’s pools reflected Hang the cattle’s graceful shapes, And Murillo’s soft boy-faces Laugh amid the Seville grapes;
And all purest, loveliest fancies That in poets’ souls may dwell Started into shape and substance At the touch of Raphael.—
Lo! her wan arms folded meekly, And the glory of her hair Falling as a robe around her, Kneels the Magdalene in prayer;
And the white-robed Virgin-mother Smiles, as centuries back she smiled, Half in gladness, half in wonder, On the calm face of her Child:—
And that mighty Judgment-vision Tells how man essayed to climb Up the ladder of the ages, Past the frontier-walls of Time;
Heard the trumpet-echoes rolling Through the phantom-peopled sky, And the still voice bid this mortal Put on immortality.
Thence we turned, what time the blackbird Pipes to vespers from his perch, And from out the clattering city Pass’d into the silent church;
Marked the shower of sunlight breaking Thro’ the crimson panes o’erhead, And on pictured wall and window Read the histories of the dead:
Till the kneelers round us, rising, Cross’d their foreheads and were gone; And o’er aisle and arch and cornice, Layer on layer, the night came on.
SHE stood at Greenwich, motionless amid The ever-shifting crowd of passengers. I marked a big tear quivering on the lid Of her deep-lustrous eye, and knew that hers Were days of bitterness. But, “Oh! what stirs” I said “such storm within so fair a breast?” Even as I spoke, two apoplectic curs Came feebly up: with one wild cry she prest Each singly to her heart, and faltered, “Heaven be blest!”