373m
I come in the gleams, from the land of dreams,Wrapp’d round in the midnight’s pall;Ye may hear my moan, in the night-wind’s groan,When the tapestry flaps on the wall;—I come from my rest in the death-owl’s nest,Where she screams in fear and pain;And my wings gleam bright in the wild moonlight,As it whirls round the madman’s brain;And down sweeps my car, like a falling star,When the winds have hush’d their breath;When ye feel in the air, from the cold sepulchre,The faint damp smell of death.
My vigil I keep, by the murderer’s sleep,When dreams round his senses spin;And I ride on his breast, and trouble his rest,In the shape of his deadliest sin;And hollow and low is his moan of woeIn the depth of his strangling pain,And his cold black eye rolls in agony,And faintly rattles his chain.The sweat-drops fall on the dark prison wall—He wakes with a deep-drawn sigh;He hears my tread, as I pass from his bed,And he calls on the saints on high.I fly to the bed where the weary headOf the poet its rest must seek,And with false dreams of fame I kindle the flameOf joy on his pallid cheek.No thought does he take of the world awake,And its cold and heartless pleasure,The holy fire of his own loved lyreIs his best and dearest treasure.But neglect’s foul sting that cheek shall bringTo a darker and deadlier hue;The last dear token, his lyre, is broken,And his heart is broken too.When the maiden asleep for her lover may weep,Afar on the boundless sea,And she dreams he is press’d to her welcome breast,Return’d from his dangers free—I come in the form of a wave of the storm,And sweep him away from her heart,And then in a dream she starts with a scream,To think that in death they part;And still in the light of her stream-bound sightThe images whirl and dance,Till my swift elision dispels the vision,And she wakes as from a trance.When the clouds, first-born of the breezy morn,In the eastern chambers roam,I glide away in the twilight grayTo rest in my shadowy home;And darkness and sleep to their kingdom sweep,And dreams rustle by like a storm;But where I dwell no man can tellWho hath seen my hideous form;Whether it be in the caves of the sea,Where the rolling breakers go,Or the crystal sphere of the upper air,Or the depths of hell below.
376m
When Dr. Gall first announced his new system of Craniology, the wits of Paris found it a good subject on which to exercise their talents, and it was attacked with all the light artillery of jokes and epigrams. Among others, Mercier, the author of theTableau de Paris, entered the lists with hisPodologyagainstCraniology, in a squib, in which he contended, that “it is not in the head that ideas reside, nor by the head that man differs from other animals; that a man without a head would not on that account, be less reflecting; in short, that the head says nothing, does nothing, and contributes nothing to the observation of man. It is hisfootwhich does every thing. It is in the foot that we must seek and find the stamp of man’s original dignity. In the foot? Yes, Sir, in the foot. Look at the footman, who smiles at your surprise—is it not the foot which supports the head? Does not the foot express anger and indignation? In Spain, all matters of love and gallantry begin with the foot. The foot, in China, plays the first part. There is nothing more rude than to tread upon another’s foot; when a man gets intoxicated, his foot refuses to carry him in that state of debasement; in fact, the foot cannot lie like the mouth and eyes. You must perceive, then, that the foot has all those qualities which prove a man to be a thinking being, or, in other words, the foot is the seat of the soul. If you would know, therefore, whether a woman is tender or faithless, if a man has the understanding of Montesquieu, or the folly of ———, instead of looking at his skull, you must see his foot. Yes, good Dr. Gall; you shall see myhead, and I will examine your feet.”—So much for the System of craniology.
379m