I HAVE seen thee, Diodati;
I have wandered in thy bowers;
I have mused in the cool shadows
Of thy venerable pines;
Have inhaled, in starry twilight,
The sweet fragrance of thy flowers,
And listened to thy voices,
O most beautiful of shrines!

In a fair and fertile valley,
Cradled in by snow-capped mountains,
Thou art sleeping in the sunshine
Of a cloudless summer sky;
While the gallant, graceful Leman,
Gathering up thy sparkling fountains,
Kneels at thy feet and worships,
With his glorious minstrelsy.

I have revelled in thy beauty
Till my very soul is laden;
But grander, higher interests
To thee and thine belong;
For thou wert the home of genius,
Thou hast been a poet's Aidenn,
And thy groves, to me, seem vocal
With the glory of his song.

He has dreamed sweet dreams of beauty
'Neath these summer-garnished arches;
He has seen the radiant visions
Which poetic fancy weaves;
He has heard the night-wind singing
In the green glooms of these larches,
And caught the soft responses
Of the trembling, low-voiced leaves.

He beheld, from this same terrace,
Clouds and darkness, lake and mountains,
Lightnings, winds and waters revelling,
With a fierce, terrific mirth;
Heard the voices of the thunder,
And the laughter of the fountains,
Pealing out as if rejoicing
Over " a young earthquake's birth. "

He could see the giant Jura,
With his head so high and hoary,
Wrapped away in folded shadows
On the bosom of the night;
Or encircled with far flashes
Of a wild and ghostly glory,
As the watchfires of the storm-king
Blazed aloft, from crag and height.

Clouds and tempest, winds and waters,
Ere the morning's dawn ceased raging,
And the lovely face of nature
Was unsullied by a scar;
But the mad, ungoverned passions
In that poet's heart kept waging
With life and with humanity
A longer, wilder war.

Thou hast seen him, Diodati,
With his cold and haughty bearing;
With his nobly gifted spirit,
Tortured by its self-made strife,
Worshipping some earth-born idol,
Of the good and true despairing,
Till he mingled deadly poison
In his bitter cup of life.

Yet he loved and sought the praises
Of the world he shunned and hated,
And his soul, though all perverted,
Was aglow with starry thought;
With feeling, power and passion,
He adorned and he created,
And beautified life's pathway
With the gems his genius wrought.

He has left no trace, no footprints,
In thy paths so often threaded;
There is neither shrine nor tablet
Here, engraven with his name;
But the least of thy surroundings
To the world's great heart is wedded,
And thy marble walls will perish
Long before his glorious fame.