II.

Strange contrasts here--for on the glacier's height,
The tempest raves, and arrowy lightnings leap--
Yet deep beneath, the wild flowers lone and light,
On slender stems in breezeless silence sleep.
Skyward the racing eagles wildly fling
Their savage clamor to the echoing dell--
While sheltered deep, the bee with folded wing,
Voluptuous slumbers in his fragrant cell.
Around, the splintered rocks are heaped to heaven,
With grisly caverns yawning wide between,
As if the Titans there had battle given,
And left their ruin written on the scene!
Yet o'er these ghastly shapes, soft lichens wind,
And timid daisies droop, and tranquil flowers
A robe of many-colored beauty, bind,
As if some vagrant fairy claimed these bowers.


III.

Fit cradle this--Majestic Stream, for thee!
Nursed at the glacier's foot--by tempests fed--
The lightning flashing o'er thy canopy,
And thunders pealing round thine infant bed--
The pious Indian marks thy mystic birth,
'Mid storm and cloud, and nature's aspect wild--
And wondering, deems thee not a thing of earth,