The Story of Some Bells: Told for a Poet

A LITTLE legend, dear and gracious friend,
Has strangely wrought upon my heart to-day;
Let me the story to thy heart commend,
And tell it to thee in my simple way.

Long years agone, a Southern artisan,
Dowered with the tender genius of his clime,
A dreamy-eyed, devout, and sad-voiced man,
Cast, with rare skill, a wondrous tuneful chime,
Whose very sound might draw the pagan Turk
To bow in rapture on the minster floor;
And, it is said, this founder seemed to pour
His deep Italian soul into his work,
Like molten music ; and when first high hung
A triumph-peal the bells harmonious rung,
And made a Sabbath on the golden air,
He stood with claspéd hands, and brow all bare,
And murmured liquid syllables of prayer.

Against the cliff, beneath the convent tower,
He built the rude nest of his peasant home ;
Nor wandering sail nor hope of gain had power
To tempt him from the spot blest by his bells to roam.

At last there came to curse that lovely land
The woe and waste of war; the legend tells
How one wild night, a sacrilegious band
Despoiled the convent even of its bells.

The founder, seizing his rude arms, in vain
Strove that fierce tide of blood and fire to stay ;
He saw his home in flames, his brave sons slain,
And then a dungeon’s walls shut out the day.

Long years wore on ; at last, the artisan,
A weary, bowed, gray-haired, and lonely man,
Joyless beheld again the sea, the sky,
And pined to hear his bells once more, — then die.

Somewhere, he knew, those bells at morn and even
Made sweetest music in the ear of Heaven ;
Voiced human worship, called to praise and prayer —
Censers of sound, high swinging in the air.

The legend telleth how, from town to town,
Where’er a minster-cross stood up to bless
God’s praying souls, where’er a spire looked down,
He through strange lands and weary ways did press
His mournful pilgrimage, companionless.

The Norman carillons, so sweet and clear,
The chimes of Amsterdam and gray old Ghent,
But alien music rang they to his ear,
No faintest thrill of joy to his sad heart they sent.

Before full many an English tower he stood,
And vainly listened, then pursued his quest;
At last, a noble lady, fair and good,
The sad-eyed pilgrim pointed to the west,
And said, “ At Limerick is a chime of bells
Fit to ring in the coming of the Lord,
So solemn sweet the melody that swells
From their bronze throats, all pealing in accord.”

Soft shades foretold the coming of the night ;
Yet goldenly on Shannon’s emerald shores,
As charmed, or fallen asleep, the sunset light
Still lingered, — or as there sweet Day
Had dropped her mantle, ere she took her flight.
Up Shannon’s tide a boat slow held its way;
All silent bent the boatmen to their oars,
For at their feet a dying stranger lay.

In broken accents of a foreign tongue
He breathed fond names, and murmured words of prayer,
And yearningly his wasted arms outflung,
Grasped viewless hands, and kissed the empty air.

Sudden, upon the breeze came floating down
The sound of vesper-bells from Limerick town,
So sweet ’t would seem that holiest of chimes
Stored up new notes amid its silent times,—
Some wandering melodies from heavenly climes, —
Or gathered music from the summer hours,
As bees draw sweets from tributary flowers.
Peal followed peal, till all the air around
Trembled in waves of undulating sound.

The dying stranger, where he gasping lay,
Heard the sweet chime, and knew it ringing nigh ;
Quick from his side the phantoms fled away,
And the last soul-light kindled in his eye !
His cold hands reaching towards the shadowy shore,
“Madonna, thanks!” he cried, “I hear my bells once more!”

Nearer they drew to Limerick, where the bells
Were raining music from the church tower high ;
The pilgrim listened, till their latest swells
Shook from his heart the faintest echoing sigh ;
With their sweet ceasing, ceased his mortal breath.
So, like a conqueror to the better land,
Passed the worn artisan,—such music grand
Uprolled before him on the heavenly path.

From the west heavens went out the sunset gold,
And Hesperus his silver lamp uphung ;
To countless pious hearts those bells had rung
The vesper chime that summoneth to pray :
But to that stranger, weary, lone, and old,
They pealed the matins of immortal day.

Thus thou, my poet, from thy soul hast wrought
In tuneful song sweet chimes of deep-toned thought,
To sound toward heaven, high hung on massive towers
That overlook the world ; in silent hours,
Even in darkness, gathering, note by note,
God’s deepest melodies, that ever float
Above the toiling or the sleeping earth ;
To answer grief with grief, and mirth with mirth ;
To fling sweet strains upon the path of day,
As flowers are flung upon a victor’s way ;
To cheerily peal out amid the storm,
Beneath the rolling of the thunder-cars ;
Ring in calm eves, with sunset glories warm,
And sound before the coming of the stars.

And from thy bells we deem each latest time
We hear a clearer and a grander chime,
That fall their faintest notes with sweetness rare,
Like birds that sing in death, soft dropping down the air.

And when thou floatest o’er that solemn river
That for its shade the mournful cypress hath;
Along whose shores the fearful aspens shiver,—
That stream of dread, the icy flood of death,
Parting our mortal life from God’s forever,—
Then from the shore thou leavest, ah, mayst thou
Know thy true thoughts yet chiming clear and high;
Then may the joy-light kindle in thine eye
And smile the cold death-shadow from thy brow,
Hearing that chime sound o’er the stream’s sad flowing,
And echoed from the land to which thou ’rt going !

Not smiting sharply on the air above,
And not in thunderbolts of sound down-hurled ;
But ringing soft God’s peace and pitying love,
And pealing his redemption o’er the world.