To perishable beings. Oh, my Anah!

When the dread hour denounced shall open wide
The fountains of the deep, how mightest thou
Have lain within this bosom, folded from
The elements; this bosom, which in vain
Hath beat for thee, and then will beat more vainly,
While thine- -Oh, God! at least remit to her
Thy wrath! for she is pure amidst the failing
As a star in the clouds, which cannot quench,
Although they obscure it for an hour. My Anah!
How would I have adored thee, but thou wouldst not;
And still would I redeem thee-see thee live
When ocean is earth's grave, and, unopposed
By rock or shallow, the leviathan,

Lord of the shoreless sea and watery world,

Shall wonder at his boundlessness of realm.

[Exit JAPHET.

Enter NOAH and SHEM.

He went forth,

Noah. Where is thy brother Japhet?
Shem.
According to his wont, to meet with Irad,

He said; but, as I fear, to bend his steps

Towards Anah's tents, round which he hovers nightly,
Like a dove round and round its pillaged nest;
Or else he walks the wild up to the cavern
Which opens to the heart of Ararat.

Noah. What doth he there? It is an evil spot
Upon an earth all evil; for things worse
Than even wicked men resort there: he
Still loves this daughter of a fated race,

Although he could not wed her if she loved him,

And that she doth not. Oh, the unhappy hearts
Of men! that one of my blood, knowing well
The destiny and evil of these days,

And that the hour approacheth, should indulge
In such forbidden yearnings! Lead the way
He must be sought for!

Shem.

I will seek Japhet.

Noah.

Go not forward, father:

Do not fear for me:

All evil things are powerless on the man

Selected by Jehovah.-Let us on.

Shem. To the tents of the father of the sisters?

Noah. No; to the cavern of the Caucasus.

[Exeunt NOAH and SHEM.

SCENE III.

The mountains.—A cavern, and the rocks of Caucasus.

Japh. (solus). Ye wilds, that look eternal; and

thou cave,

Which seem'st unfathomable; and ye mountains,
So varied and so terrible in beauty;
Here, in your rugged majesty of rocks

And toppling trees that twine their roots with stone
In perpendicular places, where the foot

Of man would tremble, could he reach them—yes,
Ye look eternal! Yet, in a few days,

Perhaps even hours, ye will be changed, rent, hurl'd
Before the mass of waters; and yon cave,
Which seems to lead into a lower world,

Shall have its depths search'd by the sweeping wave,

And dolphins gambol in the lion's den!

And man

Oh, men! my fellow-beings! Who

Shall weep above your universal grave,

Save I? Who shall be left to weep? My kinsmen,
Alas! what am I better than ye are,

That I must live beyond ye? Where shall be
The pleasant places where I thought of Anah
While I had hope? or the more savage haunts,
Scarce less beloved, where I despair'd for her?
And can it be !-Shall yon exulting peak,
Whose glittering top is like a distant star,
Lie low beneath the boiling of the deep?
No more to have the morning sun break forth,
And scatter back the mists in floating folds
From its tremendous brow? no more to have
Day's broad orb drop behind its head at even,
Leaving it with a crown of many hues?
No more to be the beacon of the world,
For angels to alight on, as the spot
Nearest the stars? And can those words "
Be meant for thee, for all things, save for us,
And the predestined creeping things reserved
By my sire to Jehovah's bidding? May
He preserve them, and I not have the power
To snatch the loveliest of earth's daughters from
A doom which even some serpent, with his mate,
Shall 'scape to save his kind to be prolong'd,
To hiss and sting through some emerging world,
Reeking and dank from out the slime, whose ooze
Shall slumber o'er the wreck of this until
The salt morass subside into a sphere
Beneath the sun, and be the monument,

no more"

The sole and undistinguish'd sepulchre,

Of yet quick myriads of all life? How much
Breath will be still'd at once! All beauteous world
So young, so mark'd out for destruction, I
With a cleft heart look on thee day by day,

And night by night, thy number'd days and nights:
I cannot save thee, cannot save even her

Whose love had made me love thee more; but as A portion of thy dust, I cannot think

Upon thy coming doom without a feeling

Such as-Oh God! and canst thou

[He pauses.(1)

A rushing sound from the cavern is heard, and shouts of laughter-afterwards a Spirit passes.

Japh.

Of the Most High, what art thou?
Spirit (laughs).

In the name

Ha ha ha!

Japh. By all that earth holds holiest, speak!
Spirit (laughs).

Ha ha!

Japh. By the approaching deluge! by the earth Which will be strangled by the ocean! by

The deep which will lay open all her fountains!
The heaven which will convert her clouds to seas,
And the Omnipotent who makes and crushes!
Thou unknown, terrible, and indistinct,

Yet awful Thing of Shadows, speak to me!
Why dost thou laugh that horrid laugh?
Spirit.

Why weep'st thou ?

(1) [This soliloquy has the fault of being too long and wire-drawn. At its close, spirits rush from the cavern, and exult in the approaching calamity of the world: a dialogue ensues between Japhet and one of them, and a chorus is sung by a body of them, part of which is truly noble. CAMPBELL.]

Japh. For earth and all her children.

Spirit.

Ha ha ha! [Spirit vanishes. Japh. How the fiend mocks the tortures of a world,

The coming desolation of an orb,

On which the sun shall rise and warm no life!

How the earth sleeps! and all that in it is
Sleep too upon the very eve of death!

Why should they wake to meet it? What is here,
Which look like death in life, and speak like things
Born ere this dying world? They come like clouds!
[Various Spirits pass from the cavern.
Rejoice!

Spirit.

The abhorred race

Which could not keep in Eden their high place,
But listen'd to the voice

Of knowledge without power,
Are nigh the hour

Of death!

Not slow, not single, not by sword, nor sorrow,

Nor years, nor heart-break, nor time's sapping motion,

Shall they drop off. Behold their last to-morrow! Earth shall be ocean!

And no breath,

Save of the winds, be on the unbounded wave!
Angels shall tire their wings, but find no spot:
Not even a rock from out the liquid grave
Shall lift its point to save,

Or show the place where strong Despair hath died,
After long looking o'er the ocean wide

For the expected ebb which cometh not: