XV.

Far down the bird may sing of love; The honey-bearing blossom blow: But hail, ye hills that rise above The limit of perpetual snow!

O Alpine City, with thy walls Of rock eterne and spires of ice, Where torrent still to torrent calls, And precipice to precipice;—

How like that holier City thou, The heavenly Salem's earthly porch, Which rears among the stars her brow, And plants firm feet on earth—the Church!

"Decaying, ne'er to be decayed," Her woods, like thine, renew their youth: Her streams, in rocky arms embayed, Are clear as virtue, strong as truth.

At times the lake may burst its dam; Black pine and rock the valley strew; But o'er the ruin soon the lamb Its flowery pasture crops anew.

She, too, in regions near the sky Up-piles her cloistered snows, and thence Diffuses gales of purity O'er fields of consecrated sense.

On those still heights a love-light glows The plains from them alone receive;— Not all the Lily! There thy Rose, O Mary, triumphs, morn and eve!