The Palm-Tree

It waved not through an eastern sky,Beside a fount of Araby;It was not fann’d by southern breezeIn some green isle of Indian seas;Nor did its graceful shadow sleepO’er stream of Afric, lone and deep.

But fair the exiled palm-tree grewMidst foliage of no kindred hue;Through the laburnum’s dropping goldRose the light shaft of orient mould,And Europe’s violets, faintly sweet,Purpled the moss-beds at its feet.

Strange look’d it there! The willow stream’dWhere silvery waters near it gleam’d;The lime-bough lured the honey-beeTo murmur by the desert’s tree,And showers of snowy roses madeA lustre in its fan-like shade.

There came an eve of festal hours--Rich music fill’d that garden’s bowers;Lamps, that from flowering branches hung,On sparks of dew soft colour flung;And bright forms glanced--a fairy show--Under the blossoms to and fro.

But one, a lone one, midst the throng,Seem’d reckless all of dance or song:He was a youth of dusky mien,Whereon the Indian sun had been,Of crested brow and long black hair--A stranger, like the palm-tree, there.

And slowly, sadly, moved his plumes,Glittering athwart the leafy glooms.He pass’d the pale-green olives by,Nor won the chestnut flowers his eye;But when to that sole palm he came,Then shot a rapture through his frame!

To him, to him its rustling spoke--The silence of his soul it broke!It whisper’d of his own bright isle,That lit the ocean with a smile;Ay, to his ear that native toneHad something of the sea-wave’s moan?

His mother’s cabin-home, that layWhere feathery cocoas fringed the bay;The dashing of his brethren’s oar--The conch-note heard along the shore;All through his wakening bosom swept--He clasp’d his country’s tree, and wept!

Oh! scorn him not! The strength wherebyThe patriot girds himself to die,Th’ unconquerable power which fillsThe freeman battling on his hills,These have one fountain deep and clear--The same whence gush’d that childlike tear!

This incident is, I think, recorded by De Lille, in his poem ofLes Jardins.