It was a vision of that last,[9]
Sorrowful night which Jesus past
With his disciples when he said
Mournfully to them--"I shall be
"Betrayed by one who here hath fed
"This night at the same board with me."
And tho' the Saviour in the dream
Spoke not these words, we saw them beam
Legibly in his eyes (so well
The great magician workt his spell),
And read in every thoughtful line
Imprinted on that brow divine.
The meek, the tender nature, grieved,
Not angered to be thus deceived--
Celestial love requited ill
For all its care, yet loving still--
Deep, deep regret that there should fall
From man's deceit so foul a blight
Upon that parting hour--and all
_His_ Spirit must have felt that night.
Who, soon to die for human-kind,
Thought only, mid his mortal pain,
How many a soul was left behind
For whom he died that death in vain!
Such was the heavenly scene--alas!
That scene so bright so soon should pass
But pictured on the humid air,
Its tints, ere long, grew languid there;[10]
And storms came on, that, cold and rough,
Scattered its gentlest glories all--
As when the baffling winds blow off
The hues that hang o'er Terni's fall,--
Till one by one the vision's beams
Faded away and soon it fled.
To join those other vanisht dreams
That now flit palely 'mong the dead,--
The shadows of those shades that go.
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