XLVII. Not so the rustic with his trembling mate Ah, monarchs! could ye taste the mirth ye mar, The hoarse dull drum would sleep, and Man be happy yet! XLVIII. How carols now the lusty muleteer? As whilome he was wont the leagues to cheer, 1 "Viva el Rey Fernando!" Long live King Ferdinand! is the chorus of most of the Spanish patriotic songs. They are chiefly in dispraise of the old king Charles, the Queen, and the Prince of Peace. I have heard many of them: some of the airs are beautiful. Don Manuel Godoy, the Principe de la Paz, of an ancient but decayed family, was born at Badajoz, on the frontiers of Portugal, and was originally in the ranks of the Spanish guards; till his person attracted the queen's eyes, and raised him to the dukedom of Alcudia, &c. &c. It is to this man that the Spaniards universally impute the ruin of their country. -[See, for ample particulars concerning the flagitious court of Charles IV., Southey's History of the Peninsular War, vol. i.] XLIX. On yon long, level plain, at distance crown'd Here was the camp, the watch-flame, and the host, L. And whomsoe'er along the path you meet Bears in his cap the badge of crimson hue, 1 Which tells you whom to shun and whom to greet: Woe to the man that walks in public view, Without of loyalty this token true : Sharp is the knife, and sudden is the stroke; And sorely would the Gallic foeman rue, If subtle poniards, wrapt beneath the cloke, Could blunt the sabre's edge, or clear the cannon's smoke. LI. At every turn Morena's dusky height The holster'd steed beneath the shed of thatch, 1 The red cockade, with "Fernando Septimo," in the centre. 2 All who have seen a battery will recollect the pyramidal form in which shot and shells are piled. The Sierra Morena was LII. Portend the deeds to come : — but he whose nod A little moment deigneth to delay: Soon will his legions sweep through these their way; The West must own the Scourger of the world. Ah! Spain! how sad will be thy reckoning-day, When soars Gaul's Vulture, with his wings unfurl'd, And thou shalt view thy sons in crowds to Hades hurl'd. LIII. And must they fall? the young, the proud, the brave, [of steel? The Veteran's skill, Youth's fire, and Manhood's heart LIV. Is it for this the Spanish maid, aroused, Hangs on the willow her unstrung guitar, And, all unsex'd, the anlace hath espoused, Sung the loud song, and dared the deed of war? And she, whom once the semblance of a scar Appall'd, an owlet's larum chill'd with dread, Now views the column-scattering bay'net jar, The falchion flash, and o'er the yet warm dead Stalks with Minerva's step where Mars might quake to tread. fortified in every defile through which I passed in my way to Seville. LV. Ye who shall marvel when you hear her tale, Mark'd her black eye that mocks her coal-black veil, Thin the closed ranks, and lead in Glory's fearful chase. Her lover sinks- - - LVI. she sheds no ill-timed tear; she fills his fatal post; she checks their base career; she heads the sallying host: Who can appease like her a lover's ghost? Who can avenge so well a leader's fall? What maid retrieve when man's flush'd hope is lost? Who hang so fiercely on the flying Gaul, Foil'd by a woman's hand, before a batter'd wall? Such were the exploits of the Maid of Saragoza, who by her valour elevated herself to the highest rank of heroines. When the author was at Seville, she walked daily on the Prado, decorated with medals and orders, by command of the Junta. [The exploits of Augustina, the famous heroine of both the sieges of Saragoza, are recorded at length in one of the most splendid chapters of Southey's History of the Peninsular War. At the time when she first attracted notice, by mounting a battery where her lover had fallen, and working a gun in his room, she was in her twenty-second year, exceedingly pretty, and in a soft feminine style of beauty. She has further had the honour to be painted by Wilkie, and alluded to in Wordsworth's Dissertation on the Convention (misnamed) of Cintra; where a noble passage concludes in these words: -" Saragoza has exemplified a melancholy, yea, a dismal truth, yet consolatory and full of joy,—that when a LVII. Yet are Spain's maids no race of Amazons, Remoter females, famed for sickening prate; LVIII. The seal Love's dimpling finger hath impress'd Her glance how wildly beautiful! how much people are called suddenly to fight for their liberty, and are sorely pressed upon, their best field of battle is the floors upon which their children have played; the chambers where the family of each man has slept; upon or under the roofs by which they have been sheltered; în the gardens of their recreation; in the street, or in the market-place; before the altars of their temples, and among their congregated dwellings, blazing or uprooted."] "Sigilla in mento impressa Amoris digitulo Vestigio demonstrant mollitudinem."-AUL. GEL. |