flight

[rest
Go, and
From Prussia's timid region.
With heroes 'mid the islands of the blest,
Or in the fields of empyrean light.
A meteor wert thou in a darksome night;
Yet shall thy name conspicuous and sub-
lime,

Stand in the spacious firmament of time,
Fixed as a star: such glory is thy right.
Alas! it may not be : for earthly fame
Is fortune's frail dependent; yet there lives
A judge, who, as man claims by merit,
gives;

To whose all-pondering mind a noble aim,
Faithfully kept, is as a noble deed:
In whose pure sight all virtue doth succeed.

course,

rose;

This done, a festal company unite

In choral song; and, while the uplifted

cross

Of Jesus goes before, the child is borne Uncovered to his grave. Her piteous loss The lonesome mother cannot choose but mourn;

Yet soon by Christian faith is grief subdued, And joy attends upon her fortitude.

If never more within their shady round Those lofty-minded law-givers shall meet, Peasant and lord, in their appointed seat, Guardians of Biscay's ancient liberty.

INDIGNATION OF A HIGH-MINDED SPANIARD. 1810.

WE can endure that he should waste our lands, [flame

ONE OF THESE FUNERALS.

1810.

foes

hands

To the paternal floor; or turn aside,
In the thronged city, from the walks of gain,
As being all unworthy to detain
A soul by contemplation sanctified.
There are who cannot languish in this strife,
Spaniards of every rank, by whom the good
Of such high course was felt and under-
stood;
[a life,
Who to their country's cause have bound
Erewhile by solemn consecration given
To labour, and to prayer, to nature, and to
heaven.*

THE FRENCH AND THE SPANISH GUERILLAS.

blast

HUNGER, and sultry heat, and nipping [by night From bleak hill-top, and length of march Through heavy swamp, or over snow-clad height, [past, These hardships ill sustained, these dangers The roving Spanish bands are reached at last, [flight Charged, and dispersed like foam ; but as a Of scattered quails by signs to reunite, So these,-and, heard of once again, are chased

With combinations of long-practised art And newly-kindled hope; but they are fled, Gone are they, viewless as the buried dead; Where now? Their sword is at the foe[thwart, And thus from year to year his walk they And hang like dreams around his guilty

man's heart!

bed.

Redoubted Viriatus breathes again;
And Mina, nourished in the studious shade,
With that great leader* vies, who, sick of
strife

And bloodshed, longed in quiet to be laid
In some green island of the western main.

Hath painted winter like a traveller-old, Propped on a staff-and, through the sullen day,

In hooded mantle, limping o'er the plain, As though his weakness were disturbed by pain:

Or, if a juster fancy should allow
An undisputed symbol of command,
The chosen sceptre is a withered bough,
Infirmly grasped within a palsied hand.
These emblems suit the helpless and forlorn,
But mighty winter the device shall scorn.

For he it was-dread winter! who beset, Flinging round van and rear his ghastly net, That host,-when from the regions of the pole

They shrunk, insane ambition's barren goal, That host, as huge and strong as e'er defied Their God, and placed their trust in human pride!

As fathers persecute rebellious sons,

He smote the blossoms of their warrior youth;

He called on frost's inexorable tooth

Life to consume in manhood's firmest hold; Nor spared the reverend blood that feebly

runs;

For why, unless for liberty enrolled And sacred home, ah! why should hoary age be bold?

Fleet the Tartar's reinless steed, But fleeter far the pinions of the wind, Which from Siberian caves the monarch freed, [kind. And sent him forth, with squadrons of his And bade the snow their ample backs bestride,

And to the battle ride. No pitying voice commands a halt, No courage can repel the dire assault; Distracted, spiritless, benumbed, and blind, Whole legions sink-and, in one instant, find [descry, Burial and death: look for them-and When morn returns, beneath the clear blue sky,

A soundless waste, a trackless vacancy!

And loud and long of winter's triumph sing!
Sing ye, with blossoms crowned, and fruits,
and flowers,
[showers,
Of winter's breath surcharged with sleety
And the dire flapping of his hoary wing!
Knit the blithe dance upon the soft green
grass;
[your gain;
With feet, hands, eyes, looks, lips, report
Whisper it to the billows of the main,
And to the aerial zephyrs as they pass,
That old decrepit winter-He hath slain,
That host, which rendered all your bounties
vain !

By Moscow self-devoted to a blaze
Of dreadful sacrifice; by Russian blood
Lavished in fight with desperate hardi-
hood;

The unfeeling elements no claim shall raise
To rob our human nature of just praise
For what she did and suffered. Pledges
Of a deliverance absolute and pure [sure
She gave, if faith might tread the beaten
ways

[High

Of Providence. But now did the Most Exalt his still small voice;-to quell that host

Gathered his Power, a manifest Ally; He whose heaped waves confounded the proud boast

Of Pharaoh, said to Famine, Snow, and Frost,

Finish the strife by deadliest victory!