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366 FALSTAFF'S DESCRIPTION OF HIS SOLDIERS.

Young Malcolm, at distance, crouched trembling, the while
Mac Gregor stood lone by the brook of Glen Gyle.
Then minutes had passed, ere he spied on the stream.
A skiff gliding light, where a lady did seem.
Her sail was the web of a gossamer's loom,

The glow-worm her wake-light, the rainbow her boom,
A dim, rayless beam was her prow, and her mast
Like wold-fire, at midnight, that glares on the waste.
Young Malcolm beheld the pale lady approach,

The chieftain salute her-and shrink from her touch!
He saw the Mac Gregor kneel down on the plain,
As begging for something he could not obtain.
She raised him indignant, derided his stay,
Then bore him on board, set her sail, and away.
Though fast the red bark down the river did glide,
Yet faster ran Malcolm adown by its side.
"Mac Gregor! Mac Gregor!" he bitterly cried;
"Mac Gregor! Mac Gregor!" the echoes replied.
He struck at the lady-but, strange though it seem,
His sword only fell on the rocks of the stream,
While the groans from the boat that ascended amain
Were the groans of a bosom in horror and pain.
Then it reached the dark lake, and bore lightly away-
Mac Gregor had vanished forever and aye.

I

FALSTAFF'S DESCRIPTION OF HIS SOLDIERS.
SHAKESPEARE.

F I be not ashamed of my soldiers, I am a soused gurnet. I have misused the king's press outrageously. I have got in exchange of an hundred and fifty soldiers, three hundred and odd pounds. I press me none but good householders, yeomen's sons; inquire me out contracted bachelors, such as have been asked twice on the bans; such a commodity of warm slaves, as had as lief hear the devil as a drum; such as fear the report of a culverin worse than a struck deer or a hurt wild duck. I press me none but such toasts in butter, with hearts in their breasts no bigger than pins' heads; and they bought out their services; and

ST. PATRICK'S DAY IN AMERICA.

367

now my whole charge consists of slaves as ragged as Lazarus in the painted cloth, where the glutton's dogs licked his sores, discarded unjust serving-men, younger sons to younger brothers, revolted tapsters, and hostlers trade-fallen, the cankers of a calm world and a long peace; and such have I to fill up the rooms of them that have bought out their services, that you would think I had an hundred and fifty tattered prodigals lately come from swine-keeping, from eating draff and husks. A mad fellow met me on the way, and told me I had unloaded all the gibbets, and pressed the dead bodies. No eye hath seen such scarecrows. I'll not march through Coventry with them, that's flat. Nay, and the villains march wide betwixt the legs, as if they had gyves on; for indeed I had the most of them out of prison. There's but a shirt and a half in all my company, and the half-shirt is two napkins tacked together, and thrown over the shoulders like a herald's coat without sleeves; and the shirt, to say the truth, stolen from my host of St. Albans, or the red-nosed innkeeper of Daintry. But that's all one, they'll find linen enough on every hedge.

ST. PATRICK'S DAY IN AMERICA.

HE March wind shook the withered grass

THE

Along the lonesome prairie,

As Dermod drank his cheerful glass,

And talked with Irish Mary.

66

"Six years ago," he said, we fled

Across the western ocean;

My purse was light-my purse was lead;
Naught left but thy devotion.

"We fled, because we saw our land
One scene of devastation,

When Famine's cold and bony hand

Descended on the nation.

"The crimson flames enwrapt our home,

The signals of eviction;

The landlord stood and scoffed, like some
Incarnate, malediction.

368

SPARTACUS TO THE ROMAN ENVOYS.

"The thick smoke veiled that poor abode,
Beloved by us, though humble;
And weeping in the wintry road,
We heard our roof-tree tumble.

"And thus we fled-but as the ship
From our dear Island bore us,
There was a tremor on each lip,
And women wailed in chorus.

"We fled, nor stayed till the Great West
In its wide arms received us;

And on its tender, giant breast
We half forgot what grieved us.

"The land we tread on is our own;
Our own the roof that covers;
And though our heads have older grown,
We've ceased not to be lovers.

"For on the soil that freemen till,
More grows than what is planted;
And Love, and Truth, and Virtue fill
The land with flowers enchanted.

"So here on Patrick's natal day
I drink my second mother;
Yet let no man presumptuous say
That I forget the other!"

So while the March wind bent the grass

Upon the lonesome prairie,

Did Dermod drink his cheerful glass,

And talk with Irish Mary.

EN

SPARTACUS TO THE ROMAN ENVOYS.

NVOYS of Rome, the poor camp of Spartacus is too much honored by your presence. And does Rome stoop to parley with the escaped gladiator, with the rebel ruffian, for whom here

SPARTACUS TO THE ROMAN ENVOYS.

369

"He has it!"

tofore no slight has been too scornful? You have come, with steel in your right hand, and with gold in your left. What heed we give the former, ask Cossinius; ask Claudius; ask Varinius; ask the bones of your legions that fertilize the Lucanian plains. And for your gold-would ye know what we do with that, go ask the laborer, the trodden poor, the helpless and the hopeless, on our route: ask all whom Roman tyranny has crushed, or Roman avarice plundered. Ye have seen me before; but ye did not then shun my glance as now. Ye have seen me in the arena, when I was Rome's pet ruffian, daily smeared with blood of men or beasts. One day-shall I forget it ever?-ye were present—I had fought long and well. Exhausted as I was, your munerator, your lord of the games, bethought him, it were an equal match to set against me a new man, younger and lighter than I, but fresh and valiant. With Thracian sword and buckler, forth he came, a beautiful defiance on his brow! Bloody and brief the fight. cried the People; "habet! habet!" But still he lowered not his arm, until, at length, I held him, gashed and fainting, in my power. I looked around upon the Podium, where sat your Senators and men of State, to catch the signal of release, of mercy. But not a thumb was reversed. To crown your sport, the vanquished man must die! Obedient brute that I was, I was about to slay him, when a few hurried words—rather a welcome to death than a plea for life--told me he was a Thracian. I stood transfixed. The arena vanished. I was a Thrace, upon my native hills! The sword dropped from my hands. I raised the dying youth tenderly in my arms. O, the magnanimity of Rome! Your haughty leaders, enraged at being cheated of their death-show, hissed their disappointment, and shouted, "Kill!" I heeded them as I would heed the howl of wolves. Kill him?—They might better have asked the mother to kill the babe smiling in her face. Ah! he was already wounded unto death; and, amid the angry yells of the spectators, he died. That night I was scourged for disobedience. I shall not forget it. Should memory fail, there are scars here to quicken it.

Well; do not grow impatient. Some hours after, finding myself, with seventy fellow-gladiators, alone in the amphitheatre, the laboring thought broke forth in words. I said-I know not what. I only know that when I ceased, my comrades looked each other

370

EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN.

in the face; and then burst forth the simultaneous cry-"Lead· on! lead on, O Spartacus!" Forth we rushed-seized what rude weapons Chance threw in our way, and to the mountains speeded There, day by day, our little band increased. Disdainful Rome sent after us a handful of her troops, with a scourge for the slave Spartacus. Their weapons soon were ours. She sent an army; and down from old Vesuvius we poured, and slew three thousand. Now it was Spartacus the dreaded rebel! A larger army, headed by the Prætor, was sent, and routed; then another still. And always I remembered that fierce cry, riving my heart, and calling me to "kill!" In three pitched battles, have I not obeyed it? And now affrighted Rome sends her two Consuls, and puts forth all her strength by land and sea, as if a Pyrrhus or a Hannibal were on her borders!

Envoys of Rome! To Lentulus and Gellius bear this message : "Their graves are measured!" Look on that narrow stream, a silver thread, high on the mountain's side! Slenderly it winds, but soon is swelled by others meeting it, until a torrent, terrible and strong, it sweeps to the abyss, where all is ruin. So Spartacus comes on! So swells his force-small and despised at first, but now resistless! On, on to Rome we come! The gladiators come! Let Opulence tremble in all his palaces! Let Oppression shudder to think the oppressed may have their turn! Let Cruelty turn pale at thought of redder hands than his! O! we shall not forget Rome's many lessons. She shall not find her training was all wasted upon indocile pupils. Now, begone! Prepare the Eternal City for our games!

EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN.-AYTOUN.

EWS of battle!--news of battle!

NEW

Hark! 'tis ringing down the street:

And the archways and the pavement

Bear the clang of hurrying feet.

News of battle!-who hath brought it?
News of triumph!-who should bring

Tidings from our noble army,

Greetings from our gallant King!

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