SELECTIONS FROM ODE WRITTEN DURING THE WAR WITH AMERICA, 1814.
WHEN shall the Island Queen of Ocean lay
The thunderbolt aside,
And, twining olives with her laurel crown,
Rest in the bower of peace?
Not long may this unnatural strife endure
Beyond the Atlantic deep;
Not long may men, with vain ambition drunk,
And insolent in wrong,
Afflict with their misrule the indignant land
Where Washington hath left
His awful memory
A light for after-times!
Vile instruments of fallen Tyranny
In their own annals, by their countrymen,
For lasting shame shall they be written down.
Soon may the better genius there prevail!
Then will the Island Queen of Ocean lay
The thunderbolt aside,
And, twining olives with her laurel crown,
Rest in the bower of peace.
Queen of the Seas! enlarge thyself;
Send thou thy swarms abroad!
For in the years to come,
Though centuries or millenniums intervene,
Where'er thy progeny,
Thy language, and thy spirit shall be found,—
If on Ontario's shores,
Or late-explored Missouri's pastures wide,
Or in that Austral world long sought,
The many-isled Pacific, yea, where waves,
Now breaking over coral reefs, affright
The venturous mariner,
When islands shall have grown, and cities risen
In cocoa groves embowered,
Where'er thy language lives,
By whatsoever name the land be called,
That land is English still, and there
Thy influential spirit dwells and reigns.
Thrones fall and dynasties are changed,
Empires decay and sink
Beneath their own unwieldy weight;
Dominion passeth like a cloud away:
The imperishable mind
Survives all meaner things.
When shall the dove go forth? oh when
Shall Peace return among the sons of men?
Hasten, benignant Heaven, the blessed day !
Justice must go before,
And Retribution must make plain the way;
Force must be crushed by force,
The power of Evil by the power of Good,
Ere Order bless the suffering world once more,
Or Peace return again.
Hold, then, right on in your auspicious course,
Ye princes, and ye people! hold right on!
Your task not yet is done;
Pursue the blow,-ye know your foe,--
Complete the happy work so well begun.
Hold on, and be your aim, with all your strength,
Loudly proclaimed and steadily pursued;
So shall this fatal Tyranny at length
Before the arms of Freedom fall subdued.
Then, when the waters of the flood abate,
The dove her resting-place secure may find;
And France, restored and shaking off her chain,
Shall join the avengers in the joyful strain,
Glory to God! Deliverance for mankind!
CLEAR shone the morn, the gale was fair,
When from Coruña's crowded port,
With many a cheerful shout and loud acclaim,
The huge Armada passed.
To England's shores their streamers point,
To England's shores their sails are spread;
They go to triumph o'er the sea-girt land,
And Rome hath blest their arms,
Along the ocean's echoing verge,
Along the mountain range of rocks,
The clustering multitudes behold their pomp,
And raise the votive prayer.
Commingling with the ocean's roar,
Ceaseless and hoarse their murmurs rise;
And soon they trust to see the winged bark
That bears good tidings home.
The watch-tower now in distance sinks;
And now Galicia's mountain rocks
Faint as the far-off clouds of evening lie,
And now they fade away.
Each like some moving citadel,
On through the waves they sail sublime;
And now the Spaniards see the silvery cliffs,
Behold the sea-girt land.
O fools! to think that ever foe
Should triumph o'er that sea-girt land!
O fools! to think that ever Britain's sons
Should wear the stranger's yoke!
For not in vain hath Nature reared
Around her coasts those silvery cliffs;
For not in vain old Ocean spreads his waves
To guard his favourite isle.
On come her gallant mariners!
What now avail Rome's boasted charms?
Where are the Spaniard's vaunts of eagle wrath,
His hopes of conquest now?
And hark! the angry winds arise,
Old Ocean heaves his angry waves;
The winds and waves against the invaders fight,
To guard the sea-girt land.
REMEMBRANCE.
MAN hath a weary pilgrimage
As through the world he wends;
On every stage from youth to age
Still discontent attends;
With heaviness he casts his eye
Upon the road before,
And still remembers with a sigh
The days that are no more.
To school the little exile goes,
Torn from his mother's arms,
What then shall soothe his earliest woes,
When novelty hath lost its charms?
Condemn'd to suffer through the day
Restraints which no rewards repay,
And cares where love has no concern, Hope lengthens as she counts the hours Before his wish'd return.
From hard control and tyrant rules,
The unfeeling discipline of schools,
In thought he loves to roam,
And tears will struggle in his eye
While he remembers with a sigh
The comforts of his home.
Youth comes; the toils and cares of life Torment the restless mind;
Where shall the tired and harass'd heart
Its consolation find?
Then is not Youth as Fancy tells,
Life's summer prime of joy?
Ah no! for hopes too long delay'd
And feelings blasted or betray'd,
Its fabled bliss destroy;
And youth remembers with a sigh
The careless days of Infancy.
Maturer Manhood now arrives,
And other thoughts come on,
But with the baseless hopes of Youth
Its generous warmth is gone;
Cold calculating cares succeed,
The timid thought, the wary deed,
The dull realities of truth;
Back on the past he turns his eye,
Remembering with an envious sigh
The happy dreams of youth.
So reaches he the latter stage
Of this our mortal pilgrimage,
With feeble steps and slow;
New ills that latter stage await,
And old Experience learns too late
That all is vanity below.
Life's vain delusions are gone by;
Its idle hopes are o'er;
Yet Age remembers with a sigh
The days that are no more.
(From "Roderick, The Last of The Goths.")
WITH that he fell upon the old man's neck ;
Then vaulted in the saddle, gave the reins,
And soon rejoined the host. On, comrades, on!
Victory and Vengeance! he exclaimed, and took
The lead on that good charger, he alone
Horsed for the onset. They, with one consent,
Gave all their voices to the inspiring cry,
Victory and Vengeance! and the hills and rocks
Caught the prophetic shout and rolled it round.
Count Pedro's people heard amid the heat
Of battle, and returned the glad acclaim.
The astonished Mussulmans, on all sides charged,
Heard that tremendous cry; yet manfully
They stood, and everywhere, with gallant front,
Opposed in fair array the shock of war.
Desperately they fought, like men expert in arms,
And knowing that no safety could be found
Save from their own right hands. No former day
Of all his long career had seen their chief
Approved so well; nor had Witiza's sons
Ever before this hour achieved in fight
Such feats of resolute valour.
Beheld Pelayo in the field afoot,
And twice essayed beneath his horse's feet
To thrust him down. Twice did the prince evade
The shock, and twice upon his shield received
The fratricidal sword. Tempt me no more,
Son of Witiza, cried the indignant chief,
Lest I forget what mother gave thee birth!
Go meet thy death from any hand but mine!
He said, and turned aside. Fitliest from me!
Exclaimed a dreadful voice, as through the throng
Orelio forced his way: fitliest from me
Receive the rightful death too long withheld!
'Tis Roderick strikes the blow! And as he spake
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