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BONDUCA.

[Bonduca the British queen, taking occasion from a defeat of the Romans to impeach their valor, is rebuked by Caratac.]

QUEEN BONDUCA, I do not grieve your fortune.

If I grieve, 'tis at the bearing of your fortunes;

You put too much wind to your sail : discretion

And hardy valor are the twins of honor,

And nursed together, make a conqueror;

Divided, but a talker. 'Tis a truth, That Rome has fled before us twice, and routed;

A truth we ought to crown the gods for, lady,

And not our tongues.

You call the Romans fearful, fleeing

Romans,

And Roman girls:

Does this become a doer? are they
such?

Where is your conquest then?
Why are your altars crowned with
wreaths of flowers,

The beast with gilt horns waiting
for the fire?

The holy Druidés composing songs
Of everlasting life to Victory?
Why are these triumphs, lady? for
a May-game?

For hunting a poor herd of wretched
Romans?

Is it no more? shut up your temples,

Britons,

And let the husbandman redeem his

heifers;

Put out our holy fires; no timbrel

ring;

Let's home and sleep; for such great
overthrows

A candle burns too bright a sacrifice;
A glow-worm's tail too full a flame.
You say, I doat upon these Ro-

mans;

Witness these wounds, I do; they were fairly given:

I love an enemy, I was born a soldier;

And he that in the head of 's troop defies me,

Rending my manly body with his
sword,

I make a mistress. Yellow-tressèd
Hymen

Ne'er tied a longing virgin with
more joy,

Than I am married to that man that
wounds me:

And are not all these Roman?
struck battles

Ten

I sucked these honored scars from, and all Roman.

Ten years of bitter nights and heavy marches,

When many a frozen storm sung
through my cuirass,

And made it doubtful whether that
or I
Were the more

stubborn metal, have I wrought through, And all to try these Romans. Ten times a night

I have swum the rivers, when the stars of Rome

Shot at me as I floated, and the billows

Tumbled their watery ruins on my shoulders,

Charging my battered sides with troops of agues,

try these Romans; And still to whom I found

As ready, and as full of that I brought,

(Which was not fear nor flight,) as

valiant,

As vigilant, as wise, to do and

suffer,

Ever advanced as forward as

Britons;

Have I not seen these Britons Run, run, Bonduca?

rack swifter;

the

not the quick

The virgin from the hated ravisher

Not half so fearful;-not a flight drawn home,

A round stone from a sling, a lover's wish,

E'er made that haste they have. By heavens!

I have seen these Britons that you magnify,

Run as they would have out-run time, and roaring,

Basely for mercy, roaring; the light shadows,

That in a thought scour o'er the fields of corn,

Halted on crutches to them. Yes, Bonduca,

I have seen thee run too, and thee, Nennius;

Yea, run apace, both; then when Penyus,

The Roman girl, cut through your armed carts,

And drove them headlong on ye down the hill;

Then when he hunted ye like Britain foxes,

More by the scent than sight: then did I see

These valiant and approved men of Britain,

Like boding owls, creep into tods of ivy,

And hoot their fears to one another nightly.

I fled too,

But not so fast; your jewel had been lost then,

Young Hengo there; he trasht me, Nennius:

For when your fears outrun him, then stept I,

And in the head of all the Romans' fury

Took him, and, with my tough belt to my back,

I buckled him;-behind him, my sure shield;

And then I followed. If I say I fought

Five times in bringing off this bud of Britain,

I lie not, Nennius. Neither had ye heard

Me speak this, or ever seen the child

more,

But that the son of Virtue, Penyus, Seeing me steer through all these storms of danger,

My helm still on my head, my sword my prow,

Turned to my foe my face, he cried out nobly,

"Go, Briton, bear thy lion's whelp off safely;

Thy manly sword has ransomed thee: grow strong,

And let me meet thee once again in arms:

Then if thou stand'st, thou art mine." I took his offer,

And here I am to honor him.

There's not a blow we gave since Julius landed,

That was of strength and worth, but like records

They file to after-ages. Our Registers The Romans are, for noble deeds of honor;

And shall we burn their mentions with upbraidings?

Had we a difference with some petty Isle,

Or with our neighbors, lady, for our landmarks,

The taking in of some rebellious Lord,

Or making a head against commotions,

After a day of blood, peace might be argued:

But where we grapple for the ground we live on,

The Liberty we hold as dear as life, The gods we worship, and next those, our honors,

And with those swords that know no end of battle: Those men beside themselves allow no neighbor;

Those minds that, where the day is, claim inheritance;

And where the sun makes ripe the fruits, their harvest;

And where they march, but measure out more ground

To add to Rome, and here in the bowels on us;

It must not be; no, as they are our foes,

And those that must be so until we

tire 'em,

Let's use the peace of Honor, that's fair dealing;

But in our ends, our swords.

BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.

THE BARD.

I. 1.

"RUIN seize thee, ruthless king! Confusion on thy banners wait; Though fanned by Conquest's crimson wing,

They mock the air with idle state. Helm, nor hauberk's twisted mail, Nor e'en thy virtues, Tyrant, shall avail

To save thy secret soul from nightly fears,

From Cambria's curse, from Cambria's tears!"

Such were the sounds that o'er the crested pride

Of the first Edward scattered wild dismay,

As down the steep of Snowdon's shaggy side

He wound with toilsome march
his long array.
Glo'ster

Stout

stood aghast in speechless trance:

"To arms!" cried Mortimer, and couched his quivering lance.

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Brave Urien sleeps upon his craggy

bed:

Mountains! ye mourn in vain Modred, whose magic song Made huge Plinlimmon bow his cloud-topped head.

On dreary Arvon's shore they lie, Smeared with gore, and ghastly pale:

Far, far aloof the affrighted ravens sail;

The famished eagle screams, and passes by.

Dear lost companions of my tuneful art,

Dear as the light that visits these sad eyes,

Dear as the ruddy drops that warm my heart,

Ye died amidst your dying country's cries

No more I weep. They do not sleep.

On yonder cliffs, a grisly band, I see them sit, they linger yet,

Avengers of their native land: With me in dreadful harmony they join,

And weave with bloody hands the tissue of thy line.

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"Girt with many a baron bold, Sublime their starry fronts they rear; And gorgeous dames, and statesmen old

In bearded majesty, appear.
In the midst a form divine!
Her eye proclaims her of the Briton-
line;

Her lion-port, her awe-commanding face.

Attempered sweet to virgin-grace. What strings symphonious tremble in the air,

What strains of vocal transport round her play

Hear from the grave, great Taliessin, hear;

They breathe a soul to animate thy clay.

Bright Rapture calls, and soaring as she sings,

Waves in the eye of heaven her many-colored wings.

III. 3.

"The verse adorn again

Fierce war, and faithful love, And truth severe, by fairy fiction drest.

In buskined measures move Pale grief, and pleasing pain, With horror, tyrant of the throbbing breast.

A voice, as of the cherub-choir, Gales from blooming Eden bear; And distant warblings lessen on my

ear,

That lost in long futurity expire. Fond impious man, think'st thou yon sanguine cloud,

Raised by thy breath, has quenched the orb of day? To-morrow he repairs the golden flood,

And warms the nations with redoubled ray.

Enough for me; with joy I see

The different doom our fates assign.

Be thine despair, and sceptred care; To triumph, and to die, are mine." He spoke, and headlong from the mountain's height

Deep in the roaring tide he plunged to endless night.

GRAY.

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From his home, in the dark rolling clouds of the north?

Lo! the death-shot of foemen outspeeding, he rode

Companionless, bearing destruction abroad;

But down let him stoop from his havoc on high!

Ah! home let him speed-for the spoiler is nigh.

Why flames the far summit? Why shoot to the blast

Those embers, like stars from the firmament cast?

'Tis the fire-shower of ruin, all dreadfully driven

From his eyry, that beacons the darkness of heaven.

Oh, crested Lochiel! the peerless in might,

Whose banners arise on the battlement's height,

Heaven's fire is around thee, to blast and to burn;

Return to thy dwelling! all lonely return!

For the blackness

of ashes shall mark where it stood,

And a wild mother scream o'er her famishing brood,

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