Like waves of ocean rolling fast,
Or thunder-cloud before the blast,
Massena's legions, stern and vast,
Rush'd to the dreadful revelry.
The pause is o'er; the fatal shock
A thousand thousand thunders woke :
The air grows sick; the mountains rock⚫
Red ruin rides triumphantly.
Light boil'd the war-cloud to the sky,
In phantom towers and columns high,
But dark and dense their bases lie,
Prone on the battle's boundary.
The thistle waved her bonnet blue,
The harp her wildest war-notes threw,
The red rose gain'd a fresher hue,
Busaco, in thy heraldry.
Hail, gallant brothers! Wo befall
The foe that braves thy triple wall!
Thy sons, O wretched Portugal!
Roused at their feats of chivalry.
58.-BOADICEA, AN ODE.
WHEN the British warrior queen,
Bleeding from the Roman rods,
Sought, with an indignant mien,
Counsel of her country's gods;
Sage beneath a spreading oak
Sat the Druid, hoary chief,
Every burning word he spoke,
Full of rage and full of grief:
Princess! if our aged eyes
Weep upon thy matchless wrongs,
'Tis because resentment ties
All the terrors of our tongues.
Rome shall perish-write that word
In the blood that she has spilt;
Perish hopeless and abhorr'd,
Deep in ruin as in guilt.
Rome, for empire far renown'd,
Tramples on a thousand states,
Soon her pride shall kiss the ground-
Hark! the Gaul is at her gates.
Other Romans shall arise,
Heedless of a soldier's name,
Sounds, not arms, shall win the prize,
Harmony the path to fame.
Then the progeny that springs
From the forests of our land,
Arm'd with thunder, clad with wings,
Shall a wider world command.
Regions Cæsar never knew
Thy posterity shall sway,
Where his eagles never flew,
None invincible as they.
Such the bard's prophetic words,
Pregnant with celestial fire,
Bending as he swept the chords
Of his sweet but awful lyre.
She, with all a monarch's pride,
Felt them in her bosom glow,
Rush'd to battle, fought and died,
Dying, hurl'd them at the foe.
Ruffians, pitiless as proud,
Heaven awards the vengeance due,
Empire is on us bestow'd,
Shame and ruin wait for you.
59.-ON THE DOWNFALL OF POLAND.
O! sacred truth! thy triumph ceased a while, And hope, thy sister, ceased with thee to smile, When leagued oppression pour'd to northern wars Her whisker'd pandoors and her fierce hussars,
Waved her dread standard to the breeze of morn, Peal'd her loud drum, and twang'd her trumpet horn ; Tumultuous horror brooded o'er her van,
Presaging wrath to Poland-and to man!
Warsaw's last champion, from her height survey'd, Wide o'er the fields, a waste of ruin laid,
O Heaven! he cried,-my bleeding country save !—
Is there no hand on high to shield the brave?
Yet, though destruction sweep these lovely plains,
Rise, fellow men! our country yet remains!
By that dread name we wave the sword on high!
And swear for her to live with her to die!
He said, and on the rampart-heights array'd
His trusty warriors, few, but undismay'd;
Firm-paced and slow, a horrid front they form,
Still as the breeze, but dreadful as the storm;
Low murmuring sounds along their banners fly,
Revenge, or death, the watch-word and reply;
Then peal'd the notes, omnipotent to charm,
And the loud tocsin toll'd their last alarm!-
In vain, alas! in vain, ye gallant few!
From rank to rank your volley'd thunder flew :-
O! bloodiest picture in the book of time,
Sarmatia fell, unwept, without a crime;
Found not a generous friend, a pitying foe,
Strength in her arms, nor mercy in her wo!
Dropp'd from her nerveless grasp the shatter'd spear,
Closed her bright eye, and curb'd her high career ;-
Hope for a season bade the world farewell,
And freedom shriek'd-as Kosciusko fell!
The sun went down, nor ceased the carnage there,
Tumultuous murder shook the midnight air-
On Prague's proud arch the fires of ruin glow,
His blood-dyed waters murmuring far below;
The storm prevails, the rampart yields a way,
Bursts the wild cry of horror and dismay !
Hark! as the smouldering piles with thunder fall,
A thousand shrieks for hopeless mercy call!
Earth shook-red meteors flash'd along the sky,
And conscious nature shudder'd at the cry!
O! righteous Heaven! ere freedom found a grave, Why slept the sword, omnipotent to save?
Where was thine arm, O vengeance! where thy rod,
That smote the foes of Zion and of God?
That crush'd proud Ammon, when his iron car
Was yoked in wrath, and thunder'd from afar?
Where was the storm that slumber'd till the host
Of blood-stain'd Pharaoh left their trembling coast,
Then bade the deep in wild commotion flow,
And heaved an ocean on their march below?
Departed spirits of the mighty dead!
Ye that at Marathon and Leuctra bled!
Friends of the world! restore your swords to man,
Fight in his sacred cause, and lead the van!
Yet for Sarmatia's tears of blood atone,
And make her arm puissant as your own!
O! once again to freedom's cause return
The patriot Tell-the Bruce of Bannockburn !
-ON ANCIENT GREECE.
CLIME of the unforgotten brave !—
Whose land from plain to mountain cave
Was freedom's home or glory's grave-
Shrine of the mighty! can it be,
That this is all remains of thee?
Approach, thou craven, crouching slave,
Say, is not this Thermopyla?
These waters blue that round you lave,
O servile offspring of the free-
Pronounce what sea, what shore is this?
The gulf, the rock of Salamis !
These scenes-their story not unknown-
Arise, and make again your own;
Snatch from the ashes of your sires
The embers of their former fires,
And he who in the strife expires
Will add to theirs a name of fear,
That tyranny shall quake to hear,
And leave his sons a hope, a fame,
They too will rather die than shame ;
For freedom's battle once begun,
Bequeath'd by bleeding sire to son,
Though baffled oft, is ever won.
Bear witness, Greece, thy living page,
Attest it, many a deathless age!
While kings, in dusty darkness hid,
Have left a nameless pyramid,
Thy heroes, though the general doom
Hath swept the column from their tomb,
A mightier monument command,
The mountains of their native land!
There points thy muse to stranger's eye
The graves of those that cannot die!
"Twere long to tell, and sad to trace,
Each step from splendour to disgrace;
Enough no foreign foe could quell
Thy soul, till from itself it fell;
Yes! self-abasement paved the way
To villain bonds and despot sway.
61.-LOUDHON'S ATTACK-A HUNGARIAN WAR-SONG.
RISE, ye Croats, fierce and strong,
Form the front and march along;
And gather fast, ye gallant men
Of Nona and of Warrasden,
Whose sunny mountains nurse a line
Generous as her fiery wine;
Hosts of Buda, hither bring
The bloody flag, and eagle wing;
Ranks of Agria, head and heel
Sheathed in adamantine steel,
Quit the woodlands and the boar,
Ye hunters wild on Drova's shore;
And ye that hew her oaken wood,
Brown with lusty hardihood,
The trumpets sound, the colours fly,
And Loudhon leads to victory!
Hark! the summons loud and strong
"Follow, soldiers-march along ;"
Every baron, sword in hand,
Rides before his gallant band;
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