THE DEVIL'S DRIVE; AN UNFINISHED RHAPSODY. (1) THE Devil return'd to hell by two, When he dined on some homicides done in ragoût, "And what shall I ride in?" quoth Lucifer then"If I follow'd my taste, indeed, I should mount in a waggon of wounded men, But these will be furnished again and again, And at present my purpose is speed; To see my manor as much as I may, "I have a state-coach at Carlton House, A chariot in Seymour Place; (1) ["I have lately written a wild, rambling, unfinished rhapsody, called "The Devil's Drive,' the notion of which I took from Porson's 'Devil's Walk.'" B. Diary, 1813.-" Of this strange, wild poem," says Moore, "the only copy that Lord Byron, I believe, ever wrote, he presented to Lord Holland. Though with a good deal of vigour and imagination, it is, for the most part, rather clumsily executed, wanting the point and condensation of those clever verses of Mr. Coleridge, which Lord Byron, adopting a notion long prevalent, has attributed to Professor Porson."-E.] VOL. X. S But they're lent to two friends, who make me amends And they handle their reins with such a grace, "So now for the earth to take my chance." And making a jump from Moscow to France, And rested his hoof on a turnpike road, But first as he flew, I forgot to say, And so sweet to his eye was its sulphury glare, And so soft to his ear was the cry of despair, That he perch'd on a mountain of slain ; And he gazed with delight from its growing height, Nor often on earth had he seen such a sight, Nor his work done half as well: For the field ran so red with the blood of the dead, That it blush'd like the waves of hell! Then loudly, and wildly, and long laugh'd he: "Methinks they have here little need of me!” But the softest note that soothed his ear eye Of a maid by her lover lying — |