260

AFTER BLENHEIM

It was a summer evening,

Old Kaspar's work was done,
And he before his cottage door

Was sitting in the sun;
And by him sported on the green
His little grandchild Wilhelmine.

She saw her brother Peterkin

Roll something large and round,
Which he beside the rivulet

In playing there had found;
He came to ask what he had found
That was so large and smooth and round.

Old Kaspar took it from the boy

Who stood expectant by;

And then the old man shook his head,
And with a natural sigh
"'Tis some poor fellow's skull," said he,
"Who fell in the great victory.

"I find them in the garden,

For there's many here about;
And often when I go to plough

The ploughshare turns them out.
For many thousand men," said he,
"Were slain in that great victory."

"Now tell us what 'twas all about,"
Young Peterkin he cries;
And little Wilhelmine looks up
With wonder-waiting eyes:

"Now tell us all about the war, And what they fought each other for."

"It was the English," Kaspar cried, "Who put the French to rout;

But what they fought each other for

I could not well make out. But everybody said," quoth he, "That 'twas a famous victory.

"My father lived at Blenheim then,

Yon little stream hard by;
They burnt his dwelling to the ground,
And he was forced to fly;

So with his wife and child he fled,
Nor had he where to rest his head.

"With fire and sword the country round

Was wasted far and wide,

And many a childing mother then
And newborn baby died:

But things like that, you know, must be
At every famous victory.

"They say it was a shocking sight
After the field was won;

For many thousand bodies here
Lay rotting in the sun:

But things like that, you know, must be
After a famous victory.

"Great praise the Duke of Marlbro' won And our good Prince Eugene;" "Why 'twas a very wicked thing!" Said little Wilhelmine;

"Nay

nay my little girl," quoth he,

..

"It was a famous victory.

"And everybody praised the Duke
Who this great fight did win."
"But what good came of it at last?"
Quoth little Peterkin :-
"Why that I cannot tell," said he,
"But 'twas a famous victory."

Robert Southey

261

PRO PATRIA MORI

When he who adores thee has left but the name

Of his fault and his sorrows behind,

Oh! say wilt thou weep, when they darken the fame

Of a life that for thee was resign'd!

Yes, weep, and however my foes may condemn,
Thy tears shall efface their decree;

For, Heaven can witness, though guilty to them,
I have been but too faithful to thee.

With thee were the dreams of my earliest love;
Every thought of my reason was thine:
In my last humble prayer to the Spirit above
Thy name shall be mingled with mine!
Oh! blest are the lovers and friends who shall live

The days of thy glory to see;

But the next dearest blessing that Heaven can give Is the pride of thus dying for thee.

Thomas Moore

262* THE BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE AT

CORUNNA

Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
As his corpse to the rampart we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our hero we buried.

We buried him darkly at dead of night,
The sods with our bayonets turning,
By the struggling moonbeam's misty light
And the lantern dimly burning.

No useless coffin enclosed his breast,

Not in sheet or in shroud we wound him; But he lay like a warrior taking his rest, With his martial cloak around him.

Few and short were the prayers we said,

And we spoke not a word of sorrow;

But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead,

And we bitterly thought of the morrow.

We thought, as we hollow'd his narrow bed

And smoothed down his lonely pillow,

That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head,
And we far away on the billow!

Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone
And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him,-
But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on
In the grave where a Briton has laid him.

But half of our heavy task was done

When the clock struck the hour for retiring;

And we heard the distant and random gun
That the foe was sullenly firing.

Slowly and sadly we laid him down,

From the field of his fame fresh and gory ; We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone, But we left him alone with his glory.

Charles Wolfe

263* SIMON LEE THE OLD HUNTSMAN

In the sweet shire of Cardigan,
Not far from pleasant Ivor Hall,
An old man dwells, a little man,-
'Tis said he once was tall.

Full five-and-thirty years he lived
A running huntsman merry;
And still the centre of his cheek
Is red as a ripe cherry.

No man like him the horn could sound,
And hill and valley rang with glee,
When Echo bandied round and round
The halloo of Simon Lee.

In those proud days he little cared
For husbandry or tillage;

To blither tasks did Simon rouse
The sleepers of the village.

He all the country could outrun,
Could leave both man and horse behind;
And often, ere the chase was done
He reel'd and was stone-blind.