With their breath, and from their birth, Though Guilt would sweep it from the earth; Scattering nations' wealth like sand; Pouring nations' blood like water, In imperial seas of slaughter! V. But the heart and the mind, And who shall resist that proud union? When once more her hosts assemble, (1) ["Talking of politics, as Caleb Quotem says, pray look at the conclusion of my 'Ode on Waterloo,' written in the year 1815, and, comparing it with the Duke de Berri's catastrophe in 1820, tell me if I have not as good a right to the character of Vates,' in both senses of the word, as Fitzgerald and Coleridge? 'Crimson tears will follow yet;' and have they not?"-B. Letters, 1820.] FROM THE FRENCH. ["MUST THOU GO, MY GLORIOUS CHIEF?"](') I. MUST thou go, my glorious Chief, With a soldier's faith for thee? II. Idol of the soldier's soul! First in fight, but mightiest now: Many could a world control; Thee alone no doom can bow. Death; and envied those who fell, (1)" All wept, but particularly Savary, and a Polish officer who had been exalted from the ranks by Buonaparte. He clung to his master's knees; wrote a letter to Lord Keith, entreating permission to accompany him, even in the most menial capacity, which could not be admitted." (2) "At Waterloo, one man was seen, whose left arm was shattered by a cannon ball, to wrench it off with the other, and throwing it up in the air, exclaimed to his comrades, Vive l'Empereur, jusqu'à la mort!' There were many other instances of the like: this you may, however, depend on as true."- Private Letter from Brussels. III. Would that I were cold with those, Scarce dare trust a man with thee, IV. Would the sycophants of him Could he purchase with that throne Hearts like those which still are thine? V. My chief, my king, my friend, adieu! Never did I droop before; Never to my sovereign sue, As his foes I now implore: All I ask is to divide Every peril he must brave; Sharing by the hero's side His fall, his exile, and his grave. ON THE STAR OF "THE LEGION OF HONOUR." [FROM THE FREnch. 1 STAR of the brave!-whose beam hath shed Such glory o'er the quick and dead Thou radiant and adored deceit ! Which millions rush'd in arms to greet, Wild meteor of immortal birth! Souls of slain heroes form'd thy rays; Like lava roll'd thy stream of blood, Before thee rose, and with thee grew, Of three bright colours (1), each divine, For Freedom's hand had blended them, (1) The tricolour. One tint was of the sunbeam's dyes; Star of the brave! thy ray is pale, And Freedom hallows with her tread NAPOLEON'S FAREWELL. [FROM THE FRENCH.] I. FAREWELL to the Land, where the gloom of my Glory Arose and o'ershadow'd the earth with her name She abandons me now-but the page of her story, The brightest or blackest, is fill'd with my fame. |