For swift to east and swift to west the ghastly war-flame spread ;

High on St. Michael's mount it shone: it shone on Beachy

Head.

Far on the deep the Spaniard saw, along each southern shire, Cape beyond cape in endless range, those twinkling points of fire.

The fisher left his skiff to rock on Tamar's glittering waves: The rugged miners poured to war from Mendip's sunless caves;

O'er Longleat's towers, o'er Cranbourne's oaks, the fiery herald flew ;

He roused the shepherds of Stonehenge, the rangers of Beaulieu.

Right sharp and quick the bells all night rang out from Bristol town,

And ere the day three hundred horse had met at Clifton

down;

The sentinel on Whitehall gate looked forth into the night, And saw o'erhanging Richmond Hill the streak of blood-red

light.

Then bugle's note and cannon's roar the death-like silence broke,

And with one start, and with one cry the royal city woke.
At once on all her stately gates arose the answering fires;
At once the loud alarums clashed from all her reeling spires ;
From all the batteries of the tower pealed loud the voice of

fear;

And all the thousand masts of Thames sent back a louder cheer:

And from the farthest wards was heard the rush of hurrying

feet,

And the broad stream of flags and pikes rushed down each roaring street;

And broader still became the blaze, and louder still the din, As fast from every village round the horse came spurring in:

And eastward straight from wild Blackheath, the warlike

errand went,

And raised in many an ancient hall the gallant squires of

Kent.

Southward from Surrey's pleasant hills flew those bright couriers forth,

High on bleak Hampstead's swarthy moor they started for the north;

And on and on without a pause, untired they bounded still; All night from tower to tower they sprang; they sprang from

hill to hill:

Till the proud Peak unfurled the flag o'er Darwin's rocky

dales,

Till like volcanoes flared to heaven the gloomy hills of Wales, Till twelve fair counties saw the blaze on Malvern's lonely

height,

Till streamed in crimson on the wind the Wrekin's crest of

light,

Till broad and fierce the star came forth on Ely's stately fane, And tower and hamlet rose in arms o'er all the boundless

plain;

Till Belvoir's lordly terraces the sign to Lincoln sent,

And Lincoln sped the message on o'er the wide vale of Trent; Till Skiddaw saw the fire that burned on Gaunt's embattled pile,

And the red glare of Skiddaw roused the burghers of Carlisle.

LORD MACAULAY.

BATTLE OF ALBUERA.

THE struggle continued with unabated fury. Colonel Inglis, twenty-two officers, and more than four hundred men, out of five hundred and seventy who had mounted the hill, fell in the fifty-seventh alone; the other regiments were scarcely better off, not one-third were standing in any ammunition failed, and as the English fire slackened, a French column

was established in advance upon the right flank. The play of the guns checked them a moment, but in this dreadful crisis Beresford wavered. Destruction stared him in the face; his personal resources were exhausted, and the unhappy thought of a retreat rose in his agitated mind. But while he was preparing to resign the contest, Colonel Hardinge had urged Cole to advance with the fourth division; and then riding to the third brigade of the second division, which, under the command of Colonel Abercrombie, had hitherto been only slightly engaged, directed him also to push forward into the fight. The die was thus cast, Beresford acquiesced, Alten received orders to retake the village, and this terrible battle was continued.

At this time six guns were in the enemy's possession, the whole of Merle's reserves were coming forward to reinforce the front column of the French, the remnant of Houghton's brigade could no longer maintain its ground, the field was heaped with carcases, the lancers were riding furiously about the captured artillery on the upper parts of the hill, and behind all, Hamilton's Portuguese and Alten's Germans, now withdrawing from the bridge, seemed to be in full retreat.

Soon, however, Cole's fusileers, flanked by a battalion of the Lusitanian legion under Colonel Hawkshawe, mounted the hill, drove off the lancers, recovered five of the captured guns and one colour, and appeared on the right of Houghton's brigade precisely as Abercrombie passed it on the left.

Such a gallant line, issuing from the midst of the smoke, and rapidly separating itself from the confused and broken multitude, startled the enemy's masses, which were increasing and pressing onwards as to an assured victory; they wavered, hesitated, and then vomiting forth a storm of fire, hastily endeavoured to enlarge their front, while a fearful discharge of grape from all their artillery whistled through the British ranks. Myers was killed, Cole and the three colonels fell wounded, and the fusileer battalions, struck by the iron tempest, reeled and staggered like sinking ships; but,

suddenly and sternly recovering, they closed on their terrible enemies, and then was seen with what a strength and majesty the British soldier fights. In vain did Soult with voice and gesture animate his Frenchmen; in vain did the hardiest veterans break from the crowded columns and sacrifice their lives to gain time for the mass to open out on such a fair field; in vain did the mass itself bear up, and, fiercely striving, fire indiscriminately upon friends and foes, while the horsemen hovering on the flank threatened to charge the advancing line. Nothing could stop that astonishing infantry. No sudden burst of undisciplined valour, no nervous enthusiasm weakened the stability of their order, their flashing eyes were bent on the dark columns in their front, their measured tread shook the ground, their dreadful volleys swept away the head of every formation, their deafening shouts overpowered the dissonant cries that broke from all parts of the tumultuous crowd, as slowly and with a horrid carnage it was pushed by the incessant vigour of the attack to the farthest edge of the hill. In vain did the French reserves mix with the struggling multitude to sustain the fight, their efforts only increased the irremediable confusion, and the mighty mass, breaking off like a loosened cliff, went headlong down the steep; the rain flowed after in streams discoloured with blood, and eighteen hundred unwounded men, the remnant of six thousand unconquerable British soldiers, stood triumphant on the fatal hill.

SIR W. NAPIER.

HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS.

I SPRANG to the stirrup, and Joris, and he;

I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped all three ;

'Good speed!' cried the watch, as the gate-bolts undrew ; 'Speed!' echoed the wall to us galloping through;

Behind shut the postern, the lights sank to rest,

And into the midnight we galloped abreast.

Not a word to each other; we kept the great pace
Neck by neck, stride by stride, never changing our place;
I turned in my saddle and made its girths tight,
Then shortened each stirrup, and set the pique right,
Rebuckled the cheek-strap, chained slacker the bit,
Nor galloped less steadily Roland a whit.

'Twas moonset at starting; but, while we drew near
Lokeren, the cocks crew and twilight dawned clear;
At Boom, a great yellow star came out to see;
At Düffeld 'twas morning as plain as could be;

And from Mecheln church-steeple we heard the half-chime, So Joris broke silence with 'Yet there is time!'

At Aershot, up leaped of a sudden the sun,
And against him the cattle stood black every one,
To stare through the mist at us galloping past,
And I saw my stout galloper Roland at last,
With resolute shoulders, each butting away
The haze, as some bluff river headland its spray :

And his low head and crest, just one sharp ear bent back
For my voice, and the other pricked out on his track;
And one eye's black intelligence,-ever that glance
O'er its white edge at me, his own master, askance !
And the thick heavy spume-flakes which aye and anon
His fierce lips shook upwards in galloping on.

By Hasselt, Dirck groaned; and cried Joris, 'Stay spur !
Your Roos galloped bravely, the fault's not in her,
We'll remember at Aix'—for one heard the quick wheeze
Of her chest, saw the stretched neck, and staggering knees,
And sunk tail, and horrible heave of the flank,

As down on her haunches she shuddered and sank.

So, we were left galloping, Joris and I,

Past Loos and past Tongres, no cloud in the sky;