TO HIS SISTER

From Childe Harold's Pilgrimage ›

HE castled crag of Drachenfels

ΤΗ

Frowns o'er the wide and winding Rhine,
Whose breast of waters broadly swells

Between the banks which bear the vine;
And hills all rich with blossomed trees,

And fields which promise corn and wine, And scattered cities crowning these,

Whose far white walls along them shine,
Have strewed a scene which I should see
With double joy, wert thou with me!

And peasant girls, with deep-blue eyes,
And hands which offer early flowers,
Walk smiling o'er this paradise;

Above, the frequent feudal towers
Through green leaves lift their walls of gray,
And many a rock which steeply lours,

And noble arch in proud decay,

Look o'er this vale of vintage bowers;

But one thing want these banks of Rhine-
Thy gentle hand to clasp in mine!

I send the lilies given to me;

Though long before thy hand they touch,
I know that they must withered be,
But yet reject them not as such;
For I have cherished them as dear,

Because they yet may meet thine eye,

And guide thy soul to mine even here,

When thou beholdest them drooping nigh, And knowest them gathered by the Rhine, And offered from my heart to thine!

The river nobly foams and flows,

The charm of this enchanted ground,
And all its thousand turns disclose

Some fresher beauty varying round;
The haughtiest breast its wish might bound
Through life to dwell delighted here;
Nor could on earth a spot be found
To nature and to me so dear,

Could thy dear eyes in following mine
Still sweeten more these banks of Rhine!

2977

ODE TO NAPOLEON

Is done - but yesterday a King,
And armed with Kings to strive;
And now thou art a nameless thing,

So abject-yet alive!

Is this the man of thousand thrones,

Who strewed our earth with hostile bones,

And can he thus survive?

Since he, miscalled the Morning Star,
Nor man nor fiend hath fallen so far.

Ill-minded man! why scourge thy kind

Who bowed so low the knee?
By gazing on thyself grown blind,

Thou taught'st the rest to see.

With might unquestioned-power to save—
Thine only gift hath been the grave
To those that worshiped thee;
Nor till thy fall could mortals guess
Ambition's less than littleness!

Thanks for that lesson-it will teach

To after-warriors more

Than high Philosophy can preach,

And vainly preached before.
That spell upon the minds of men
Breaks never to unite again,

That led them to adore

Those pagod things of sabre sway,
With fronts of brass and feet of clay.

The triumph and the vanity,

The rapture of the strife*—
The earthquake voice of Victory,
To thee the breath of life —
The sword, the sceptre, and that sway
Which man seemed made but to obey,
Wherewith renown was rife -

All quelled!— Dark Spirit! what must be
The madness of thy memory!

* "Certaminis gaudia"-the expression of Attila in his harangue to his army, previous to the battle of Châlons.

The Emperor Charles V., who abdicated in 1555.

Too late thou leav'st the high command
To which thy weakness clung;

All Evil Spirit as thou art,

It is enough to grieve the heart

To see thine own unstrung;

To think that God's fair world hath been
The footstool of a thing so mean!

And Earth hath spilt her blood for him,
Who thus can hoard his own!

And Monarchs bowed the trembling limb,
And thanked him for a throne!
Fair Freedom! we may hold thee dear,
When thus thy mightiest foes their fear
In humblest guise have shown.
Oh! ne'er may tyrant leave behind
A brighter name to lure mankind!
Thine evil deeds are writ in gore,

Nor deemed Contempt could thus make mirth Of these, the Conquerors of the earth.

And she, proud Austria's mournful flower,

Thy still imperial bride,

How bears her breast the torturing hour?

Still clings she to thy side?

Must she too bend, must she too share

Thy late repentance, long despair,

Thou throneless Homicide?

If still she loves thee, hoard that gem 'Tis worth thy vanished diadem!

*

Then haste thee to thy sullen Isle,
And gaze upon the sea;
That element may meet thy smile.

It ne'er was ruled by thee!
Or trace with thine all idle hand,
In loitering mood upon the sand,
That Earth is now as free!
That Corinth's pedagogue* hath now
Transferred his byword to thy brow.

Thou Timour! in his captive's cage,

What thoughts will there be thine,
While brooding in thy prisoned rage?

But one- -"The world was mine!"
Unless, like him of Babylon,
All sense is with thy sceptre gone,
Life will not long confine
That spirit poured so widely forth -
So long obeyed-so little worth!

THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO

From Childe Harold's Pilgrimage›

HERE was a sound of revelry by night,

THE

And Belgium's capital had gathered then
Her beauty and her chivalry, and bright

The lamps shone o'er fair women and brave men;

A thousand hearts beat happily; and when

Music arose with its voluptuous swell,

Soft eyes looked love to eyes which spake again,
And all went merry as a marriage-bell;

But hush! hark! a deep sound strikes like a rising knell!

Did ye not hear it?-No; 'twas but the wind,

Or the car rattling o'er the stony street;

On with the dance! let joy be unconfined;

No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure meet
To chase the glowing Hours with flying feet.
But hark! that heavy sound breaks in once more,
As if the clouds its echo would repeat,
And nearer, clearer, deadlier than before!

Arm! arm! it is-it is-the cannon's opening roar!

Dionysius of Sicily, who, after his fall, kept a school at Corinth.