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Though sorrow, need, or death make earth

For me a desert land.

My Father's care

Is round me there;

He holds me that I shall not fall,

And so to Him I leave it all.

C. Winkworth.

(From the German of S. Rodigast, 1675.)

CLXXI.

IVRY.

OW glory to the Lord of Hosts, from whom all glories are!

And glory to our Sovereign Liege, King Henry of Navarre !

Now let there be the merry sound of music and of dance, Through thy corn-fields green, and sunny vines, oh pleasant land of France!

And thou, Rochelle, our own Rochelle, proud city of the waters,

Again let rapture light the eyes of all thy mourning

daughters.

As thou wert constant in our ills, be joyous in our joy, For cold, and stiff, and still are they who wrought thy walls annoy.

Hurrah! Hurrah! a single field hath turned the chance of war,

Hurrah! Hurrah! for Ivry,* and Henry of Navarre.

Oh! how our hearts were beating, when, at the dawn of day,

We saw the army of the League drawn out in long array;

* The Battle of Ivry was fought in the year 1590.

With all its priest-led citizens, and all its rebel peers,
And Appenzel's* stout infantry, and Egmont's+ Flemish

spears.

There rode the brood of false Lorraine, the curses of our

land;

And dark Mayenne was in the midst, a truncheon in his

hand;

And, as we looked on them, we thought of Seine's empurpled flood,

And good Coligni's hoary hair all dabbled with his

blood;

And we cried unto the living God, who rules the fate of

war,

To fight for his own holy name, and Henry of Navarre.

The King is come to marshal us, in all his armour

drest,

And he has bound a snow-white plume upon his gallant

crest.

He looked upon his people, and a tear was in his eye;
He looked upon the traitors, and his glance was stern

and high.

Right graciously he smiled on us, as rolled from wing to wing,

Down all our line, a deafening shout, 'God save our Lord

the King.'

'And if my standard-bearer fall, as fall full well he may, For never saw I promise yet of such a bloody fray,

Press where ye see my white plume shine, amidst the

ranks of war,

And be your Oriflamme to-day the helmet of Navarre.'

* There were Swiss Catholic mercenaries in the Camp of the League. Shortly before the battle Count Egmont had brought considerable reinforcements from the Spanish Low Countries.

§ Oriflamme-golden flame,—‘a red taffeta banner cut into three points, each adorned with a green silk tassel.' It was displayed in the crisis of a battle.

Hurrah! the foes are moving! Hark to the mingled

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Of fife, and steed, and trump, and drum, and roaring

culverin.

The fiery Duke is pricking fast across Saint André's plain,

With all the hireling chivalry of Guelders and Almayne.* Now by the lips of those ye love, fair gentlemen of France,

Charge for the Golden Lilies,—upon them with the lance. A thousand spurs are striking deep, a thousand spears in

rest,

A thousand knights are pressing close behind the snowwhite crest;

And in they burst, and on they rushed, while, like a guiding star,

Amidst the thickest carnage blazed the helmet of Navarre.

Now, God be praised, the day is ours! Mayenne hath turned his rein.

D'Aumale hath cried for quarter.-The Flemish count is slain.

Their ranks are breaking like thin clouds before a Biscay

gale;

The field is heaped with bleeding steeds, and flags, and cloven mail.

And then we thought on vengeance, and, all along our

van,

'Remember Saint Bartholomew,' was passed from man

to man.

But out spake gentle Henry, 'No Frenchman is my foe : Down, down, with every foreigner, but let your brethren go.'

*Almayne.

Allemayne, Germany; so called from the ancient con

federacy of tribes, the Allemanni.

Oh! was there ever such a knight, in friendship or in

war,

As our Sovereign Lord, King Henry, the Soldier of Navarre?

Right well fought all the Frenchmen who fought for France to-day;

And many a lordly banner God gave them for a

prey.

But we of the religion have borne us best in fight;

And the good Lord of Rosny hath ta'en the cornet

white.

Our own true Maximilian the cornet white hath ta'en,
The cornet white with crosses black, the flag of false

Lorraine.

Up with it high; unfurl it wide; that all the host may know

How God hath humbled the proud house which wrought his church such woe.

Then on the ground, while trumpets sound their loudest point of war,

Fling the red shreds, a footcloth meet for Henry of Navarre.

Ho! maidens of Vienna ;* Ho! matrons of Lucerne ; Weep, weep, and rend your hair for those who never shall

return.

Ho! Philip, send, for charity, thy Mexican pistoles, That Antwerp monks may sing a mass for thy poor spearsmen's souls.

Ho! gallant nobles of the League, look that your arms be bright;

Ho! burghers of Saint Genevieve,† keep watch and ward to-night.

*The Catholic German powers supported the League.

St. Genevieve, the patron saint of Paris.

For our God hath crushed the tyrant, our God hath raised the slave,

And mocked the counsel of the wise, and the valour of the brave.

Then glory to His holy name, from whom all glories

are;

And glory to our Sovereign Lord, King Henry of Navarre.
T. B. Macaulay.

CLXXII.

THE SOURCE OF THE GANGES.

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(FROM THE CURSE OF KEHAMA.')

ONE hath seen its secret fountain;
But on the top of Meru mountain,
Which rises o'er the hills of earth,
In light and clouds, it hath its mortal birth.
Earth seems that pinnacle to rear

Sublime above this worldly sphere,
Its cradle, and its altar, and its throne,
And there the new-born river lies
Outspread beneath its native skies,
As if it there would love to dwell

Alone and unapproachable.
Soon flowing forward, and resigned
To the will of the Creating Mind,
It springs at once, with sudden leap,

Down from the immeasurable steep;

From rock to rock, with shivering force rebounding,
The mighty cataract rushes: heaven around,
Like thunder, with the incessant roar resounding,
And Meru's summit shaking with the sound.
Wide spreads the snowy foam, the sparkling spray
Dances aloft; and ever there at morning
The earlest sunbeams haste to wing their way,

With rainbow wreaths the holy stream adorning :

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