Like a servant of the Lord, with his Bible and his sword, The General rode along us to form us to the fight, When a murmuring sound broke out, and swelled into a shout

Among the godless horsemen upon the tyrant's right.

And hark! like the roar of the billows on the shore,

The cry of battle rises along their charging line! For God! for the Cause! for the Church! for the Laws! For Charles, King of England, and Rupert of the Rhine!

The furious German comes, with his clarions and his drums,

5

6

His bravoes of Alsatia, and pages of Whitehall; They are bursting on our flanks. Grasp your pikes, close

your ranks;

For Rupert never comes but to conquer or to fail.

They are here! They rush on! We are broken! We are gone!

Our left is borne before them like stubble on the blast. O Lord, put forth thy might! O Lord, defend the right! Stand back to back, in God's name, and fight it to the last.

Stout Skippon hath a wound; the center hath given ground:

Hark! hark!-What means the trampling of horsemen on our rear?

Whose banner do I see, boys? 'Tis he, thank God, 'tis he,

boys.

Bear up another minute; brave Oliver is here.

4. General. Cromwell.

5. Alsatia. A section of London frequented by law-breakers. 6. Whitehall. A famous palace in London.

Their heads all stooping low, their points all in a row,

Like a whirlwind on the trees, like a deluge on the dykes,

Our cuirassiers have burst on the ranks of the Accurst, And at a shock have scattered the forest of his pikes.

Fast, fast, the gallants ride, in some safe nook to hide

Their coward heads, predestined to rot on Temple Bar:7 And he he turns, he flies:-shame on those cruel eyes

That bore to look on torture, and dare not look on war!

Ho! comrades, scour the plain; and, ere ye strip the slain, First give another stab to make your search secure, Then shake from sleeves and pockets their broad-pieces and lockets,

The tokens of the wanton, the plunder of the poor.

Fools! your doublets shone with gold, and your hearts were gay and bold,

When you kissed your lily hands to your lemans &

today;

And tomorrow shall the fox, from her chambers in the

rocks,

Lead forth her tawny cubs to howl above the prey.

Where be your tongues that late mocked at heaven and hell and fate,

And the fingers that once were so busy with your

blades,

Your perfumed satin clothes, your catches and your oaths, Your stage-plays and your sonnets, your diamonds and

your spades?

7. Temple Bar. A famous stone gateway in London, where heads of traitors were often exposed as warnings.

8. Lemans. Sweethearts.

Down, down, for ever down with the miter and the

crown,

With the Belial9 of the Court, and the Mammon of the

Pope!

There is woe in Oxford Halls: there is wail in Durham's Stalls: 10

The Jesuit smites his bosom: the Bishop rends his cope.

And She of the Seven Hills 11 shall mourn her children's ills,

And tremble when she thinks on the edge of England's

sword;

And the Kings of earth in fear shall shudder when they

hear

What the hand of God hath wrought for the Houses and the Word.

55

THE BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE
AT CORUNNA1

CHARLES WOLFE

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.

9. Belial. Devil, Prince of darkness.

10.

11.

Durham's Stalls. Seats in the, choir of Durham Cathedral.
She of the Seven Hills. The Roman Catholic Church.

1. The British under Sir John Moore held back the French at Corunna, Spain, in 1809, until the British army Was enabled to embark in safety; but their leader was killed.

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.

56

THE SOLDIER'S DREAM

THOMAS CAMPBELL

Our bugles sang truce, for the night-cloud had lower'd, And the sentinel stars set their watch in the sky; And thousands had sunk on the ground overpower'd, The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die.

When reposing that night on my pallet of straw

By the wolf-scaring faggot that guarded the slain,

At the dead of the night a sweet Vision I saw;
And thrice ere the morning I dreamt it again.

Methought from the battlefield's dreadful array .
Far, far, I had roam'd on a desolate track:
'Twas Autumn,-and sunshine arose on the way

To the home of my fathers, that welcomed me back.

I flew to the pleasant fields traversed so oft

In life's morning march, when my bosom was young; I heard my own mountain-goats bleating aloft,

And knew the sweet strain that the corn-reapers sung.

Then pledged we the wine-cup, and fondly I swore
From my home and my weeping friends never to part;
My little ones kiss'd me a thousand times o'er,
And my wife sobb'd aloud in her fulness of heart.

"Stay-stay with us!-rest!-thou

art weary and

worn !"

And fain was their war-broken soldier to stay;But sorrow return'd with the dawning of morn,

And the voice in my dreaming ear melted away.