And still the Rhine had rolled a German flood.
'O, nursed in many a wile,and practised long
To spoil the poor, and cringe before the strong,
To swell the victor's state, and hovering near,
Like some base vulture in the battle's rear,
To watch the carnage of the field, and share
Each loathsome alms the prouder eagles spare:
A curse is on thee, Brandenburgh, the sound
Of Poland's wailing drags thee to the ground,
And drunk with guilt, thy harlot lips shall know
The bitter dregs of Austria's cup of wo.
Enough of vengeance. O'er the ensanguined plain
I gaze, and seek their numerous host in vain, Gone like the locust band, when whirlwinds
Their flimsy legions through the waste of air.
Enough of vengeance. By the glorious dead,
Who bravely fell where youthful Lewis led,
By Blucher's sword in fiercest danger tried,
And the true heart that burst when Brunswic
died,
By her whose charms the coldest zeal might
The manliest firmness in the fairest form
Save, Europe, save the remnant.-Yet remains One glorious path to free the world from chains. Why, when your northern band in Eylau's wood
Retreating struck, and tracked their course with
While one firm rock the floods of ruin stayed,
Why, generous Austria,were thy wheels delayed?
And Albion !'-Darker sorrow veiled his brow-
'Friend of the friendless-Albion,where art thou?
Child of the Sea, whose wing-like sails are spread,
The covering cherub of the ocean's bed;
The storm and tempest render peace to thee,
And the wild-roaring waves a stern security.
But hope not thou in Heaven's own strength to
ride,
Freedom's loved ark, o'er broad oppression's tide,
If virtue leave thee, if thy careless eye
Glance in contempt on Europe's agony.
Alas! where now the bands who wont to pour
Their strong deliverance on the Egyptian shore?
Wing,wing your course, a prostrate world to save,
Triumphant squadrons of Trafalgar's wave.
And thou, blest star of Europe's darkest hour, Whose words were wisdom, and whose counsels
Whom Earth applauded through her peopled shores,
(Alas! whom Earth too early lost deplores ;-) Young without follies, without rashness bold, And greatly poor amidst a nation's gold ;
In every veering gale of faction true,
Untarnished Chatham's genuine child, adieu.
Unlike our common suns, whose gradual ray
Expands from twilight to intenser day,
Thy blaze broke forth at once in full meridian sway.
O, proved in danger, not the fiercest flame
Of Discord's rage thy constant soul could tame ;
Not when, far-striding o'er thy palsied land,
Gigantic Treason took his bolder stand;
Not when wild Zeal, by murderous Faction led, On Wicklow's hills, her grass-green banner spread;
Or those stern conquerors of the restless wave
Defied the native soil they wont to save.-
Undaunted patriot, in that dreadful hour,
When pride and genius own a sterner power;
When the dimmed eyeball, and the struggling
breath,
And pain, and terror, mark advancing death ;—
Still in that breast thy country held her throne,
Thy toil, thy fear, thy prayer were hers alone,
Thy last faint effort hers, and hers thy parting
groan.
Yes, from those lips while fainting nations drew Hope ever strong, and courage ever new ;-
Yet, yet, I deemed, by that supporting hand
Propped in her fall might Freedom's ruin stand;
And purged by fire, and stronger from the storm,
Degraded Justice rear her reverend form.
Now, hope, adieu;-adieu the generous care
To shield the weak, and tame the proud in war;
The golden chain of realms, when equal awe
Poised the strong balance of impartial law;
When rival states as federate sisters shone,
Alike, yet various, and though many, one;
And, bright and numerous as the spangled sky,
Beamed cach fair star of Europe's galaxy-
All, all are gone, and after-time shall trace
One boundless rule, one undistinguished race;
Twilight of worth, where nought remains to move
The patriot's ardor, or the subject's love.
'Behold, e'en now, while every manly lore
And every muse forsakes my yielding shore;
Faint, vapid fruits of slavery's sickly clime,
Each tinsel art succeeds, and harlot rhyme;
To gild the vase, to bid the purple spread
In sightly foldings o'er the Grecian bed,
Their mimic guard where sculptured gryphons
keep,
And Memphian idols watch o'er beauty's sleep To rouse the slumbering sparks of faint desire With the base tinkling of the Teian lyre,
While youth's enervate glance and gloating age
Hang o'er the nazy waltz, or pageant stage,
Each wayward wish of sickly taste to please,
The nightly revel and the noontide ease-
These, Europe. are thy toils, thy trophies these.
'So, when wide-wasting hail, or whelming rain
Have strowed the bearded hope of golden grain,
From the wet furrow, struggling to the skies,
The tall, rank weeds in barren splendor rise;
And strong, and towering o'er the mildewed ear,
Uncomely flowers and baneful herbs appear:
The swain's rich toils to useless poppies yield,
And Famine stalks along the purple field.
And thou, the poet's theme, the patriot's
prayer:
Where, France, thy hopes, thy gilded promise where;
When o'er Montpelier's vines, and Jura's snows, All goodly bright, young Freedom's planet rose? What boots it now, (to our destruction brave,) How strong thine arm in war? a valiant slave. What boots it now that wide thine eagles sail, Fanned by the flattering breath of conquest's gale, What, that, high-piled within yon ample dome, The blood-bought treasures rest of Greece and Rome?
Scourge of the highest, bolt in vangeance hurled By Heaven's dread justice on a shrinking world,
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