ODE ON HEARING OF THE DEATH OF MR PITT. O, Pitt, I may wail thee, and wail without blame, 'Twas in the lone wild I first heard of thy name, 299 Who taught me to love thee-my boast and my pride I read and I wonder'd, but still I read on, I wonder'd when senators sternly express'd For I was as simple as babe at the breast, I knew not, and still small the knowledge is mine, Of the passions that mankind dissever, That minds there are framed like the turbulent ocean, That foams on its barriers with ceaseless commotion, On the rock that stands highest commanding devotion, There dash its rude billows for ever. 300 ODE ON HEARING OF THE DEATH OF MR PITT. They said thou wert proud;-I have ponder'd it long, I have tried thee by plummet and line, Have weigh'd in the balance the right and the wrong, They call'd thee ambitious;-a censure condign- But it was of thy country alone thou wert proud, For there thy wrung heart a wild torrent withstood, Be hallow'd thy memory, illustrious shade! A shepherd can ill understand, But he weens that as clear and unbiass'd a head, As clean and less sordid a hand, Or a heart more untainted did never command The wealth of a nation on earth; And he knows that long hence, when his head's low as thine, That the good and the great, and the brave and benign, And the lovers of country and king, will combine To hallow the hour of thy birth. BUSACO. BEYOND Busaco's mountains dun, When far had roll'd the sultry sun, And night her pall of gloom had thrown O'er nature's still convexity, High on the heath our tents were spread, And o'er the hero's dew-chill'd head The loud war-trumpet woke the morn, "Arouse for death or victory!" The orb of day in crimson dye Began to mount the morning sky, Then what a scene for warrior's eye The serried bay'nets glittering stood, An aerial stream, a silver wood, Reel'd in the flickering canopy. Like waves of ocean rolling fast, Or thunder-cloud before the blast, Massena's legions, stern and vast, Rush'd to the dreadful revelry. The pause is o'er, the fateful shock, Light boil'd the war-cloud to the sky, Prone on the battle's boundary. |