With human hearts to what? a dream alone. Can despots compass aught that hails their sway? Or call with truth one span of earth their own, Save that wherein at last they crumble bone by bone? XLIII. Oh, Albuera! glorious field of grief! As o'er thy plain the Pilgrim prick'd his steed, A scene where mingling foes should boast and bleed ! Till others fall where other chieftains lead Thy name shall circle round the gaping throng, And shine in worthless lays, the theme of transient song! XLIV. Enough of Battle's minions! let them play Or in a narrower sphere wild Rapine's path pursued. XLV. Full swiftly Harold wends his lonely way Where Desolation plants her famish'd brood XLVI. But all unconscious of the coming doom, The feast, the song, the revel here abounds; Strange modes of merriment the hours consume, Nor bleed these patriots with their country's wounds Nor here War's clarion, but Love's rebeck sounds; IIere Folly still his votaries inthralls; And young-eyed Lewdness walks her midnight rounds: Girt with the silent crimes of Capitals, Still to the last kind Vice clings to the tott'ring walls. XVLII. Not so the rustic — with his trembling mate Ah, monarchs! could ye taste the mirth ye mar, The hoarse dull drum would sleep, and Man be happy yet! XLVIII. How carols now the lusty muleteer? Of love, romance, devotion is his lay, As whilome he was wont the leagues to cheer, His quick bells wildly jingling on the way? No! as he speeds, he chants" Viva el Rey!" And checks his song to execrate Godoy, The royal wittol Charles, and curse the day When first Spain's queen beheld the black-eyed boy, And gore-faced Treason sprung from her adulterate joy XLIX. On yon long, level plain, at distance crown'd Here was the camp, the watch-flame, and the host, And points to yonder cliffs, which oft were won and lost. L. And whomsoe'er along the path you meet Bears in his cap the badge of crimson hue, (1) The red cockade, with " Fernando Septimo" in the centre. Wo to the man that walks in public view If subtle poniards, wrapt beneath the cloke, Could blunt the sabre's edge, or clear the cannon's smoke. LI. At every turn Morena's dusky height : The holster'd steed beneath the shed of thatch, LII. Portend the deeds to come: — but he whose nod way; Soon will his legions sweep through these their LIII. And must they fall? the young, the proud, the brave, The Veteran's skill, Youth's fire, and Manhood's heart of steel? (1) All who have seen a battery will recollect the pyramidal form in which shot and shells are piled. The Sierra Morena was fortified in every defile through which I passed in my way to Seville. LIV. Is it for this the Spanish maid, aroused, Hangs on the willow her unstrung guitar And, all unsex'd, the anlace hath espoused Sung the loud song, and dared the deed of war? And she, whom once the semblance of a scar Appall'd, an owlet's larum chill'd with dread, Now views the column-scattering bay'net jar, The falchion flash, and o'er the yet warm dead Stalks with Minerva's step where Mars might quake to tread. LV. Ye who shall marvel when you hear her tale, Mark'd her black eye that mocks her coal-black veil, Thin the closed ranks, and lead in Glory's fearful chase. Her chief is slain Her fellows flee LVI. she sheds no ill-timed tear; she fills his fatal post; she checks their base career; The foe retires - she heads the sallying host: Who can appease like her a lover's ghost? Who can avenge so well a leader's fall? What maid retrieve when man's flush'd hope is lost? Who hang so fiercely on the flying Gaul, Foil'd by a woman's hand, before a batter'd wall? (1) LVII. Yet are Spain's maids no race of Amazons, (1) Such were the exploits of the Maid of Saragoza. When the author was at Sevilly she walked daily on the Prado, decorated with medals and orders, by cou mand of the Junta, Pecking the hand that hovers o'er her mate: Remoter females, famed for sickening prate; Her mind is nobler sure, her charms perchance as great. LVIII. The seal Love's dimpling finger hath impress'd Her glance how wildly beautiful! how much Which glows yet smoother from his amorous clutch! LIX. Match me, ye climes! which poets love to laud; Beauties that ev'n a cynic must avow; Match me those Houries, whom ye scarce allow His black-eyed maids of Heaven, angelically kind. LX. Oh, thou Parnassus! (2) whom I now survey, Not in the fabled landscape of a lay But soaring snow-clad through thy native sky In the wild pomp of mountain majesty ! What marvel if I thus essay to sing? The humblest of thy pilgrims passing by Would gladly woo, thine Echoes with his string, Though from thy heights no more one Muse will wave her wing. (1) "Sigilla in mento impressa Amoris digitulo Vestigio demonstrant mollitudinem." AUL. GEL. (2) These stanzas were written in Castri, (Delphos,) at the foot of Parnassus, now called Atakupa—Liakura. |