By every thought of freedom and of fame, Yea, it is broken!-Hark, the sudden shock Rolls on from wave to wave, from rock to rock; Up, for the Cross and Freedom! far and near Forth starts the sword, and gleams the patriot spear, And bursts the echo of the battle-song, Cheering and swift, the banded hosts along. bows; Green be the laurel, ever blest the meed The hoary sire has helmed his locks of gray, Scorned the safe hearth, and tottered to the fray; The beardless boy has left his gilt guitar, And bared his arm for manhood's holiest war. E'en the weak girl has mailed her bosom there, Mirth for the field, the distaff for the lance. Delicious hopes, and dreams of life and love, All breathing fire, all speaking "Liberty!" Firm has that struggle been! but is there none To hymn the triumph, when the fight is won? Oh for the harp which once-but through the strings, Far o'er the sea, the dismal night-wind sings; VOL. II.-19 Where is the hand that swept it?-cold and mute, The lifeless master, and the voiceless lute! VOW, All these are nothing,-life is nothing now! And "what is writ, is writ!"-the guilt and shame, All eyes have seen them, and all lips may blame; Where is the record of the wrong that stung, The charm that tempted, and the grief that wrung? Let feeble hands, iniquitously just, Rake up the relics of the sinful dust, Let Ignorance mock the pang it cannot feel, Glory looks dim, and joyous conquest weeps. The maids of Athens to the spot shall bring To bloom round BYRON's urn, or droop in sadness there! Farewell, sweet ATHENS! thou shalt be again The sceptred Queen of all thine old domain, Again be blest in all thy varied charms Of loveliness and valour, arts and arms. Forget not then, that in thine hour of dread, While the weak battled, and the guiltless bled, Though Kings and Courts stood gazing on thy fate, The bad, to scoff-the better, to debate, Here, where the soul of youth remembers yet The smiles and tears which manhood must for get, In a far land, the honest and the free Had lips to pray, and hearts to feel, for thee! NOTE.-Several images in the early part of the poem are selected from passages in the Greek Tragedians-particularly from the two well-known Choruses in the Edipus Coloneus and the Medea. The death of Lord Byron took place after the day appointed for the sending in of the exercises, and the allusion to it was of course introduced subsequently to the adjudication of the prize. THE ASCENT OF ELIJAH.* "Ille, feris caput inviolabile Parcis, Liquit Jordanios turbine raptus, agros.” MILTONI Lat. Poem. SERVANT of God, thy fight is fought; Servant of God, thy crown is wrought: Lingerest thou yet upon the joyless earth? Thy place is now in heaven's high bowers, Far from this mournful world of ours, Among the sons of light, that have a different birth. Go to the calm and cloudless sphere Where doubt, and passion, and dim fear, And black remorse, and anguish have no root; Turn-turn away thy chastened eyes From sights that make their tears arise, And shake th' unworthy dust from thy departing foot. Thy human task is ended now; No more the lightning of thy brow Shall wake strange terror in the soul of guilt; * This Poem obtained one of the Seatonian prizes at the University of Cambridge, A. D. 1830. |