When lo! far onwards waving on the wind I saw the skirts of the DEPARTING YEAR! Starting from my silent sadness Then with no unholy madness, Ere yet the enter'd cloud forbade my sight, I rais'd th' impetuous song, and solemniz'd his flight. STROPHE II. Hither from the recent tomb, Or where o'er cradled infants bending Ye Woes, and young-eyed Joys advance! Forbids its fateful strings to sleep, I bid you haste, a mix'd tumultuous band; And each domestic hearth, Haste for one solemn hour; And with a loud and yet a louder voice, Still echoes the dread name that o'er the earth Justice and Truth! They, too, have heard the spell, They, too, obey thy name, divinest Liberty! EPODE 1. I mark'd Ambition in his war-array! I heard the mailed Monarch's troublous cry"Ah! wherefore does the Northern Conqueress stay! Groans not her chariot o'er its onward way ?" Fly; mailed monarch fly! Stunn'd by Death's" twice mortal" mace, The insatiate hag shall gloat with drunken eye! Ye that gasp'd on Warsaw's plain ! Ye that erst at Ismail's tower, When human ruin chok'd the streams, Fell in conquest's glutted hour, Mid women's shrieks and infant's screams! Sudden blasts of triumph swelling, Oft, at night, in misty train, Rush around her narrow dwelling! Th' exterminating fiend is fled— Mighty army of the dead Dance, like death-fires, round her tomb! Then with prophetic song relate, Each some sceptred murderer's fate! ANTISTROPHE I. Departing Year! 'twas on no earthly shore Thou stored'st thy sad hours! Silence ensued, The Spirit of the Earth made reverence meet, ANTISTROPHE II. On every harp, on every tongue, By the Earth's unsolac'd groaning, By Belgium's corse impeded flood! And hunger's bosom to the frost-winds bar'd! Strange, horrible, and foul ! By what deep guilt belongs To the deaf Senate, 'full of gifts and lies!' By wealth's insensate laugh! by torture's howl! For ever shall the bloody Island scowl? For aye, unbroken, shall her cruel bow Shoot famine's arrows o'er thy ravag'd world? Hark! how wide Nature joins her groans below! Rise, God of Nature, rise! Ah why those bolts unhurl'd?" * The Rhine. EPODE 11. The voice had ceas'd, the phantoms fled; And my thick and struggling breath No stranger agony confounds The soldier on the war-field spread, When all foredone with toils and wounds, Death-like he dozes among heaps of dead! (The strife is o'er, the day-light fled, And the night wind clamours hoarse! See the startful wretch's head Lies pillowed on a brother's corse!) O doom'd to fall, enslav'd and vile, And Ocean mid his uproar wild Hence for many a fearless age Has social quiet lov'd thy shore; Nor ever sworded foeman's rage Orsack'd thy towers, or stain'd thy fields with gore. Disclaim'd of heaven! * mad av'rice at thy side All nations curse thee: and with eager wond'ring By livid fount, or roar of blazing stream, O Albion! thy predestin'd ruins rise, *The Poet from having considered the peculiar advantages which this country has enjoyed, passes in rapid transition to the uses which we have made of these advantages. We have been preserved by our insular situation, from suffering the actual horrors of war ourselves, and we have shown our gratitude to Providence, for this immunity by our eagerness to spread those horrors over nations less happily situated. In the midst of plenty and safety we have raised or joined the yell for famine and blood. Of the one hundred and seven last years, fifty have been years of war. Such wickedness cannot pass unpunished. We have been proud and confident in our alliances and our fleets-but God has prepared the canker-worm, and will smite the gourds of our pride. "Art thou better than populous No, that was situate among the rivers, that had the waters round about it, whose rampart was the sea? Ethiopia and Egypt were her strength, and it was infinite; Put and Lubin were her helpers. Yet she was carried away, she went into captivity; and they cast lots for her honourable men, and all her great men were bound in chains. Thou also shalt be drunken; all thy strong-holds shall be like fig trees with the first ripe figs; if they be shaken, they shall ever fall into the mouth of the eater. Thou hast multiplied thy merchants above the stars of heaven. Thy cowned are as the locusts; and thy captains as the great grasshoppers which camp in the hedges in the cool-day; but when the sun ariseth they flee away, and their place is not known where they are. There is no healing of thy bruise; thy wound is grievous; all that hear the report of thee, shall clap the hands over thee; for upon whom hath not thy wickedness passed continually?" -NAHUM, CHAP. III. 1 |