THE EVE BEFORE WATERLOO (From "Childe Harold," Canto III.) LORD BYRON THERE was a sound of revelry by night, Music arose with its voluptuous swell, Soft eyes looked love to eyes which spake again, But, hush! hark! a deep sound strikes like a rising knell! Did ye not hear it?-No; 'twas but the wind, Or the car rattling o'er the stony street. On with the dance! let joy be unconfined; No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure meet But, hark! that heavy sound breaks in once more, And nearer, clearer, deadlier than before! Arm! arm! it is-it is the cannon's opening roar! Within a windowed niche of that high hall Ah! then and there was hurrying to and fro,. 35 40 Blushed at the praise of their own loveliness; If ever more should meet those mutual eyes, And there was mounting in hot haste: the steed, 45 Or whispering with white lips, "The foe! They come! they come !" 50 And wild and high the "Cameron's Gathering" rose! The stirring memory of a thousand years. And Evan's, Donald's fame rings in each clansman's ears! 55 And Ardennes waves above them her green leaves, Dewy with Nature's tear-drops, as they pass, Grieving, if aught inanimate e'er grieves, Over the unreturning brave-alas! Ere evening to be trodden like the grass 60 Which now beneath them, but above shall grow In its next verdure, when this fiery mass Of living valor, rolling on the foe, And burning with high hope, shall molder cold and low. 1 Last noon beheld them full of lusty life, 65 Last eve in Beauty's circle proudly gay; 70 The midnight brought the signal sound of strife- The thunderclouds close o'er it, which when rent Which her own clay shall cover, heaped and pent, HELPS TO STUDY Historical: On the evening of June 15, 1815, the Duchess of Richmond gave a ball at Brussels. Wellington's officers, at his request, were present, his purpose being to conceal the near approach of battle. Napoleon, the leader of the French army, was the military genius of the age; Wellington, the leader of the English forces, had, Tennyson tells us, "gained a hundred fights nor ever lost an English gun.'' These two great generals now met for the first time. The event was of supreme interest to all the world. The engagement that followed next day was fought at Quatre Bras; the great battle of Waterloo took place June 18th, Sunday. Read Thackeray's "Vanity Fair" for description of this night in Brussels. This is a great martial poem-the greatest inspired by this event. Note the movement of the poem. The revelry, the beauty and the chivalry, the music and the merry-making, the alarm, the hurrying to and fro, the gathering tears, the mounting in hot haste, the whispering with white lips, the Scotch music, the green leaves of Ardennes, the closing The mountains look on Marathon— And Marathon looks on the sea; I dreamed that Greece might still be free: A king sat on the rocky brow Which looks o'er sea-born Salamis; And men in nations;-all were his! And where are they? and where art thou The heroic bosom beats no more. 'Tis something in the dearth of fame, Must we but weep o'er days more blest? A remnant of our Spartan dead! What, silent still? and silent all? Ah, no; the voices of the dead |