The effort was in vain!

That yellow lustre glimmer'd pale,
On broken plate and bloodied mail,
Rent crest and shattered coronet,
And the best names that England
Of Baron, Earl, and Banneret;
knew,

Claim'd in the death-prayer dismal due.

Yet mourn not, Land of Fame! Though ne'er the Leopards on thy shield

Retreated from so sad a field,

Since Norman William came. Oft may thine annals justly boast

horse;

Grudge not her victory,

When for her freeborn rights she strove;

Rights dear to all who freedom love, To none so dear as thee!

XXXVII.

Even upon Bannock's bloody plain, Heap'd then with thousands of the slain,

'Mid victor monarch's musings high, Mirth laugh'd in good King Robert's eye.

"And bore he such angelic air, Such noble front, such waving hair? Hath Ronald kneel'd to him?" he said,

"Then must we call the church to aid

Our will be to the Abbot known,

Ere these strange news are wider blown,

To Cambuskenneth straight ye pass, And deck the church for solemn mass,

To pay for high deliverance given,
A nation's thanks to gracious Heaven.
Let him array, besides, such state,
As should on princes' nuptials wait.

Ourself the cause, through fortune's spite,

That once broke short that spousal rite,

Ourself will grace, with early morn, The bridal of the Maid of Lorn." CONCLUSION.

Go forth, my Song, upon thy ven

turous way;

Go boldly forth; nor yet thy master blame,

Who chose no patron for his humble lay,

And graced thy numbers with no friendly name,

Whose partial zeal might smooth thy path to fame.

There icas-and O! how many sorrows crowd

Into these two brief words!-there was a claim

By generous friendship given-had fate allow'd,

It well had bid thee rank the proudest of the proud!

All angel now-yet little less than all,

While still a pilgrim in our world below!

What 'vails it us that patience to recall,

Which hid its own to soothe all other woe;

What 'vails to tell, how Virtue's purest glow

Shone yet more lovely in a form so fair:

And, least of all, what 'vails the world should know,

That one poor garland, twined to deck thy hair,

Is hung upon thy hearse, to droop and wither there!

I.

FAIR Brussels, thou art far behind, Though, lingering on the morning wind,

We yet may hear the hour Peal'd over orchard and canal, With voice prolong'd and measured fall,

From proud St. Michael's tower; Thy wood, dark Soignies, holds us

now*

Where the tall beeches' glossy bough
For many a league around,
With birch and darksome oak be-
tween,

Spreads deep and far a pathless screen,

Of tangled forest ground. Stems planted close by stems defy The adventurous foot-the curious

eye

For access seeks in vain; And the brown tapestry of leaves, Strew'd on the blighted ground, receives

Nor sun, nor air, nor rain. No opening glade dawns on our way, No streamlet, glancing to the ray,

Our woodland path has cross'd; And the straight causeway which we tread,

Prolongs a line of dull arcade, Unvarying through the unvaried shade

Until in distance lost.

II.

A brighter, livelier scene succeeds; In groups the scattering wood recedes,

Hedge-rows, and huts, and sunny meads,

*The wood of Soignies is a remnant of the forest of Ardennes, the scene of the charming and romantic incidents of Shakespeare's "As you Like it."

And corn-fields, glance between; The peasant, at his labour blithe, Plies the hook'd staff and shorten'd scythe:

But when these ears were green, Placed close within destruction's scope,

Full little was that rustic's hope

Their ripening to have seen! And, lo, a hamlet and its fane:Let not the gazer with disdain

Their architecture view; For yonder rude ungraceful shrine, And disproportion'd spire, are thine, Immortal WATERLOO !

III.

Fear not the heat, though full and high

The sun has scorch'd the autumn sky,
And scarce a forest straggler now
To shade us spreads a greenwood
bough:

These fields have seen a hotter day
Than e'er was fired by sunny ray.
Yet one mile on-yon shatter'd hedge
Crests the soft hill whose long smooth
ridge

Looks on the field below,
And sinks so gently on the dale,
That not the folds of Beauty's veil
In easier curves can flow.
Brief space from thence, the ground
again

Ascending slowly from the plain,
Forms an opposing screen,
Which, with its crest of upland
ground,

Shuts the horizon all around.

The soften'd vale between Slopes smooth and fair for courser's tread;

Not the most timid maid need dread To give her snow-white palfrey head

On that wide stubble-ground;

Nor wood, nor tree, nor bush, are there,

Her course to intercept or scarce, Nor fosse nor fence are found, Save where, from out her shatter'd bowers,

VI.

Ay, look again-that line, so black And trampled, marks the bivouac, Yon deep-graved ruts the artillery's track,

So often lost and won;

ers.

So deem'st thou-so each mortal deems,

Still shows were, fetlock-deep in

blood,

The fierce dragoon, through battle's flood,

Dash'd the hot war-horse on. These spots of excavation tell

The ravage of the bursting shellAnd feel'st thou not the tainted steam,

That reeks against the sultry beam,
From yonder trenched mound?
The pestilential fumes declare
That Carnage has replenish'd there
Her garner-house profound.

VII.

Far other harvest-home and feast, Than claims the boor from scythe released,

On these scorch'd fields were known!

Death hover'd o'er the maddening rout,

And, in the thrilling battle-shout,
Sent for the bloody banquet out
A summons of his own.
Through rolling smoke the Demon's

eye

seems.

But other harvest here, Than that which peasant's scythe demands,

Was gather'd in by sterner hands,

With bayonet, blade, and spear. No vulgar crop was theirs to reap, No stinted harvest thin and cheap! Heroes before each fatal sweep

Fell thick as ripen'd grain;
And ere the darkening of the day,
Piled high as autumn shocks, there
lay

The ghastly harvest of the fray,
The corpses of the slain.

Distinguish every tone

That fill'd the chorus of the frayFrom cannon-roar and trumpet-bray, From charging squadrons' wild

hurra,

From the wild clang that mark'd their way,

Down to the dying groan, And the last sob of life's decay,

When breath was all but flown.

VIII.

Feast on, stern foe of mortal life, Feast on !-but think not that a strife With such promiscuous carnage rife,