II.

TO J. M. K.

My hope and heart is with thee-thou wilt be
A latter Luther, and a soldier-priest

To scare church-harpies from the master's feast;
Our dusted velvets have much need of thee:
Thou art no sabbath-drawler of old saws,
Distill'd from some worm-canker'd homily;
But spurr'd at heart with fieriest energy
To embattail and to wall about thy cause
With iron-worded proof, hating to hark
The humming of the drowsy pulpit-drone

Half God's good sabbath, while the worn-out clerk
Brow-beats his desk below. Thou from a throne
Mounted in heaven wilt shoot into the dark

Arrows of lightnings. I will stand and mark.

III.

:

MINE be the strength of spirit, full and free,
Like some broad river rushing down alone,
With the selfsame impulse wherewith he was thrown
From his loud fount upon the echoing lea :-
Which with increasing might doth forward flee
By town, and tower, and hill, and cape, and isle,
And in the middle of the green salt sea
Keeps his blue waters fresh for many a mile.
Mine be the power which ever to its sway
Will win the wise at once, and by degrees
May into uncongenial spirits flow;
Ev'n as the warm gulf-stream of Florida
Floats far away into the Northern seas
The lavish growths of southern Mexico,

IV.

ALEXANDER.

WARRIOR of God, whose strong right arm debased
The throne of Persia, when her Satrap bled
At Issus by the Syrian gates, or fled
Beyond the Memmian naphtha-pits, disgraced
For ever thee (thy pathway sand-erased)
Gliding with equal crowns two serpents led
Joyful to that palm-planted fountain-fed
Ammonian Oasis in the waste.

There in a silent shade of laurel brown

Apart the Chamian Oracle divine

Shelter'd his unapproached mysteries:

High things were spoken there, unhanded down;
Only they saw thee from the secret shrine

Returning with hot cheek and kindled eyes.

I

V.

BUONAPARTE.

HE thought to quell the stubborn hearts of oak, Madman !-to chain with chains, and bind with bands That island queen who sways the floods and lands From Ind to Ind, but in fair daylight woke,

When from her wooden walls,-lit by sure hands,-
With thunders, and with lightnings, and with smoke,—
Peal after peal, the British battle broke,

Lulling the brine against the Coptic sands.
We taught him lowlier moods, when Elsinore
Heard the war moan along the distant sea,

Rocking with shatter'd spars, with sudden fires

Flamed over at Trafalgar yet once more

We taught him: late he learned humility

Perforce, like those whom Gideon school'd with briers.

VI.

POLAND.

How long, O God, shall men be ridden down,
And trampled under by the last and least

Of men? The heart of Poland hath not ceased
To quiver, tho' her sacred blood doth drown
The fields, and out of every smouldering town
Cries to Thee, lest brute Power be increased,
Till that o'ergrown Barbarian in the East

Transgress his ample bound to some new crown :— Cries to Thee, 'Lord, how long shall these things be? How long this icy-hearted Muscovite

Oppress the region ?' Us, O Just and Good,

Forgive, who smiled when she was torn in three; Us, who stand now, when we should aid the right— A matter to be wept with tears of blood!