子 So dense, so still, the Austrians stood, A living wall, a human wood! Impregnable their front appears, All horrent with projected spears, Whose polished points before them shine, From flank to flank, one brilliant line, Bright as the breakers' splendors run Along the billows to the sun. Opposed to these, a hovering band Contended for their native land: Peasants, whose new-found strength had broke From manly necks the ignoble yoke, And forged their fetters into swords, On equal terms to fight their lords, And what insurgent rage had gained In many a mortal fray maintained; Marshalled once more at Freedom's call, They came to conquer or to fall, Where he who conquered, he who fell, Was deemed a dead, or living Tell! Such virtue had that patriot breathed, So to the soil his soul bequeathed, That wheresoe'er his arrows flew Heroes in his own likeness grew, And warriors sprang from every sod Which his awakening footstep trod. And now the work of life and death Yet, while the Austrians held their ground, Unmarked he stood amid the throng, But 't was no sooner thought than done, The field was in a moment won : "Make way for Liberty!" he cried, Then ran, with arms extended wide, As if his dearest friend to clasp; Ten spears he swept within his grasp. "Make way for Liberty!" he cried ; Their keen points met from side to side; He bowed amongst them like a tree, And thus made way for Liberty. Swift to the breach his comrades fly; "Make way for Liberty!" they cry, And through the Austrian phalanx dart, As rushed the spears through Arnold's heart; While, instantaneous as his fall, Rout, ruin, panic, scattered all: An earthquake could not overthrow A city with a surer blow. Thus Switzerland again was free; Thus death made way for Liberty! JAMES MONTGOMERY. SWITZERLAND. WILLIAM TELL. ONCE Switzerland was free! With what a pride How happy was I in it, then! I loved In my boat at night, when midway o'er the lake, MONCONTOUR. O, WEEP for Moncontour! O, weep for the hour When the children of darkness and evil had power; When the horsemen of Valois triumphantly trod On the bosoms that bled for their rights and their God. O, weep for Moncontour! O, weep for the slain For we trampled on the throng of the haughty and the strong, Who sate in the high places and slew the saints of God. It was about the noon of a glorious day of June That we saw their banners dance and their cuirasses shine, And the man of blood was there, with his long essenced hair, Who for faith and for freedom lay slaughtered in And Astley, and Sir Marmaduke, and Rupert of vain ! O, weep for the living, who linger to bear the Rhine. Like a servant of the Lord, with his Bible and his sword, One look, one last look, to the cots and the The General rode along us to form us for the fight; towers, To the rows of our vines and the beds of our flowers; To the church where the bones of our fathers decayed, When a murmuring sound broke out, and swelled into a shout Among the godless horsemen upon the tyrant's right. Where we fondly had deemed that our own should And hark! like the roar of the billows on the The cry of battle rises along their charging line : For God for the cause! for the Church! for the laws! Alas! we must leave thee, dear desolate home, Rhine! his drums, Farewell to thy fountains, farewell to thy shades, The furious German comes, with his clarions and To the song of thy youths, the dance of thy maids; To the breath of thy gardens, the hum of thy bees, And the long waving line of the blue Pyrenees! His bravoes of Alsatia and pages of Whitehall ; fall. Farewell and forever! The priest and the slave we are broken, Our left is borne before them like stubble on the blast. O Lord, put forth thy might! O Lord, defend the right! Stand back to back, in God's name! and fight it to the last! Stout Skippen hath a wound, the centre hath horsemen on our rear? Whose banner do I see, boys? "T is he! thank Bear up another minute! Brave Oliver is here! Their heads all stooping low, their points all in a row, Like a whirlwind on the trees, like a deluge on the dikes, Our cuirassiers have burst on the ranks of the accurst, And at a shock have scattered the forest of his pikes. Fast, fast the gallants ride, in some safe nook to hide Their coward heads, predestined to rot on Temple Bar; And he he turns! he flies! shame on those cruel eyes That bore to look on torture, and dare not look on war! Ho, comrades! scour the plain; and ere ye strip the slain, First give another stab to make your search secure; Then shake from sleeves and pockets their broadpieces and lockets, The tokens of the wanton, the plunder of the poor. Fools! your doublets shone with gold, and your hearts were gay and bold, When you kissed your lily hands to your lemans to-day; And to-morrow shall the fox from her chambers in the rocks Lead forth her tawny cubs to howl above the prey. Where be your tongues, that late mocked at heaven and hell and fate? And the fingers that once were so busy with your blades? Your perfumed satin clothes, your catches and your oaths? Your stage-plays and your sonnets, your diamonds and your spades? But hark! through the fast-flashing lightning of war, What steed to the desert flies frantic and far! WIZARD. -Lochiel, Lochiel! beware of the day; Lo! anointed by Heaven with the phials of wrath, Rise, rise! ye wild tempests, and cover his flight! moors. Culloden is lost, and my country deplores, torn? Ah no! for a darker departure is near; brae, And the clan has a name that is nameless by day; The war-drum is muffled, and black is the bier; THE moon's on the lake, and the mist's on the With the smoke of its ashes to poison the gale LOCHIEL. Our signal for fight, that from monarchs we drew, -Down, soothless insulter! I trust not the tale; Glen Orchy's proud mountains, Coalchurn and For never shall Albin a destiny meet, So black with dishonor, so foul with retreat. their gore, Like ocean-weeds heaped on the surf-beaten shore, her towers, Glenstrae and Glenlyon no longer are ours: We're landless, landless, landless, Grigalach! But doomed and devoted by vassal and lord Look proudly to Heaven from the death-bed of Give their roofs to the flame, and their flesh to If they rob us of name, and pursue us with beagles, fame. SCOTLAND. THOMAS CAMPBELL. O CALEDONIA! stern and wild, the eagles! Then vengeance, vengeance, vengeance, Vengeance, vengeance, vengeance, etc. While there's leaves in the forest, and foam on the river, Macgregor, despite them, shall flourish forever! Come then, Grigalach! come then, Grigalach! Come then, come then, come then, etc. |