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VII.

A people's voice! we are a people yet. Tho' all men else their nobler dreams forget,

Confused by brainless mobs and lawless Powers;

Thank Him who isled us here, and roughly set

His Briton in blown seas and storming

showers,

We have a voice, with which to pay the debt

Of boundless love and reverence and regret

To those great men who fought, and kept it ours.

And keep it ours, O God, from brute

control;

O Statesmen, guard us, guard the eye,

the soul

Of Europe, keep our noble England

whole,

And save the one true seed of freedom

sown

Betwixt a people and their ancient throne, That sober freedom out of which there springs

Our loyal passion for our temperate kings; For, saving that, ye help to save mankind Till public wrong be crumbled into dust, And drill the raw world for the march of mind,

Till crowds at length be sane and crowns

be just.

But wink no more in slothful overtrust. Remember him who led your hosts; He bad you guard the sacred coasts.

Your cannons moulder on the seaward

wall;

His voice is silent in your council-hall
For ever; and whatever tempests lour
For ever silent; even if they broke
In thunder, silent; yet remember all

He spoke among you, and the Man who spoke ;

Who never sold the truth to serve the hour,

Nor palter'd with Eternal God for power; Who let the turbid streams of rumour flow Thro' either babbling world of high and low;

Whose life was work, whose language rife

With rugged maxims hewn from life;
Who never spoke against a foe;
Whose eighty winters freeze with one
rebuke

All great self-seekers trampling on the right:

Truth-teller was our England's Alfred

named;

Truth-lover was our English Duke;

Whatever record leap to light

He never shall be shamed.

VIII.

Lo, the leader in these glorious wars
Now to glorious burial slowly borne,
Follow'd by the brave of other lands,
He, on whom from both her open hands
Lavish Honour shower'd all her stars,
And affluent Fortune emptied all her horn.
Yea, let all good things await
Him who cares not to be great,
But as he saves or serves the state.
Not once or twice in our rough island-
story,

The path of duty was the way to glory :
He that walks it, only thirsting

For the right, and learns to deaden
Love of self, before his journey closes,
He shall find the stubborn thistle bursting
Into glossy purples, which outredden
All voluptuous garden-roses.
Not once or twice in our fair island-story,
The path of duty was the way to glory :

S

258

ODE ON THE DEATH OF THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON.

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Whom we see not we revere ;

We revere, and we refrain

From talk of battles loud and vain,

And brawling memories all too free
For such a wise humility

As befits a solemn fane :

We revere, and while we hear
The tides of Music's golden sea
Setting toward eternity,

Uplifted high in heart and hope are we,
Until we doubt not that for one so true
There must be other nobler work to do
Than when he fought at Waterloo,
And Victor he must ever be.

For tho' the Giant Ages heave the hill
And break the shore, and evermore
Make and break, and work their will;
Tho' world on world in myriad myriads

roll

Round us, each with different powers,
And other forms of life than ours,
What know we greater than the soul?
On God and Godlike men we build our

trust.

Hush, the Dead March wails in the people's ears:

The dark crowd moves, and there are sobs

and tears:

The black earth yawns: the mortal

disappears;

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust;

He is gone who seem'd so great.—
Gone; but nothing can bereave him
Of the force he made his own
Being here, and we believe him
Something far advanced in State,
And that he wears a truer crown
Than any wreath that man can weave him.
Speak no more of his renown,
Lay your earthly fancies down,

And in the vast cathedral leave him.
God accept him, Christ receive him.

1852.

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If you be fearful, then must we be bold. Our Britain cannot salve a tyrant o'er. Better the waste Atlantic roll'd

On her and us and ours for evermore. What! have we fought for Freedom from our prime,

At last to dodge and palter with a public crime?

Shall we fear him? our own we never fear'd.

From our first Charles by force we

wrung our claims.

Prick'd by the Papal spur, we rear'd,
We flung the burthen of the second

James.

I say, we never feared! and as for these, We broke them on the land, we drove them on the seas.

And you, my Lords, you make the people

muse

In doubt if you be of our Barons' breedWere those your sires who fought at Lewes ?

Is this the manly strain of Runnymede?

O fall'n nobility, that, overawed, Would lisp in honey'd whispers of this monstrous fraud !

We feel, at least, that silence here were sin,

Not ours the fault if we have feeble

hosts

If easy patrons of their kin

Have left the last free race with naked

coasts!

They knew the precious things they had to guard :

For us, we will not spare the tyrant one hard word.

Tho' niggard throats of Manchester may bawl,

What England was, shall her true sons forget?

We are not cotton-spinners all,

But some love England and her honour

yet.

And these in our Thermopyle shall stand, And hold against the world this honour of the land.

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