Now for the fight now for the cannon-peal –
Forward-through blood, and toil, and cloud, and fire!
Glorious the shout, the shock, the crash of steel,

The volley's roll, the rocket's blasting spire;
They shake-like broken waves their squares retire,
On, hussars! - Now give them rein and heel;

Think of the orphaned child, the murdered sire;
Earth cries for blood in thunder on them wheel!
This hour to Europe's fate shall set the triumph-seal!

Körner.

CCXXXIV.

THE MAIN TRUCK, OR A LEAP FOR LIFE.

LD Ironsides at anchor lay

OL

In the harbor of Mahon;

A dead calm rested on the bay,

The waves to sleep had gone ;
When little Hal, the Captain's son,
A lad both brave and good,
In sport, up shroud and rigging ran,
And on the main truck stood !

A shudder shot through every vein,
All eyes were turned on high!
There stood the boy, with dizzy brain,
Between the sea and sky;

No hold had he above, below;

Alone he stood in air:

To that far height none dared to go;

No aid could reach him there.

We gazed,

- but not a man could speak!

With horror all aghast,

In groups, with pallid brow and cheek,

We watched the quivering mast.
The atmosphere grew thick and hot,
And of a lurid hue;

As riveted unto the spot,

Stood officers and crew.

CATILINE ON HIS BANISHMENT FROM ROME.

BANISHED from Rome! What's banished, but set free

From daily contact of the things I loathe ?

"Tried and convicted traitor!" Who

says

Who'll prove it, at his peril, on my head?

this?

Banished? -I thank you for 't. It breaks my chain!
I held some slack allegiance till this hour;
But now my sword's my own.

Smile on, my lords;

I scorn to count what feelings, withered hopes,
Strong provocations, bitter, burning wrongs,
I have within my heart's hot cells shut up,
To leave you in your lazy dignities.

But here I stand and scoff you : - here I fling

Hatred and full defiance in your face.

Your consul's merciful. For this all thanks.

He dares not touch a hair of Catiline.

.6

Traitor!" I go but I return. This trial! Here I devote your senate! I've had wrongs, To stir a fever in the blood of age,

Or make the infant's sinews strong as steel.

This day's the birth of sorrows! This hour's work
Will breed proscriptions. Look to your hearths, my lords;
For there henceforth shall sit, for household gods,

Shapes hot from Tartarus ! — all shapes and crimes :
Wan Treachery, with his thirsty dagger drawn ;
Suspicion, poisoning his brother's cup;
Naked Rebellion, with the torch and axe,
Making his wild sport of your blazing thrones;
Till anarchy comes down on you like Night,
And massacre seals Rome's eternal grave!

G. Croly.

CCXXXVI.

APOSTROPHE TO THE OCEAN.

THERE is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,

There is society where none intrudes,
By the deep sea, and music in its roar;
I love not Man the less, but Nature more,
From these our interviews, in which I steal
From all I may be or have been before,
To mingle with the Universe and feel

What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal.

Roll on, thou deep and dark blue ocean - roll!
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain ;
Man marks the earth with ruin his control

Stops with the shore! upon the watery plain
The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain
A shadow of man's ravage, save his own,
When, for a moment, like a drop of rain,
He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan,
Without a grave, unknelled, uncoffined, and unknown

His steps are not upon thy paths, thy fields

thou dost arise

And shake him from thee; the vile strength he wields

For earth's destruction, thou dost all despise,
Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies,
And send'st him, shivering in thy playful spray
And howling, to his gods, where haply lies
His petty hope in some near port or bay,
And dashest him again to earth: – there let him lay.

The armaments which thunderstrike the walls
Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake,
And monarchs tremble in their capitals,
The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make
Their clay creator the vain title take
Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war;
These are thy toys, and, as the snowy flake,
They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar
Alike the Armada's pride, or spoils of Trafalgar.

Thy shores are empires, changed in all save thee
Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what are they?
Thy waters wasted them while they were free,
And many a tyrant since; their shores obey
The stranger, slave or savage; their decay
Has dried up realms to deserts: - not so thou,
Unchangeable save to thy wild waves' play -
Time writes no wrinkle on thy azure brow
Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now.

Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty's form
Glasses itself in tempests: in all time,

Calm or convulsed

in breeze, or gale or storm,

Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime

Dark-heaving; boundless, endless, and sublime

Of the Invisible; even from out thy slime

The monsters of the deep are made; each zone Obeys thee; thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, alone.

Lord Byron

CCXXXVII.

BATTLE OF WATERLOO.

HERE was a sound of revelry by night;

THER

And Belgium's capital had gathered then
Her Beauty and her Chivalry; and bright

The lamps shone o'er fair women and brave men,
A thousand hearts beat happily; and when

Music arose with its voluptuous swell,

Soft eyes looked love to eyes which spake again, And all went merry as a marriage bell ;

But hush! hark! a deep sound strikes like a rising knell'

Or the car rattling o'er the stony street:

Ɔn with the dance! let joy be unconfined;

No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure meet
To chase the glowing Hours with flying feet-

But, hark!

that heavy sound breaks in once more, As if the clouds its echo would repeat;

And nearer, clearer, deadlier than before!

Arm! Arm! it is it is the cannon's opening roar !

Ah! then and there was hurrying to and fro,

And gathering tears, and tremblings of distress, And cheeks all pale, which but an hour ago

Blushed at the praise of their own loveliness; And there were sudden partings, such as press The life from out young hearts, and choking sighs Which ne'er might be repeated. Who could guess If ever more should meet those mutual eyes, Since upon night so sweet such awful morn could rise?

And there was mounting in hot haste: the steed,
The mustering squadron, and the clattering car,
Went pouring forward with impetuous speed,
And swiftly forming in the ranks of war: