The princedoms of Almayne

Shall wear the Phrygian chain;

In humbler waves shall vassal Tiber roll;
And Rome, a slave forlorn,

Her laurelled tresses shorn,

Shall feel our iron in her inmost soul.
Who shall bid the torrent stay?
Who shall bar the lightning's way?
Who arrest the advancing van
Of the fiery Ottoman ?

As the curling smoke wreaths fly
When fresh breezes clear the sky,
Passed away each swelling boast
Of the misbelieving host.
From the Hebrus rolling far
Came the murky cloud of war,
And in shower and tempest dread
Burst on Austria's fenceless head.
But not for vaunt or threat
Didst Thou, oh Lord, forget

The flock so dearly bought, and loved so well.
Even in the very hour

Of guilty pride and power

Full on the circumcised Thy vengeance fell.
Then the fields were heaped with dead,
Then the streams with gore were red,

And every bird of prey, and every beast,
From wood and cavern thronged to Thy great feast.

What terror seized the fiends obscene of Nile!
How wildly, in his place of doom beneath,
Arabia's lying prophet gnashed his teeth,
And cursed his blighted hopes and wasted guile!
When, at the bidding of Thy sovereign might,
Flew on their destined path

Thy messengers of wrath,

Riding on storms and wrapped in deepest night.
The Phthian mountains saw,

And quaked with mystic awe :

The proud Sultana of the Straights bowed down
Her jewelled neck and her embattled crown.

The miscreants, as they raised their eyes.
Glaring defiance on Thy skies,

Saw adverse winds and clouds display
The terrors of their black array ;—
Saw each portentous star

Whose fiery aspect turned of yore to flight
The iron chariots of the Canaanite

Gird its bright harness for a deadlier war.

Beneath Thy withering look
Their limbs with palsy shook;

Scattered on earth the crescent banners lay;
Trembled with panic fear

Sabre and targe and spear,

Through the proud armies of the rising day.
Faint was each heart, unnerved each hand;
And, if they strove to charge or stand,
Their efforts were as vain

As his who, scared in feverish sleep
By evil dreams, essays to leap,

Then backward falls again.
With a crash of wild dismay,
Their ten thousand ranks gave way;
Fast they broke, and fast they fled;
Trampled, mangled, dying, dead,
Horse and horseman mingled lay;
Till the mountains of the slain
Raised the valleys to the plain.

Be all the glory to Thy name divine!

The swords were ours; the arm, O Lord, was Thine.

Therefore to Thee, beneath whose footstool wait
The powers which erring man calls Chance and Fate,
To Thee who hast laid low

The pride of Europe's foe,

And taught Byzantium's sullen lords to fear,

I pour my spirit out

In a triumphant shout,

And call all ages and all lands to hear.
Thou who evermore endurest,
Loftiest, mightiest, wisest, purest,
Thou whose will destroys or saves,
Dread of tyrants, hope of slaves,
The wreath of glory is from Thee,
And the red sword of victory.

There where exulting Danube's flood.
Runs stained with Islam's noblest blood
From that tremendous field,

There where in mosque the tyrants met,
And from the crier's minaret
Unholy summons pealed,

Pure shrines and temples now shall be
Decked for a worship worthy Thee.
To Thee thy whole creation pays
With mystic sympathy its praise,
The air, the earth, the seas:

The day shines forth with livelier beam;
There is a smile upon the stream,

An anthem on the breeze.

Glory, they cry, to Him whose might
Hath turned the barbarous foe to flight,
Whose arm protects with power divine
The city of his favoured line.

The caves, the woods, the rocks, repeat the sound;
The everlasting hills roll the long echoes round.

But, if Thy rescued church may dare
Still to besiege Thy throne with prayer,
Sheathe not, we implore Thee, Lord,
Sheathe not Thy victorious sword.
Still Panonia pines away,

Vassal of a double sway:

Still Thy servants groan in chains,

Still the race which hates Thee reigns:

Part the living from the dead :

Join the members to the head:

Snatch Thine own sheep from yon fell monster's hold; Let one kind shepherd rule one undivided fold.

He is the victor, only he

Who reaps the fruits of victory.
We conquered once in vain,

When foamed the Ionian waves with

And heaped Lepanto's stormy shore

With wrecks and Moslem slain.

Yet wretched Cyprus never broke
The Syrian tyrant's iron yoke.
Shall the twice vanquished foe
Again repeat his blow?

gore,

Shall Europe's sword be hung to rust in peace ?
No-let the red-cross ranks

Of the triumphant Franks

Bear swift deliverance to the shrines of Greece,
And in her inmost heart let Asia feel

The avenging plagues of Western fire and steel.

Oh God! for one short moment raise
The veil which hides those glorious days.
The flying foes I see Thee urge
Even to the river's headlong verge.
Close on their rear the loud uproar
Of fierce pursuit from Ister's shore
Comes pealing on the wind;
The Rab's wild waters are before,
The Christian sword behind.
Sons of perdition, speed your flight.
No earthly spear is in the rest;
No earthly champion leads to fight
The warriors of the West.

The Lord of Hosts asserts His old renown,

Scatters, and smites, and slays, and tramples down.
Fast, fast, beyond what mortal tongue can say,
Or mortal fancy dream,

He rushes on his prey:

Till, with the terrors of the wondrous theme

Bewildered and appalled, I cease to sing,

And close my dazzled eye, and rest my wearied wing.

THE ARMADA. (1832.)

A FRAGMENT.

ATTEND, all ye who list to hear our noble England's praise;
I tell of the thrice famous deeds she wrought in ancient days,
When that great fleet invincible against her bore in vain
The richest spoils of Mexico, the stoutest hearts of Spain.

It was about the lovely close of a warm summer day, There came a gallant merchant-ship full sail to Plymouth Bay; Her crew hath seen Castile's black fleet, beyond Aurigny's isle, At earliest twilight, on the waves lie heaving many a mile. At sunrise she escaped their van, by God's especial grace; And the tall Pinta, till the noon, had held her close in chase. Forthwith a guard at every gun was placed along the wall; The beacon blazed upon the roof of Edgecumbe's lofty hall; Many a light fishing-bark put out to pry along the coast, And with loose rein and bloody spur rode inland many a post. With his white hair unbonneted, the stout old sheriff comes; Behind him march the halberdiers; before him sound the drums; His yeomen round the market cross make clear an ample space; For there behoves him to set up the standard of Her Grace. And haughtily the trumpets peal, and gaily dance the bells, As slow upon the labouring wind the royal blazon swells. Look how the Lion of the sea lifts up his ancient crown,

And underneath his deadly paw treads the gay lilies down.

So stalked he when he turned to flight, on that famed Picard field,
Bohemia's plume, and Genoa's bow, and Cæsar's eagle shield.
So glared he when at Agincourt in wrath he turned to bay,
And crushed and torn beneath his claws the princely hunters lay.
Ho! strike the flagstaff deep, sir Knight: ho! scatter flowers, fair maids:
Ho! gunners, fire a loud salute: ho! gallants, draw your blades:
Thou sun, shine on her joyously; ye breezes, waft her wide;
Our glorious SEMPER EADEM, the banner of our pride.

The freshening breeze of eve unfurled that banner's massy fold; The parting gleam of sunshine kissed that haughty scroll of gold;