Too late thou leav'st the high command To which thy weakness clung; All Evil Spirit as thou art, 75 It is enough to grieve the heart, To see thine own unstrung; To think that God's fair world hath been 80 And Earth hath spilt her blood for him, And Monarchs bowed the trembling limb, Thine evil deeds are writ in gore, Or deepen every stain: If thou hadst died as honour dies, To shame the world again- Weighed in the balance, hero dust Is vile as vulgar clay : Thy scales, Mortality, are just To all that pass away: But yet methought the living great Some higher sparks should animate, To dazzle and dismay: Nor deemed Contempt could thus make mirth Of these, the conquerors of the earth. 85 90 95 100 105 And she, proud Austria's mournful flower, How bears her breast the torturing hour? Still clings she to thy side? Must she too bend, must she too share Thou throneless Homicide? 110 115 If still she loves thee, hoard that gem; 'Tis worth thy vanished diadem! Then haste thee to thy sullen Isle, Thou Timour! in his captive's cage- Life will not long confine That spirit poured so widely forth- Or, like the thief of fire from heaven, 120 125 130 135 His vulture and his rock! Foredoomed by God-by man accurst, 140 And that last act, though not thy worst, The very Fiend's arch-mock; He in his fall preserved his pride, And, if a mortal, had as proudly died! Lord Byron. CCXVIII SONG. FOR THE ANNIVERSARY MEETING OF THE PITT CLUB OF SCOTLAND, 1814. O dread was the time, and more dreadful the omen, Not the fate of broad Europe could bend his brave spirit 5 And hallow the goblet that flows to his name. Round the husbandman's head, while he traces the furrow, He may die ere his children shall reap in their gladness, Though anxious and timeless his life was expended, 1Ο 15 20 Nor forget his gray head, who, all dark in affliction, Yet again fill the wine-cup, and change the sad measure, 25 30 To our Prince, to our Heroes, devote the bright treasure, 35 A thousand years hence hearts shall bound at their story, 40 Sir Walter Scott. CCXIX TO THE MEMORY OF PIETRO D'ALESSANDRO, SECRETARY TO THE PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT OF SICILY IN 1848, WHO DIED AN EXILE AT MALTA IN JANUARY, 1855. Beside the covered grave Linger the exiles, though their task is done. Yes, brethren; from your band one more is gone, A good man and a brave. Scanty the rites, and train; How many' of all the storied marbles, set Hide nobler heart and brain? Ah! had his soul been cold, Tempered to make a sycophant or spy, 5 ΙΟ Then, not the spirit's strife, Nor sickening pangs at sight of conquering crime, Nor anxious watching of an evil time, Had worn his chords of life: Nor here, nor thus with tears Untimely shed, but there whence o'er the sea No! Different hearts are bribed; And therefore, in his cause's sad eclipse, Here died he, with Palermo' on his lips, Wrecked all thy hopes, O friend, 15 20 25 Hopes for thyself, thine Italy, thine own, High gifts defeated of their due renown,— The end? not ours to scan: Yet grieve not, children, for your father's worth; 30 He lay, a baser man. What to the dead avail The chance success, the blundering praise of fame? Oh! rather trust, somewhere the noble aim Is crowned, though here it fail. 35 Kind, generous, true wert thou: This meed at least to goodness must belong, That such it was. Farewell; the world's great wrong Is righted for thee now. Rest in thy foreign grave, Sicilian whom our English hearts have loved, Italian! such as Dante had approved,— 40 An exile-not a slave! Henry Lushington. |