Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

Ah! few shall part where many meet!
The snow shall be their winding-sheet,
And every turf beneath their feet

Shall be a soldier's sepulchre.

51. SONG OF THE GREEKS, 1822.-Thomas Campbell.

AGAIN to the battle, Achaians!

Our hearts bid the tyrants defiance;

[ocr errors]

Our land, the first garden of Liberty's tree,
It has been, and shall yet be, the land of the free;
For the cross of our faith is replanted,

The pale dying crescent is daunted,

And we march that the foot-prints of Mahomet's slaves May be washed out in blood from our forefathers' graves. Their spirits are hovering o'er us,

And the sword shall to glory restore us.

Ah! what though no succor advances,

Nor Christendom's chivalrous lances

[ocr errors]

Are stretched in our aid? - Be the combat our own!
And we'll perish or conquer more proudly alone;
For we've sworn by our country's assaulters,
By the virgins they 've dragged from our altars,
By our massacred patriots, our children in chains,
By our heroes of old, and their blood in our veins,
That, living, we will be victorious,

Or that, dying, our deaths shall be glorious.

A breath of submission we breathe not:

The sword that we've drawn we will sheathe not;
Its scabbard is left where our martyrs are laid,
And the vengeance of ages has whetted its blade.

Earth may hide, waves engulf, fire consume us;
But they shall not to slavery doom us:
If they rule, it shall be o'er our ashes and graves:
But we've smote them already with fire on the waves,
And new triumphs on land are before us;

[ocr errors]

To the charge! Heaven's banner is o'er us.

This day

shall ye blush for its story?

Or brighten your lives with its glory?.

Our women-O, say, shall they shriek in despair,
Or embrace us from conquest, with wreaths in their hair?
Accursed may his memory blacken,

If a coward there be that would slacken

Till we've trampled the turban, and shown ourselves worth Being sprung from, and named for, the god-like of earth.

Strike home! -and the world shall revere us
As heroes descended from heroes.

Old Greece lightens up with emotion!

Her inlands, her isles of the ocean,

Fanes rebuilt, and fair towns, shall with jubilee ring,
And the Nine shall new hallow their Helicon's spring.
Our hearths shall be kindled in gladness,

That were cold, and extinguished in sadness;
Whilst our maidens shall dance with their white waving arms,
Singing joy to the brave that delivered their charms,

When the blood of yon Mussulman cravens
Shall have crimsoned the beaks of our ravens!

52. FALL OF WARSAW, 1794.-Thomas Campbell.
O! SACRED Truth! thy triumph ceased a while,
And Hope, thy sister, ceased with thee to smile,
When leagued Oppression poured to Northern wars
Her whiskered pandours and her fierce hussars,
Waved her dread standard to the breeze of morn,
Pealed her loud drum, and twanged her trumpet horn:
Tumultuous horror brooded o'er her van,
Presaging wrath to Poland and to man!

[ocr errors]

Warsaw's last champion from her heights surveyed Wide o'er the fields a waste of ruin laid

-

O Heaven! he cried, my bleeding country save!
Is there no hand on high to shield the brave?
Yet, though destruction sweep these lovely plains,
Rise, fellow-men! our country yet remains!
By that dread name, we wave the sword on high,
And swear for her to live! - with her to die!

[ocr errors]

He said; and on the rampart heights arrayed.
His trusty warriors, few, but undismayed;
Firm paced and slow, a horrid front they form,
Still as the breeze, but dreadful as the storm;
Low, murmuring sounds along their banners fly,-
Revenge, or death!". the watchword and reply;
Then pealed the notes, omnipotent to charm,
And the loud tocsin tolled their last alarm!
In vain, alas! in vain, ye gallant few!

From rank to rank your volleyed thunder flew ;-
O! bloodiest picture in the book of Time,
Sarmatia fell, unwept, without a crime;
Found not a generous friend, a pitying foe,
Strength in her arms, nor mercy in her woe!

Dropped from her nerveless grasp the shattered spear,

Closed her bright eye, and curbed her high career.
Hope, for a season, bade the world farewell,
And Freedom shrieked, as Kosciusko fell!

O righteous Heaven! ere Freedom found a grave,
Why slept the sword, omnipotent to save?
Where was thine arm, O vengeance! where thy rod,
That smote the foes of Sion and of God?
Departed spirits of the mighty dead!

Ye that at Marathon and Leuctra bled!
Friends of the world! restore your swords to man,
Fight in his sacred cause, and lead the van!
Yet for Sarmatia's tears of blood atone,
And make her arm puissant as your own!
O! once again to Freedom's cause return.
The patriot Tell, the Bruce of Bannockburn!
Yes, thy proud lords, unpitied land! shall see
That man hath yet a soul, and dare be free!
A little while, along thy saddening plains,
The starless night of Desolation reigns;
Truth shall restore the light by Nature given,
And, like Prometheus, bring the fire of Heaven!
Prone to the dust Oppression shall be hurled,
Her name, her nature, withered from the world!

53. MARCO BOZZARIS.-Fitz-Greene Halleck.

Marco Bozzaris, the Epaminondas of modern Greece, fell in a night attack upon the Turkish camp at Laspi, the site of the ancient Platæa, August 20, 1823, and expired in the moment of victory. His last words were: -"To die for liberty is a pleasure, and not a pain."

Ar midnight, in his guarded tent,

The Turk was dreaming of the hour
When Greece, her knee in suppliance bent,
Should tremble at his power:

In dreams through camp and court he bore
The trophies of a conqueror;

In dreams his song of triumph heard;
Then wore his monarch's signet ring, -

Then pressed that monarch's throne, -a king;

As wild his thoughts, and gay of wing,

As Eden's garden bird.

An hour passed on,

the Turk awoke;

That bright dream was his last;

He woke, to hear his sentries shriek,

"To arms! they come! the Greek! the Greek ”

He woke, to die midst flame and smoke,

And shout, and groan, and sabre-stroke,

And death-shots falling thick and fast

As lightnings from the mountain cloud;
And heard, with voice as trumpet loud,
Bozzaris cheer his band: -

"Strike. till the last armed foe expires!
Strike- for your altars and your fires!
Strike for the green graves of your sires!
God, and your native land!"

They fought, like brave men, long and well;
They piled the ground with Moslem slain;
They conquered; but Bozzaris fell,
Bleeding at every vein.

His few surviving comrades saw

His smile, when rang their proud hurrah,
And the red field was won;

Then saw in death his eyelids close,
Calmly, as to a night's repose,

Like flowers at set of sun.

Come to the bridal chamber, Death!
Come to the mother's when she feels
For the first time her first-born's breath;
Come when the blessed seals
That close the pestilence are broke,
And crowded cities wail its stroke;
Come in Consumption's ghastly form,
The earthquake shock, the ocean storm;
Come when the heart beats high and warm,
With banquet song, and dance, and wine, -
And thou art terrible: the tear,

The groan, the knell, the pall, the bier,
And all we know, or dream, or fear,
Of agony, are thine.

But to the hero, when his sword

Has won the battle for the free,
Thy voice sounds like a prophet's word,
And in its hollow tones are heard
The thanks of millions yet to be.
Bozzaris! with the storied brave

Greece nurtured in her glory's time,
Rest thee: there is no prouder grave,
Even in her own proud clime.
We tell thy doom without a sigh;
For thou art Freedom's now, and Fame's,-
One of the few, the immortal names,

That were not born to die!

54. THE SEMINOLE'S DEFIANCE.-G. W. Patten.

BLAZE, with your serried columns! I will not bend the knee;
The shackle ne'er again shall bind the arm which now is free!
I 've mailed it with the thunder, when the tempest muttered low;
And where it falls, ye well may dread the lightning of its blow.
I've scared you in the city; I've scalped you on the plain;
Go, count your chosen where they fell beneath my leaden rain!
I scorn your proffered treaty; the pale-face I defy;

Revenge is stamped upon my spear, and "blood" my battle-cry!

Some strike for hope of booty; some to defend their all;
I battle for the joy I have to see the white man fall.

I love, among the wounded, to hear his dying moan,

And catch, while chanting at his side, the music of his groan.
Ye 've trailed me through the forest; ye 've tracked me o'er the stream;
And struggling through the everglade your bristling bayonets gleam.
But I stand as should the warrior, with his rifle and his spear;
The scalp of vengeance still is red, and warns you, -"Come not here!"
Think ye to find my homestead? — I gave it to the fire.

My tawny household do ye seek? - I am a childless sire.

But, should ye crave life's nourishment, enough I have, and good;
I live on hate, - 't is all my bread; yet light is not my food.
I loathe with
you
bosom! I scorn you
my
with mine eye!

And I'll taunt you with my latest breath, and fight you till I die!
I ne'er will ask for quarter, and I ne'er will be your slave;
But I'll swim the sea of slaughter till I sink beneath the wave!

55. BATTLE HYMN.-Theodore Korner. Born, 1791; fell in battle, 1813.
FATHER of earth and Heaven! I call thy name!
Round me the smoke and shout of battle roll;
My eyes are dazzled with the rustling flame;
Father! sustain an untried soldier's soul.
Or life, or death, whatever be the goal
That crowns or closes round the struggling hour,
Thou knowest, if ever from my spirit stole

One deeper prayer, 't was that no cloud might lower
On my young fame! -O hear! God of eternal power!

Now for the fight! Now for the cannon-peal!

[ocr errors]

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 them, 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!

« ZurückWeiter »