The Downing legends : Stories in Rhyme :: :: University of Virginia Library

But Downing might not cease his labor,
Nor even wipe his bloody sabre
While foeman trampled any tittle
Of earth where humans guess and whittle.
How could he think of crops and cattle,
How think of anything but battle,
While demon-fleets in weird processions
Imported hordes of Belial's Hessians
To captivate and slay his fellows
Beyond the Hudson's crystal billows,
Or sleep their beery sleep and fatten
Upon the sacred isle, Manhattan?

Thus roused to fury, Downing thundered
Such words that even Shiloh wondered,
And feared lest toils too elephantic
Had driven the Yankee Sampson frantic.

“I'll build,” he roared with indignation,
“A fleet to save our chosen nation;
I'll cruise about the briny surges
In spite of Guildhall's demiurges;
I'll harry all the tarnal regions
That breed the sassage-eating legions,
And drive Apollyon's self to wrestle
Like mad to save his Hesse Cassel.”

Gog and Magog.

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Two wooden statues, popularly called Gog and Magog, formerly in the Guildhall, London.