Peace and war An Ode. By William Allingham. Reprinted, by permission, from the "Daily News." |
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IX.
But loud, if worthy, were the strain,
For those that died for deathless rights
Upon the Marathonian plain,
And won the first of many patriot fights;
For senate, camp, and civic home,
Which, when their sun with bloody disk
Announced the extremest hour of risk,
Never despair'd of Rome;
For names exulting echo speaks
To Alpine vallies, and are hurl'd
Reverberating round the world,—
So dear to men must ever be
Heroic love of liberty,
And theirs was lofty as their native peaks,
Pure as the snow-wreath round the highest curl'd.
For those that died for deathless rights
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And won the first of many patriot fights;
For senate, camp, and civic home,
Which, when their sun with bloody disk
Announced the extremest hour of risk,
Never despair'd of Rome;
For names exulting echo speaks
To Alpine vallies, and are hurl'd
Reverberating round the world,—
So dear to men must ever be
Heroic love of liberty,
And theirs was lofty as their native peaks,
Pure as the snow-wreath round the highest curl'd.
And would that I could chant to trembling strings,
Trembling with fervour, pity, shame,
That Girl who from her sheepfold came
Affrighted armies to command,
And drove the invaders from the land,
And turn'd the destinies of kings:
Might swell, though grave, a more triumphant note
For Hampden, Cromwell, and the homely powers
Who, for their country and for ours,
A regal rebel smote:
Nor fail to join their worthy sons
(Not changed in soul by time or sea)
Disloyal to Old England's laws
In the same clear immortal cause
Of genuine loyalty;—
What brow to-day of England's noble ones
Gives she a fairer wreath than Washington's?
Trembling with fervour, pity, shame,
That Girl who from her sheepfold came
Affrighted armies to command,
And drove the invaders from the land,
And turn'd the destinies of kings:
Might swell, though grave, a more triumphant note
For Hampden, Cromwell, and the homely powers
Who, for their country and for ours,
A regal rebel smote:
Nor fail to join their worthy sons
(Not changed in soul by time or sea)
Disloyal to Old England's laws
In the same clear immortal cause
Of genuine loyalty;—
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Gives she a fairer wreath than Washington's?
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