The Poetical Works of Robert Montgomery :: :: University of Virginia Library

With parting homage let these lines conclude,
And consecrate a poet's gratitude
To him, the paragon of English praise,
In whom Posterity's admiring gaze
Will mark a Hero, who adorn'd the Earth
And made the World a debtor to his worth:
Best of the best, and greatest of the great
In all which guards a throne, or guides a state;
The massive grandeur of whose balanced mind
Was so adjusted, that the Will inclined
Where Conscience led, and not where Fortune threw
Her fleeting radiance o'er some distant view.—
His frame was iron; and with sleepless force
Through half a cent'ry traced his hero-course:
Abroad, at home, in Senate-house, or Field,
Friendship and Hate alike to his firm counsels yield,
Whose glance, by mental intuition, ran
Through each dark maze of policy and plan,
And reached conclusions whose results contain
Maxims and morals, which will rule and reign
As long as Treason, Stratagem, and War
Endanger thrones, or threaten from afar.

Just as the Law, inflexible as Truth,
Thus lived great Wellington in age and youth;
And when hoar'd years had bow'd that classic head
With silver-locks so venerably spread,
How did we greet him in the public Square
And rouse the stranger with re-echo'd “There!
“There comes The Duke! whose very shadow throws
A light on England, wheresoe'er he goes;”
While pausing Childhood with entrancéd eye
Beheld him in his glory moving by:
And though the winter of declining age
Touch'd form and feature with a sad presage,
In list'ning reverence how the Senate hung
On the plain Saxon of that pithy tongue!—
The smiting earnestness of honest speech
Which taught more wisdom than mere words can reach.

And hence, the Arbiter of Empires, he
Reign'd on his throne of true simplicity,
And by the firmness of unflinching will
Rallied around him trusting Empires still:—
A Kingly Subject, whose unscepter'd hand
Was more than Armies, when it waved command.
And this, by virtue of that noble Creed
That helm'd each movement in the hour of need,
The master-spell which rein'd emotion down—
That danger must be met by duty to The Crown!