 | Hours at Naples, and Other Poems |  |
293
SONNET
WRITTEN BY THE SEA SIDE.—1834.
Ocean, thy foam-crown'd bulwarks round our Land,Thy mountain-wall of waves—must they be vain,
To shield her from the curse, the scourge, the chain?—
Shall she forget in palmy pride to stand?—
Shall ruin spoil her with its red right hand?
And must thy rolling ramparts, mightiest Main
Prove weak to o'erwhelm her foes, or to restrain?
Out upon those, the abhorred, the Unrighteous band.
Alas! the Children of her bosom they
Who to her heart the envenomed dagger hold,
And to her lips the cup of sore dismay;
By such shall England's golden days be told,
Shall freedom's Land by such be bought and sold.
Ocean! ere they become the traitors prey,
Shroud up the Imperial Isles in thy hoar Surges old!
| Hours at Naples, and Other Poems | |