 | The Podesta's daughter and other miscellaneous poems |  |
147
TO ENGLAND.
Lear and Cordelia! 'twas an ancient taleBefore thy Shakspeare gave it deathless fame:
The times have changed, the moral is the same.
So like an outcast, dowerless and pale,
Thy daughter went; and in a foreign gale
Spread her young banner, till its sway became
A wonder to the nations. Days of shame
Are close upon thee: prophets raise their wail.
When the rude Cossack with an outstretched hand
Points his long spear across the narrow sea—
“Lo! there is England!” when thy destiny
Storms on thy straw-crowned head, and thou dost stand
Weak, helpless, mad, a by-word in the land,—
God grant thy daughter a Cordelia be!
| The Podesta's daughter and other miscellaneous poems | |