 | Flotsam and Jetsam |  |
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THE ARRIVAL OF THE ARCHDUCHESS.
I
Welcome—and welcome thrice over,Marie from Muscovy's shore!
Merry bell-chimings to Thee and thy Lover
Peal out the welcome our thunder-ships roar!
Well may Spring's best sunshine mellow
Myriad banners, black and yellow,
Bright with blue and crimson blended!
O well may troops of girls sea-girt in hues like azure ocean,
Or white as ocean-foam, desire for thee a life all roses;
Upon thy pathway flower-festooned fling down fresh showers of posies,
And breathe to Love, thy Prince and Thee, their innocent devotion!
But 'mid loud joy-bursts, lavish, unsuspended—
Come silent thoughts of things of yore,
Old links with thy great land and race of friendliest emotion!
103
II
Stories we think of we loved so—Joined in our juvenile days;
Two of two heroes whose manliness moved so
Purest of sympathy, paramount praise!
One thy Consort-Duke's name-giver,
Dear to English hearts for ever,
He who made us first a nation,
Alfred, all perfect patriot-king! in hallowed light abiding,
How shines he through the thousand years, to give us mild assurance
Of the majesty of steadfast Will, the might of calm Endurance,
Swamp-isled in thicks of Athelney from swarms of Dane-foes hiding,
Shaping arrows, in firm sad meditation
How best his hapless land to raise,
While oaten-cakes were scorching and the swineherd's shrew was chiding!
III
Yes, and the other as brave is,Bravely defiant of Time;
Tale of a King too, and founder of Navies,
More too by manhood than kingship sublime!
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'Twas her grandeur's grand unfolder,
He, thine own throne nested Eagle,
High towards that Sun, his Country's weal, his fierce flight ever winging;
Thy wild ancestral Wonder, whose impetuous self-reliance
Took Civilisation by the throat to force her to compliance!
Lives not his stalwart image still, to young remembrance clinging,
In squalor of a splendour more than regal,
In Deptford's dockyard-pitch and grime,
Lord of the lives of millions he, the shipwright's hammer swinging?
IV
Memories—glorious, greater,Speak in majestical tone:
How, as we foiled the proud World-desolater,
England and Russia stood fearless alone!
How, in high self-desecration
Moscow's holiest conflagration,
Vengeful as the skies it reddened,
Blazed back to icy death aghast Gaul's brigand hosts from plunder;
While Spain's green orange-groves beheld—stern Duty's ægis o'er him—
That iron Fate advancing still, driving her foes before him!
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All sense of such deep sympathy have deadened?
No ancient feuds inveterate grown,—
Respect for mutual valour left, shall this our friendship sunder?
V
No! but if rancour to banish—Any resentment remain,
Princess, to-day at thy sight it should vanish,
Cast o'er thy coming no shadow of pain!
O the force of finest graces!
Blest that fortunate fair face is—
Doubly blest thy blushes, beauties!
Their happy privilege, far more than protocols, despatches,
To help two haughty Empires their last bitterness to smother,
And make a hundred million hearts beat kindlier towards each other!
Thy sweetest presence seems to whisper how to both attaches
One mission,—softly smiles their common duties;
Nay, to large souls of loftier strain,
Hints how some Power Divine from both for work harmonious watches!
VI
Well! may not each be a Warder,Both in true unison be?
They for Authority conquer, and Order—
Order for ever and Liberty we!
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Thy great Czar, and warriors fearless
Spread the Eagle or the Lion;
If Cossacks scoured the Khivan plains black shadowed 'mid their glaring
By Timour's bleached skull-pyramids, and clove those turban-spangles;
Or if our kilted Highland pride, through fevering forest-tangles,
To fire Kumasi's shambles red, its fiery path went tearing;
Did they not both in kindred spirit ply on
Towards one great end where both agree—
To give the World more peace for work, no turbulent tyrant sparing?—
VII
Aye! and what heights unascended,Wonders kind Fate might decree,
Rise at the dream of alliance so splendid—
Lords of the Land with the Kings of the Sea!
Room for both—their ships and legions:
See revived the lovely regions
Now by loathly mildew blighted;
Byzance beneath the Eagle's wing and Lion's might upgrowing;
Glad Palestine;—and Haroun's towns, gay as in fairy story!
Sparkling through Asian marts re-thronged, see traffic's tranquil glory;
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Drilled myriads, steel-clad monsters, see, united!
Amphibious Giant, setting free
And on two Continents at last, peace, light and life bestowing!
VIII
Once through fair Indies our fiatShivered foul Slavery's sway;
Once spoke thy Sire—and no Serfdom to sigh at
Lingered from Lapland to sunny Cathay!
Briton, Russ! that godlike mission
Work—in mutual recognition;
Rivals be where chains are broken!—
But let this air with pealing bells and cannon-thunders riven,
Flags, flowers and motto-stars to make the night one blaze of blessing,
This Princess fair through London Town triumphantly progressing—
As Dove and Rainbow showed of old Earth reconciled with Heaven—
How bright the skies between us now betoken;
And o'er the sunshine of to-day
How strong our hope no hostile clouds may evermore be driven.
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