ページの画像
PDF
ePub

those they loved in this, and that they are permitted to exert a watchful care over the friends they knew in this world. The author of The Pleasures of Memory expresses such a belief.

THE ALPS AT DAY BREAK.

The sun-beams strike the azure skies,
And line with light the mountain's brow:
With hounds and horns the hunters rise,
And chase the roe-buck through the snow.

From rock to rock with giant bound,
High on their iron poles they pass :
Mute, lest the air convulsed by sound,
Rend from above, a frozen mass.

The goats wind slow their wonted way,
Up craggy steeps, and ridges rude;
Marked by the wild wolf for his prey,
From desert cave or hanging wood.

And while the torrent thunders loud,
And as the echoing cliffs reply,
The hut peeps o'er the morning cloud,
Perched like an eagle's nest on high.

The region of the Alps is the abode of a secluded but vigorous and adventurous race of men, whose favourite occupations are hunting and scaling their snow covered mountains. In the ascent of these they are assisted by poles pointed with iron, which aid them in their dangerous passages. Mr. Gray says "there are passes in the Alps, where the guides tell you to move on with speed, and say nothing, lest the air agitated by the voice should loosen the snows above," and the detached masses should instantly destroy the travellers.

.

SIR JOHN MOORE.

General Sir John Moore was the son of Dr. John Moore, the author of Zeluco, and of several other excelJent novels. General Moore was killed at Corunna, in Spain, January 1808. He was sent into Spain by the British government, at the head of a large military force, in order to assist the Spaniards against the French. At that period Ferdinand II., king of Spain, was a prisoner in France, and Joseph Bonaparte, (a brother of the Emperor Napoleon, now resident in the United States,) was the "intrusive king" of the country. Bonaparte had resolved to establish his family in Spain, and the English government intended to defend what they call legitimate power-meaning by this, the continued authority of European sovereigns, whose ancestors have governed before them. The English, upon this principle, sent an army to expel the French from Spain; but their army was forced to leave Spain without accomplishing their purpose. General Moore was a man of great courage and military skill, and his want of success in this enterprize was owing to circumstances which he could not control. When he was about to embark his troops, in order to return to England, he was overtaken by the French general, Marshal Soult, and a battle took place between them.

"The attack was made by the French on the 16th January, in heavy columns, and with their usual vivacity; but it was sustained and repelled on all hands. The gallant general was mortally wounded in the action, just as he called on the 42d Highland regiment to remember Egypt,' and reminded the same brave mountaineers that though ammunition was scarce, they had their bayo

nets!" "

[ocr errors]

"Thus died on the field of victory, which atoned for previous misfortunes, one of the bravest and best officers of the British army. His body was wrapped in his military cloak, instead of the usual vestments of the tomb; it was deposited in a grave hastily dug on the ramparts of Co

[ocr errors]

runna; and the army completing its embarkation on the subsequent day, their late general was left alone with his glory.' Sir Walter Scott's life of Napoleon.

[ocr errors]

A few verses written upon this occasion were admired by the readers of poetry long before their author was discovered: he is now known to have been a clergyman by the name of Wolfe-a man of fine genius, but destined to an obscure station in the church somewhere in England or Ireland.

"Not a drum was heard, nor a funeral note,
As his corse to the ramparts we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our hero was buried.

We buried him darkly at dead of night,
The sods with our bayonets turning,-
By the struggling moonbeam's misty light,
And the lantern dimly burning.

No useless coffin confined his breast,
Nor in sheet nor in shroud we bound him,
But he lay like a warrior taking his rest
With his martial cloak around him.

Few and short were the prayers we said,

And we spoke not a word of sorrow;

But we steadfastly gazed on the face of the dead,
And we bitterly thought of the morrow.

We thought as we heaped his narrow bed,

And smooth'd down his lonely pillow,

That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his

And we far away on the billow.

Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone,
And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him;

But nothing he'll reck, if they let him sleep on
In the grave where a Briton has laid him.

But half of our heavy task was done,
When the clock told the hour of retiring;

[head,

And we heard by the distant and random gun, That the foe was suddenly firing.

Slowly and sad we laid him down

From the field of his fame fresh and gory, We carved not a line, we raised not a stone, But we left him alone with his glory."

COWFER.

Born 1731-Died 1800.

The Biographers of Cowper are fond of tracing his origin to nobles, and even to kings. "His mother was

descended," says the poet's relative, the reverend Mr. Johnson, "by four different lines from Henry the Third, king of England." Cowper says of himself,

[ocr errors]

My boast is not that I deduce my birth

From loins enthroned, and rulers of the earth,

But higher far my proud pretensions rise."

The proud pretensions thus asserted by this truly humble man were the merits of his excellent parents, but we shall exalt these pretensions above every other consideration should we refer them to himself alone.-To him

"Whose virtues formed the magic of his song,"

whose genius was so informed by piety and goodness, so devoted to the contemplation of God and his works, that he has left one of the most lovely examples upon record of what a high and holy gift the talent of the true poet is. The first extract from his works which shall be inserted here, is his own sketch of the poetical character, which, however, is limited to the peculiar moral character of the poet, without touching upon the excursive and inventive powers of his imagination, of which Shakspeare says,

"The Poet's eye in a fine phrenzy rolling

Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven. And, as imagination bodies form,

The forms of things unseen, the poet's pen

Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing

A local habitation and a name."

THE POET.

-The mind that feels indeed the fire
The muse imparts, and can command the lyre,

« 前へ次へ »