But these are gone-their faith, their swords, their | Who now assemble at the holy call!
Yet left more antichristian foes than they;
The bigot monarch and the butcher priest,
The inquisition, with her burning feast,
The faith's red "auto," fed with human fuel,
While sate the Catholic Moloch, calmly cruel,
Enjoying, with inexorable eye,
That fiery festival of agony !
The stern or feeble sovereign, one or both
The blest Alliance, which says three are al'
An earthly trinity! which wears the shape
Of heaven's, as man is mimick'd by the ape.
A pious unity! in purpose one-
To melt three fools to a Napoleon.
Why, Egypt's gods were rational to these;
Their dogs and oxen knew their own degrees,
And, quiet in their kennel or their shed,
Cared little, so that they were duly fed;
The power to bark and bite, to toss and gore.
Ah! how much happier were good Esop's frogs
Than we! for ours are animated logs,
With ponderous malice swaying to and fro,
And crushing nations with a stupid blow;
All duly anxious to leave little work
Unto the revolutionary stork.
By turns; the haughtiness whose pride was sloth; But these, more hungry, must have something more
The long degenerate noble; the debased
Hidalgo, and the peasant less disgraced,
But more degraded; the unpeopled realm;
The once proud navy which forgot the helm;
The once impervious phalanx disarray'd;
The idle forge that form'd Toledo's blade;
The foreign wealth that flow'd on ev'ry shore,
Save hers who earned it with the natives' gore;
The very language which might vie with Rome's,
And once was known to nations like their home's,
Neglected or forgotten:-such was Spain;
But such she is not, nor shall be again.
These worst, these home invaders, felt and feel
The new Numantine soul of old Castile.
Up! up again! undaunted Tauridor!
The bull of Phalaris renews his roar;
Mount, chivalrous Hidalgo! not in vain
Revive the cry-"Iago! and close Spain!
Yes, close her with your armed bosoms round,
And form the barrier which Napoleon found,-
The exterminating war, the desert plain,
The streets without a tenant, save the slain;
The wild sierra, with its wilder troop
Of vulture-plumed guerrillas, on the stoop
For their incessant prey; the desperate wall
Of Saragossa, mightiest in her fall;
The man nerved to a spirit, and the maid
Waving her more than Amazonian blade,
The knife of Arragon,† Toledo's steel;
The famous lance of chivalrous Castile;
The unerring rifle of the Catalan ;
The Andalusian courser in the van;
The torch to make a Moscow of Madrid;
And in each heart the spirit of the Cid:-
Such have been, such shall be, such are. Advance,
And win-not Spain, but thine own freedom, France!
But lo! a Congress! What! that hallow'd name
Which freed the Atlantic? May we hope the same
For outworn Europe? With the sound arise,
Like Samuel's shade to Saul's monarchic eyes,
The prophets of young Freedom, summon'd far
From climes of Washington and Bolivar;
Henry, the forest-born Demosthenes,
Whose thunder shook the Philip of the seas;
And stoic Franklin's energetic shade,
Robed in the lightnings which his hand allay'd;
And Washington, the tyrant-tamer, wake,
To bid us blush for these old chains, or break.
But who compose this senate of the few
That should redeem the many? Who renew
This consecrated name, till now assign'd
To councils held to benefit mankind!
"St. lago! and close Spain !" the old Spanish war-cry.
The Arragonians are peculiarly dexterous in the use of this weapon, and lisplayed particularly in femer French wars.
Thrice blest Verona! since the holy three
With their imperial presence shine on thee;
Honor'd by them, thy treacherous site forgets
The vaunted tomb of "all the Capulets;"
Thy Scaligers-for what was "Dog the Great,"
"Can Grande," (which I venture to translate,)
To these sublimer pugs? Thy poet too,
Catullus, whose old laurels yield to new;
Thine amphitheatre, where Romans sate;
And Dante's exile shelter'd by thy gate;
Thy good old man, whose world was all within
Thy wall, nor knew the country held him in:
Would that the royal guests it girds about
Were so far like, as never to get out!
Ay, shout! inscribe! rear monuments of shame,
To tell Oppression that the world is tame!
Crowd to the theatre with loyal rage,
The comedy is not upon the stage;
The show is rich in ribandry and stars,
Then gaze upon it through thy dungeon bars;
Clap thy permitted palms, kind Italy,
For thus much still thy fettered hands are free!
Resplendent sight! Behold the coxcomb czar,
The autocrat of waltzes and of war!
As eager for a plaudit as a realm,
And just as fit for flirting as the helm;
A Calmuck beauty with a Cossack wit,
And generous spirit, when 'tis not frost-bit;
Now half dissolving to a liberal thaw,
But harden'd back whene'er the morning's raw;
With no objection to true liberty,
Except that it would make the nations free.
How well the imperial dandy prates of peace,
How fain, if Greeks would be his slaves, free
How nobly gave he back the Poles their Diet,
Then told pugnacious Poland to be quiet!
How kindly would he send the mild Ukraine,
With all her pleasant pulks, to lecture Spain!
How royally show off in proud Madrid
His goodly person, from the South long hid!
A blessing cheaply purchased, the world knows,
By having Muscovites for friends or foes.
Proceed, thou namesake of great Philip's son!
La Harpe, thine Aristotle, beckons on;
• The famous old man of Verona.
And that which Scythia was to him of yore
Find with thy Scythians on Iberia's shore.
Yet think upon, thou somewhat aged youth,
Thy predecessor on the banks of Pruth;
Thou hast to aid thee, should his lot be thine,
Many an old woman, but no Catherine.
Spain too hath rocks, and rivers, and defiles-
The bear may rush into the lion's toils.
Fatal to Goths are Xeres' sunny fields;
Think'st thou to thee Napoleon's victor yields?
Better reclaim thy deserts, turn thy swords
To ploughshares, shave and wash thy Bashkir hordes,
Redeem thy realms from slavery and the knout,
Than follow headlong in the fatal route,
To infest the clime whose skies and laws are pure
With thy foul legions. Spain wants no manure;
Her soil is fertile, but she feeds no foe;
Her vultures, too, were gorged not long ago;
And wouldst thou furnish them with fresher prey?
Alas! thou wilt not conquer, but purvey.
I am Diogenes, though Russ and Hun
Stand between mine and many a myriad's sun;
But were I not Diogenes, I'd wander
Rather a worm than such an Alexander!
Be slaves who will, the cynic shall be free;
His tub hath tougher walls than Sinopé :
Still will he hold his lantern up to scan
The face of monarchs for an "honest man.'
And what doth Gaul, the all-prolific land
Of ne plus ultra ultras and their band
Of mercenaries? and her noisy chambers
And tribune, which each orator first clambers
Before he finds a voice, and when 'tis found,
Hears "the lie" echo for his answer round!
Our British commons sometimes deign to "hear!
A Gallic senate hath more tongue than ear;
Even Constant, their sole master of debate,
Must fight next day his speech to vindicate.
But this costs little to true Franks, who had rather
Combat than listen, were it to their father.
What is the simple standing of a shot,
To listening long, and interrupting not?
Though this was not the method of old Rome,
When Tully fulmined o'er each vocal dome,
Demosthenes has sanction'd the transaction,
In saying eloquence meant "Action, action!"
But where's the monarch? hath he dined? or yet
Groans beneath indigestion's heavy debt?
Have revolutionary patés risen,
And turn'd the royal entrails to a prison?
His discontented movements stirr'd the troops;
Or have no movements follow'd traitorous soups?
Have Carbonaro cooks not carbonadoed
Each course enough? or doctors dire dissuaded
Repletion? Ah! in thy dejected looks
I read all France's treason in her cooks!
Good classic Louis! is it, canst thou say,
Desirable to be the "Desiré ?"
Why wouldst thou leave calm Hartwell's
abode,
Apician table, and Horatian ode,
To rule a people who will not be ruled,
And love much rather to be scourged than school'd?
Ah! thine was not the temper or the taste
For thrones; the table sees thee better placed:
A mild Epicurean, form'd, at best,
To be a kind host and as good a guest,
To talk of letters, and to know by heart
One half the poet's, all the gourmand's art.
A scholar always, now and then a wit,
And gentle when digestion may permit ;-
But not to govern lands enslaved or free;
The gout was martyrdom enough for thee
Shall noble Albion pass without a phrase
From a bold Briton in her wonted praise ?
"Arts-arms-and George-and glory-and the
isles-
White cliffs, that held invasion far aloof—
And happy Britain-wealth-and freedom's smiles-
Contented subjects, all alike tax-proof-
Proud Wellington, with Eagle beak so curl'd,
That nose, the hook where he suspends the world!
And Waterloo-and trade-and-(hush! not yet
A syllable of imposts or of debt)——
And ne'er (enough) lamented Castlereagh,
Whose penknife slit a goose-quill t'other day-
And 'pilots who have weather'd every storm'-
(But, no, not even for rhyme's sake, name reform.")
These are the themes thus sung so oft before,
Methinks we need not sing them any more;
Found in so many volumes far and near,
There's no occasion you should find them here.
Yet something may remain perchance to chime
With reason, and, what's stranger still, with rhyme.
Even this thy genius, Canning! may permit,
Who, bred a statesman, still was born a wit,
And never, even in that dull house could'st tame
To unleaven'd prose thine own poetic flame;
Our last, our best, our only orator,
Even I can praise thee-tories do no more;
Nay, not so much;-they hate thee, man, because
Thy spirit less upholds them than it awes.
The hounds will gather to the huntsman's hollo,
And where he leads the duteous pack will follow;
But not for love mistake their yelling cry;
Their yelp for game is not an eulogy;
Less faithful far than the fourfooted pack,
A dubious scent would lure the bipeds back.
Thy saddle-girths are not yet quite secure,
Nor royal stallion's feet extremely sure;
The unwieldy old white horse is apt at last
To stumble, kick, and now and then stick fast
With his great self and rider in the mud;
But what of that? the animal shows blood.
Alas, the country! how shall tongue or pen Bewail her now uncountry gentlemen ? The last to bid the cry of warfare cease, The first to make a malady of peace." For what were all these country patriots born? green To hunt, and vote, and raise the price of corn? But corn, like every mortal thing, must fall, Kings, conquerors, and markets most of all.
• The dexterity of Catherine extricated Peter (called the Great by courtesy) when surrounded by the Musulmans on the banks of the river Pruth.
"Naso suspendit adunco."-Horace.
The Roman applies it to one who merely was imperious to his acquaintance,
And must ye fall with every ear of grain?
Why would you trouble Bonaparte's reign?
He was your great Triptolemus; his vices [prices;
Destroy'd but realms, and still maintain'd your
He amplified to every lord's content
The grand agrarian alchymy, hight rent.
Why did the tyrant stumble on the Tartars,
And lower wheat to such desponding quarters ?
Why did you chain him on yon isle so lone?
The man was worth much more upon his throne.
True, blood and treasure boundlessly were spilt;
But what of that? the Gaul may bear the guilt;
But bread was high, the farmer paid his way,
And acres told upon the appointed day.
But where is now the goodly audit ale?
The purseproud tenant, never known to fail?
The farm which never yet was left on hand?
The marsh reclaim'd to most improving land?
The impatient hope of the expiring lease?
The doubling rental? What an evil's peace!
In vain the prize excites the ploughman's skill,
In vain the Commons pass their patriot bill;
The landed interest-(you may understand
The phrase much better leaving out the land)—
The land self-interest groans from shore to shore,
For fear that plenty should attain the poor.
Up, up again, ye rents! exalt your notes,
Or else the ministry will lose their votes,
And patriotism, so delicately nice,
Her loaves will lower to the market price;
For ah!"the loaves and fishes," once so high,
Are gone their oven closed, their ocean dry,
And nought remains of all the millions spent,
Excepting to grow moderate and content.
They who are not so, had their turn-and turn
About still flows from Fortune's equal urn;
Now let their virtue be its own reward,
Lo, Mother Church, while all religion writhes,
Like Niobe, weeps o'er her offspring, Tithes;
The prelates go to-where the saints have gone,
And proud pluralities subside to one;
Church, state, and faction wrestle in the dark,
Toss'd by the deluge in their common ark.
Shorn of her bishops, banks, and dividends,
Another Babel soars-but Britain ends.
And why? to pamper the self-seeking wants,
And prop the hill of these agrarian ants.
"Go to these ants, thou sluggard, and be wise;"
Admire their patience through each sacrifice,
Till taught to feel the lesson or their pride,
The price of taxes and of homicide;
Admire their justice, which would fain deny
The debt of nations:-pray who made it high?
Or turn to sail between those shifting rocks,
The new Symplegades-the crushing Stocks,
Where Midas might again his wish behold
In real paper or imagined gold.
That magic palace of Alcina shows
More wealth than Britain ever had to lose,
Were all her atoms of unleaven'd ore,
And all her pebbles from Pactolus' shore.
There Fortune plays, while Rumor holds the stake,
And the world trembles to bid brokers break.
How rich is Britain! not indeed in mines,
Or peace or plenty, corn or oil, or wines;
No land of Canaan, full of milk and honey,
Nor (save in paper shekels) ready money:
But let us not to own the truth refuse,
Was ever Christian land so rich in Jews?
Those parted with their teeth to good King John,
And now, ye kings! they kindly draw your own;
All states, all things, all sovereigns they control,
And share the blessing which themselves prepared. And waft a loan "from Indus to the pole."
See these inglorious Cincinnati swarm,
Farmers of war, dictators of the farm;
Their ploughshare was the sword in hireling hands,
Their fields manured by gore of other lands;
Safe in their barns, these Sabine tillers sent
Their brethren out to battle-why? for rent!
Year after year they voted cent. per cent.,
The banker-broker-baron-brethren, speed
To aid these bankrupt tyrants in their need.
Nor these alone: Columbia feels no less
Fresh speculations follow each success;
And philanthropic Israel deigns to drain
Her mild percentage from exhausted Spain.
Blood, sweat, and tear-wrung millions-why? for Not without Abraham's seed can Russia march;
They roar'd, they dined, they drank, they swore
they meant
To die for England-why then live? for rent!
The peace has made one general malecontent
Of these high-market patriots; war was rent!
Their love of country, millions all misspent,
How reconcile? by reconciling rent!
And will they not repay the treasures lent?
No: down with every thing, and up with rent!
Their good, ill, health, wealth, joy, or discontent,
Being, end, aim, religion-rent, rent, rent!
Thou sold'st thy birthright, Esau! for a mess;
Thou should'st have gotten more, or eaten less;
Now thou hast swill'd thy pottage, thy demands
Are idle; Israel says the bargain stands.
Such, landlords! was your appetite for war,
And, gorged with blood, you grumble at a scar!
What! would they spread their earthquake even
o'er cash?
And when land crumbles, bid firm paper crash?
So rent may rise, bid bank and nation fall,
And found on 'Change a Fundling Hospital?
'Tis gold, not steel, that rears the conqueror's arch
Two Jews, a chosen people, can command
In every realm their scripture-promised land :—
Two Jews keep down the Romans, and uphold
The accursed Hun, more brutal than of old.
Two Jews-but not Samaritan's-direct
The world, with all the spirit of their sect.
What is the happiness of earth to them?
A congress forms their "New Jerusalem,"
Where baronies and orders both invite-
Oh, holy Abraham! dost thou see the sight?
Thy followers mingling with these royal swine,
Who spit not "on their Jewish gaberdine,"
But honor them as portion of the show-
(Where now, oh pope! is thy forsaken toe?
Could it not favor Judah with some kicks?
Or has it ceased to "kick against the pricks?"
On Shylock's shore behold them stand afresh,
To cut from nations' hearts their "pound of flesh.'
Strange sight this Congress! destined to unite
All that's incongruous, all that's opposite.
I speak not of the sovereigns-they're alike,
A common coin as ever mint could strike:
But those who sway the puppets, pull the strings,
Have more of motley than their heavy kings.
Jews, authors, generals, charlatans, combine,
While Europe wonders at the vast design:
There Metternich, power's foremost parasite,
Cajoles; there Wellington forgets to fight;
There Chateaubriand forms new books of martyr's;*
And subtle Greeks intrigue for stupid Tartars;
There Montmorenci, the sworn foe to charters,
Turns a diplomatist of great eclat,
To furnish articles for "the Debats; "
Of war so certain-yet not quite so sure
As his dismissal in the "Moniteur."
Alas! how could his cabinet thus err?
Can peace be worth an ultra-minister?
He falls indeed, perhaps to rise again
"Almost as quickly as he conquered Spain."
Enough of this-a sight more mournful woos
The averted eye of the reluctant muse.
The imperial daughter, the imperial bride,
The imperial victim-sacrifice to pride;
The mother of the hero's hope, the boy,
The young Astyanax of modern Troy;
The still pale shadow of the loftiest queen
That earth has yet to see, or e'er hath seen;
She flits amid the phantoms of the hour,
The theme of pity, and the wreck of power.
Oh, cruel mockery! Could not Austria spare
A daughter? What did France's widow there?
Her fitter place was by St. Helen's wave,
Her only throne is in Napoleon's grave.
But, no, she still must hold a petty reign,
Flank'd by her formidable chamberlain ;
• Monsieur Chateaubriand, who has not forgotten the author in the miniser, received a handsome compliment at Verona from a literary sovereign: "Ah! Monsieur C -, are you related to that Chateaubriand whowho has written something?" (écrit quelque chose!) It is said that the author of Atala repented him for a moment of his legitimacy.
The martial Argus, whose not hundred eyes
Must watch her through these paltry pageantries.
What though she share no more, and shared in vain,
A sway surpassing that of Charlemagne,
Which swept from Moscow to the southern seas i
Yet still she rules the pastoral realm of cheese,
Where Parma views the traveller resort
To note the trappings of her mimic court.
But she appears! Verona sees her shorn
Of all her beams-while nations gaze and mourn-
Ere yet her husband's ashes have had time
To chill in their inhospitable clime;
(If e'er those awful ashes can grow cold;
But no,-their embers soon will burst the mould;,
She comes!-the Andromache (but not Racine's,
Nor Homer's)-Lo! on Pyrrhus' arm she leans!
Yes! the right arm, yet red from Waterloo,
Which cut her lord's half-shatter'd sceptre through,
Is offer'd and accepted! Could a slave
Do more? or less ?-and he in his new grave!
Her eye, her cheek, betray no inward strife,
And he ex-empress grows as ex a wife!
So much for human ties in royal breasts!
Why spare men's feelings, when their own are jests?
But, tired of foreign follies, I turn home,
And sketch the group-the picture's yet to come
My muse 'gan weep, but ere a tear was spilt,
She caught Sir William Curtis in a kilt!
While throng'd the chiefs of every highland clan
To hail their brother, Vich Ian Alderman!
Guildhall grows Gael, and echoes with Erse roar,
While all the Common Council cry "Claymore!"
To see proud Albyn's tartan's as a belt
Gird the gross sirloin of a city Celt,
She burst into a laughter so extreme,
That I awoke-and lo! 'twas no dream!
Here, reader, will we pause ;-if there's no harm in This first-you'll have, perhaps, a second "Carmen."
THE VISION
VISION OF JUDGMENT.
SUGGESTED BY THE COMPOSITION SO ENTITLED BY THE AUTHOR OF "WAT TYLER.”
"A Daniel come to Judgment! yea, a Daniel!
I thank thee, Jew, for teaching me that word."
Ir Aath been wisely said, that "One fool makes many;" and it hath been poetically observed,
"That fools rush in where angels fear to tread."-Pope.
3dly. Was he not entitled by William Smith, in full parliament, "a rancorous renegado ?" 4thly. Is he not poet laureate, with his own lines on Martin the regicide staring him in the face?
And 5thly. Putting the four preceding items totion of the laws to the publication of others, be gether, with what conscience dare he call the atten they what they may?
If Mr. Southey had not rushed in where he had no business, and where he never was before, and never will be again, the following poem would not have been written. It is not impossible that it may ing; its meanness speaks for itself; but I wish to I say nothing of the cowardice of such a proceedbe as good as his own, seeing that it cannot, by any touch upon the motive, which is neither more nor species of stupidity, natural or acquired, be worse. less than that Mr. S. has been laughed at a little in The gross flattery, the dull impudence, the renegado some recent publications, as he was of yore in the intolerance, and impious cant of the poem by the " Anti-jacobin " by his present patrons. Hence all author of Wat Tyler, are something so stupendous this "skimble-scamble stuff" about "Satanic," and as to form the sublime of himself-containing the so forth. However, it is worthy of him--" Qualis quintessence of his own attributes. ab incepto."
So much for his poem-a word on his preface. In this preface it has pleased the magnanimous laureate opinions of a portion of the public in the following If there is any thing obnoxious to the political to draw the picture of a supposed "Satanic School," poem, they may thank Mr. Southey. He might the which he doth recommend to the notice of the have written hexameters, as he has written every legislature; thereby adding to his other laurels the thing else, for aught that the writer cared-had ambition of those of an informer. If there exists any they been upon another subject. But to attempt to where, excepting in his imagination, such a school, canonize a monarch, who, whatever were his houseis he not sufficiently armed against it by his own hold virtues, was neither a successful nor a patriot intense vanity? The truth is, that there are certain king-inasmuch as several years of his reign passed writers whom Mr. S. imagines, like Scrub, to have in war with America and Ireland, to say nothing of "talked of him; for they laughed consumedly." the aggressions upon France,-like all other exag
I think I know enough of most of the writers to geration, necessarily begets opposition. In whatwhom he is supposed to allude, to assert, that they, ever manner he may be spoken of in this new in their individual capacities, have done more good "Vision," his public career will not be more favorin the charities of life to their fellow-creatures in ably transmitted by history. Of his private virtues any one year, than Mr. Southey has done harm to (although a little expensive to the nation) there can himself by his absurdities in his whole life; and be no doubt. this is saying a great deal. But I have a few questions to ask.
1stly. Is Mr. Southey the author of Wat Tyler? 2dly. Was he not refused a remedy at law by the highest judge of his beloved England, because it was a blasphemous and seditious publication?
With regard to the supernatural personages about them, and (as an honest man) have a better treated of, I can only say, that I know as much right to talk of them than Robert Southey. I have also treated them more tolerantly. The way in which that poor insane creature, the laureate, deals about
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