FIELD OF WATERLOO.

And there was mounting in hot haste: the steed,
The mustering squadron, and the clattering car,
Went pouring forward with impetuous speed,
And swiftly forming in the ranks of war;
And the deep thunder peal on peal afar;
And near, the beat of the alarming drum
Roused up the soldier ere the morning star;
While throng'd the citizens with terror dumb,
Or whispering, with white lips-"The foe! they come, they

come !"

49

And wild and high the "Cameron's gathering" rose!
The war-note of Lochiel, which Albyn's hills
Have heard-and heard, too, have her Saxon foes:7
How in the noon of night that pibroch thrills,
Savage and shrill! But with the breath which fills
Their mountain-pipe, so fill the mountaineers
With their fierce native daring, which instils
The stirring memory of a thousand years;
And Evan's, Donald's fame rings in each clansman's ears!

And Ardennes waves above them her green leaves,
Dewy with nature's tear-drops, as they pass,
Grieving-if aught inanimate e'er grieves-
Over the unreturning brave,-alas!
Ere evening to be trodden like the grass
Which now beneath them, but above shall grow
In its next verdure; when this fiery mass

Of living valour, rolling on the foe

And burning with high hope, shall moulder cold and low!

Last noon beheld them full of lusty life,
Last eve in Beauty's circle proudly gay;
The midnight brought the signal-sound of strife,
The morn the marshalling in arms,-the day
Battle's magnificently-stern array!

The thunder-clouds close o'er it, which when rent
The earth is cover'd thick with other clay,"
Which her own clay shall cover-heap'd and pent,
Rider and horse,-friend, foe,-in one red burial blent !12

BYRON.

1. What empire ?

2. In what sense is simpler used here?

3. Red rain?

4. What is it?

5. "This stanza is very grand, even from its total unadornment. It is only a versification of the common narratives; but here may well be applied a position E

of Johnson, that When truth is sufficient to fill the mind, fiction is worse than useless.'"-Brydges.

10. The ellipsis here?
11. What clay?

12. Sir Walter Scott, no incompetent judge, has said of this description of the Field of Waterloo, "I am not sure that any verses in our language surpass, in vigour and in feeling, this most beautiful description."

6. Albyn is the Celtic name of Scotland.

7. Who are meant by her Saxon foes? 8. Explain the phrase noon of night. 9. The verb fill is used here in two different verses; explain them.

XXVIII. ANCIENT GREECE.

"SEPARATED from Asia by the Hellespont and the long defiles of Thrace, shielded on the North by the lofty chain of mountains which divides it, with Italy, from the open plains of Northern Europe, surrounded on every other side by water, Greece, combines with all these external fortifications, the advantage of an internal construction, resembling a castle of the Middle Ages. Wall is added to wall, portal to portal, forming an inextricable labyrinth, which always affords a retreat and an asylum for its defenders after every defeat, and presents snares and perils to its enemies after every victory. Upon this soil, shone upon by a glorious sun, bathed by romantic seas, adorned to profusion by the wild and picturesque beauties of a luxuriant vegetation, a race of men no less admirably organized was cast by Providence, to be trained and educated for the benefit of humanity; a race endowed with activity and courage, possessing a bold and poetical imagination, loving the mountain and the sea, and, consequently, independence and danger; fitted for every thing,-for philosophy no less than for business; for the arts no less than for virtue; for the labours of war no less than for those of peace: a race gifted with an extraordinary and unrivalled genius, and the unhappy remains of which we shamefully permit to perish before our eyes. If a people were ever predestined by Heaven to a high and peculiar destiny and were entitled to the name of the People of God, this certainly was the people. It sustained this rank during ten centuries; for during ten centuries, it marched at the head of humanity, opening an immortal path before it; it was pre-eminent over all who had been chosen before, or who have been since; for it was by it, and in it, that the root was firmly planted, in the bosom of humanity, of that tree of civilization which is destined at length to cover the earth with its branches."-Jouffroy on the "Influence of Greece in the Development of Humanity."

Derivations.

Cave.
Servile.

Expires.
Pyramid.
Despot.

Etymology.

Story.

Strife.
Shame.

Heroes.

Gulf.

Syntax,

Pronounce.
Story.
Monument.
Mountains.

Compare these adjectives :

Brave.

Former.
Nameless.

Mighty.

Native.

CLIME' of the unforgotten brave!
Whose land from plain to mountain cave
Was freedom's home or glory's grave!
Shrine of the mighty! can it be,
That this is all remains2 of thee?

ANCIENT GREECE.

Approach, thou craven crouching slave:
Say, is not this Thermopylæ ?
These waters blue that round you lave,
Oh servile offspring of the free-
Pronounce what sea, what shore is this?
The gulf, the rock of Salamis !
These scenes, their story not unknown,
Arise, and make again your own;
Snatch from the ashes of your sires
The embers of their former fires;
And he who in the strife expires,
Will add to theirs a name of fear,3
That tyranny shall quake to hear,
And leave his sons a hope, a fame,
They too will rather die than shame :
For freedom's battle once begun,
Bequeathed by bleeding sire to son,
Though baffled oft, is ever won.
Bear witness, Greece, thy living page,*
Attest it many a deathless age! 5
While kings, in dusty darkness hid,
Have left a nameless pyramid;
Thy heroes, though the general doom
Hath swept the column from their tomb,
A mightier monument command-
The mountains of their native land!
There' points thy Muse to stranger's eye
The graves of those that cannot die!
"Twere long to tell, and sad to trace,
Each step from splendour to disgrace;
Enough-no foreign foe could quell
Thy soul, till from itself it fell;
Yes! self-abasement paved the way
To villain-bonds and despot sway.

1. Clime, a contraction for what?
2. What is the noun to remains?
3. What is meant by a name of fear?
4. What living page?

|

5. How is age governed?
6. What general doom?
7. Where?

BYRON.

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XXIX. THE PLAIN OF MARATHON.

"WHAT days were those of Marathon, of Salamis, of Platea, in the history of the human race! Hitherto, civilization had yielded in its infancy to the power of the barbarians. On the shores of the Eu

phrates and the Tigris, in Syria, in Egypt, on the favoured coasts of Asia Minor, at all epochs and in every place, it had proved to be the weakest. In those three days of immortal memory, for the first time, it gained the victory; for the first time, the power of numbers was broken by that of intelligence, and force was made to feel restraint." -Jouffroy on the "Influence of Greece in the Development of Humanity.”

WHERE'ER we tread 'tis haunted holy ground;
No earth of thine is lost in vulgar mould,
But one vast realm of wonder spreads around,
And all the Muses tales seem truly told,
Till the sense aches with gazing to behold
The scenes our earliest dreams have dwelt upon :
Each hill and dale, each deep'ning glen and wold
Defies the power which crush'd thy temples gone:
Age shakes Athena's tower, but spares gray Marathon.

The sun, the soil, but not the slave, the same;
Unchanged in all except its foreign lord-
Preserves alike its bounds and boundless fame
The battle-field, where Persia's victim horde
First bow'd beneath the brunt of Hella's sword,
As on the morn to distant glory dear,
When Marathon became a magic word;
Which uttered, to the hearer's eye appear
The camp, the host, the fight, the conqueror's career,

The flying Mede, his shaftless broken bow;
The fiery Greek, his red pursuing spear ;
Mountains above, Earth's, Ocean's plains below,
Death in the front, Destruction in the rear!
Such was the scene-what now remaineth here?
What sacred trophy marks the hallow'd ground,
Recording freedom's smile and Asia's tear?
The rifled urn, the violated mound,

The dust thy courser's hoof, rude stranger! spurns around.

BYRON.

XXX. AMERICA TO GREAT BRITAIN.

"ENGLAND before long, this island of ours, will hold but a smali fraction of the English; in America, in New Holland, east and west to the very Antipodes, there will be a Saxondom covering great spaces of the globe. And now, what is it that can keep all these together into virtually one nation, so that they do not fall out and fight, but

AMERICA TO GREAT BRITAIN.

53

live at peace in brotherlike intercourse, helping one another? This is justly regarded as the greatest practical problem, the thing all manner of sovereignties and governments are held to accomplish: what is it that will accomplish this? Acts of Parliament, administrative prime ministers cannot. America is parted from us, so far as Parliament could part it. Call it not fantastic, for there is much reality in it. Here, I say, is an English king, whom no time or chance, Parliament or combination of Parliaments, can dethrone! This King Shakspeare, does not he shine in crowned sovereignty over us all, as the noblest, gentlest, yet strongest of rallying signs; indestructible; really more valuable in that point of view, than any other means or appliance whatsoever? We can fancy him as radiant aloft over all the nations of Englishmen; a thousand years hence. From Paramatta, from New York, wheresoever, under what sort of parish constable soever, English men and women are, they will say to one another: Yes, this Shakspeare is ours; we produced him; we speak and think by him; we are of one blood and kind with him.' The most common-sense politician too, may, if he pleases, think of that."- Carlyle.

ALL hail! thou noble land,
Our father's native soil!

O stretch thy mighty hand,
Gigantic grown by toil,

O'er the vast Atlantic wave to our shore;

For thou, with magic might,
Canst reach to where the light
Of Phoebus travels bright
The world o'er?

The genius of our clime,
From his pine-embattled steep,
Shall hail the great sublime;
While the Tritons of the deep

With their conch the kindred league shall proclaim

Then let the world combine

O'er the main our naval line,

Like the milky-way, shall shine
Bright in fame!

Though ages long have passed
Since our fathers left their home,
Their pilot in the blast,
O'er untravell'd seas to roam,-

Yet lives the blood of England in our veins !
And shall we not proclaim
That blood of honest fame,
Which no tyranny can tame
By its chains?