SONG OF THE GREEK BARD. And where are they? and where art thou, The heroic bosom beats no more! What, silent still! and silent all! Ah! no-the voices of the dead And shed the blood of Scio's vine! The nobler and the manlier one? Fill high the bowl with Samian wine! It made Anacreon's song divine: He served but served Polycrates A tyrant; but our masters then 59 The tyrant of the Chersonese Was freedom's best and bravest friend; O! that the present hour would lend Such chains as his were sure to bind. Fill high the bowl with Samian wine! Such as the Doric mothers bore; Trust not for freedom to the Franks- Where nothing, save the waves and I, 1. Meaning of burning? 2. Explain the allusions to Delos and Phoebus. 3. What place is alluded to? BYRON. 4. What Persian? XXXIII. THE DEATH OF NAPOLEON. "THE 5th of May came amid wind and rain. Napoleon's passing spirit was deliriously engaged in a strife more terrible than the elements around. The words 'tête d'armée,' (head of the army,) the last which escaped from his lips, intimated that his thoughts were watching the current of a heady fight. About eleven minutes before six in the evening Napoleon expired."- Scott's Life of Napoleon. THE DEATH OF NAPOLEON. WILD was the night, yet a wilder night A few fond mourners were kneeling by, They knew by his awful and kingly look, That he dream'd of days when the nations shook, He dream'd that the Frenchmen's sword still slew, Like the hare before the beagle. The bearded Russian he scourged again, And again, on the hills of haughty Spain, Over Egypt's sands, over Alpine snows, Where the wave of the lordly Danube flows, On the snowy cliffs where mountain-streams He led again, in his dying dreams, Again Marengo's field was won, Made pale at his cannon's rattle. He died at the close of that darksome day, In the rocky land they placed his clay 61 MCLELLAN, XXXIV. THE DUMFRIES VOLUNTEERS. "FRANCE now (1803) had little of popular sympathy in any other country. She had lost the support of the democratic party throughout Europe, and stood forth merely as a threatening and conquering military power. This change, though at the time little attended to, as all alterations which are gradual in their progress, was of the utmost moment, and deprived the contest, in its future stages, of the principal dangers with which it had at first been fraught. It was no longer a war of opinion on either side of the channel. Democratic ambition did not now hail, in the triumphs of the French, the means of individual elevation. Aristocratic passion ceased to hope for this overthrow as paving the way to a restoration of the ancient order of things. The contest had changed its character: from being social it had become national. Not the maintenance of the constitution, the coercion of the disaffected, the overthrow of the Jacobins, was the object for which we fought: the preservation of the national independence, the vindication of the national honour was felt to be at stake. The painful schism which had so long divided the country was at an end. National success was looked upon with triumph and exultation by an immense majority of the people, with the exception of a few party leaders who to the last regarded it with aversion. The war called forth the sympathies of almost all classes of citizens. The young, who had entered into life under its excitement, were unanimous in its support; and a contest which had commenced under more divided feelings than any recorded in the history of England, terminated with a degree of unanimity unprecedented in its long and glorious career."-Alison's History of Europe. DOES haughty Gaul invasion threat? Ere we permit a foreign foe, ON THE THREATENED INVASION, 1803. The kettle o' the kirk and state, Perhaps a clout may fail in't; Our fathers' bluid the kettle bought, The wretch that wad a tyrant own, And the wretch his true-born brother Who will not sing "God save the King," But, while we sing "God save the King" BURNS. 63 XXXV. STANZAS ON THE THREATENED INVASION, 1803. "By a series of criminal enterprises the liberties of Europe have been gradually extinguished; and we are the only people in the eastern hemisphere who are in possession of equal laws and a free constitution. Freedom, driven from every spot on the Continent, has sought an asylum in a country which she always chose for her favourite abode; but she is pursued even here and threatened with destruction. The inundation of lawless power, after covering the whole earth, threatens to follow us here; and we are most exactly, most critically placed in the only aperture where it can be successfully repelled--in the Thermopylae of the world. As far as the interests of freedom are concerned--the most important by far of sublunary interests!-you, my countrymen, stand in the capacity of the federal representatives of the human race; for with you it is to determine (under God) in what condition the latest posterity shall be born; their fortunes are intrusted to your care, and on your conduct at this moment depend the colour and complexion of their destiny."-Robert Hall. OUR bosoms we'll bare for the glorious strife, And our oath is recorded on high, To prevail in the cause that is dearer than life, Then rise, fellow-freemen, and stretch the right hand, 'Tis the home we hold sacred is laid to our trust- |