Billeder på siden
PDF
ePub

MARRIAGE OF THE PRINCESS LOUISE

AND THE MARQUIS OF LORNE.

"His banner over me was love."

What is beauty, what is birth,
What is all the wealth of earth,
What the brightest costliest gem
In the monarch's diadem,

If the heart be sold for gain,
Marriage be but custom's chain,
Love be sacrificed to fame,
Freedom but an empty name?

Love cannot be bought or sold,
Love its fair love must enfold,
Love goes forth to seek its own
In the cot and on the throne.

Princess of our dear old land,

Worth like thine might well command

Kings and Princes to aspire

To thy hand with love's desire.

Thou to England's sons hast shown,
That man's seated on a throne,
Who hath virtue for a crown,
Whether fortune smile or frown.

England's glory! Scotland's pride!
Let the marriage knot be tied,
Plighted troth, and book, and ring,
As for subject, so for king.

Thou, great God, who hast ordained
Marriage should be unconstrained,
Pour upon the noble pair

Gifts yet nobler and more rare.

Shine out, Sun, with glorious ray
On the happy wedding day;
Storms, your murmurs hoarse contain,
Not a cloud the welkin stain.

Breezes of the new-born Spring,
Sweetest odours with you bring;
Let the Earth her loveliest flowers
Yield from most delightsome bowers.

Lords and ladies, fine and fair,
Greet the newly-wedded pair;
Merriment and jocund fun
Round the festive circle run.

People all, in bright array,
Keep the joyous holiday:
Let the peasant with the peer
Join in good old English cheer.

THE UNIVERSITY BOAT-RACE OF 1872.

"One receiveth the prize."

Pull hard, my boys, pull hard,
"Tis not for vile reward,

For muck of earth,

For gold or silver's worth;

'Tis to obtain

A higher nobler gain,

That deathless fame,

Which none but spirits bold and brave can claim.

[blocks in formation]

Right through the watery spray ;

Bravo! Well done!

"The Cam, the Cam has won,'

With mighty roar

[ocr errors]

Thunder ten thousand tongues from shore to shore.

THE DEMON OF WAR.

"Destruction upon destruction."

The Fury waves her brand of war,
And calls her legions from afar ;

"To arms," the maddened nations cry,

66

On, on,—we conquer or we die."

Peace droops her head, and Commerce sighs, And Culture languishes and dies.

I heard upon the rising gale

A mother's shriek, a widow's wail ;
I saw a soldier carried past,
The blood of life was ebbing fast;
I saw a field, wherein were laid
Heaps upon heaps, unburied dead !
Famine and Pestilence were there,
The vulture hovered in the air,
Mankind had fled, the land was bare;
Yet still the Fury waved her brand,
And still fresh legions, sword in hand,

Killed and were killed-her dire command.

« ForrigeFortsæt »