E'en now he seems, with eager pace, The consecrated floor to trace,
And ope, from its tremendous gloom, The treasure of the wondrous tomb: E'en now he burns in thought to rear, From its dark bed the ponderous spear, Rough with the gore of Pictish kings: E'en now fond hope his fancy wings, To poise the monarch's massy blade, Of magic-temper'd metal made; And drag to day the dinted shield That felt the storm of Camlan's field. O'er the sepulchre profound
E'en now, with arching sculpture crown'd, He plans the chantry's choral shrine, The daily dirge, and rites divine.
BOUND for holy Palestine, Nimbly we brush'd the level brine, All in azure steel array'd;
O'er the wave our weapons play'd, And made the dancing billows glow; High upon the trophied prow, Many a warrior-minstrel swung His sounding harp, and boldly sung : "Syrian virgins, wail and weep, English Richard ploughs the deep.! Tremble, watchmen, as ye spy, From distant towers, with anxious eye,
The radiant range of shield and lance Down Damascus' hills advance : From Sion's turrets as afar
Ye ken the march of Europe's war! Saladin, thou paynim king,
From Albion's isle revenge we bring ! On Acon's spiry citadel,
Though to the gale thy banners swell, Pictured with the silver moon; England shall end thy glory soon! In vain, to break our firm array, Thy brazen drums hoarse discord bray : Those sounds our rising fury fan: English Richard in the van,
On to victory we go,
A vaunting infidel the foe."
Blondel led the tuneful band,
And swept the wire with glowing hand. Cyprus, from her rocky mound,
And Crete, with piny verdure crown'd, Far along the smiling main
Echoed the prophetic strain.
Soon we kiss'd the sacred earth That gave a murder'd Saviour birth; Then, with ardour fresh endued, Thus the solemn song renew'd.
WILLIAM COWPER.
BORN 1731-DIED 1800,
EXTRACT FROM VERSES TO THE YARDLEY OAK.
SURVIVOR Sole, and hardly such, of all That once lived here, thy brethren, at my birth, (Since which I number threescore winters past,) A shatter'd veteran, hollow-trunk'd perhaps, As now, and with excoriate forks deform, Relics of ages! could a mind, imbued With truth from heaven, created thing adore, I might with reverence kneel, and worship thee. It seems idolatry with some excuse,
When our forefather Druids in their oaks
Unpurified by an authentic act
Of amnesty, the meed of blood divine,
Loved not the light, but, gloomy, into gloom Of thickest shades, like Adam after taste Of fruit proscribed, as to a refuge, fled.
Thou wast a bauble once, a cup and ball Which babes might play with; and the thievish jay,
Seeking her food, with ease might have purloin'd The auburn nut that held thee, swallowing down Thy yet close folded latitude of boughs, And all thine embryo vastness at a gulp. But Fate thy growth decreed; autumnal rains Beneath thy parent tree mellow'd the soil
Design'd thy cradle; and a skipping deer, With pointed hoof dibbling the glebe prepared The soft receptacle, in which, secure,
Thy rudiments should sleep the winter through. So Fancy dreams. Disprove it, if ye can, Ye reasoners broad awake, whose busy search Of argument, employ'd too oft amiss, Sifts half the pleasures of short life away!
Thou fell'st mature; and, in the loamy clod Swelling with vegetative force instinct,
Didst burst thine egg, as theirs the fabled Twins, Now stars; two lobes, protruding, pair'd exact ; A leaf succeeded, and another leaf, And, all the elements thy puny growth
Fostering propitious, thou becam'st a twig. Who lived when thou wast such? Oh! couldst thou speak,
As in Dodona once thy kindred trees Oracular, I would not curious ask
The future, best unknown, but, at thy mouth Inquisitive, the less ambiguous past.
By thee I might correct, erroneous oft, The clock of history, facts and events Timing more punctual, unrecorded facts Recovering, and mistated setting right- Desperate attempt, till trees shall speak again! Time made thee what thou wast, king of the
And Time hath made thee what thou art-a cave For owls to roost in. Once thy spreading boughs O'erhung the champaign; and the numerous
That grazed it stood beneath that ample cope Uncrowded, yet safe shelter'd from the storm.
No flock frequents thee now.
Thy popularity, and art become
(Unless verse rescue thee awhile) a thing Forgotten, as the foliage of thy youth.
While thus through all the stages thou hast push'd
Of treeship-first a seedling, hid in grass; Then twig: then sapling; and, as century roll'd Slow after century, a giant-bulk
Of girth enormous, with moss-cushion'd root Upheaved above the soil, and sides emboss'd With prominent wens globose-till at the last The rottenness, which time is charged to inflict On other mighty ones, found also thee.
What exhibitions various hath the world Witness'd of mutability in all
That we account most durable below! Change is the diet on which all subsist, Created changeable, and change at last Destroys them. Skies uncertain now the heat Transmitting cloudless, and the solar beam Now quenching in a boundless sea of clouds- Calm and alternate storm, moisture and drought, Invigorate by turns the springs of life
In all that live, plant, animal, and man, And in conclusion mar them.
Fine passing thought, e'en in her coarsest works, Delight in agitation, yet sustain
The force that agitates not unimpair'd ;
But, worn by frequent impulse, to the cause Of their best tone their dissolution owe.
Thought cannot spend itself, comparing still The great and little of thy lot, thy growth
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