Such the bard's prophetic words, Pregnant with celestial fire, Bending as he swept the chords Of his sweet but awful lyre.

She, with all a monarch's pride, Felt them in her bosom glow: Rushed to battle, fought, and died; Dying, hurled them at the foe.

Ruffians! pitiless as proud,

Heaven awards the vengeance due; Empire is on us bestowed, Shame and ruin wait for you. COWPER.

BONDUCA.

[Bonduca the British queen, taking occasion from a defeat of the Romans to impeach their valor, is rebuked by Caratac.]

QUEEN BONDUCA, I do not grieve your fortune.

If I grieve, 'tis at the bearing of your fortunes;

You put too much wind to your sail : discretion

And hardy valor are the twins of honor,

And nursed together, make a conqueror;

Divided, but a talker. 'Tis a truth, That Rome has fled before us twice, and routed;

A truth we ought to crown the gods for, lady,

And not our tongues.

You call the Romans fearful, fleeing Romans,

And Roman girls:

Does this become a doer? are they such?

Where is your conquest then? Why are your altars crowned with wreaths of flowers,

The beast with gilt horns waiting for the fire?

The holy Druidés composing songs
Of everlasting life to Victory?
Why are these triumphs, lady? for
a May-game?

For hunting a poor herd of wretched
Romans?

Is it no more? shut up your temples,

Britons,

And let the husbandman redeem his

heifers;

But not so fast; your jewel had been lost then,

Young Hengo there; he trasht me, Nennius:

For when your fears outrun him, then stept I,

And in the head of all the Romans' fury

Took him, and, with my tough belt to my back,

I buckled him; - behind him, my sure shield;

And then I followed. If I say I fought

Five times in bringing off this bud of Britain,

I lie not, Nennius. Neither had ye heard

Me speak this, or ever seen the child

My helm still on my head, my sword my prow,

Turned to my foe my face, he cried out nobly,

"Go, Briton, bear thy lion's whelp off safely;

Thy manly sword has ransomed thee: grow strong,

And let me meet thee once again in arms:

Then if thou stand'st, thou art mine." I took his offer,

And here I am to honor him.

There's not a blow we gave since Julius landed,

That was of strength and worth, but like records

They file to after-ages. Our Registers The Romans are, for noble deeds of honor;

And shall we burn their mentions with upbraidings?

Had we a difference with some petty Isle,

Or with our neighbors, lady, for our landmarks,

The taking in of some rebellious Lord,

Or making a head against commotions,

After a day of blood, peace might be argued:

But where we grapple for the ground we live on,

The Liberty we hold as dear as life, The gods we worship, and next those, our honors,

And with those swords that know no end of battle:

Those men beside themselves allow no neighbor;

Those minds that, where the day is, claim inheritance;

And where the sun makes ripe the fruits, their harvest; And where they march, but measure out more ground

To add to Rome, and here in the bowels on us;

It must not be; no, as they are our

foes,

And those that must be so until we

tire 'em,

Let's use the peace of Honor, that's fair dealing;

But in our ends, our swords.

BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.

On a rock, whose haughty brow Frowns o'er old Conway's foaming flood,

Robed in the sable garb of woe, With haggard eyes the poet stood; (Loose his beard, and hoary hair Streamed, like a meteor, to the troubled air),

And with a master's hand, and prophet's fire,

Struck the deep sorrows of his lyre. "Hark, how each giant-oak, and desert cave,

Sighs to the torrent's awful voice beneath!

O'er thee, oh King! their hundred arms they wave,

Revenge on thee in hoarser murmurs breathe;

Vocal no more, since Cambria's fatal day,

To high-born Hoel's harp, or soft
Llewellyn's lay.
I. 3.

"Cold is Cadwallo's tongue,
That hushed the stormy main:

II. 2.

"Mighty victor, mighty lord!
Low on his funeral couch he lies!
No pitying heart, no eye, afford
A tear to grace his obsequies.
Is the sable warrior fled?

Thy son is gone. He rests among the dead.

The swarm, that in thy noontide beam were born?

Gone to salute the rising morn. Fair laughs the morn, and soft the zephyr blows,

While proudly riding o'er the azure realm

In gallant trim the gilded vessel goes;

Youth on the prow, and Pleasure at the helm;

Regardless of the sweeping whirlwind's sway,

That, hushed in grim repose, expects his evening prey.

"Girt with many a baron bold, Sublime their starry fronts they rear; And gorgeous dames, and statesmen old

In bearded majesty, appear.
In the midst a form divine!
Her eye proclaims her of the Briton-
line;

Her lion-port, her awe-commanding
face,
Attempered sweet to virgin-grace.
What strings symphonious tremble
in the air,

What strains of vocal transport round her play

Hear from the grave, great Taliessin, hear;

They breathe a soul to animate thy clay.

Bright Rapture calls, and soaring as she sings,

Waves in the eye of heaven her many-colored wings.

III. 3.

"The verse adorn again

Fierce war, and faithful love, And truth severe, by fairy fiction drest.

In buskined measures move Pale grief, and pleasing pain, With horror, tyrant of the throbbing breast.

A voice, as of the cherub-choir, Gales from blooming Eden bear; And distant warblings lessen on my

ear,

That lost in long futurity expire. Fond impious man, think'st thou yon sanguine cloud,

Raised by thy breath, has quenched the orb of day? To-morrow he repairs the golden flood,

And warms the nations with redoubled ray.

Enough for me; with joy I see The different doom our fates assign.

Be thine despair, and sceptred care; To triumph, and to die, are mine." He spoke, and headlong from the mountain's height

Deep in the roaring tide he plunged to endless night.

A steed comes at morning: no rider is there;

But its bridle is red with the sign of despair.

Weep, Albin! to death and captivity led!

Oh weep! but thy tears cannot number the dead:

For a merciless sword on Culloden shall wave,

Culloden! that reeks with the blood of the brave.

Lochiel. - Go, preach to the coward, thou death-telling seer! Or, if gory Culloden so dreadful ap

pear,

Draw, dotard, around thy old wavering sight!

This mantle, to cover the phantoms of fright.

Wizard. - Ha! laugh'st thou, Lochiel, my vision to scorn? Proud bird of the mountain, thy plume shall be torn!

Say, rushed the bold eagle exultingly forth,

From his home, in the dark rolling clouds of the north?

Lo! the death-shot of foemen outspeeding, he rode

Companionless, bearing destruction abroad;

But down let him stoop from his havoc on high!

Ah! home let him speed-for the spoiler is nigh.

Why flames the far summit? Why shoot to the blast

Those embers, like stars from the firmament cast?

'Tis the fire-shower of ruin, all dreadfully driven

From his eyry, that beacons the darkness of heaven.

Oh, crested Lochiel! the peerless in might,

Whose banners arise on the battlement's height,

Heaven's fire is around thee, to blast and to burn;

Return to thy dwelling! all lonely return!

For the blackness of ashes shall mark where it stood,

And a wild mother scream o'er her famishing brood.