The poem closes in a rolicking frame of mind, which is not remarkably consistent with the preceding thought, except that the poet seems determined to get all he can out of the music of the past by enlivening it with his own jolly mood. To this end he sets a patriotic poem to the tune of Avison's march, in honor of our old friend, Pym. It is a clever tour de force for the words are made to match exactly in rhythm and quantity the notes of the march. Truth to say, the essential goodness of the tune comes out by means of these enlivening words.
XIV
Therefore—bang the drums,
Blow the trumpets, Avison! March-motive? that's
[446] Truth which endures resetting. Sharps and flats,
Lavish at need, shall dance athwart thy score
When ophicleide and bombardon's uproar
Mate the approaching trample, even now
Big in the distance—or my ears deceive—
Of federated England, fitly weave
March-music for the Future!
XV
Or suppose
Back, and not forward, transformation goes?
Once more some sable-stoled procession—say,
From Little-ease to Tyburn—wends its way,
Out of the dungeon to the gallows-tree
Where heading, hacking, hanging is to be
Of half-a-dozen recusants—this day
Three hundred years ago! How duly drones
Elizabethan plain-song—dim antique
Grown clarion-clear the while I humbly wreak
A classic vengeance on thy March! It moans—
Larges and Longs and Breves displacing quite
Crotchet-and-quaver pertness—brushing bars
Aside and filling vacant sky with stars
Hidden till now that day returns to night.
Avison's March