The Battle of Talavera

by John Wilson Croker

XV.

But not to that tremendous hour
Does Heaven remit its torturing power;
And ev’n thy tyrant heart shall feel,
That here—that now—there’s vengeance still!
In vain, thy gorgeous state would hide
Of conscious fear and wounded pride,
The self-inflicted pang;—
Though monarchs to thy car be tied,
Though over half the world beside,
Thy chains of conquest clang,—
Britain and Spain, erect and proud,
Defy thee to the strife aloud,
And wave to Europe’s servile crowd,
The flag of liberty:
In it, thou seest thy glory’s shroud;
It’s shadow, like a thunder cloud,
O’erhangs thy destiny.

XVI.

Yes, thou shalt learn—and, at the tale,
Thy pride shall shrink, thy hope shall fail,
Though falsehood’s hand have trac’d
The lying legend—thou shall know
Thy marshals foiled—thy thousands low—
Thy puppet King disgrac’d!
Far other thoughts their bosoms fill;
As now to Talavera’s hill
Proud in their numbers and their skill,
The Gallic columns haste:
The same they are, and led by those,
The scourges of the world’s repose,
Victors of Milan’s fair domain,
Of Austerlitz’s wintry plain,
And Friedland’s sandy waste:
Who Prussia’s shiver’d sceptre hurl’d
Down to the dust, and from the world
Her very name erased:
Who boast them, in presumptuous tone,
Each feat and fortune to have known
Of war, except defeat alone;
But now of that to taste!

XVII.

Valiant tho’ vain, tho’ boastful wise—
Marshals, and Dukes!—with skilful eyes
They view the adverse line;
And well their prudent councils weigh
The eventful danger of the day,
Where Britain’s banners shine.
‘What though the Spanish spear we foil,
Poor were the prize, and vain the toil:—
Nothing is done till Britain’s spoil
Attest our victory:
Till, on the wings of terror borne,
The Leopards, scattered and forlorn,
Fly to their guardian sea.
On then!—let Britain prove our might!
Her’s be the trial of the fight,
The peril and the pain!
Press her with growing thousands round,
Dash that red banner to the ground,
And seal the fate of Spain!’

XVIII.

Thus France her baseless vision forms:
But He,—long tried in battle storms—
In Ind’s unequal war
Scattering, like dust, the sable swarms
Of Scindiah and Berar;
He, conqueror still where’er he turns,
On Zealand’s frozen reign,
Or where the sultry summer burns
Vimero’s rocky plain;
Who, from his tyrant station shook,
With grasp of steel, Abrantes’ Duke;
He, who from Douro’s rescued side,
Dispersed Dalmatia’s upstart pride;—
In fortune and desert, the same
On every scene of war,
Sebastiani’s pride shall tame;
And practised Jourdan’s veteran fame,
And Victor! thy portentous name
Shall fade before his star!

XIX.

In front of Talavera’s wall,
And near the confluent streams, the Gaul
His royal banner rears to sight,
With all the borrow’d blazon bright
Of Leon and Castille;
And seems to meditate a fight
That Spain alone shall feel.
Oh, vain pretence! to Wellesley’s eyes,
As pervious as the air!
He knows, that while the red cross flies,
From the strong covert, where she lies
Entrench’d and shelter’d, Spain defies
The utmost France can dare—
That Britain, on her blood-stain’d hill,
The brunt of fight must bear—
And France, though baffled thrice, will still
Strain all her force, exhaust her skill,
To plant her eagles there;
Which soon, from that commanding height
Would speed their desolating flight,
And, sweeping o’er the scatter’d plain,
The hopes of England and of Spain
With iron talon tear.