"The crown he gave," and now, alas! has he
Who was the heir to England's sovereignty
No diadem except the cerecloth band,
No sceptre but the taper in his hand!
The glory that embalms his brilliant name
Alone is deathless through the voice of fame;
Or where, adorned in many a loyal heart,
It burns unmoved till life itself shall part—
It lives undying there. What other throne
So meet for him who called those hearts his own?
But O! when history with frigid eye
Shall write the lengthened list of deeds gone by,
And deal with justice, passionless but true,
The meed deserved the living never knew,
Forbid it, Heaven! her voice divine should stay
The tide of praise that swells his name to-day.
Tell how, when victory had wreathed his arms,
And peace at length replaced war's dread alarms,
(Such peace is theirs who can resist no more)
When captive led from France's vanquished shore
A conquered monarch graced the victor's car,
The splendid trophy of the finished war.
Say how, eclipsed in an inferior's guise,
He scorned to feed with show the people's eyes;
And spurning Roman conqueror's gaudy pride,
Rode, humble, by the French usurper's side.
Such deed as this shall live to mock decay
When time has borne war's fading wreaths away.
The golden corn shall wave on Cressy's plain,
The thrush shall sing in Poitier's woods again;
The rosemaries upon Najarra's hill
Shall perfume Najarilla's noiseless rill;
The fields of France shall bloom in verdant pride,
Unstained by ruthless conquest's crimson tide;
The summer roses bloom in far Castile—
While, levelled by the dart we all must feel,
The mortal victor lies—a wreck of clay,
Once brilliant and as perishing as they.
There mark the armour that in life he wore
Hangs o'er his dreamless head! O never more
Shall coat so princely fence so meet a heart!
And still, as if demanding ne'er to part,
There yet the leopards in their sanguine shield
Alternate with the lilies' heavenly field.
One step aside, and blazing through the gloom,
The pinnacles that deck the martyr's[[3]] tomb
Rise high and glittering o'er the golden urn;
And there for aye the dying tapers burn,
As if they cried to men in protest high
That soon their earthly honours all must die;
But that upon the Christian's sainted shade
Alone is bound a wreath that cannot fade.
O! ye who lie together, levelled here,
In life so sundered and in death so near—
He who has shed men's blood to win a throne,
And he who for Religion shed his own;
What thoughts unnumbered on the rapid mind
Arise, with mingled grief and awe combined!
O! for a worthier art with skill to paint
The light eternal that surrounds the saint:
And justly mete the song of swelling praise
The hero's virtues force our hearts to raise!
Shades of the great, the holy, and the brave,
Whose earthly vestment slumbers in the grave,
Teach us by bright example each to tread
The heavenward pathway hallowed by the dead.
What though the trembling element of earth
May swell again the clay that gave it birth;
What though again the wanton breeze reclaim
The vital breath it lent to warm your frame;
Not less ye live because our feebler race
Your lordly presence now no more shall grace.
Where'er the wild and careless winds can blow,
Where'er the ocean's cold, dark waters flow,
Where'er the heart heroic dares to die,
There—there your fadeless memory lives for aye,
Till Ruin claims her universal sway,
And worn-out Time himself shall pass away.
BUTE.
[[1]] Edward Bruce was once King of Northern Ireland.
[[2]] The symbols of the chief powers of Europe are taken from a royal masque in the reign of Henry VIII. The pomegranate represents Spain, the olive Italy, and the pine-cone Germany.
[[3]] St. Thomas of Canterbury.