"Napoleon's fierce spirit rolled,

In terror and blood and gold,

A torrent of ruin to death from his birth.

Leave the millions who follow to mould

The metal before it be cold;

And weave into his shame, which like the dead

Shrouds me, the hopes that from his glory fled."


[NAPOLEON AND ENGLAND (1821).]

Source.—Lord Tennyson's Early Sonnets, V. 1832.