Now to his grave this hero's borne,
While savage foes triumph and scorn,
And drooping banners dress his urn,
And guard him to his tomb.
Heralds and monarchs of the dead,
You that so many worms have fed,
He's coming to your chilly bed,
Edge close and give him room.
HIS EPITAPH
Beneath this stone brave Braddock lies,
Who always hated cowardice,
But fell a savage sacrifice
Amidst his Indian foes.
I charge you, heroes, of the ground,
To guard his dark pavilion round,
And keep off all obtruding sound,
And cherish his repose.
Sleep, sleep, I say, brave valiant man,
Bold death, at last, has bid thee stand
And to resign thy great command,
And cancel thy commission.
Altho' thou didst not much incline
Thy post and honors to resign;
Now iron slumber doth confine;
None envy's thy condition.
A SURVEY OF THE FIELD OF BATTLE
Return my muse unto the field,
See what a prospect it doth yield;
Ingrateful to the eyes and smell
A carnage bath'd in gore,
Lies scalp'd and mangled o'er the hills,
While sanguine rivers fill the dales,
And pale-fac'd horror spreads the fields,
The like ne'er here before.
And must these sons of Brittany
Be clouded, set in western skies,
And fall a savage sacrifice?
Oh! 'tis a gloomy hour!
My blood boils high in every vein,
To climb the mountains of the slain,
And break the iron jaws in twain,
Of savage Gallic power.
Our children with their mothers die,
While they aloud for mercy cry;
They kill, and scalp them instantly,
Then fly into the woods,
And make a mock of all their cries,
And bring their scalps a sacrifice
To their infernal deities,
And praise their demon gods.
Revenge, revenge the harmless blood
Which their inhuman dogs have shed
In every frontier neighborhood,
For near these hundred years.
Their murdering clan in ambush lies,
To kill and scalp them by surprize,
And free from tender parents' eyes
Ten hundred thousand tears.
Their sculking, scalping, murdering tricks
Have so enraged [old sixty-six],
With legs and arms like withered sticks,
And youthful vigor gone;
That if he lives another year,
Complete in armor he'll appear,
And laugh at death and scoff at fear,
To right his country's wrong.