Where’er the Red Cross banner is unfurled,
There let it carry truth, and light, and peace!
Did not the Angels who announced thy birth,
Proclaim it with the sound of Peace on Earth?’
From the length of time that this prediction has remained unfulfilled, Mr. Southey thinks its accomplishment must be near. His Odes will not hasten the event.
Again, we do not understand the use which Mr. Southey makes of Red Cross in this poem. For speaking of himself he says,
‘And when that last and most momentous hour
Beheld the re-risen cause of evil yield
To the Red Cross and England’s arm of power,
I sung of Waterloo’s unrivalled field,