The Land of Song Volume Iii Part 7

The garlands wither on your brow; Then boast no more your mighty deeds; Upon Death's purple altar now, See where the victor victim bleeds: Your heads must come To the cold tomb; Only the actions of the just Smell sweet, and blossom in their dust.

JAMES s.h.i.+RLEY.

OZYMANDIAS OF EGYPT.

I met a traveler from an antique land Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand, Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command Tell that its sculptor well those pa.s.sions read Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed; And on the pedestal these words appear: "My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!"

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, The lone and level sands stretch far away.

PERCY BYSSHE Sh.e.l.lEY.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THOMAS CAMPBELL.]

LOCHIEL'S WARNING.

WIZARD--LOCHIEL.

WIZARD.

Lochiel, Lochiel! beware of the day When the lowlands shall meet thee in battle array!

For a field of the dead rushes red on my sight, And the clans of Culloden are scattered in fight.

They rally, they bleed, for their kingdom and crown; Woe, woe to the riders that trample them down!

Proud c.u.mberland prances, insulting the slain, And their hoof-beaten bosoms are trod to the plain.

But hark! through the fast-flas.h.i.+ng lightning of war, What steed to the desert flies frantic and far?

'Tis thine, oh Glenullin! whose bride shall await, Like a love-lighted watch fire, all night at the gate.

A steed comes at morning: no rider is there; But its bridle is red with the sign of despair.

Weep, Albin! to death and captivity led!

Oh weep, but thy tears cannot number the dead: For a merciless sword on Culloden shall wave, Culloden! that reeks with the blood of the brave.

LOCHIEL.

Go, preach to the coward, thou death-telling seer; Or, if gory Culloden so dreadful appear, Draw, dotard, around thy old wavering sight This mantle, to cover the phantoms of fright.

WIZARD.

Ha! laugh'st thou, Lochiel, my vision to scorn?

Proud bird of the mountain, thy plume shall be torn!

Say, rushed the bold eagle exultingly forth, From his home, in the dark rolling clouds of the north?

Lo! the death-shot of foemen outspeeding, he rode Companionless, bearing destruction abroad; But down let him stoop from his havoc on high!

Ah! home let him speed,--for the spoiler is nigh.

Why flames the far summit? Why shoot to the blast Those embers, like stars from the firmament cast?

'Tis the fire shower of ruin, all dreadfully driven From his eyrie, that beacons the darkness of heaven.

Oh, crested Lochiel! the peerless in might, Whose banners arise on the battlements' height, Heaven's fire is around thee, to blast and to burn; Return to thy dwelling! all lonely return!

For the blackness of ashes shall mark where it stood, And a wild mother scream o'er her famis.h.i.+ng brood.

LOCHIEL.

False Wizard, avaunt! I have marshaled my clan, Their swords are a thousand, their bosoms are one!

They are true to the last of their blood and their breath, And like reapers descend to the harvest of death.

Then welcome be c.u.mberland's steed to the shock!

Let him dash his proud foam like a wave on the rock!

But woe to his kindred, and woe to his cause, When Albin her claymore indignantly draws; When her bonneted chieftains to victory crowd, Clanronald the dauntless, and Moray the proud, All plaided and plumed in their tartan array--

WIZARD.

--Lochiel, Lochiel! beware of the day; For, dark and despairing, my sight I may seal, But man cannot cover what G.o.d would reveal; 'Tis the sunset of life gives me mystical lore, And coming events cast their shadows before.

I tell thee, Culloden's dread echoes shall ring With the bloodhounds that bark for thy fugitive king.

Lo! anointed by Heaven with the vials of wrath, Behold where he flies on his desolate path!

Now in darkness and billows, he sweeps from my sight: Rise, rise! ye wild tempests, and cover his flight!

'Tis finished. Their thunders are hushed on the moors: Culloden is lost, and my country deplores.

But where is the ironbound prisoner? Where?

For the red eye of battle is shut in despair.

Say, mounts he the ocean wave, banished, forlorn, Like a limb from his country cast bleeding and torn?

Ah no! for a darker departure is near; The war drum is m.u.f.fled, and black is the bier; His death bell is tolling: oh! mercy, dispel Yon sight, that it freezes my spirit to tell!

Life flutters convulsed in his quivering limbs, And his blood-streaming nostril in agony swims.

Accursed be the f.a.gots, that blaze at his feet, Where his heart shall be thrown, ere it ceases to beat, With the smoke of its ashes to poison the gale--

LOCHIEL.

--Down, soothless insulter! I trust not the tale: For never shall Albin a destiny meet, So black with dishonor, so foul with retreat.

Tho' my peris.h.i.+ng ranks should be strewed in their gore, Like ocean weeds heaped on the surf-beaten sh.o.r.e, Lochiel, untainted by flight or by chains, While the kindling of life in his bosom remains, Shall victor exult, or in death be laid low, With his back to the field, and his feet to the foe!

And leaving in battle no blot on his name, Look proudly to Heaven from the deathbed of fame.

THOMAS CAMPBELL.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _"Announced by all the trumpets of the sky"_]

THE SNOWSTORM.

Announced by all the trumpets of the sky, Arrives the snow, and, driving o'er the fields, Seems nowhere to alight: the whited air Hides hills and woods, the river, and the heaven, And veils the farmhouse at the garden's end.

The sled and traveler stopped, the courier's feet Delayed, all friends shut out, the housemates sit Around the radiant fireplace, inclosed In a tumultuous privacy of storm.