ON THE DEATH OF A WIFE. Whoe'er, like me, with trembling anguish brings Whose virtue warmed me, and whose beauty blessed, Lord Palmerston. DIRGE OF ALARIC, THE VISIGOTH, Who stormed and spoiled the city of Rome, and was afterwards buried in the channel of the river Busentius, the water of which had been diverted from its course, that the body might be interred. When I am dead, no pageant train Shall waste their sorrows at my bier, For I will die as I did live, Ye shall not raise a marble bust Ye shall not pile with servile toil Your monuments upon my breast,, Nor yet within the common soil Lay down the wreck of power to rest; Where man can boast that he has trode On him, that was the scourge of God.' But ye the mountain stream shall turn, My gold and silver ye shall fling The ransom of a conquered earth; But when, beneath the mountain-tide Ye've laid your monarch down to rot, Ye shall not rear upon its side, Pillar nor mound to mark the spot ; For long enough the world has shook My course was like the river deep, Across the world in wrath to sweep, And where I went the spot was cursed, Nor blade of grass again was seen Where Alaric and his hosts had been. See how their haughty barriers fail Not for myself did I ascend In judgment my triumphal car; With iron hand that scourge I reared O'er guilty king and guilty realm, Destruction was the ship I steered, And vengeance sat upon the helm ; When launched in fury on the flood, I ploughed my way through seas of blood, And in the stream their hearts had spilt, Washed out the long arrears of guilt. Across the everlasting Alp I poured the torrent of my powers, And feeble Cæsars shrieked for help In vain within their seven-hilled towers; I quenched in blood the brightest gem That glittered in their diadem, And struck a darker, deeper die In the purple of their majesty, And bade my northern banners shine. Upon the conquered Palatine. My course is run, my errand done, But never yet shall set the sun Of glory that adorns my name; And Roman hearts shall long be sick When men shall think of Alaric. |