Did ye not hear it?—No; 'twas but the wind,
Or the car rattling o'er the stony street:
On with the dance! let joy be unconfined;
No sleep till morn, when youth and pleasure meet
To chase the glowing hours with flying feet-
But hark! the heavy sound breaks in once more,
As if the clouds its echo would repeat;

And nearer, clearer, deadlier than before!
Arm! arm! it is—it is the cannon's opening roar!
Within a window'd niche of that high hall
Sat Brunswick's fated chieftain; he did hear
That sound the first amid the festival,

And caught its tone with death's prophetic ear;
And when they smiled because he deem'd it near,
His heart more truly knew that peal too well
Which stretch'd his father on a bloody bier1,
And roused the vengeance blood alone could quell:
He rush'd into the field, and, foremost fighting, fell.
Ah! then and there was hurrying to and fro,
And gathering tears, and tremblings of distress,
And cheeks all pale, which but an hour ago
Blush'd at the praise of their own loveliness;
And there were sudden partings, such as press
The life from out young hearts, and choking sighs,
Which ne'er might be repeated; who could guess
If ever more should meet those mutual eyes,
Since upon night so sweet such awful morn could rise!
And there was mounting in hot haste: the steed,
The mustering squadron, and the clattering car,
Went pouring forward with impetuous speed,
And swiftly forming in the ranks of war;
And the deep thunder, peal on peal, afar;
And near the beat of the alarming drum2
Roused up the soldier ere the morning star;
While throng'd the citizens, with terror dumb,
Or whispering, with white lips-"The foe! They come!
they come!"

The Duke of Brunswick's father, Charles William Ferdinand, received his death wound at the battle of Jena in 1806. Frederick William, his son, fell at the battle of Quatre Bras, on the 16th June, 1815. In the midst of the action, a musket-ball entered his

bridle arm, passed through his side,
and, lodging in a vital part, caused
his speedy death.
This battle was
the prelude to that of Waterloo.
2 Alarming drum, the drum beating
to arms.

And wild and high the "Cameron's gathering" rose;
The war-note of Lochiel, which Albyn's hills1
Have heard, and heard, too, have her Saxon foes-
How in the noon of night that pibroch thrills,
Savage and shrill! But with the breath which fills
Their mountain pipe, so fill the mountaineers
With the fierce native daring which instils
The stirring memory of a thousand years,

And Evan's, Donald's 3 fame rings in each clansman's ears!
And Ardennes waves above them her green leaves,
Dewy with nature's tear-drops, as they pass,
Grieving, if aught inanimate ere grieves,

Over the unreturning brave-alas!

Ere evening to be trodden like the grass

Which now beneath them, but above shall grow

In its next verdure, when this fiery mass

Of living valour, rolling on the foe,

And burning with high hope, shall moulder cold and low.

Last noon beheld them full of lusty life,

Last eve in Beauty's circle proudly gay,

The midnight brought the signal-sound of strife-
The morn, the marshalling in arms—the day,
Battle's magnificently stern array!

The thunder-clouds 5 close o'er it; which, when rent,
The earth is cover'd thick with other clay;
Which her own clay shall cover, heap'd and pent
Rider and horse-friend, foe-in one red burial blent!

1 Albyn's hills. The Scottish Highlands are sometimes so named. By some it is derived from the Celtic word alb, alp, high.

2 Pibroch. Martial music produced by the bagpipe of the Highlanders. Sometimes it is used for the bagpipe itself.

3 Donald Cameron, of Lochiel, who occupied a prominent place in the rebellion of 1745. He was the grandson of Sir Evan Cameron, who lived to an extreme old age. At the battle of Culloden many Camerons were slain, and Lochiel, the chief of the clan, was borne from the field dangerously wounded.

4 Ardennes. This is the name of

E

Byron.

a great forest and hilly region which is found in the north of France. In the time of Cæsar, who calls it Sylva Arduenna, it extended to the Rhine. The wood of Soignes, close to Waterloo, is here, however, understood by Ardennes. On the 17th of June, the British position stretched in front of the Forest of Soignes, on a ridge of eminences cutting the road from Charleroi to Brussels at right angles, and forming one side of a valley about 1200 yards in width.

5 The evening before the battle the troops bivouacked under a deluge of rain, and the morning was ushered in by a thunderstorm.

So on he fares, and to the border comes
Of Eden, where delicious Paradise

Now nearer, crowns with her enclosure green,
As with a rural mound, the champaign head
Of a steep wilderness, whose hairy1 sides,
With thicket overgrown, grotesque and wild,
Access denied; and overhead up grew
Insuperable height of loftiest shade,

Cedar, and pine, and fir, and branching palm,
A sylvan scene: and, as the ranks ascend
Shade above shade, a woody theatre

Of stateliest view. Yet higher than their tops
The verdurous wall of Paradise up sprung:
Which to our general sire gave prospect large
Into his nether empire neighbouring round.
And higher than that wall a circling row
Of goodliest trees, loaden with fairest fruit,
Blossoms and fruits at once of golden hue,
Appear'd with gay enamell'd' colours mix'd:
On which the sun more glad impress'd his beams
Than in a fair evening cloud, or humid bow,

When God hath shower'd the earth; so lovely seem'd
That landscape: and of pure, now purer air
Meets his approach, and to the heart inspires
Vernal delight and joy, able to drive
All sadness but despair: now gentle gales,

1 Hairy, prickly, rough.

Grotesque-grotesque, French; grottesco, Italian. From the strange and extravagant figures which were painted in the grottos or crypts of the

ancient Romans. Distorted of figure; unnatural.-Todd's Johnson.

3 Enamelled. Of various hues and tints, as in the process of enamelling, or fixing colours by the action of fire.

Fanning their odoriferous wings, dispense
Native perfumes, and whisper whence they stoel
Those balmy spoils. As when to them who sail
Beyond the Cape of Hope, and now are past
Mozambic1, off at sea north-east winds blow
Sabean2 odours from the spicy shore

Of Araby the blest; with such delay

Well pleased they slack their course, and many a league Cheer'd with the grateful smell old Ocean smiles :

So entertain'd those odorous sweets the fiend.

*

*

*

*

Southward through Eden went a river3 large,

4

Nor changed his course, but through the shaggy hill
Pass'd underneath ingulfed; for God had thrown
That mountain as his garden-mound high raised
Upon the rapid current, which, through veins
Of porous earth with kindly thirst updrawn,
Rose a fresh fountain, and with many a rill
Water'd the garden; thence united fell
Down the steep glade, and met the nether flood,
Which from his darksome passage now appears,
And now, divided into four main streams,
Runs diverse, wandering many a famous realm
And country, whereof here needs no account;
But rather to tell how, if Art could tell,

6

How from that sapphire fount the crisped brooks,
Rolling on orient pearl and sands of gold,
With mazy errour under pendent shades
Ran nectar, visiting each plant, and fed
Flowers worthy of Paradise, which not nice Art
In beds and curious knots, but Nature boon7
Pour'd forth profuse on hill, and dale, and plain,
Both where the morning sun first warmly smote
The open field, and where the unpierced shade
Imbrown'd the noontide bowers: thus was this place
A happy rural seat of various view;

1 Mozambic, the island of Mozambique, on the eastern coast of Africa.

Sabean odours, from Saba, a city and country of Arabia Felix, the most famous for frankincense.-Newton.

4 Shaggy, rough, covered with shrubs.

5 Glade, an avenue. Here the way cut by the river down the hill.

6 Sapphire, a bright blue colour; crisped, having the surface ruffled

3 River. In another place Milton with waves. calls it the Tigris. 7 Boon, liberal, kind.

Groves whose rich trees wept odorous gums and balm,
Others whose fruit, burnish'd with golden rind,
Hung amiable (Hesperian1 fables true,

If true, here only), and of delicious taste :
Betwixt them lawns, or level downs, and flocks
Grazing the tender herb, were interposed,
Or palmy hillock; or the flowery lap❜
Of some irriguous valley spread her store,
Flowers of all hue, and without thorn the rose:
Another side, umbrageous grots and caves
Of cool recess, o'er which the mantling vine
Lays forth her purple grape, and gently creeps
Luxuriant; meanwhile murmuring waters fall
Down the slope hills, dispersed, or in a lake,
That to the fringed bank, with myrtle crown'd,
Her crystal mirrour holds, unite their streams.
The birds their quire apply; airs, vernal airs,
Breathing the smell of field and grove, attune
The trembling leaves; while universal Pan3,
Knit with the Graces and the Hours4 in dance,
Led on the eternal spring.

Hesperian fables. On the shores of the Atlantic, in heathen mythology, were placed the gardens of the Hesperides, which produced golden apples. "What is said of the Hesperian Gardens is true here only; if all is not pure invention, this garden was meant ; and, moreover, these fruits have a delicious taste; those there had none."-Richardson.

Lap, hollow, recess.

3 Pan, the tutelary deity of herdsmen and shepherds, and also of their flocks and herds. He is represented

Milton.

as bearing in his right hand the crooked shepherd's rod. Here he means, all nature. "While universal Nature, linked with the graceful seasons, danced a perpetual round, and throughout the earth, yet unpolluted, led eternal spring."

4 The dancing-horæ, or seasons, following one another in measured steps, are an emblem of fleeting time. As friends and companions of the Graces, they often mingle with them in a common choir.