The Sun.
London, England, 1852-11-18 00:00:00

WELLINGTON.

AN IRREGULAR ODE.
Br WILLIAM CHARLES KENT.
A shadow on her visage as of woe,
The Guardian Goddess of the land—
Throned where the sullen billows flow,
The trident tremulous in her slackened hand,
Still brooding in a dumb surprise,
Trouble in her sea-blue eyes
And anguish at her heart—
Dreams of all her glories won :
Dreams of all her songs of praise
Hymned by earth's divinest art :
Glories won by sire and son
In these and ancient days.
Scattered in disorder 'round,
Lo ! her haughty spoils of war
Strewn neglected, where with melancholy sound
Grim ocean laps the shore.
Her stubborn buckler, black from thunderous strife'
And dinted o'er by bolts of battle—see !
Propped idly at her matron knee :
A Gorgon oval—England's shield of Life.
And glittering near her sandalled foot,
'Mid shells that murmur in the creaming wave,
On Albion's strand the trenchant brand
That oft' can Gordian knots divide—
Each woven wile of foreign guile—
Or lop the boughs of Pride :
Whose keenness still, as Fame may tell,
Resistless as of yore, shall fell
The world's tyrannic Upas to the root :
The giant sword by foes abhorred--
Britannia's dreaded glaive !
'Round the Goddess throws her glance
O'er the beach and o'er the flood,
Gazing as though she saw advance
The azure tide—a tide of blood !
Stirless o'er her helmed head,
Drooping down its Saxon spear,
Her Norman banner hangs dispread
As o'er a nation's bier.
Yet, breathless though her standard falls,
About the golden helm' beneath—
As ruffled by a zephyr's sigh—
Green stirs the laurel wreath !
Ev'n as bereaved affection calls
From souls the labouring breath,
When sobs within the charnel halls
Disturb the fringed gloom of palls
That trail the pomp of death :
So, soft, the air with sorrow heaves—
So feebly, faintly move the leaves
Around her saddened brow,
Where Memory with most solemn mien,
Distorting every line serene,
Bids Grief her claims allow.
Though tears her sight suffuse—
As weeps in spray the seething brine—
The solemn Past its life renews,
Arraying in its rainbow hues
The visions of a heart divine.
Flickering out like flame from embers,
Lo ! the gorgeous pageant comes :
Comes—and, as each sense remembers,
Clang the trumpets, roll the drums.
Yonder, driving down like cattle
All the turbaned rout of war,
Where, in agonies of battle,
Died the Tiger of Mysore—
O'er the rampart gleams the blade,
Lightening in the betel shade,
Flaming down the ghastly fray,
Loved for all the hopes allied
With the scabbard by his side--
'As the bridegroom loves the bride'—
Meteor, thou of Asian day !
Not Orlando loved so well
Edge and hilt of Durandel,
As did he the iron wand,
Blazing in his grasped hand,
When he led his doughty band,
Fierce on Scindiah's dread array,
Till victorious there he stood,
Looming grand thro' smoke and blood—
The hero of Assaye !
Radiant smiles the Goddess now ;
Radiant beams her gladdened brow ;
Calm her looks with fires of rapture burn :
For, again, 0 Queen! behold
Nobler annals yet unrolled,
Brighter deeds and mightier shades return.
There—she views her victor, gone
From her orient' realms afar;
By the awful, fated hour
Called to grapple with a Power
Dreadlier than dark Sultaun,
Or Rajah of Berar.
Here—in terror issuing forth,
Borne above the boreal main,
O'er the green, ice-curdling billows of the North,
See his serried warriors throng,
See them smite with might the strong,
And sweep in panic flight along
The legions of the Dane.
Hark ! the bugle clarion sounding,
Summons him to grander toil,
Where, with deadly blows rebounding,
Nations combat for a soil—
Combat for the soil that hid
The name, the fame, the ashes of the Cid.
'Sees she then her flags arise,
Under Lusitanian skies—
Rustling through the carnage dun ;
Fluttering in the southern sun ;
Tattered where the gun-bolts fly :
Paling never, but for ever
Blushing red with victory.
Proudly though the eagle soaring,
On its eyrie-ridge alight—
His the storm destruction pouring
O'er Rolica's ravaged height.
His the blue and blinding rain,
Hurled in hurricanes around,
Heaping with the dying and the slain
Vimiera's branded ground.
Fairest of all ocean's daughters !
Listen 'mid the thickening gloom,
Where across the Douro's waters
Loud the dreadful cannon boom.
Talavera's valour, see—
And Busaco's chivalry.
But, when numbers bid him tremble,
Witness all his craft dissemble ;
Watch where, keen, each bayonet shines,
Under Torres Vedras' wall—
Baffling all the arms of Gaul,
Tranquil every troop reclines,
Sheltered and shadowed by those wondrous lines•

Wakes at length the Voice of Glory,
Famous in heroic story,
When with hoofs and fetlocks gory,
Over raveline and fosse,
Forth each gallant charger bounding,
Gave to light a force redounding
Grandly over gain or loss :
Witness Ciudad's shattered pride,
Witness still the riven side
Of grimly Badajos.
Goddess ! gladlier yet thy trident wield ;
Joy yet more royal in thy breast lie hid :
For, lo ! where, borne from Salamanca's field,
Thy Conqueror rides triumphant down Madrid
Hushed the wild thunders of his lordly wrath,
As scattered, round,
With pattering sound,
The purpling blossoms strow his kingly path.
Gentler yet thy sovereign, glances
Tremble 'neath those lids divine,
When thy champion chief advances,
Glorying in that name of thine :
Threefold splendour streaming down
On Vittoria's dread renown.

Crowning such sublime emotions,
See at last float out to view,
Climax of a world's commotions,
Sceptre-rending Waterloo.
Brilliant in her 'raptured face,
Gladness fills the heavenly fair,
Touching every line to grace,
Glistening in her golden hair.
For elated by remembrance
Of the conflict's ireful brunt,
She beholds in vivid semblance--
Eagle eye and eagle front,
Tranquil as when first beneath
Verdant laurels, or as since
Olives bound with civic wreath
England's aged Warrior-Prince.

Startled from her soul's celestial pleasure,
Darkness 'round the Goddess' form descends,
While discordant notes in doleful measure
Each a pang of misery portends.
Throbbing like the pulse of woe,
Hark ! the dumb funereal tread,
Where the silent thousands flow,
Mourning for their mighty dead.
Where, in shadowy train assembling,
Under spectral plumage trembling,
Shrouded pomps in sombre trappings come,--
Rolling on the wind away,
O'er the trumpet's choral bray,
The dull, redoubling drum.
'Mid surges murmuring thus around her throne,
Behold the sacred Monarch of the Free,
Musing, dejected, on her isle alone,
Britannia weeping by her subject sea—
Weeping for her noblest son,
Her prince, her pride, her patriot—Welhugw" '

of
London : Printed and Published by AII7RDO YOUN
No. 112, Strand, Printer, at The Sun Office, No. --
Strand, in the Precinct of the Swop, in the countl
Middlesex, Wednesday, November 18, 1852.