The Sun.
London, England, 1852-12-25 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, SATURDAY EVENING, DECEMBER 25,

chy never possessed ; so that with unlimited means
of obtaining money, and no control over expendi-
ture, and with power to alter tariffs, order public
works, and create companies, the Emperor enjoys
greater power than _ever fell into the hands of the
most absolute of his predecessors.
The Pope and Tuscany have acknowledged the
Emperor.
The Constitutionnel states that the Emperor has
given a second sum of 10,000 f. to the Mayor of
Compiegne for the foundation of Salles d'Asile in that
town. The Freres des Ecoles Chretiennes hate also
received 2,000 f., and several old soldiers different
sums amounting to 500 f.
M. Duchesne, formerly responsible editor of the
Peuple, who in 11 different prosecutions had been
condemned altogether to 30 years' imprisonment
and 80,000 f. fine, has just been released from the
prison at Bell Isle, in virtue of the late amnesty
for offences of the press.
The Senate met yesterday, at half-past one o'clock,
pursuant to adjournment, to discuss the report of M.
Troplong on the Senatus Consultunt for the modifica-
tion of the Constitution. M. Mesnard, as usual, in
~he chair. Another article has been added to the pro-
' ject, so that it now consists of seventeen instead of
sixteen clauses. The new article is to the effect that
Lieutenant-Generals admitted on the half-pay list
may be named deputies. The Commission, more-
over, has added a few words to the 7th Article, which
specified that the French Princes, that is, the Princes of
the Imperial family, were of right senators at the age of
1S years ; the words now added are, " with the assent
of the Emperor." In virtue of another amendment, the
allowance of the deputies is increased to 2,500 f. instead
of 2,000 f, or 7,500 f. for the year, independently of ex-

tordinary sessions.
Some new suggestions have been proposed to the
Minister at War, with the view of rendering the army
more efficient." The author of the plan, whose name
not made public, proposes to convert the 25 regiments
flight infantry into rifle corps, but without the expense
ttending a change in the staff. The idea is to corn-
rose those 25 regiments of three battalions each
battalion to consist of six companies, four of chasseurs
wearing the same uniform and armed in the same man-
ner as the Chasseurs de Vincennes, and two companies
of Chasseurs-Tirailleurs, to be substituted for the existing
carabiniers and voltigeurs. The author of this plan
would further substitute the red trousers of the men for
grey cloth, as better calculated for troops employed as
an advanced guard or as flankers.
The Four-and-a-Half per Cents. closed at 106 f. ;
Three per Cents., 82f. 10c. ; Bank of France,
2,930 f.

- -
THE CONTINENT.

SPAIN.

Advices from Madrid have been received dated
the 19th. The only points of interest they contain
are a statement that the Moderate electoral com-
mittee continue to hold frequent meetings. The
Heraldo states that Messrs. Bravo Murillo and
Bordin had left Madrid in r post-chaise for
France. The 19th being Sunday there was no
Bourse.

Duke's warlike ac hievements. We say this—al-
though we do nA )t at all like that mention of Na-
poleon as "The, War-Fiend." We were in hopes
we had got over the days when Boney was syno-
nymous in the Laii id of John Bull with Boguey. It
would seem othcri vise, however : for here, in 1852,
we have an Englis h author talking of Napoleon the
Great as the I Var-Fiend, and a French author
(Victor Hugo) calling " Napoleon the Little" (as
he terms him, but Napoleon the Third as he has
been designated. -by nearly 8,000,000 of his fellow-
countrymen) m ore hard names than can be found
in Lear's Curse or Timon's Malediction ! But passing
this by, and reverting to this death-chaunt over " The
Hero's Funeral," we come with the " Procession to
the Cathedral." Subsequently we have the " Fare-
well," and " St. Paul's," and " The Burial ;" and
after the " Conclusion," " Nature's Analogy," and
" Moral Contrast," and " Patriotism," and " The
People," and " The Hero," and then really the
end, entitled " Final Apostrophe." The descrip-
tion of the interior of the Cathedral is surprisingly
graphic, even to the minute reference to the vaulted
dome—

"Bacheled. o'er with beads of golden light "
a touch as true as any line or gleam in a daguerreo-
type. So, too, that allusion—

"As the wind-bowed plumes were bending,
High o'er his coffin-lid depending,
How life and death together seemed to be,
And awed the gazer like a mystery."
It is exact. One more quotation and we have
done. It is the earnest and fervid passage dedi-
cated to the glories, and the duties, and the privi-
leges of

PATRIOTIS/1.
" And Thou, environ'd with thy zone of waves,
Nursling of waters ! whom old Ocean laves,
As though He lov'd to hear his billow-roar
Champion the rocks which sentinel thy shore ;
Intrepid Isle ! whose amaranthine bays
Bloom in the light of Heaven's approving gaze ;
Defender of the Faith in Christendom's great heart !
Well may we proudly think on this clay what Thou art ;
And, pond'ring o'er th' imperishable past,
See Glory's halo round thy hist'ry cast !

Let Patriots boast of thine and thee,
Of Commerce, Arms, and Chivalry,
Of princely homes, of palaces-halls,
Of Culture, and whateer recals
How lofty will can dare, and lion-heart can do,
When Trafalgar became an ocean- lVaterloo :
'Tis right to let such feeling reign,—
And, when dead ages breathe again,
O'er the harp-string of the soul
Like a lyric rapture roll.

And their proud boast is purer still,
If Thou thy mission-work fulfil,
As dauntless champion of the Truth to stand
And brighten Europe like a beacon-land,
By teaching tyrants, who would crush the mind,
'Tis sacrilege !—for GOD is there enshrined.
Thus, sacred law and liberty unite
A Prince's sceptre with the People's right
And in the bulwark of a bold-voic'd Press,
Nations can utter forth their nobleness,
Who find in scripture, when it frees the soul
A Magna Charta which sublimes the whole !"

We could find many other portions of the
" Poem" equally worthy of being extracted ;
but the fragments already excerpted must
surely suffice to show the scope of the de-
sign—proving it, as we have before remark-
ed, in every respect worthy of its author, of
the author of " Satan," and " Luther," and
" Woman," and " The Messiah," and " Oxford,"
and " The Omnipresence of the Deity," the Rev.
Robert Montgomery.

The Burial of Wellington. —An Elegiac and
Tributary Poem. By Nicholas Michell. Tegg
and Company. '

Altogether, we cannot but think these verses dis-
tressingly weak, and in some parts painfully com-
mon-place. They were evidently written with over-
precipitation. For in the account given of the
procession for example, it is rather unluckily said—
" Warriors from foreign lands ye see;
Proud Austria sends her chivalry."
Austria having done nothing of the sort, from the
circumstance of her still sulking over the brutality
of the brewers' draymen, in their conduct one fine
day towards Marshal Haynau. There is one good
couplet about the Old Duke—namely, that in which
Mr. Michell calls him—
" A Nestor with his locks of snow,
Miltiades without his woe."
But a single meritorious couplet cannot compensate
for sixteen pages of very indifferent rhyming—tall-
ing us among other things, that on the 18th ultimo,

" Old Thames more smoothly seemed to flow,"

" Each low-drooped flag to droop more low,"
when they seemed nothing of the kind, but were
just "pretty much as usual." Everything con-
sidered, these elegiac verses reflect but a feeble lus-
tre on the name of the ingenious author of " Ruins
of many Lands."

Wellington—His Death—His Funeral. An Ode.
By Andrew Park. Mackenzie.
Mr. Andrew Park is already favourably known
a§. the writer of " Songs for all Seasons,"
as well as of " The Queen of Merry Eng-
land," besides being a welcomes name as an
agneable contributor to our periodical litera-
ture—otherwise, his present effusion might have
been passed by unnoticed like similar stanzas upon
the same subject, provided by the crowd of " illus-
trious obscures" for the popular delectation. Re-
membering what Mr. Park has done before now,
we can forgive the absence of any very noteable
merit in this somewhat monotonous production.
As affording an example of its tone, we subjoin one
of the least indifferent passages :
" Behold along the people-crowded Strand,
The dauntless warrior borne in silence on—
Saving the muffled music of each baud,
That thrills the air with melancholy. tone.
In homage due, the great of every land
Give more respect, than if from regal throne
Some pompons king, in all the world's array,
Were from his gorgeous palace borne away !"
The rest of the ode is equally uncoloured by
any novelty either of idea or expression.

By W. C.

The Death Chaunt of Wellington.
Bennett. 65, Cheapside.
Among the most meritorious effusions on the
one mournful and absorbing theme of the hour,
we would decidedly class this simple, eloquent, and
effective " Death-Chaunt of Wellington." The
opening stanza is singularly striking and dramatic :
" Whom bear you thus with heavy tread,
With arms reversed, and brows deprest?'
" ' Comrade, we bear the mighty dead
In glory to his place of rest.
A nation throngs the city's ways,
In grief for him whose race is run ;
On, in dark state, beneath their gaze,
Comrade, we bear great Wellington.'
March—slowly march—hark ! in the hush, I hear
Assaye's hurrah, and Badajos's cheer."
Each separate stanza, it will be observed, is an
epoch in the career of the departed warrior—the
refrain glorifying his renown by the inspiriting
mention of his principal military achievements.
Thus—in the first, and still more obviously in the
second stanza it will be perceived that the author
advances from Hindostan to the Peninsula :
" Yes—o'er him let the trumpet wail,'
And round him roll your muffled drums ;
In this last hour who now shall fail
In open grief for him who comes?
Its solemn swell the Dead-march pour,
In grief for him whose deeds are done ;
Grief, let the mighty cannon roar,
As on we bear great Wellington.
March—slowly march—hark ! in the hush, I hear
Victoria's shout, and Salamanca's cheer."
Again—in the third stanza, allusion is made no
longer to the great pitched battles, but to the vic-
torious assaults upon the hostile fortifications :
" On-13ar him on to where they sleep,
Our greatest, whom we name with pride ;
Lay him by Moore, in slumber deep ;
Lay him by Abercrombie's side.
Nay—place him by the only one
Who fixed, with him, red victory's smile !
Room for the dead, by him who won
For us Trafalgar and the Nile !
On—bear him on—hark ! in the hush, I hear
Toulouse's charge and St. Sebastian's cheer."
Before the fourth and closing stanza, the ear has be-
come accustomed to the changing metre ofthe refrain
insomuch that the effect indeed proves very har-
monious and beautiful.
" Throw wide the doors ; dust unto dust ;
O'er him the yawning marble close ;
Give him to death, with trembling trust,
Calm in his last stern cold repose.
In reverent silence, in the gloom.
Brooding beneath the mighty dome,
Conqueror, to share the conquered s doom.
Leave him to fame in his last home.
March—comrades, march—hark ! in the hush, I hear
Quatre Bras' hurrah and Waterloo's fierce cheer."
And so—with the climax of warlike success the
Death-Chaunt is brought to an appropriate and
brilliant conclusion.

A Dirge for Wellington. By Martin F. Tupper.
Within nearly two hundred lines, or, more cor-
rectly speaking, verses, it was scarcely possible that
Mr. Tupper—Martin Farquhar Tupper, the thought-
ful and poetic sage who has penned that most sug-
gestive work entitled " Proverbial Philosophy"—
could do otherwise than evince the brightness of his
abilities and the force of his imagination.* Through-
out the lament is forceful and pathetic—sometimes
rising to a dignity of woe consonant with the occa-
sion. In the celebration of the Great Duke's
victories we cannot understand the energy or merit
of a merely bald enumeration—as where (stanza
xv.) are mentioned thus—
Barossa ! Talavera ! Vittoria !"

---
That, we take it, is scarcely poetry—it is neither
rhyme nor reason. Again, too, we are startled by