"Here reigns the Russian, there the Turk; observe "His capital city!"-Thence-along a tract Of livelier interest to his hopes and fears His finger moved, distinguishing the spots Where wide-spread conflict then most fiercely raged ; On which the Sons of mighty Germany This spoken, from his seat the Pastor rose, And moved towards the grave;-instinctively His steps we followed; and my voice exclaimed, "Power to the Oppressors of the world is given, A might of which they dream not. Oh! the curse, To be the Awakener of divinest thoughts, Father and Founder of exalted deeds, And to whole Nations bound in servile straits More than heroic! this to be, nor yet Have sense of one connatural wish, nor yet When these involuntary words had ceased, The Pastor said, "So Providence is served; The forked weapon of the skies can send Illumination into deep, dark Holds, Which the mild sunbeam hath not power to pierce. Why do ye quake, intimidated Thrones? For, not unconscious of the mighty debt Which to outrageous Wrong the Sufferer owes, Europe, through all her habitable Seats, Darkening the sun.-But less impatient thoughts, A humble Champion of the better Cause ; A Peasant-youth, so call him, for he asked peace No higher name; in whom our Country shewed, In spite of vice, and misery, and disease, Spread with the spreading of her wealthy arts, -No more of this, lest I offend his dust: One summer's day, a day of annual pomp And solemn chace; from morn to sultry noon His steps had followed, fleetest of the fleet, With cry of hound and horn: and, from that toil This generous Youth, too negligent of self, (A natural failing which maturer years Would have subdued) took fearlessly-and kept- Among a busy company convened To wash his Father's flock. Convulsions dire Seized him, that self-same night; and through the space Of twelve ensuing days his frame was wrenched, Till nature rested from her work in death. -To him, thus snatched away, his Comrades paid A Soldier's honours. At his funeral hour Bright was the sun, the sky a cloudless blue, A golden lustre slept upon the hills; And if by chance a Stranger, wandering there, Was pallid, seldom hath that eye been moist With tears-that wept not then; nor were the few Who from their Dwellings came not forth to join Of instantaneous thunder, which announced The Pastor ceased.-My venerable Friend Victoriously upraised his clear bright eye; And, when that eulogy was ended, stood Enwrapt, as if his inward sense perceived The prolongation of some still response, Sent by the ancient soul of this wide Land, The spirit of its mountains and its seas, Its cities, temples, fields, its awful power, Its rights and virtues-by that Deity Descending; and supporting his pure heart With patriotic confidence and joy. And, at the last of those memorial words, The pining Solitary turned aside, Whether through manly instinct to conceal Tender emotions spreading from the heart |