Ye towers of Julius," London's lasting shame,

With many a foul and midnight murder fed,
Revere his Consort's faith, his Father's fame,P

And spare the meek Usurper's holy head!
Above, below, the rose of snow,
Twined with her blushing foe, we spread;
The bristled boar," in infant gore

Wallows beneath the thorny shade.

q

Now, Brothers, bending o'er the accursed loom, Stamp we our vengeance deep, and ratify his doom!

"Edward, lo! to sudden fate (Weave we the woof. The thread is spun.) Half of thy hearts we consecrate.

(The web is wove. The work is done).”.

Stay, oh stay! nor thus forlorn

Leave me unblessed, unpitied, here to mourn:
In yon bright track, that fires the western skies,
They melt, they vanish from my eyes.

But oh! what solemn scenes, on Snowdon's height
Descending slow, their glittering skirts unroll?
Visions of glory, spare my aching sight!

Ye unborn ages, crowd not on my soul! No more our long-lost Arthur we bewail. All hail, ye genuine Kings! Britannia's issue, hail!

"Girt with many a baron bold Sublime their starry fronts they rear; And gorgeous Dames and Statesmen old, In bearded majesty appear;

In the midst a Form divine,

Her eye proclaims her of the Briton-line;
Her lion-port, her awe-commanding face,
Attemper'd sweet to virgin grace.'

t

"Henry VI.; George, Duke of Clarence; Edward V.; Richard, Duke of York, believed to have been murdered secretly in the Tower of London, the oldest part of which structure is attributed to Julius Cæsar. Margaret of Anjou. ? Henry VI. 9 The red and white roses, devices of York and Lancaster. Richard III., whose badge was a silver boar. s Eleanor of Castile, wife of Edward I. t Queen Elizabeth.

What strings symphonious tremble in the air,
What strains of vocal transport round her play!
Hear from the grave, great Taliessen, hear;
They breathe a soul to animate thy clay:
Bright Rapture calls, and soaring as she sings,
Waves in the eye of Heaven her many-coloured wings.

"The verse adorn again

Fierce War, and faithful Love

And Truth severe, by fairy Fiction drest,

In buskin'd measures move.

Pale Grief and pleasing Pain,

With Horror," Tyrant of the throbbing breast,

A voice, as of the Cherub-Choir,

X

Gales from blooming Eden bear; *

And distant warblings lessen on my ear,

That lost in long futurity expire. >

"Fond, impious Man, think'st thou yon sanguine cloud, Raised by thy breath, has quenched the orb of day? To-morrow He repairs the golden flood,

And warms the nations with redoubled ray. Enough for me: with joy I see

The different doom our fates assign.
Be thine Despair, and sceptred Care;
To triumph and to die, are mine.'

He spoke, and headlong from the mountain's height
Deep in the roaring tide he plunged to endless night.

น

Thomas Gray.

III.-DE BOUNE AND ROBERT BRUCE.

OH! gay, yet fearful to behold,

Flashing with steel and rough with gold,
And bristled o'er with bills and spears,
With plumes and pennons waving fair,
Was that bright battle-front! for there
Rode England's king and peers;
And who that saw that monarch ride,
His kingdom battled by his side,

Shakespeare. * Milton.

The succession of poets after Milton.

Could then his direful doom foretell?
Fair was his seat in knightly selle,
And in his sprightly eye was set
Some spark of the Plantagenet.

Though light and wandering was his glance,
It flashed at sight of shield and lance.
"Knowest thou," he said, "De Argentine,
Yon knight who marshals Scotland's line ?"
"The tokens of his helmet tell

The Bruce, my liege :. I know him well."
"And shall the audacious traitor brave
The presence where our banners wave ?"
"So please, my liege," said Argentine,
"Were he but horsed on steed like mine,
To give him fair and knightly chance,
I would adventure forth my lance."
"In battle-day," the king replied,
"Nice tourney rules are set aside.
-Still must the rebel dare our wrath?
Set on him-sweep him from our path!"
And, at King Edward's signal, soon
Dashed from the ranks Sir Henry Boune.
Of Hereford's high blood he came,
A race renowned for knightly fame:
He burned before his monarch's eye
To do some deed of chivalry.

He spurred his seed, he couched his lance,
And darted on the Bruce at once.

As motionless as rocks, that bide
The wrath of the advancing tide,

The Bruce stood fast. Each breast beat high,
And dazzled was each gazing eye;
The heart had hardly time to think,
The eye-lid scarce had time to wink,
While on the king, like flash of flame,
Spurred to full speed, the war-horse came !-
The partridge may the falcon mock,
If that slight palfrey stand the shock.-
But, swerving from the knight's career,
Just as they met, Bruce shunned the spear.

Onward the baffled warrior bore

His course-but soon his course was o'er!
High in his stirrups stood the king,
And gave his battle-axe the swing:
Right on De Boune, the whiles he passed,
Fell that stern dint-the first-the last!-
Such strength upon the blow was put,
The helmet crashed like hazel-nut;
The axe-shaft, with its brazen clasp,
Was shivered to the gauntlet-grasp;
Springs from the blow the startled horse,
Drops to the plain the lifeless corse;
First of that fatal field, how soon,
How sudden, fell the fierce De Boune!-

Sir Walter Scott.

IV.-DEATH OF KING JOHN.

Enter Prince HENRY, SALISBURY, and BIGOT.

P. Hen. It is too late; the life of all his blood
Is touch'd corruptibly; and his pure brain
(Which some suppose the soul's frail dwelling-house,)
Doth by the idle comments, that it makes,

Fortell the ending of mortality.

Enter PEMBROKE.

Pem. His highness yet doth speak; and holds belief, That, being brought into the open air,

It would allay the burning quality

Of that fell poison which assaileth him.

P. Hen. Let him be brought into the orchard here.Doth he still rage?

He is more patient

[Exit Bigot.

Pem.
Than when you left him; even now he sung.
P. Hen. O vanity of sickness! fierce extremes,
In their continuance, will not feel themselves.
Death, having prey'd upon the outward parts,

Leaves them insensible; and his siege is now
Against the mind, the which he pricks and wounds
With many legions of strange fantasies;

Which, in their throng and press to that last hold, Confound themselves. 'Tis strange, that death should sing.

I am the cygnet to this pale, faint swan,

Who chants a doleful hymn to his own death;
And, from the organ-pipe of frailty, sings

His soul and body to their lasting rest.

Sal. Be of good comfort, prince; for you are born To set a form upon that indigest,

Which he hath left so shapeless and so rude.

Re-enter BIGOT and Attendants, who bring in King JOHN in a chair.

K. John. Ay, marry, now my soul hath elbow-room; It would not out at windows, nor at doors. There is so hot a summer in my bosom, That all my bowels crumble up to dust: I am a scribbled form, drawn with a pen Upon a parchment; and against this fire Do I shrink up.

P. Hen.

How fares your majesty ?

K. John. Poison'd. Ill-fare!-dead, forsook, cast off: And none of you will bid the winter come,

To thrust his icy fingers in my maw;

Nor let my kingdom's rivers take their course
Through my burn'd bosom; nor entreat the north
To make his bleak winds kiss my parched lips,

And comfort me with cold:-I do not ask you much,
I beg cold comfort; and you are so strait,
And so ungrateful, you deny me that.

P. Hen. O, that there were some virtue in my tears, That might relieve you!

K. John.
The salt in them is hot.-
Within me is a hell; and there the poison
Is, as a fiend, confin'd to tyrannize
On unreprievable condemned blood.