BOADICEA.
21
Though o'er the strings his hands have ceased to stray,
And left the plaintive notes to die away,
They melt as if some spirit of the air
With notes of triumph loved to linger there.
Well may the Druid mark that vivid glow,
That lightning glance which fires her pallid brow;
As if those sounds that breathed around had cast
On life's warm embers one reviving blast;
As if those floating notes on wings sublime
Had borne her soul across th' abyss of time:
While her fix'd gaze in air appears to spy
Unearthly forms conceal'd from mortal eye,
And her pale lip triumphant smiles at death,
In accents wild she pours her parting breath:
"—Yes, Roman! proudly shake thy crested brow,
'Tis thine to conquer, thine to triumph now;
For thee, lo, Victory lifts her gory hand,
And calls the Fiends of Terror on the land,
And flaps, as tiptoe on thy helm she springs,
Dripping with British blood her eagle wings.
"Yet think not, think not long to thee 'tis giv'n
To laugh at Justice, and to mock at Heav'n;
Soon shall thy head with blood-stain'd laurels crown'd
Stoop at the feet of Vengeance to the ground.
I see amid the gloom of future days
Thy turrets totter, and thy temples blaze;
I see upon thy shrinking Latium hurl'd
The countless millions of the northern world;
I see, like vultures gathering to their prey,
The shades of states that fell beneath thy sway;
They leave their fallen palaces and fanes,
Their grass-grown streets, and ruin-scatter'd plains,
Where lonely long they viewless loved to dwell,
And mourn the scenes that once they loved so well.
Triumphant, lo! on all the winds they come,
And clap th' exulting hand o'er fallen Rome,
And left the plaintive notes to die away,
They melt as if some spirit of the air
With notes of triumph loved to linger there.
Well may the Druid mark that vivid glow,
That lightning glance which fires her pallid brow;
As if those sounds that breathed around had cast
On life's warm embers one reviving blast;
As if those floating notes on wings sublime
Had borne her soul across th' abyss of time:
While her fix'd gaze in air appears to spy
Unearthly forms conceal'd from mortal eye,
And her pale lip triumphant smiles at death,
In accents wild she pours her parting breath:
"—Yes, Roman! proudly shake thy crested brow,
'Tis thine to conquer, thine to triumph now;
For thee, lo, Victory lifts her gory hand,
And calls the Fiends of Terror on the land,
And flaps, as tiptoe on thy helm she springs,
Dripping with British blood her eagle wings.
"Yet think not, think not long to thee 'tis giv'n
To laugh at Justice, and to mock at Heav'n;
Soon shall thy head with blood-stain'd laurels crown'd
Stoop at the feet of Vengeance to the ground.
I see amid the gloom of future days
Thy turrets totter, and thy temples blaze;
I see upon thy shrinking Latium hurl'd
The countless millions of the northern world;
I see, like vultures gathering to their prey,
The shades of states that fell beneath thy sway;
They leave their fallen palaces and fanes,
Their grass-grown streets, and ruin-scatter'd plains,
Where lonely long they viewless loved to dwell,
And mourn the scenes that once they loved so well.
Triumphant, lo! on all the winds they come,
And clap th' exulting hand o'er fallen Rome,
