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Part III.
PETER BELL.
63
Roll'd audibly!—it swept along—
A muffled noise—a rumbling sound!
'Twas by a troop of miners made,
Plying with gunpowder their trade,
Some twenty fathoms under ground.
Small cause of dire effect!—for, surely,
If ever mortal, King or Cotter,
Believed that earth was charg'd to quake
And yawn for his unworthy sake,
'Twas Peter Bell the Potter!
But, as an oak in breathless air
Will stand though to the centre hewn,
Or as the weakest things, if frost
Have stiffen'd them, maintain their post,
So he, beneath the gazing moon!—
