And move, Amphion-like, those hearts of stoneThe hearts that have been deaf to Poland's dying groan!

Tell them, we hold the Rights of Man too dear, To bless ourselves with lonely freedom blest; But could we hope, with sole and selfish breast, To breathe untroubled Freedom's atmosphere ?— Suppose we wish'd it? England could not stand A lone oasis in the desert ground

Of Europe's slavery; from the waste around

Oppression's fiery blast and whirling sand Would reach and scathe us? No; it may not be: Britannia and the world conjointly must be free!

Burdett, demand why Britons send abroad

Soft greetings to th' infanticidal Czar, The Bear on Poland's babes that wages war. Once, we are told, a mother's shriek o'erawed A lion, and he dropt her lifted child; But Nicholas, whom neither God nor law, Nor Poland's shrieking mothers, overawe, Outholds to us his friendship's gory clutch: Shrink, Britain-shrink, my king and country, from the touch!

He prays to Heaven for England's king, he says— And dares he to the God of mercy kneel, Besmear'd with massacres from head to heel? No; Moloch is his God-to him he prays

And if his weird-like prayers had power to bring

An influence, their power would be to curse. His hate is baleful, but his love is worseA serpent's slaver deadlier than its sting! Oh, feeble statesmen-ignominious times, That lick the tyrant's feet, and smile upon his crimes!

1832.

ODE TO THE GERMANS.

THE spirit of Britannia

Invokes, across the main,

Her sister Allemannia

To burst the Tyrant's chain :
By our kindred blood, she cries,
Rise, Allemannians, rise,

And hallow'd thrice the band
Of our kindred hearts shall be,
When
your land shall be the land
Of the free-of the free!

With Freedom's lion-banner

Britannia rules the waves;

Whilst your BROAD STONE OF HONOUR

1

1 Ehrenbreitstein signifies, in German, "the broad stone of honour."

Is still the camp of slaves.
For shame, for glory's sake,

Wake, Allemannians, wake,
And thy tyrants now that whelm
Half the world shall quail and flee,
When your realm shall be the realm
Of the free-of the free!

MARS owes to you his thunder1
That shakes the battle field,
Yet to break your bonds asunder
No martial bolt has peal'd.
Shall the laurell'd land of art
Wear shackles on her heart?

No! the clock ye framed to tell,
By its sound, the march of time;
Let it clang oppression's knell

The press's magic letters,

That blessing ye brought forth,

Behold! it lies in fetters

On the soil that gave it birth: But the trumpet must be heard, And the charger must be spurr'd; For your father Armin's Sprite Calls down from heaven, that ye Shall gird you for the fight,

And be free!-and be free!

clime!

1881.

1 Germany invented gunpowder, clock-making, and printing.

LINES

ON A PICTURE OF A GIRL IN THE ATTITUDE OF

PRAYER.

By the Artist Gruse, in the possession of Lady Stepney.

WAS man e'er doom'd that beauty made
By mimic heart should haunt him;

Like Orpheus, I adore a shade,

And dote upon a phantom.

Thou maid that in my inmost thought

Art fancifully sainted,

Why liv'st thou not-why art thou nought
But canvas sweetly painted?

Whose looks seem lifted to the skies,
Too pure for love of mortals-

As if they drew angelic eyes

To greet thee at heaven's portals.

Yet loveliness has here no grace,

Abstracted or ideal

Art ne'er but from a living face

Drew looks so seeming real.

What wert thou, maid?-thy life-thy name.

Oblivion hides in mystery;

Though from thy face my heart could frame A long romantic history.

Transported to thy time I seem,

Though dust thy coffin coversAnd hear the songs, in fancy's dream, Of thy devoted lovers.

How witching must have been thy breath-
How sweet the living charmer-
Whose every semblance after death
Can make the heart grow warmer!

Adieu, the charms that vainly move
My soul in their possession-
That prompt my lips to speak of love,
Yet rob them of expression.

Yet thee, dear picture, to have praised
Was but a poet's duty;

And shame to him that ever gazed

Impassive on thy beauty.

1830.