Oh, thou eternal Homer! who couldst charm All cars, though long; all ages, though so short, By merely wielding with poetic arm Arms to which men will never more resort, Unless gunpowder should be found to harm Much less than is the hope of every court, Which now is leagued young Freedom to annoy;
But they will not find Liberty a Troy:-Oh, thou eternal Homer! I have now To paint a siege, wherein more men were slain, With deadlier engines and a speedier blow, Than in thy Greek gazette of that campaign;
And yet, like all men else, I must allow, To vie with thee would be about as vain As for a brook to cope with ocean's flood;
But still we moderns equal you in blood;
If not in poetry, at least in fact;
And fact is truth, the grand desideratum!
Of which, howe'er the Muse describes each act, There should be ne'ertheless a slight substratum.
But now the town is going to be attack'd;
Great deeds are doing- how shall I relate 'em?
Souls of immortal generals! Phoebus watches To colour up his rays from your despatches.
Oh, ye great bulletins of Bonaparte!
Oh, ye less grand long lists of kill'd and wounded!
Shade of Leonidas, who fought so hearty, When my poor Greece was once, as now, surrounded!
Oh, Caesar's Commentaries! now impart, ye Shadows of glory! (lest I be confounded)
A portion of your fading twilight hues, So beautiful, so fleeting, to the Muse.
When I call 'fading' martial immortality, I mean, that every age and every year, And almost every day, in sad reality, Some sucking hero is compell'd to rear, Who, when we come to sum up the totality Of deeds to human happiness most dear, Turns out to be a butcher in great business, Afflicting young folks with a sort of dizziness.
Medals, rank, ribands, lace, embroidery, scarlet, Are things immortal to immortal man, As purple to the Babylonian harlot:
An uniform to boys is like a fan To women; there is scarce a crimson varlet But deems himself the first in Glory's van.
But Glory's glory; and if you would find What that is- ask the pig who sees the wind!
At least he feels it, and some say he sees, Because he runs before it like a pig;
Or, if that simple sentence should displease, Say, that he scuds before it like a brig, A schooner, or- but it is time to ease This Canto, ere my Muse perceives fatigue.
The next shall ring a peal to shake all people, Like a bob-major from a village steeple.
Hark! through the silence of the cold, dull night, The hum of armies gathering rank on rank!
Lo! dusky masses steal in dubious sight Along the leaguer'd wall and bristling bank Of the arm'd river, while with straggling light The stars peep through the vapours dim and dank, Which curl in curious wreaths:- how soon the smoke Of Hell shall pall them in a deeper cloak!
Here pause we for the present- as even then That awful pause, dividing life from death, Struck for an instant on the hearts of men, Thousands of whom were drawing their last breath!
A moment- and all will be life again!
The march! the charge! the shouts of either faith!
Hurra! and Allah! and- one moment more, The death-cry drowning in the battle's roar.
