Thine to conduct, through ways how difficult,
A mighty people in their march sublime

From Good to Better. Great thy recompense,
When in their eyes thou read'st what thou hast done;
And may'st thou long enjoy it; may'st thou long
Preserve for them what they still claim as theirs,
That generous fervor and pure eloquence,
Thine from thy birth and Nature's noblest gifts,
To guard what they have gained!

WRITTEN IN 1834.

WELL, when her day is over, be it said
That, though a speck on the terrestrial globe,
Found with long search and in a moment lost,
She made herself a name a name to live
While science, eloquence, and song divine,
And wisdom, in self-government displayed,
And valor, such as only in the Free,

Shall among men be honored.

Every sea

Was covered with her sails; in every port

Her language spoken; and, where'er you went,
Exploring, to the east or to the west,

Even to the rising or the setting day,
Her arts and laws and institutes were there,
Moving with silent and majestic march,
Onward and onward, where no pathway was;
There her adventurous sons, like those of old,
Founding vast empires"- empires in their turn

Destined to shine through many a distant age

With sun-like splendor.

Wondrous was her wealth,

The world itself her willing tributary;

Yet, to accomplish what her soul desired,
All was as nothing; and the mightiest kings,
Each in his hour of strife exhausted, fallen,
Drew strength from her, their coffers from her own
Filled to o'erflowing. When her fleets of war
Had swept the main,- had swept it and were gone,
Gone from the eyes and from the minds of men,
Their dreadful errand so entirely done,-

Up rose her armies; on the land they stood,
Fearless, erect; and in an instant smote

Him with his legions.2

Yet ere long 't was hers,

Great as her triumphs, to eclipse them all,

To do what none had done, none had conceived,
An act how glorious, making joy in Heaven;
When, such her prodigality, condemned
To toil and toil, alas! how hopelessly,
Herself in bonds, for ages unredeemed ---
As with a godlike energy she sprung,
All else forgot, and, burdened as she was,
Ransomed the African.43

NOTES.

(1) Written in 1785.

(2) The sacrifice of Iphigenia.

(8) Lucretius, I. 63.

(4) The funeral rite of the Hindoos.

(5) The Fates of the northern mythology. See Mallet's Antiquities.

(6) An allusion to the second sight.

En. II. 172, &c.

(8) The bull, Apis.

(9) The crocodile.

(10) According to an ancient proverb, it was less difficult in Egypt to find a god than a

man.

(11) The Hieroglyphics.

(12) The Catacombs.

(18) "The Persians," says Herodotus, "have no temples, altars or statues. They sacrifice on the tops of the highest mountains." — I. 131.

(14) Æn. VI. 46, &c.

(15) See Tacitus, I. xiv. c. 29.

(16) This remarkable event happened at the siege and sack of Jerusalem, in the last year of the eleventh century. - Matth. Paris, IV. 2.

(17) The law of gravitation.

(18) On the death of a young sister.

(19) After a tragedy, performed for her benefit at the Theatre Royal, in Drury Lane, April 27, 1795.

(20) Radice in Tartara tendit. - Virg.

(21) Alluding to some verses which she had written on an elder sister.

(22) In the winter of 1805.

(23) Mrs. Sheridan's.

(24) Inscribed on an urn in the flower-garden at Hafod.

(25) In the gardens of the Vatican, where it was placed by Julius II., it was long the favorite study of those great men to whom we owe the revival of the arts, Michael Angelo, Raphael and the Caracci.

(26) Once in the possession of Praxiteles, if we may believe an ancient epigram on the Guidian Venus. - Analecta Vet. Poetarum, III. 200.

(27) On the death of her sister, in 1805.

(28) In the twelfth century William Fitz-Duncan laid waste the valleys of Craven with fire and sword; and was afterwards established there by his uncle, David, King of Scotland.

He was the last of the race; his son, commonly called the Boy of Egremond, dying before him in the manner here related; when a Priory was removed from Embsay to Bolton, that it might be as near as possible to the place where the accident happened. That place is still known by the name of the Strid; and the mother's answer, as given in the first stanza, is to this day often repeated in Wharfedale.-See Whitaker's Hist. of Craven.

(29) Signifying in the Gaelic language an isthmus.

(30) Loch-Long.

(31) A phenomenon described by many navigators.

(32) There is a beautiful story, delivered down to us from antiquity, which will here, perhaps, occur to the reader.

Icarius, when he gave Penelope in marriage to Ulysses, endeavored to persuade him to dwell in Lacedæmon, and, when all he urged was to no purpose, he entreated his daughter to remain with him. When Ulysses set out with his bride for Ithaca, the old man followed the chariot till, overcome by his importunity, Ulysses consented that it should be left to Penelope to decide whether she would proceed with him or return with her father. It is related, says Pausanias, that she made no reply, but that she covered herself with her veil; and that Icarius, perceiving at once by it that she inclined to Ulysses, suffered her to depart with him.

A statue was afterwards placed by her father as a memorial in that part of the road where she had covered herself with her veil. It was still standing there in the days of Pausanias, and was called the statue of Modesty.

(33) A Turkish superstition.

(34) At Woburn Abbey.

(35) He is said to have slain a million of men in Gaul alone.

(36) After the funeral of the Right Hon. CHARLES JAMES FOX.

(37) Venez voir le peu qui nous reste de tant de grandeur, &c.—Bossuet. Oraison funèbre de Louis de Bourbon.

(38) Et rien enfin ne manque dans tous ces honneurs, que celui à qui on les rend.— Bossuet. Oraison funèbre de Louis de Bourbon.

(39) How strange, said he to me, are the impressions that sometimes follow a battle! After the battle of Assaye I slept in a farm-house, and so great had been the slaughter that whenever I awoke, which I did continually through the night, it struck me that I had lost all my friends, nor could I bring myself to think otherwise till morning came, and one by one I saw those that were living.

(40) On Friday, the 19th of November, 1830, there was an assembly at Bridgewater House, a house which has long ceased to be, and of which no stone is now resting on another. It was there that I saw a lady whose beauty was the least of her attractions, and she said, "I never see you now."-"When may I come?"-"Come on Sunday at five."-" At five, then, you shall see me."-"Remember five."— And through the evening, wherever I went, a voice followed me, repeating, in a tone of mock solemnity, "Remember five!" It was the voice of one who had overheard us; and little did he think what was to take place at five.

On Sunday, when the time drew near, it struck me as I was leaving Lord Holland's, in Burlington-street, that I had some engagement, so little had I thought of it, and I repaired to the house, No. 4, in Carlton Gardens. There were the Duke of Wellington's horses at the door, and I said, "The duke is here."—"But you are expected, sir."—I went in and found him sitting with the lady of the house, the lady who had made the appointment, nor was it long before he spoke as follows:

"They want me to place myself at the head of a faction, but I tell them that I never will.

"To-morrow I shall give up my office and go down into my county, to restore order there, if I can restore it. When I return, I shall take my place in Parliament, to approve when I can approve; and when I cannot, to say so. I have now served my country forty years, twenty in the field and ten- if not more- in the cabinet; nor, while I live, shall I be found wanting, wherever I may be. But never-no, never will I place myself at the head of a faction."

Having met Lord Grey, who was to succeed him in his office, again and again under my roof, and knowing our intimacy, he meant that these words should be repeated to him; and so they were, word for word, on that very night.

(41) North America speaks for itself; and so indeed may we say of India, when such a territory is ours in a region so remote; when a company of merchants, from such small beginnings, have established a dominion so absolute, - a dominion over a people for ages civilized and cultivated, while we were yet in the woods.

(42) Alluding to the battle of Waterloo. The illustrious man who commanded there on our side, and who, in his anxiety to do justice to others, never fails to forget himself, said to me many years afterwards, with some agitation, when relating an occurrence of that day, "It was a battle of giants! a battle of giants!"

(43) Parliament had only to register the edict of the people. — Channing.

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