In Rome's great forum, who but hears him roll And hence that calm delight the portrait gives: We gaze on every feature till it lives! Still the fond lover sees the absent maid; What tho' the iron school of War erase The intrepid Swiss, who guards a foreign shore, Condemned to climb his mountain-cliffs no more, If chance he hears the song so sweetly wild Which on those cliffs his infant hours beguiled, Melts at the long-lost scenes that round him rise, And sinks a martyr to repentant sighs. Ask not if courts or camps dissolve the charm: Say why VESPASIAN loved his Sabine farm; Why great NAVARRE, when France and freedom bled, Say, when contentious CHARLES renounced a throne, The social tribes its choicest influence hail:- Leaned on his staff to lengthen out the tale; Gleamed o'er the furze to light him on his way; |