But shooting high and rolling far,
What new and horrid face of war
Now flushes on the sight?
’Tis France, as furious she retires,
That wreaks, in desolating fires,
The vengeance of her flight.
Already parch’d by summer’s sun,
The grassy vale the flames o’er-run;
And, sweeping wreath’d and light
Before the wind, the thickets seize,
And climb the dry and withered trees,
In flashes long and bright.
Oh! ’twas a scene sublime and dire,
To see that billowy sea of fire,
Rolling its flaky tide
O’er cultured field and tangled wood,
And drowning in the flaming flood
The seasons’ hope and pride!