_Extracted from an unpublished Poem, called_ “BOADICEA.”
_By Miss M. Tylden._
Amid those aged sons of song
One seem’d to tower the rest among:
For though the heavy hand of Time
Had somewhat marr’d his youthful prime;
Though the sunny glow had faded
On the locks his brow that shaded;
Stern Time, not ev’n thy icy sway
Might quench the heaven-enkindled lay
Which waken’d to achievements high
Those heroes of antiquity.
Howe’er it were, from that bright band
Sadly apart he seem’d to stand,
And lowly on his harp he leant
With eye of gloom and eyebrow bent;
But still, despite his sterner mood,
By all with reverence he was view’d,
Such charm of dignity hath age
When on the brow experience sage
Hath stamp’d the worth of years that sleep,
And when the mind hath known to reap
Harvests of scientific lore,
And well secured the precious store;—
When all the stormy dreams of youth
Fade in the beacon-light of truth;
When fiery feelings are repress’d,
The spirit calm’d, the heart at rest!
Then in the form of age we find
Somewhat surpassing earthly kind.
Now forth his harp that minstrel drew,
And o’er the chords his fingers threw,
The while beneath their lighter sway
Murmur’d the scarcely-bidden lay,
In soft half-warbled cadence stealing
O’er the melting soul of feeling:—
But when he caught the transport high
Which mark’d the kindling melody,
His upturn’d eye and heaving breast
The mighty frenzy quick confess’d;
The sympathetic strings beneath
A wild inspiring chorus breathe,
And, borne the lofty halls along,
Floats high the patriot minstrel’s song:—
The mildew of time steeps the laurel-bound wreath,
And the war-sword ingloriously rusts in its sheath,
Which burst on the foe as the bolt from on high,
And sprinkled the blood of revenge to the sky.
The arm is unbraced and the nerves are unstrung
Of him who in combat that dark weapon swung;
For the souls of the heroes of loftier days,
Kindled high in their glory, have sunk in the blaze:
And the laurels of Britain, droop’d, wither’d and shrunk,
And her standard of freedom all hopelessly sunk,
And the sons of the isles, scatter’d thin on the hill,
Stood forsaken and drooping, but dauntlessly still.
Ye sons of the brave! is the bold spirit fled
Which to combat and conquest your forefathers led?
Oh no! it but sleeps in the souls it should warm,
The more fiercely to burn in the day of the storm.
But too long it hath slept: for the hearts of the brave
Are a country’s best bulwarks to guard and to save:
Oh then be the lion aroused in each breast,
Triumphant to conquer, or nobly to rest.
Be it yours to divulge the dark volume of fate;
Be it yours to revenge, ere revenge be too late:
Oh let not the spirit of freedom repose
Till it visit the wrongs of our land on its foes.
’Tis your country that calls; shall that cry be in vain?
All bleeding she lies in the conqueror’s chain:
Chiefs! one struggle more, and her freedom is won:
Let us triumph or die, as our fathers have done.
Like the lightning of heaven be your arms on the heath,
Loud, loud ring your shields with the thunder of death:
As the waves of your ocean rush down to the strife,
And each stroke be for Britain,—for freedom and life!
The bard has ceased: the lofty lay
In long vibrations dies away,
And melts upon the air around
Till silence blends away the sound.
The bard upon each warrior gazed,
To mark what thoughts his strain had raised.
The eye that late flash’d high with mirth
In alter’d cheer now sought the earth;
The cheek that bright with joy had blush’d,
Far other feeling now had flush’d.
It might have seem’d throughout the hall
(So motionless, so mute were all)
As though the spirit of the storm
Had swept along each stately form.
A moment—and what change was wrought
In every look and every thought!
Roused by the breath of life, they seem
To start at once from their death-like dream;
A sudden impulse, wild and strong,
Agitates the moving throng,
And like the billows of the deep,
When darkening tempests o’er it sweep,
In every freeborn heart, that strain
Concordant echoes roused again!
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