The Emperor is dead. On a waste island in the Atlantic ocean is his
lonely grave, and he for whom the world was too narrow lies quietly
under a little hillock, where five weeping willows hang their green
heads, and a little brook, murmuring sorrowfully, ripples by. There is
no inscription on his tomb; but Clio, with a just pen, has written
thereon, invisible words, which will resound, like spirit-tones, through
thousands of years.
Britannia! the sea is thine. But the sea has not water enough to wash
away the shame with which the death of that Mighty One has covered thee.
Not thy windy Sir Hudson--no, thou thyself wert the Sicilian bravo with
whom perjured kings bargained, that they might revenge on the man of the
people that which the people had once inflicted on one of
themselves.--And he was thy guest, and had seated himself by thy hearth.
Until far ages the boys of France will sing and tell of the terrible
hospitality of the _Bellerophon_, and when those songs of mockery and
tears resound across the Channel, the cheeks of every honourable Briton
will blush. Some day, however, this song will ring thither, and
Britannia will be no more; the people of pride will be humbled to the
earth, Westminster's monuments will be broken, and the royal dust which
they enclosed forgotten.--And St. Helena is the Holy Grave, whither the
races of the East and of the West will make their pilgrimage in ships
with flags of many a colour, and their hearts will grow strong with
great memories of the deeds of the worldly Saviour, who suffered and
died under Hudson Lowe, as it is written in the evangelists, Las Cases,
O'Meara, and Autommarchi.
Strange! A terrible destiny has already overtaken the three greatest
enemies of the Emperor. Londonderry has cut his throat, Louis XVIII. has
rotted away on his throne, and Professor Saalfeld is still Professor in
Göttingen.