All Snowdon's craggy chaos yells The many mingled cries.
That day Lewellyn little loved The chase of hart or hare,
And scant and small the booty proved For Gelert was not there.
Unpleased Lewellyn homeward hied; When, near the portal seat, His truant Gelert he espied, Bounding his lord to greet.
But when he gained his castle door, Aghast the chieftain stood;
The hound all o'er was smeared with gore,
His lips, his fangs ran blood.
Lewellyn gazed with fierce surprise, Unused such looks to meet;
His favorite checked his joyful guise, And crouched and licked his feet.
Onward in haste Lewellyn past, And on went Gelert too,
And still where'er his eyes he cast, Fresh blood-drops shocked his view.
O'erturned his infant's bed he found, With blood-stained covert rent; And all around the walls and ground, With recent blood besprent.
He called his child- no voice replied; He searched with terror wild:
Blood, blood he found on every side, But nowhere found his child.
"Hellhound! my child's by thee devoured, The frantic father cried,
And to the hilt his vengeful sword
He plunged in Gelert's side.
His suppliant looks, as prone he fell,
No pity could impart,
But still his Gelert's dying yell
Passed heavy o'er his heart.
Aroused by Gelert's dying yell, Some slumberer wakened nigh,
What words the parent's joy could tell, To hear his infant cry.
Concealed beneath a tumbled heap, His hurried search had missed; All glowing from his rosy sleep, The cherub boy he kissed.
No wound had he, nor harm, nor dread;
But the same couch beneath,
Lay a gaunt wolf, all torn and dead,
Tremendous still in death.
Ah, what was then Lewellyn's pain? For now the truth was clear; His gallant hound the wolf had slain, To save Lewellyn's heir.
Vain, vain was all Lewellyn's woe: "Best of thy kind, adieu!
The frantic blow that laid thee low, This heart shall ever rue."
And now a gallant tomb they raise, With costly sculpture decked; And marble, storied with his praise, Poor Gelert's bones protect.
There, never could the spearman pass, Or forester, unmoved;
There, oft the tear-besprinkled grass Lewellyn's sorrow proved.
And there he hung his horn and spear,
And there, as evening fell,
In fancy's car he oft would hear
Poor Gelert's dying yell.
And 'till great Snowdon's rocks grow old, And cease the storm to brave,
The consecrated spot shall hold The name of "Gelert's Grave."
AND thou hast walked about (how strange a story!) In Thebes' streets three thousand years ago, When the Memnonium was in all its glory, And time had not begun to overthrow Those temples, palaces, and piles stupendous, Of which the very ruins are temendous.
Speak! for thou long enough hast acted dummy, Thou hast a tongue, come let us hear its tune: Thou 'rt standing on thy legs above ground, Mummy! Revisiting the glimpses of the moon;
Not like thin ghosts or disembodied creatures, But with thy bones and flesh, and limbs and features.
for doubtless thou canst recollect,
To whom should we assign the sphynx's fame? Was Cheops or Cephrenes architect
Of either pyramid that bears his name?
Is Pompey's pillar really a misnomer?
Had Thebes a hundred gates, as sung by Homer?
Perhaps thou wert a Mason, and forbidden
By oath to tell the mysteries of thy trade, Then say what secret melody was hidden
In Memnon's statue, which at sunrise played? Perhaps thou wert a priest-if so, my struggles Are vain ;-Egyptian priests ne'er owned their juggles.
Perchance that very hand, now pinioned flat,
Has hob-a-nobbed with Pharaoh, glass to glass;
Or dropped a half-penny in Homer's hat,
Or doffed thine own to let Queen Dido pass,
Or held, by Solomon's own invitation, A torch at the great temple's dedication.
I need not ask thee if that hand, when armed, Has any Roman soldier mauled and knuckled, For thou wert dead, and buried, and embalmed, Ere Romulus and Remus had been suckled:
Antiquity appears to have begun
Long after thy primeval race was run.
Since first thy form was in this box extended,
We have, above ground, seen some strange mutations; The Roman empire has begun and ended;
New worlds have risen we have lost old nations, And countless kings have into dust been humbled, While not a fragment of thy flesh has crumbled.
Didst thou not hear the pother o'er thy head When the great Persian conqueror, Cambyses, Marched armies o'er thy tomb, with thundering tread, O'erthrew Osiris, Orus, Apis, Isis,
And shook the pyramids with fear and wonder, When the gigantic Memnon fell asunder?
If the tomb's secrets may not be confessed, The nature of thy private life unfold ;-
A heart has throbbed beneath that leathern breast, And tears adown that dusky cheek have rolled :- Have children climbed those knees, and kissed that face? What was thy name and station, age and race?
Statue of flesh-immortal of the dead! Imperishable type of evanescence !
Posthumous man, who quitt'st thy narrow bed, And standest undecayed within our presence, Thou wilt hear nothing till the judgment morning, When the great trump shall thrill thee with its warning
Why should this worthless tegument endure, If its undying guest be lost forever? Oh, let us keep the soul embalmed and pure In living virtue; that when both must sever, Although corruption may our frame consume, Th' immortal spirit in the skies may bloom.
THE AMERICAN FLAG.
WHEN Freedom, from her mountain hight, Unfurled her standard to the air, She tore the azure robe of night, And set the stars of glory there! She mingled with its gorgeous dyes The milky baldric of the skies.
And striped its pure celestial white With streakings of the morning light; Then from his mansion in the sun, She called her eagle-bearer down, And gave into his mighty hand The symbol of her chosen band! Majestic monarch of the cloud!
Who rearest aloft thy regal form, To hear the tempest trumping loud, And see the lightning lances driven,
When stride the warriors of the storm And rolls the thunder-drum of heaven! Child of the sun! to thee 't is given To guard the banner of the free, To hover in the sulphur smoke, To ward away the battle-stroke, And bid its blendings shine afar, Like rainbows on the cloud of war The harbingers of victory.
Flag of the brave! thy folds shall fly, The sign of hope and triumph high! When speaks the signal trumpet tone, And the long line comes gleaming on, (Ere yet the life-blood, warm and wet, Has dimmed the glistening bayonet,) Each soldier's eye shall brightly turn To where thy meteor glories burn, And as his springing steps advance, Catch war and vengeance from the glance! And when the cannon's mouthings loud Heave in wild wreaths the battle shroud, And gory sabers rise and fall,
Like shoots of flame on midnight's pall, There shall thy victor glances glow, And cowering foes shall sink beneath Each gallant arm, that strikes below That lovely messenger of death.
Flag of the seas! on ocean's wave Thy stars shall glitter o'er the brave, When Death, careering on the gale, Sweeps darkly round the bellied sail, And frighted waves rush wildly back, Before the broadside's reeling rack;
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