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And there lay the rider distorted and pale,

With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his mail;
And the tents were all silent, the banners alone,
The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown.

And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail,
And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal;
And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword,
Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!

E

Chillon

TERNAL Spirit of the chainless mind!

Brightest in dungeons, Liberty, thou art;
For there thy habitation is the heart,

The heart which love of thee alone can bind;
And when thy sons to fetters are consigned,

To fetters, and the damp vault's dayless gloom,
Their country conquers with their martyrdom,
And Freedom's fame finds wings on every wind.
Chillon! thy prison is a holy place,

And thy sad floor an altar, for 'twas trod,
Until his very steps have left a trace

Worn as if thy cold pavements were a sod,
By Bonnivard! May none those marks efface,
For they appeal from tyranny to God.

Oh! Snatched Away in Beauty's Bloom

H, snatched away in beauty's bloom!

But on thy turf shall roses rear

Their leaves, the earliest of the year,

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And the wild cypress wave in tender gloom;
And oft by yon blue gushing stream

Shall Sorrow lean her drooping head,

And feed deep thought with many a dream,
And lingering pause and lightly tread;
Fond wretch! as if her step disturbed the dead!

Away! we know that tears are vain,
That Death nor heeds nor hears distress:
Will this unteach us to complain?
Or make one mourner weep the less?
And thou, who tell'st me to forget,
Thy looks are wan, thine eyes are wet.

Stanzas to Augusta

This poem should rank high in the Byronic reliquary. Poe appraises it justly: "Although the rhythm here is one of the most difficult, the versification could scarcely be improved. No nobler theme ever engaged the pen of poet. It is the soul-elevating idea that no man can consider himself entitled to complain of Fate while, in his adversity, he still retains the unwavering love of woman."

HOUGH the day of my destiny's over,

TH

And the star of my fate hath declined,
Thy soft heart refused to discover

The faults which so many could find.
Though thy soul with my grief was acquainted,
It shrunk not to share it with me,
And the love which my spirit hath painted
It never hath found but in thee.

Then when nature around me is smiling,
The last smile which answers to mine,

I do not believe it beguiling,
Because it reminds me of thine;

And when winds are at war with the ocean,
As the breasts I believed in with me,
If their billows excite an emotion,
It is that they bear me from thee.

Though the rock of my last hope is shivered,
And its fragments are sunk in the wave;
Though I feel that my soul is delivered
To pain-it shall not be its slave.

There is many a pang to pursue me:

They may crush, but they shall not contemnThey may torture, but shall not subdue me'Tis of thee that I think-not of them.

Though human, thou didst not deceive me,
Though woman, thou didst not forsake;
Though loved, thou forborest to grieve me;
Though slandered, thou never couldst shake;
Though trusted, thou didst not disclaim me;
Though parted, it was not to fly;

Though watchful, 'twas not to defame me,
Nor mute, that the world might belie.

Yet I blame not the world, nor despise it,
Nor the war of the many with one-
If my soul was not fitted to prize it,
'Twas folly not sooner to shun;
And if dearly that error hath cost me,

And more than I once could forsee,
I have found that, whatever it lost me,
It could not deprive me of thee.

From the wreck of the past which hath perished
Thus much I at least may recall:

It hath taught me that what I most cherished
Deserved to be dearest of all.

In the desert a fountain is springing,
In the wild waste there still is a tree,
And a bird in the solitude singing,
Which speaks to my spirit of thee.

From "English Bards and Scotch Reviewers"

In 1809, Byron published this famous satire, which ran through many editions. In 1816, he had the high-mindedness to disavow his belittlement of such men as Coleridge and Wordsworth, saying he regretted that he was not able to consign "this miserable record of misplaced anger and indiscriminate acrimony to the flames." I give you a taste of the satire.

PREP

REPARE for rhyme-I'll publish, right or wrong:
Fools are my theme, let satire be my song.

A man must serve his time to every trade

Save censure-critics all are ready-made.

Take hackneyed jokes from Miller, got by rote, With just enough of learning to misquote.

With eagle pinion soaring to the skies,
Behold the ballad-monger Southey rise!
To him let Camoëns, Milton, Tasso yield,

Whose annual strains, like armies, take the field.
First in the ranks see Joan of Arc advance,

The scourge of England and the boast of France!
The burnt by wicked Bedford for a witch,
Behold her statue placed in glory's niche:

Her fetters burst, and just released from prison,
A virgin phoenix from her ashes risen.
Next see tremendous Thalaba come on,
Arabia's monstrous, wild and wondrous son;
Domdaniel's dread destroyer, who o'erthrew
More mad magicians than the world e'er knew.
Immortal hero! all thy foes o'ercome,
For ever reign—the rival of Tom Thumb!

There be, who say, in these enlightened days,
That splendid lies are all the poet's praise;
That strained invention, ever on the wing,
Alone impels the modern bard to sing:

'Tis true, that all who rhyme-nay, all who write,
Shrink from that fatal word to genius-trite;
Yet Truth sometimes will lend her noblest fires
And decorate the verse herself inspires:
This fact in Virtue's name let Crabbe attest;
Thou nature's sternest painter, yet the best.

The Coliseum

FROM "CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE"

RCHES on arches! as it were that Rome,

A Collecting the chief trophies of her line,

Would build up all her triumphs in one dome,
Her Coliseum stands; the moonbeams shine
As 'twere its natural torches, for divine
Should be the light which streams here to illume
This long-explored but still exhaustless mine

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