To the close rock the frightened raven flies,
Soon as the rising eagle cuts the air;
The shaggy wolf unseen and trembling lies,
When the hoarse roar proclaims the lion near.
Ill-starred did we our forts and lines forsake,
To dare our British foes to open fight;
Our conquest we by stratagem should make;
Our triumph had been founded in our flight.
'Tis ours, by craft and by surprise to gain;
'Tis theirs, to meet in arms, and battle in the plain.
The ancient father of this hostile brood,
Their boasted Brute, undaunted snatched his gods
From burning Troy, and Xanthus red with blood,
And fixed on silver Thames his dire abodes:
And this be Troynovante, he said, the seat
By Heaven ordained, my sons, your lasting place:
Superior here to all the bolts of fate
Live, mindful of the author of your race,
Whom neither Greece, nor war, nor want, nor flame, Nor great Pelides' arm, nor Juno's rage could tame.
Their Tudors hence, and Stuart's offspring flow:
Hence Edward, dreadful with his sable shield,
Talbot, to Gallia's power eternal foe,
And Seymour, famed in council or in field:
Hence Nevil, great to settle or dethrone,
And Drake and Cavendish, terrors of the sea;
Hence Butler's sons, o'er land and ocean known,
Herbert's and Churchill's warring progeny:
Hence the long roll which Gallia should conceal:
For, oh! who, vanquished, loves the victor's fame to
Envied Britannia, sturdy as the oak,
Which on her mountain-top she proudly bears,
Eludes the axe, and sprouts against the stroke;
Strong from her wounds, and greater by her wars.
And as those teeth, which Cadmus sowed in earth,
Produced new youth, and furnished fresh supplies:
So with young vigour, and succeeding birth,
Her losses more than recompensed arise;
And every age she with a race is crowned,
For letters more polite, in battles more renowned.
Obstinate power, whom nothing can repel;
Not the fierce Saxon, nor the cruel Dane,
Nor deep impression of the Norman steel,
Nor Europe's force amassed by envious Spain,
Nor France on universal sway intent,
Oft breaking leagues, and oft renewing wars;
Nor (frequent bane of weakened government)
Their own intestine feuds and mutual jars:
Those feuds and jars, in which I trusted more,
Than in my troops, and fleets, and all the Gallic
To fruitful Rheims, or fair Lutetia's gate,
What tidings shall the messenger convey;
Shall the loud herald our success relate,
Or mitred priest appoint the solemn day!
Alas! my praises they no more must sing;
They to my statue now must bow no more:
Broken, repulsed is their immortal king:
Fall'n, fall'n for ever, is the Gallic power.
The woman chief is master of the war;
Earth, she has freed by arms, and vanquished
Heaven by prayer.
While thus the ruined foe's despair commends
Thy council and thy deed, victorious queen,
What shall thy subjects say, and what thy friends;
How shall thy triumphs in our joy be seen!
Oh! deign to let the eldest of the nine
Recite Britannia great, and Gallia free:
Oh! with her sister sculpture let her join
To raise, great Anne, the monument to thee;
To thee, of all our good the sacred spring;
To thee, our dearest dread; to thee, our softer king.
Let Europe saved the column high erect,
Than Trajan's higher, or than Antonine's;
Where sembling art may carve the fair effect
And full achievement of thy great designs.
In a calm Heaven, and a serener air,
Sublime the queen shall on the summit stand,
From danger far, as far removed from fear,
And pointing down to earth her dread command.
All winds, all storms, that threaten human woe,
Shall sink beneath her feet, and spread their rage
below.
Their fleets shall strive, by winds and waters
tossed,
Till the young Austrian on Iberia's strand,
Great as Eneas on the Latian coast,
Shall fix his foot. And this, be this the land,
Great Jove, where I for ever will remain
(The empire's other hope shall say), and here
Vanquished, intombed I'll lie, or, crowned, I'll reign!
O virtue, to thy British mother dear!
Like the famed Trojan suffer and abide;
For Anne is thine, I ween, as Venus was his guide.
There, in eternal characters engraved,
Vigo,' and Gibraltar, and Barcelone,
Their force destroyed, their privileges saved,
Shall Anna's terrors and her mercies own.
Spain, from the usurper Bourbon's arms retrieved,
Shall with new life and grateful joy appear,
Numbering the wonders which that youth achieved,
Whom Anna clad in arms and sent to war;
Whom Anna sent to claim Iberia's throne;
And made him more than king, in calling him her
There Ister, pleased by Blenheim's glorious field,
Rolling shall bid his eastern waves declare
Germania saved by Britain's ample shield,
And bleeding Gaul, afflicted by her spear,
Shall bid them mention Marlborough on that shore,
Leading his islanders, renowned in arms,
Through climes, where never British chief before
Or pitched his camp, or sounded his alarms;
Shall bid them bless the queen, who made his
Glorious as those of Boyne, and safe as those of
Thames.
Brabantia, clad with fields, and crowned with towers,
With decent joy shall her deliverer meet;
Shall own thy arms, great queen, and bless thy powers,
Laying the keys beneath thy subject's feet.
1 Vigo was surprised by the Duke of Ormond and Sir George Rooke, and the galleons taken and destroyed in the year 1702; Gibraltar by Sir George Rooke in 1704; and Barcelona by the Prince of Hesse and the Earl of Peterborough in 1705.
Flandria, by plenty made the home of war,
Shall weep her crime, and bow to Charles restored;
With double vows shall bless thy happy care,
In having drawn, and having sheathed the sword;
From these their sister provinces shall know,
How Anne supports a friend, and how forgives a foe!
33 Bright swords, and crested helms, and pointed spears,
In artful piles around the work shall lie;
And shields indented deep in ancient wars,
Blazoned with signs of Gallic heraldry;
And standards with distinguished honours bright,
Marks of high power and national command,
Which Valois' sons, and Bourbon's bore in fight,
Or gave to Foix' or Montmorency's hand:
Great spoils, which Gallia must to Britain yield,
From Cressy's battle saved, to grace Ramilia's field.
And, as fine Art the spaces may dispose,
The knowing thought and curious eye shall see
Thy emblem, gracious queen, the British rose,
Type of sweet rule and gentle majesty;
The northern thistle, whom no hostile hand
Unhurt too rudely may provoke, I ween;
Hibernia's harp, device of her command,
And parent of her mirth, shall there be seen:
Thy vanquished lilies, France, decayed and torn,
Shall with disordered pomp the lasting work adorn.
Beneath, great queen, oh! very far beneath,
Near to the ground, and on the humble base,
To save herself from darkness and from death,
That Muse desires the last, the lowest place;
|