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SONG OF MARION'S MEN.

Have you guarded well the coast?
Have you marshaled all your host?
Standeth each man at his post?

Have you counted up the cost?
What is gained and what is lost,
When the foe your lines have crost?

Gained - the infamy of fame.

Gained

Gained

Lost

Lost

a dastard's spotted name.
eternity of shame.

Lost-desert of manly worth.

the right you had by birth.
lost!-freedom for the earth.

Freemen, up! The foe is nearing!
Haughty banners high uprearing-
Lo, their serried ranks appearing!

Freemen, on! The drums are beating!
Will you shrink from such a meeting?
Forward! Give them hero greeting!

From your hearths, and homes, and altars,
Backward hurl your proud assaulters.
He is not a man that falters.

Hush! The hour of fate is nigh.
On the help of God rely!

Forward! We will do or die!

109

G. HAMILTON.

VI. -SONG OF MARION'S MEN.

OUR band is few, but true and tried, - our leader frank and bold,
The British soldier trembles when Marion's name is told.
Our fortress is the good green wood, our tent the cypress-tree;
We know the forest round us as seamen know the sea.
We know its walls of thorny vines, its glades of reedy grass,
Its safe and silent islands within the dark morass.

;

Woe to the English soldiery that little dread us near!
On them shall light, at midnight, a strange and sudden fear
When, waking to their tents on fire, they grasp their arms in vain
And they who stand to face us are beat to earth again;
And they who fly in terror deem a mighty host behind,
And bear the tramp of thousands upon the hollow wind.

Well knows the fair and friendly moon the band that Marion

leads

The glitter of their rifles, the scampering of their steeds.
'Tis life to guide the fiery barb across the moonlight plain;
'Tis life to feel the night-wind that lifts his tossing mane.
A moment in the British camp a moment - and away,
Back to the pathless forest, before the peep of day.

Grave men there are by broad Santee, grave men with hoary hairs:
Their hearts are all with Marion, for Marion are their prayers.
And lovely ladies greet our band with kindliest welcoming,
With smiles like those of summer, and tears like those of spring.
For them we wear these trusty arms, and lay them down no more
Till we have driven the Briton for ever from our shore.

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THIS day, O soldiers, will terminate or establish the largest empire that, any age has known. But recently lords of all the climes from the Hellespont to the ocean, we have now to fight, not for glory, but for safety, and, for what we prize above safety -liberty! If we can not make a stand here, no place of retreat remains. By continued armaments every thing in our rear is exhausted. The cities are deserted. The very fields are abandoned by their cultivators. Our wives and children, who have followed the levies, are but so many spoils prepared for the enemy, unless we interpose our bodies as a rampart before these dearest objects and pledges of affection.

On my part, I have collected an army such as the largest plain can hardly contain. I have chosen a field of battle where our whole line can act. The rest depends on yourselves. Dare to conquer, and you will conquer! We hear of the enemy's reputation. Reputation ! As if that were a weapon which brave men had not learnt to despise! These spacious plains expose poverty of your foe- -a poverty which the Cilician mountains concealed. We perceive thin ranks, wire-drawn wings, a center quite drained; while their last line faces to the rear, in readiness to fly.

the

If we but conquer now, all the victories of the war will be transferred to us. The enemy have no place of refuge; here the Euphrates bars them in, and there the Tigris. A heavy booty impedes their operations. Entangled in the spoils they have won from us, they may be easily overwhelmed; and thus the means of our triumph will be its reward.

HIGHLAND WAR-SONJ.

lii

Does a name startle you? - the name of Alexander? Let girls and cowards stand in awe of it! Imprudent, reckless, absurd, our own irresolution, and not his courage, has been the cause of his successes hitherto. Nothing that is not built on moderation can last. His prosperity has reached its height, and punishment now awaits his presumption.

By our guardian deities, O soldiers! by the eternal fire carried before us on our altars; by the dazzling sun which rises within the limits of my dominions; by the immortal memory of Cyrus, who transferred the empire from the Medes and Lydians to the Persians; by your hopes of freedom and your scorn of oppression, I con-jure you to vindicate your name and nation from the last disgrace! In your own right hands you carry liberty, power, and every future reliance. Whoever despises death, escapes it. Follow me, then, for home and country, family and freedom,

follow me to the field!

QUINTUS CURTIUS (paraphrase from).

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PIBROCH✶ of Donuil Dhu, pibroch of Donuil,
Wake thy wild voice anew, summon Clan-Conuil.
Come away, come away, hark to the summons!
Come in your war array, gentles and commons!
Come from deep glen, and from mountain so rocky,
The war-pipe and pennon are at Inverlochy ;
Come every hill-plaid, and true heart that wears one,
Come
every steel-blade, and strong hand that bears one.
Leave untended the herd, the flock without shelter;
Leave the corpse uninterred, the bride at the altar;
Leave the deer, leave the steer, leave nets and barges ;
Come with your fighting gear, broadswords and targes.
Come as the winds come, when forests are rended;
Come as the waves come, when navies are stranded :
Faster come, faster come, faster and faster,
Chief, vassal, page and groom, tenant and master.

Fast they come, fast they come; see how they gather!
Wide waves the eagle-plume, blended with heather.
Cast your plaids, draw your blades, forward each man set!
Pibroch of Donuil Dhu, knell for the onset!

SIR WALTER SCOTT.

A pibroch (pronounced pi'brok) is a martial air played with the bagpipe.

Donuil, pronounce Don'nil.

IX.. 1

- ARMINIUS TO HIS SOLDIERS.

SOLDIERS and friends! we soon shall reach the ground
your poor country waits the sacrifice,

Who

The noliest offering of he hildren's blood!
Here have we come, not for the lust of conquest,
Not for the booty of the lawless plunderer;

No, friends, we come to tel, or proud invaders
That we will use our strengil to purchase freedom!
Freedom prime blessing of his fleeting life!-
Is there a 1an that hears thy sacred name,
And thrills not to the sound with loftiest hope,
With proud disdain of tyrant whips and chairs?
Much-injured friends, your slavish hours are past!
Conquest is ours! not that your German swords
Have keener edges than the Foman falchions;
Not that your shields are stouter, nor your armor
Impervious to the swift and deadly lance;
Not that your ranks are thicker than the Roman ;
No, no; they will outnumber you, my soldiers;
But that your cause is good! They are poor slaves
Who fight for hire and plunder, - pampered ruffians,
Who have no souls for glory. We are Germans;
Who here are bound, by oaths indissoluble,
To keep your glorious birthrights or to die!
This is a field where beardless boys might fight,
And, looking on the angel Liberty,

Might put such mettle in their tender arms

That veteran chiefs would ill ward off their blows.

I say no more, my dear and trusty friends!
Your glorious rallying-cry has music in it,
To rouse the sleepiest spirit from his trance,
For Freedom and Germania!

MURPHY.

X.- POLAND.

Is Freedom's latest struggle o'er? Is Poland fallen to rise no more? Is Kosciusko's name forgotten? Is the spirit fled, that once to deathless glory led, and never lessening fame? No! though the imperial Russ decree Poland shall never more be free, she yet shall burst her chain, - again the sword of Freedom wield, and in the blood-red battle-field her arch foe meet again.

Who, but the driveling despots, dream, all silent though.

HENRY V. TO HIS SOLDIERS.

113

Sarmatia seem, - her noble spirit fled? She sleeps a short and troubled sleep-but, when she wakes, let despots weep! — 0, Poland is not dead! Still, still, in Tyranny's despite, fair Liberty's all quenchless light shall stronger, brighter shine! Fresh blood shall rush through Poland's veins, and Russia's self throw off her chains, and hail the maid divine!

Was Ostrolenska's fight in vain, — in vain the blood on Grochow's plain, like water freely poured? And still must Kosciusko's land be crushed beneath the withering hand of a barbarian lord? Perish the thought! our dawning day shall yet see Poland spurn the sway of Moscow's haughty czar. Till all the world shall own her free, or Time itself shall cease to be, her cry shall still be- WAR!

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WARRIORS and chiefs! should the shaft or the sword
Pierce me in leading the hosts of the Lord,
Heed not the corse, though a king's, in your path:
Bury your steel in the bosoms of Gath!

Thou who art bearing my buckler and bow,
Should the soldiers of Saul look away from the foe,
Stretch me that moment in blood at thy feet!
Mine be the doom, which they dared not to meet.
Farewell to others, but never we part,

Heir to my royalty, son of my heart!
Bright is the diadem, boundless the sway,

Or kingly the death, which awaits us to-day!

BYRON.

XII.

HENRY V. TO HIS SOLDIERS AT THE SIEGE OF
HARFLEUR.

ONCE more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
Or close the wall up with our English dead!

In

peace, there's nothing so becomes a man

As modest stillness and humility:

But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger;
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favored rage:
Then lend the eye a terrible aspéct ;

Let it pry through the portage of the head,
Like the brass cannon.

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