14
PRIZE POEMS.
Think'st thou the Deluge of thy power shall spread
Till not one islet shows its verdant head;
Till, like the dove the olive-branch that bore,
Fair Peace shall seek in vain a friendly shore,
And banish'd Liberty on soaring wing
Back to her native skies indignant spring—?
Vain thought! beyond thy empire's sweeping bound
Shall Freedom find some hallow'd spot of ground;
Driven from the climes where fervid summer glows,
She seeks the northern wastes and polar snows;
There, though the bleak blasts rend th' inclement sky,
Shall Nature smile beneath her cheering eye,
Unfading there her blooms and flow'rs remain
Till thy vast empire shrinks to nought again.
What though thou deem that thine is Albion's shore,
Her day of freedom gone, her battles o'er;
Deem thou may'st smiling hear around thee rise
Her groans of anguish, her accusing cries,
And see her Queen in widow'd sorrow stand
Red from thy scourge, and bleeding from thy hand,
Destined in vain her country's wrongs to mourn,
Slave to thy slave, insulted and forlorn;
Perhaps e'en yet her patriot arm may stay
Thy mad Ambition on his crimson'd way.
E'en now—while 'mid the calm that slumbers wide,
Thou view'st the prospect round in swelling pride,
Inhal'st each breeze, and think'st for thee they bear
Their ripening fragrance through the balmy air;—
E'en now the coming tempest loads the gales,
Waves through the woods, and breathes along the vales;
It comes—it comes—I hear the boding sound
That calls the spirits of the storm around,
O'er all the sky their sable wings they spread,
And point the bolts of Vengeance at thy head.
Ye Powers that guard your Albion's rude domains,
Her trackless wilds and grey-extending plains,
Till not one islet shows its verdant head;
Till, like the dove the olive-branch that bore,
Fair Peace shall seek in vain a friendly shore,
And banish'd Liberty on soaring wing
Back to her native skies indignant spring—?
Vain thought! beyond thy empire's sweeping bound
Shall Freedom find some hallow'd spot of ground;
Driven from the climes where fervid summer glows,
She seeks the northern wastes and polar snows;
There, though the bleak blasts rend th' inclement sky,
Shall Nature smile beneath her cheering eye,
Unfading there her blooms and flow'rs remain
Till thy vast empire shrinks to nought again.
What though thou deem that thine is Albion's shore,
Her day of freedom gone, her battles o'er;
Deem thou may'st smiling hear around thee rise
Her groans of anguish, her accusing cries,
And see her Queen in widow'd sorrow stand
Red from thy scourge, and bleeding from thy hand,
Destined in vain her country's wrongs to mourn,
Slave to thy slave, insulted and forlorn;
Perhaps e'en yet her patriot arm may stay
Thy mad Ambition on his crimson'd way.
E'en now—while 'mid the calm that slumbers wide,
Thou view'st the prospect round in swelling pride,
Inhal'st each breeze, and think'st for thee they bear
Their ripening fragrance through the balmy air;—
E'en now the coming tempest loads the gales,
Waves through the woods, and breathes along the vales;
It comes—it comes—I hear the boding sound
That calls the spirits of the storm around,
O'er all the sky their sable wings they spread,
And point the bolts of Vengeance at thy head.
Ye Powers that guard your Albion's rude domains,
Her trackless wilds and grey-extending plains,
