Of a proud, brotherly, and civic band,
All unbought champions in no princely cause
Of vice-entailed Corruption; they no land[1]
Doomed to bewail the blasphemy of laws
Making Kings' rights divine, by some Draconic clause.
LXV.
By a lone wall a lonelier column rears
A gray and grief-worn aspect of old days;
'Tis the last remnant of the wreck of years,
And looks as with the wild-bewildered gaze
Of one to stone converted by amaze,
Yet still with consciousness; and there it stands
Making a marvel that it not decays,
When the coeval pride of human hands,
Levelled Aventicum,N14 hath strewed her subject lands.
LXVI.
And there—oh! sweet and sacred be the name!—
Julia—the daughter—the devoted—gave
Her youth to Heaven; her heart, beneath a claim
Nearest to Heaven's, broke o'er a father's grave.
Justice is sworn 'gainst tears, and hers would crave
- ↑
——their proud land
Groan'd not beneath——.—[MS.]
