Читать книгу Poetry of the Anti-Jacobin - Various - Страница 27
ОглавлениеODE TO ANARCHY.
BY A JACOBIN.
(BEING AN IMITATION OF HORACE, ODE XXXV. BOOK I.)
O Diva, gratum quæ regis Antium!
Goddess, whose dire terrific power
Spreads from thy much-loved Gallia’s plains
Where’er her blood-stain’d ensigns lower,
Where’er fell Rapine stalks, or barb’rous Discord reigns!
Thou, who canst lift to fortune’s height
The wretch by truth and virtue scorn’d,
And crush with insolent delight,
All whom true merit rais’d, or noble birth adorn’d!
Thee, oft the murd’rous band implores,
Swift darting on its hapless prey:
Thee, wafted from fierce Afric’s shores,
The Corsair Chief invokes to speed him on his way.
Thee, the wild Indian Tribes revere;
Thy charms the roving Arab owns;
Thee, kings, thee tranquil nations fear,
The bane of social bliss, the foe to peaceful thrones.
For, soon as thy loud trumpet calls
To deadly rage, to fierce alarms,
Just Order’s goodly fabric falls,
Whilst the mad people cries, “To arms! to arms!”
With thee Proscription, child of strife,
With Death’s choice implements, is seen,
Her Murderer’s gun, Assassin’s knife,
And, “last not least in love,” her darling Guillotine.
Fond Hope is thine,—the hope of Spoil,
And Faith,—such faith as ruffians keep:
They prosper thy destructive toil,
That makes the Widow mourn, the helpless Orphan weep.
Then false and hollow friends retire,
Nor yield one sigh to soothe despair;
Whilst crowds triumphant Vice admire,
Whilst Harlots shine in robes that deck’d the Great and Fair.
Guard our famed Chief to Britain’s strand!
Britain, our last, our deadliest foe:
Oh, guard his brave associate band!
A band to slaughter train’d, and “nursed in scenes of woe”.
What shame, alas! one little Isle
Should dare its native laws maintain!
At Gallia’s threats serenely smile,
And, scorning her dread power, triumphant rule the main.
For this have guiltless victims died
In crowds at thy ensanguined shrine!
For this has recreant Gallia’s pride
O’erturned Religion’s Fanes, and braved the Wrath Divine!
What Throne, what Altar, have we spared
To spread thy power, thy joys impart?
Ah! then, our faithful toils reward!
And let each falchion pierce some loyal Briton’s heart.
[THE FOLLOWING IS A TRANSLATION, BY DUNCOMBE, OF
HORACE’S ODE TO FORTUNE,
Of which the above Ode is a parody.
O Goddess, whose propitious sway
Thy Antium’s favourite sons obey;
Whose voice from depth of woe recalls
The wretch, and triumphs turns to funerals;
From Thee, rich crops the needy swain
Implores. Thee, sovereign of the main,
The mariner invokes, who braves
In a Bithynian bark the Cretan waves;
Thee, Scythians, wandering far and near,
And unrelenting Dacians, fear:
The warlike sons of Italy;
Cities, and realms, and empires, worship Thee.
Mothers of barbarous monarchs dread,
And purple tyrants, lest thou tread
With spurning foot, and scatter round
The sculptured column on th’ encumbered ground;
And lest the fickle crowd should break
Their bonds; and with loud clamours wake
The peaceful to assert their right
By force of arms, and quell usurping might.
Ruthless necessity prepares
The way for Thee; and ever bears
Huge nails in her strong hands of brass
The wedge, the hook, and lead’s hot molten mass.
Thee Hope and white robed Faith, adore,
So rarely found!—She, when no more
Thou smil’st, attends the fallen great
Stript of his gay attire and stately seat.
But venal crowds and harlots fly:
And, if the flowing casks are dry,
When to the dregs the wine they drink,
From friendship’s yoke the false associates shrink.
Thy aid for Cæsar Rome implores,
Conduct him safe to Britain’s shores,
The limits of the world; and lead
Our new-raised bands against the trembling Mede.
Alas! we mourn our crimes, our scar
And brethren slain in civil wars:
How oft have Roman youth embrued
Their savage hands in streams of social blood!
What has this Iron Age not dared?
What Gods revered? What Altars spared?
O! point again the blunted steel,
And let the Massagete our vengeance feel!—Ed.]
The following Song is recommended to be sung at all Convivial Meetings, convened for the purpose of opposing the Assessed-Tax Bill. The correspondent who has transmitted it to us informs us that he has tried it with great success among many of his well-disposed neighbours, who had been at first led to apprehend that the 1–20th part of their income was too great a sacrifice for the preservation of the remainder of their property from French Confiscation.
You have heard of Rewbell,[33]
That demon of hell,
And of Barras, his brother Director;
Of the canting Lepaux,
And that scoundrel Moreau,
Who betray’d his old friend and protector.
Would you know how these friends,
For their own private ends,
Would subvert our Religion and Throne?—
Do you doubt of their skill
To change Laws at their will?—
You shall hear how they treated their own.
’Twas their pleasure to look,
In a little blue book,
At the Code of their famed legislation,
That with truth they might say,
In the space of one day
They had broke every Law of the Nation.
The first law that they see,
Is “the Press shall be free!”
The next is “the Trial by Jury”:
Then, “the People’s free Choice”;
Then, “the Members’ free Voice”—
When Rewbell exclaim’d in a fury—
“On a method we’ll fall
For infringing them all—
We’ll seize on each Printer and Member:
No period so fit
For a desperate hit,
As our bloody month of September.
“We’ll annul each election
Which wants our correction,
And name our own creatures instead.
When once we’ve our will,
No blood we will spill,
(But let Carnot be knock’d on the head).
“To Rochefort we’ll drive
Our victims alive,
And as soon as on board we have got ’em,
Since we destine the ship
For no more than one trip,
We can just make a hole in the bottom.
“By this excellent plan,
On the true Rights of Man,
When we’ve founded our fifth Revolution,
Though England’s our foe,
An army shall go
To improve HER corrupt Constitution.
“We’ll address to the Nation
A fine Proclamation
With offers of friendship so warm:
Who can give Buonaparte
A welcome so hearty
As the friends of a THOROUGH REFORM?”
