WAT TYLER'S ADDRESS TO THE KING. ROBERT SOUTHEY. King of England, Petitioning for pity is most weak, The sovereign People ought to demand justice. I lead them here against the Lord's anointed, Because his Ministers have made him odious! His yoke is heavy, and his burden grievous. Why do ye carry on this fatal war, To force upon the French a King they hate; Tearing our young men from their peaceful homes, Forcing his hard-earned fruits from the honest peasant, Distressing us to desolate our neighbors? But to support your Court's extravagance, And, like your spaniels, lick the hand that beats us? ! You sit at ease in your gay palaces: The costly banquet courts your appetite; Sweet music soothes your slumbers: we, the while, Scarce by hard toil can earn a little food, And sleep scarce sheltered from the cold night wind; Whilst your wild projects wrest the little from us Which might have cheered the wintry hours of age! The Parliament forever asks more money; We toil and sweat for money for your taxes; Where is the benefit,-what good reap we From all the counsels of your government? Think you that we should quarrel with the French? Do What boots to us your victories, your glory? And tyrants tremble,-mark me, King of THE SOLDIER'S DREAM. THOMAS CAMPBELL. Our bugles sang truce, for the night-cloud had lowered, And the sentinel stars set their watch in the sky; And thousands had sunk on the ground overpowered, The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die. When reposing that night on my pallet of straw, By the wolf-scaring fagot that guarded the slain, At the dead of night a sweet vision I saw, And thrice ere the morning I dreamed it again. Methought, from the battlefield's dreadful array, Far, far I had roamed on a desolate track; "Twas autumn,-and sunshine arose on the way To the home of my fathers, that welcomed me back. I flew to the pleasant fields, traversed so oft In life's morning march, when my bosom was young; I heard my own mountain-goats bleating aloft, And knew the sweet strain that the cornreapers sung. |