"Where will you serve?"—"Where'er you please." "I know

You like to be the hope of the forlorn, And doubtless would be foremost on the foe

After the hardships you've already borne. And this young fellow say what can he do?

He with the beardless chin and garments torn ?"
"Why, general, if he hath no greater fault
In war than love, he had better lead the assault."
LXIII.

"He shall if that he dare." Here Juan bow'd
Low as the compliment deserved. Suwarrow
Continued: "Your old regiment's allow'd,
By special providence, to lead to-morrow,
Or it may be to-night, the assault: I have vow'd
To several saints, that shortly plough or harrow
Shall pass o'er what was Ismail, and its tusk
Be unimpeded by the proudest mosque.

Men's hearts against whole millions, when their trade Is butchery, sometimes a single sorrow

Will touch even heroes-and such was Suwarrow.

LXX.

He said, and in the kindest Calmuck tone,-
"Why, Johnson, what the devil do you mean
By bringing women here? They shall be shown
All the attention possible, and seen

In safety to the waggons, where alone

In fact they can be safe. You should have been Aware this kind of baggage never thrives : Save wed a year, I hate recruits with wives."

LXXI.

"May it please your excellency," thus replied Our British friend, "these are the wives of others, And not our own. I am too qualified

By service with my military brothers

To break the rules by bringing one's own bride
Into a camp: I know that nought so bothers
The hearts of the heroic on a charge,
As leaving a small family at large.

LXXII.

"But these are but two Turkish ladies, who
With their attendant aided our escape,
And afterwards accompanied us through
A thousand perils in this dubious shape.
To me this kind of life is not so new;

To them, poor things, it is an awkward scrape. I therefore, if you wish me to fight freely, Request that they may both be used genteelly."

LXXIII.

Meantime these two poor girls, with swimming eyes,
Look'd on as if in doubt if they could trust
Their own protectors; nor was their surprise
Less than their grief (and truly not less just)
To see an old man, rather wild than wise

In aspect, plainly clad, besmear'd with dust,
Stript to his waistcoat, and that not too clean,
More fear'd than all the sultans ever seen.

LXXIV.

For every thing seem'd resting on his nod,
As they could read in all eyes. Now to them,
Who were accustom'd, as a sort of god,
To see the sultan, rich in many a gem,
Like an imperial peacock stalk abroad

(That royal bird, whose tail's a diadem,) With all the pomp of power, it was a doubt How power could condescend to do without.

Oh, thou eternal Homer! who couldst charm
All ears, though long; all ages, though so short,
By merely wielding with poetic arm

Arms to which men will never more resort,
Unless gunpowder should be found to harm

Much less than is the hope of every court, Which now is leagued young Freedom to annoy ; But they will not find Liberty a Troy :LXXX.

Oh, thou eternal Homer! I have now

To paint a siege, wherein more men were slain, With deadlier engines and a speedier blow,

Than in thy Greek gazette of that campaign; And yet, like all men else, I must allow,

To vie with thee would be about as vain As for a brook to cope with ocean's flood; But still we moderns equal you in blood; LXXXI.

If not in poetry, at least in fact;

And fact is truth, the grand desideratum! Of which, howe'er the Muse describes each act, There should be ne'ertheless a slight substratum. But now the town is going to be attack'd;

Great deeds are doing-how shall I relate 'em? Souls of immortal generals! Phoebus watches To colour up his rays from your despatches.

LXXXII.

Oh, ye great bulletins of Bonaparte !

Oh, ye less grand long lists of kill'd and wounded! Shade of Leonidas, who fought so hearty,

When my poor Greece was once, as now, surrounded!

Oh, Cæsar's Commentaries! now impart, ye
Shadows of glory! (lest I be confounded)

A portion of your fading twilight hues,
So beautiful, so fleeting, to the Muse.

LXXXIII.

When I call "fading" martial immortality, I mean, that every age and every year, And almost every day, in sad reality,

Some sucking hero is compell'd to rear, Who, when we come to sum up the totality Of deeds to human happiness most dear, Turns out to be a butcher in great business, Afflicting young folks with a sort of dizziness.

LXXXIV.

Medals, rank, ribands, lace, embroidery, scarlet,
Are things immortal to immortal man,
As purple to the Babylonian harlot :
An uniform to boys is like a fan

To women; there is scarce a crimson varlet
But deems himself the first in Glory's van.
But Glory's glory; and if you would find
What that is ask the pig who sees the wind!

LXXXV.

At least he feels it, and some say he sees,
Because he runs before it like a pig ;
Or, if that simple sentence should displease,
Say, that he scuds before it like a brig,
A schooner, or but it is time to ease

This Canto, ere my Muse perceives fatigue. The next shall ring a peal to shake all people, Like a bob-major from a village steeple.

LXXXVI.

Hark! through the silence of the cold, dull night,
The hum of armies gathering rank on rank !
Lo! dusky masses steal in dubious sight

Along the leaguer'd wall and bristling bank
Of the arm'd river, while with straggling light

The stars peep through the vapours dim and dank, Which curl in curious wreaths :- how soon the

smoke

Of Hell shall pall them in a deeper cloak!

LXXXVII.

Here pause we for the present as even then
That awful pause, dividing life from death,
Struck for an instant on the hearts of men,
Thousands of whom were drawing their last breath!
A moment and all will be life again!

The march the charge! the shouts of either faith!
Hurra! and Allah! and-one moment more-
The death-cry drowning in the battle's roar.

V.

And such they are,- and such they will be found : Not so Leonidas and Washington,

[This Canto Is almost entirely filled with the taking of Ismail by storm. It would be absurd to attempt, in prose, even a feeble outline of the varied horrors which marked that celebrated scene of ruthless and indiscriminate carnage; the noble writer has depicted them with all that vivid and appalling fidelity, which, on such a theme, might be expected from his powerful muse; and, if any thing can add to the shuddering sensation we experience in reading these terrific details, it is the consideration that poetry, in this instance, instead of dealing in fiction, must necessarily relate a tale that falls short of the truth. CAMPBELL.]

2 [La nuit était obscure; un brouillard épais ne nous permettait de distinguer autre chose que le feu de notre artillerie, dont l'horizon était embrasé de tous côtés: ce feu, partant du milieu du Danube, se réfléchissait sur les eaux, et offrait un coup d'œil très-singulier."— Hist. de la Nouvelle Russie, tom. iii. p. 209.]

["À peine eut on parcouru l'espace de quelques toises au-delà des batteries, que les Turcs, qui n'avaient point tiré pendant toute la nuit s'apperçevant de nos mouvemens, commencèrent de leur côté un feu très-vif, qui embrasa le reste de l'horizon: mais ce fut bien autre chose lorsque, avancés davantage, le feu de la mousqueterie commença dans toute l'étendue du rempart que nous appercevions. Ce fut alors que la place parut à nos yeux comme un volcan dont le feu sortait de toutes parties.' -Ibid. p. 209.]

Whose every battle-field is holy ground,

Which breathes of nations saved, not worlds undone. How sweetly on the ear such echoes sound!

While the mere victor's may appal or stun The servile and the vain, such names will be A watchword till the future shall be free.

VI.

2

The night was dark, and the thick mist allow'd
Nought to be seen save the artillery's flame,
Which arch'd the horizon like a fiery cloud,
And in the Danube's waters shone the same.
A mirror'd hell! the volleying roar, and loud
Long booming of each peal on peal, o'ercame
The car far more than thunder; for Heaven's flashes
Spare, or smite rarely-man's make millions ashes!
VII.

The column order'd on the assault scarce pass'd
Beyond the Russian batteries a few toises,
When up the bristling Moslem rose at last,

Answering the Christian thunders with like voices:
Then one vast fire, air, earth, and stream embraced,
Which rock'd as 't were beneath the mighty noises;
While the whole rampart blazed like Etna, when
The restless Titan hiccups in his den. 3

The Prince de Ligne was wounded in the knee;
Count Chapeau-Bras, too, had a ball between
His cap and head, 8 which proves the head to be
Aristocratic as was ever seen,

4 ["Un cri universel d'Allah! qui se répétait tout autour de la ville, vint encore rendre plus extraordinaire cet instant, dont il est impossible de se faire une idée."-Hist. de la N. R. p. 209.]

5 Allah Hu! is properly the war cry of the Mussulmans, and they dwell on the last syllable, which gives it a wild and peculiar effect.

6[" Toutes les colonnes étaient en mouvement; celles qui attaquaient par eau commandées par le général Arseniew, essuyerent un feu épouvantable, et perdirent avant le jour un tiers de leurs officiers." Ibid.]

Because it then received no injury

More than the cap; in fact, the ball could mean No harm unto a right legitimate head : "Ashes to ashes"-why not lead to lead?

XI.

Also the General Markow, Brigadier,
Insisting on removal of the prince

Amidst some groaning thousands dying near,—
All common fellows, who might writhe and wince,
And shrick for water into a deaf car,

The General Markow, who could thus evince
His sympathy for rank, by the same token,
To teach him greater, had his own leg broken. 1
XII.

Three hundred cannon threw up their emetic,
And thirty thousand muskets flung their pills
Like hail, to make a bloody diuretic. 2

Mortality! thou hast thy monthly bills; Thy plagues, thy famines, thy physicians, yet tick, Like the death-watch, within our cars the ills Past, present, and to come; —but all may yield To the true portrait of one battle-field.

XVII.

But here I leave the general concern,

To track our hero on his path of fame : He must his laurels separately earn;

For fifty thousand heroes, name by name, Though all deserving equally to turn

A couplet, or an elegy to claim, Would form a lengthy lexicon of glory, And what is worse still, a much longer story:

XVIII.

And therefore we must give the greater number
To the Gazette-which doubtless fairly dealt
By the deceased, who lie in famous slumber
In ditches, fields, or where'er they felt
Their clay for the last time their souls encumber; -
Thrice happy he whose name has been well spelt
In the despatch: I knew a man whose loss
Was printed Grove, although his name was Gross. +
XIX.

Juan and Johnson joined a certain corps,

And fought away with might and main, not knowing

The way which they had never trod before,

And still less guessing where they might be going; But on they march'd, dead bodies trampling o'er, Firing, and thrusting, slashing, sweating, glowing, But fighting thoughtlessly enough to win, To their two selves, one whole bright bulletin.

principalement composées des grenadiers de Fanagorie, escaladaient le retranchement et la palissade."— Hist. de la N. R. p. 210.]

4 A fact: see the Waterloo Gazettes. I recollect remarking at the time to a friend :-" There is fame! a man is killed, his name is Grose, and they print it Grove." I was at college with the deceased, who was a very amiable and clever man, and his society in great request for his wit, gaiety, and "Chansons à boire."

But Juan was quite "a broth of a boy,"
A thing of impulse and a child of song;
Now swimming in the sentiment of joy,

Or the sensation (if that phrase seem wrong), And afterward, if he must needs destroy,

In such good company as always throng To battles, sieges, and that kind of pleasure, No less delighted to employ his leisure;

XXV.

But always without malice: if he warr'd

Or loved, it was with what we call "the best Intentions," which form all mankind's trump card, To be produced when brought up to the test. The statesman, hero, harlot, lawyer-ward

Off each attack, when people are in quest Of their designs, by saying they meant well; "Tis pity" that such meaning should pave hell."2 XXVI.

I almost lately have begun to doubt

Whether hell's pavement-if it be so pavedMust not have latterly been quite worn out,

Not by the numbers good intent hath saved, But by the mass who go below without

Those ancient good intentions, which once shaved And smooth'd the brimstone of that street of hell, Which bears the greatest likeness to Pall Mall.

XXVII.

Juan, by some strange chance, which oft divides
Warrior from warrior in their grim career,
Like chastest wives from constant husbands' sides
Just at the close of the first bridal year,
By one of those odd turns of Fortune's tides,
Was on a sudden rather puzzled here,
When, after a good deal of heavy firing,
He found himself alone, and friends retiring.

XXVIII.

I don't know how the thing occurr'd-it might Be that the greater part were kill'd or wounded, And that the rest had faced unto the right

About; a circumstance which has confounded Cæsar himself, who, in the very sight

Of his whole army, which so much abounded In courage, was obliged to snatch a shield, And rally back his Romans to the field. 9

1 See General Valancey and Sir Lawrence Parsons. 2 The Portuguese proverb says that "hell is paved with good intentions."- [See antè, p. 518.]

3 [" "The Nervii marched to the number of sixty thousand, and fell upon Cæsar, as he was fortifying his camp, and had not the least notion of so sudden an attack. They first routed his cavalry, and then surrounded the twelfth and the seventh legions, and killed all the officers. Had not Cæsar snatched a buckler from one of his own men, forced his way through the combatants before him, and rushed upon the barbarians; or had not the tenth legion, seeing his danger, ran from the heights where they were posted, and mowed

Juan, who had no shield to snatch, and was
No Cæsar, but a fine young lad, who fought
He knew not why, arriving at this pass,

Stopp'd for a minute, as perhaps he ought
For a much longer time; then, like an ass-
(Start not, kind reader, since great Homer thought
This simile enough for Ajax, Juan

Perhaps may find it better than a new one); —

XXX.

Then, like an ass, he went upon his way,

And, what was stranger, never look'd behind; But seeing, flashing forward, like the day Over the hills, a fire enough to blind Those who dislike to look upon a fray, He stumbled on, to try if he could find A path, to add his own slight arm and forces To corps, the greater part of which were corses. XXXI.

Perceiving then no more the commandant

Of his own corps, nor even the corps, which had
Quite disappear'd-the gods know how! (I can't
Account for every thing which may look bad
In history; but we at least may grant

It was not marvellous that a mere lad,
In search of glory, should look on before,
Nor care a pinch of snuff about his corps :)-

XXXII.

Perceiving nor commander nor commanded,
And left at large, like a young heir, to make
His way to where he knew not-single handed;
As travellers follow over bog and brake
An ignis fatuus; or as sailors stranded

Unto the nearest hut themselves betake;
So Juan, following honour and his nose,
Rush'd where the thickest fire announced most foes.

XXXIII.

He knew not where he was, nor greatly cared,
For he was dizzy, busy, and his veins
Fill'd as with lightning-for his spirit shared
The hour, as is the case with lively brains;
And where the hottest fire was seen and heard,

And the loud cannon peal'd his hoarsest strains, He rush'd, while earth and air were sadly shaken By thy humane discovery, Friar Bacon !5

XXXIV.

And as he rush'd along, it came to pass he
Fell in with what was late the second column,
Under the orders of the General Lascy,

But now reduced, as is a bulky volume
Into an elegant extract (much less massy)

Of heroism, and took his place with solemn Air 'midst the rest, who kept their valiant faces And levell'd weapons still against the glacis.

down the enemy's ranks, not one Roman would have survived the battle."- PLUTARCH.]

4 [ N'appercevant plus le commandant du corps dont je faisais partie, et ignorant où je devais porter mes pas, je crus reconnoître le lieu où le rempart était situé; on y faisait un feu assez vif, qu je jugeai étre celui du Général-major de Lascy."-Hist. de la N. R. p. 210.]

3 Gunpowder is said to have been discovered by this friar. [N. B. Though Friar Bacon seems to have discovered gunpowder, he had the humanity not to record his discovery in intelligible language.]