GRAVE OF THE LAST SAXON

“Know ye the land where the bright orange glows!”

Oh! rather know ye not the land, beloved

Of Liberty, where your brave fathers bled!

The land of the white cliffs, where every cot

Whose smoke goes up in the clear morning sky,

On the green hamlet's edge, stands as secure

As the proud Norman castle's bannered keep!

Oh! shall the poet paint a land of slaves,

( Albeit, that the richest colours warm

His tablet, glowing from the master's hand,)

And thee forget, his country — thee, his home!

Fair Italy! thy hills and olive-groves

A lovelier light empurples, or when morn

Streams o'er the cloudless van of Apennine,

Or more majestic eve, on the wide scene

Of columns, temples, arches, and aqueducts,

Sits, like reposing Glory, and collects

Her richest radiance at that parting hour;

While distant domes, touched by her hand, shine out

More solemnly,‘ mid the gray monuments

That strew the illustrious plain; yet say, can these,

Even when their pomp is proudest, and the sun

Sinks o'er the ruins of immortal Rome,

A holy interest wake, intense as that

Which visits his full heart, who, severed long,

And home returning, sees once more the light

Shine on the land where his forefathers sleep;

Sees its white cliffs at distance, and exclaims:

There I was born, and there my bones shall rest!

Then, oh! ye bright pavilions of the East,

Ye blue Italian skies, and summer seas,

By marble cliffs high-bounded, throwing far

A gray illumination through the haze

Of orient morning; ye, Etruscan shades,

Where Pan's own pines o'er Valambrosa wave;

Scenes where old Tiber, for the mighty dead

As mourning, heavily rolls; or Anio

Flings its white foam; or lucid Arno steals

On gently through the plains of Tuscany;

Be ye the impassioned themes of other song.

Nor mine, thou wondrous Western World, to call

The thunder of thy cataracts, or paint

The mountains and the vast volcano range

Of Cordilleras, high above the stir

Of human things; lifting to middle air

Their snows in everlasting solitude;

Upon whose nether crags the vulture, lord

Of summits inaccessible, looks down,

Unhearing, when the thunder dies below!

Nor,‘ midst the irriguous valleys of the south,

Where Chili spreads her green lap to the sea,

Now pause I to admire the bright blue bird,

Brightest and least of all its kind, that spins

Its twinkling flight, still humming o'er the flowers,

Like a gem of flitting light!

To these adieu!

Yet ere thy melodies, my harp, are mute

For ever, whilst the stealing day goes out

With slow-declining pace, I would essay

One patriot theme, one ancient British song:

So might I fondly dream, when the cold turf

Is heaped above my head, and carping tongues

Have ceased, some tones, Old England, thy green hills

Might then remember.

Time has reft the shrine

Where the last Saxon, canonized, lay,

And every trace has vanished,like the light

That from the high-arched eastern window fell,

With broken sunshine on his marble tomb —

So have they passed; and silent are the choirs,

That to his spirit sang eternal rest;

And scattered are his bones who raised those walls,

Where, from the field of blood slowly conveyed,

His mangled corse, with torch and orison,

Before the altar, and in holy earth,

Was laid! Yet oft I muse upon the theme;

And now, whilst solemn the slow curfew tolls,

Years and dim centuries seem to unfold

Their shroud, as at the summons; and I think

How sad that sound on every English heart

Smote, when along those darkening vales, where Lea

Beneath the woods of Waltham winds, it broke

First on the silence of the night, far heard

Through the deep forest! Phantoms of the past,

Ye gather round me! Voices of the dead,

Ye come by fits! And now I hear, far off,

Faint Eleesons swell, whilst to the fane

The long procession, and the pomp of death,

Moves visible; and now one voice is heard

From a vast multitude, Harold, farewell!

Farewell, and rest in peace! That sable car

Bears the last Saxon to his grave; the last

From Hengist, of the long illustrious line

That swayed the English sceptre. Hark! a cry!

‘ Tis from his mother, who, with frantic mien,

Follows the bier: with manly look composed,

Godwin, his eldest-born, and Adela,

Her head declined, her hand upon her brow

Beneath the veil, supported by his arm,

Sorrowing succeed! Lo! pensive Edmund there

Leads Wolfe, the least and youngest, by the hand!

Brothers and sisters, silent and in tears,

Follow their father to the dust, beneath

Whose eye they grew. Last and alone, behold,

Magnus,subduing the deep sigh, with brow

Of sterner acquiescence. Slowly pace

The sad remains of England's chivalry,

The few whom Hastings’ field of carnage spared,

To follow their slain monarch's hearse this night,

Whose corse is borne beneath the escutcheoned pall,

To rest in Waltham Abbey. So the train,

Imagination thus embodies it,

Moves onward to the abbey's western porch,

Whose windows and retiring aisles reflect

The long funereal lights. Twelve stoled monks,

Each with a torch, and pacing, two and two,

Along the pillared nave, with crucifix

Aloft, begin the supplicating chant,

Intoning “Miserere Domine.”

Now the stone coffins in the earth are laid

Of Harold, and of Leofrine, and Girth,

Brave brethren slain in one disastrous day.

And hark! again the monks and choristers

Sing, pacing round the grave-stone, “Requiem

Eternam dona iis.” To his grave

So was King Harold borne, within those walls

His bounty raised: his children knelt and wept,

Then slow departed, never in this world,

Perhaps, to meet again. But who is she,

Her dark hair streaming on her brow, her eye

Wild, and her breast deep-heaving? She beheld

At distance the due rites, nor wept, nor spake,

And now is gone!

Alas! from that sad hour,

By many fates, all who that hour had met

Were scattered. Godwin, Edmund, Adela,

Exiles in Denmark, there a refuge found

From England's stormy fortunes. Three long years

Have passed; again they tread their native land.

The Danish armament beneath the Spurn

Is anchored. Twenty thousand men at arms

Follow huge Waltheof, on his barbed steed,

His battle-axe hung at the saddle-bow;

Morcar and Edwin, English earls, are there,

With red-cross banner, and ten thousand men

From Ely and Northumberland; they raise

The death-song of defiance, and advance

With bows of steel. From Scotland's mountain-glens,

From sky-blue lochs, and the wild highland heaths,

From Lothian villages, along the banks

Of Forth, King Malcolm leads his clansmen bold,

And, dauntless as romantic, bids unfurl

The banner of St Andrew; by his side

Mild Edgar Atheling, a stripling boy,

His brother, heir to England's throne, appears;

The dawn of youth on his fresh cheek; and, lo!

The broadswords glitter as the tartaned troops

March to the pibroch's sound. The Danish trump

Brays like a gong, heard to the holts and towns

Of Lincolnshire.

With crests and shields the same,

A lion frowning on each helmet's cone,

Like the two brothers famed in ancient song,

Godwin and Edmund, sons of Harold, lead

From Scandinavia and the Baltic isles

The impatient Northmen to the embattled host

On Humber's side. The standards wave in air,

Drums roll, and glittering columns file, and arms

Flash to the morn, and bannered-trumpets bray,

Heralds or armourers from tent to tent

Are hurrying; crests, and spears, and steel-bows gleam,

Far as the eye can reach; barbed horses neigh,

Their mailed riders wield the battle-axe,

Or draw the steel-bows with a clang; and, hark!

From the vast moving host is heard one shout,

Conquest or death!— as now the sun ascends,

And on the bastioned walls of Ravenspur

Flings its first beam — one mighty shout is heard,

Perish the Norman! Soldiers, on!— to York!