Complete Poetical Works of Robert Southey

by Robert Southey

  By day with hurrying crowds the streets were thronged,

  To gain of this great Czar a passing sight;

  And music, dance, and banquetings prolonged

  The various work of pleasure through the night.

  You might have deemed, to see that joyous town,

  That wretchedness and pain were there unknown.

  Yet three short months had scarcely passed away,

  Since, shaken with the approaching battle’s breath,

  Her inmost chambers trembled with dismay;

  And now within her walls, insatiate Death,

  Devourer whom no harvest e’er can fill,

  The gleanings of that field was gathering still.

  Within those walls there lingered at that hour

  Many a brave soldier on the bed of pain,

  Whom aid of human art should ne’er restore

  To see his country and his friends again;

  And many a victim of that fell debate

  Whose life yet wavered in the scales of fate.

  Some I beheld, for whom the doubtful scale

  Had to the side of life inclined at length;

  Emaciate was their form, their features pale,

  The limbs so vigorous late, bereft of strength;

  And for their gay habiliments of yore,

  The habit of the House of Pain they wore.

  Some in the courts of that great hospital,

  That they might taste the sun and open air,

  Crawled out; or sate beneath the southern wall;

  Or leaning in the gate, stood gazing there

  In listless guise upon the passers by,

  Whiling away the hours of slow recovery.

  Others in waggons borne abroad I saw,

  Albeit recovering, still a mournful sight:

  Languid and helpless some were stretched on straw,

  Some more advanced sustained themselves upright,

  And with bold eye and careless front, methought,

  Seemed to set wounds and death again at nought.

  Well had it fared with these; nor went it ill

  With those whom war had of a limb bereft,

  Leaving the life untouched, that they had still

  Enough for health as for existence left;

  But some there were who lived to draw the breath

  Of pain through hopeless years of lingering death.

  Here might the hideous face of war be seen,

  Stript of all pomp, adornment, and disguise;

  It was a dismal spectacle I ween,

  Such as might well to the beholders’ eyes

  Bring sudden tears, and make the pious mind

  Grieve for the crimes and follies of mankind.

  What had it been then in the recent days

  Of that great triumph, when the open wound

  Was festering, and along the crowded ways,

  Hour after hour was heard the incessant sound

  Of wheels, which o’er the rough and stony road

  Conveyed their living agonizing load!

  Hearts little to the melting mood inclined

  Grew sick to see their sufferings; and the thought

  Still comes with horror to the shuddering mind

  Of those sad days when Belgian ears were taught

  The British soldier’s cry, half groan, half prayer,

  Breathed when his pain is more than he can bear.

  Brave spirits, nobly had their part been done!

  Brussels could show, where Senne’s slow waters glide,

  The cannon which their matchless valour won,

  Proud trophies of the field, ranged side by side,

  Where as they stood in inoffensive row,

  The solitary guard paced to and fro.

  Unconscious instruments of human woe,

  Some for their mark the royal lilies bore,

  Fixed there when Britain was the Bourbon’s foe;

  And some embossed in brazen letters wore

  The sign of that abhorred misrule, which broke

  The guilty nation for a Tyrant’s yoke.

  Others were stampt with that Usurper’s name,..

  Recorders thus of many a change were they,

  Their deadly work through every change the same;

  Nor ever had they seen a bloodier day,

  Than when as their late thunders rolled around,

  Brabant in all her cities felt the sound.

  Then ceased their occupation. From the field

  Of battle here in triumph were they brought;

  Ribbands and flowers and laurels half concealed

  Their brazen mouths, so late with ruin fraught;

  Women beheld them pass with joyful eyes,

  And children clapt their hands and rent the air with cries.

  Now idly on the banks of Senne they lay,

  Like toys with which a child is pleased no more:

  Only the British traveller bends his way

  To see them on that unfrequented shore,

  And as a mournful feeling blends with pride,

  Remembers those who fought, and those who died.

  III.

  THE FIELD OF BATTLE.

  Southward from Brussels lies the field of blood,

  Some three hours’ journey for a well-girt man;

  A horseman who in haste pursued his road

  Would reach it as the second hour began.

  The way is through a forest deep and wide,

  Extending many a mile on either side.

  No chearful woodland this of antic trees,

  With thickets varied and with sunny glade;

  Look where he will, the weary traveller sees

  One gloomy, thick, impenetrable shade

  Of tall straight trunks, which move before his sight,

  With interchange of lines of long green light.

  Here, where the woods receding from the road

  Have left on either hand an open space

  For fields and gardens and for man’s abode,

  Stands Waterloo; a little lowly place,

  Obscure till now, when it hath risen to fame,

  And given the victory its English name.

  What time the second Carlos ruled in Spain,

  Last of the Austrian line by Fate decreed,

  Here Castanaza reared a votive fane,

  Praying the Patron Saints to bless with seed

  His childless sovereign; Heaven denied an heir,

  And Europe mourned in blood the frustrate prayer.

  That temple to our hearts was hallowed now:

  For many a wounded Briton there was laid,

  With such poor help as time might then allow

  From the fresh carnage of the field conveyed;

  And they whom human succours could not save,

  Here in its precincts found a hasty grave.

  And here on marble tablets set on high,

  In English lines by foreign workmen traced,

  Are names familiar to an English eye;

  Their brethren here the fit memorials placed,

  Whose unadorned inscriptions briefly tell

  Their gallant comrades’ rank, and where they fell.

  The stateliest monument of public pride,

  Enriched with all magnificence of art,

  To honour Chieftains who in victory died,

  Would wake no stronger feeling in the heart

  Than these plain tablets, by the soldier’s hand

  Raised to his comrades in a foreign land.

  Not far removed you find the burial-ground,

  Yet so that skirts of woodland intervene;

  A small enclosure, rudely fenced around;

  Three grave-stones only for the dead are seen:

  One bears the name of some rich villager,

  The first for whom a stone was planted there.

  Beneath the second is a German laid,

  Whom Bremen, shaking off the Frenchman’s yoke,

  Sent w
ith her sons the general cause to aid;

  He in the fight received his mortal stroke,

  Yet for his country’s aggravated woes

  Lived to see vengeance on her hated foes.

  A son of Erin sleeps below the third;

  By friendly hands his body where it lay

  Upon the field of blood had been interred,

  And thence by those who mourned him borne away

  In pious reverence for departed worth,

  Laid here with holy rites in consecrated earth.

  Repose in peace, brave soldiers, who have found

  In Waterloo and Soigny’s shade your rest!

  Ere this hath British valour made that ground

  Sacred to you, and for your foes unblest,

  When Marlborough here, victorious in his might

  Surprized the French, and smote them in their flight.

  Those wars are as a tale of times gone by,

  For so doth perishable fame decay,..

  Here on the ground wherein the slaughter’d lie,

  The memory of that fight is passed away;..

  And even our glorious Blenheim to the field

  Of Waterloo and Wellington must yield.

  Soon shall we reach that scene of mighty deeds,

  In one unbending line a short league hence;

  Aright the forest from the road recedes,

  With wide sweep trending south and westward thence;

  Aleft along the line it keeps its place

  Some half hour’s distance at a traveller’s pace.

  The country here expands, a wide-spread scene;

  No Flemish gardens fringed with willows these,

  Nor rich Brabantine pastures ever green,

  With trenches lined and rows of aspin trees;

  In tillage here the unwooded open land

  Returns its increase to the farmer’s hand.

  Behold the scene where Slaughter had full sway!

  A mile before us lieth Mount St. John,

  The hamlet which the Highlanders that day

  Preserved from spoil; yet as much farther on

  The single farm is placed, now known to fame,

  Which from the sacred hedge derives its name.

  Straight onward yet for one like distance more,

  And there the house of Belle Alliance stands,

  So named, I guess, by some in days of yore,

  In friendship or in wedlock joining hands:

  Little did they who called it thus foresee

  The place that name should hold in history!

  Beyond these points the fight extended not,..

  Small theatre for such a tragedy!

  Its breadth scarce more, from eastern Papelot

  To where the groves of Hougoumont on high

  Rear in the west their venerable head,

  And cover with their shade the countless dead.

  But wouldst thou tread this celebrated ground,

  And trace with understanding eyes a scene

  Above all other fields of war renowned,

  From western Hougoumont thy way begin;

  There was our strength on that side, and there first,

  In all its force, the storm of battle burst.

  Strike eastward then across toward La Haye,

  The single farm: with dead the fields between

  Are lined, and thou wilt see upon the way

  Long wave-like dips and swells which intervene,

  Such as would breathe the war-horse, and impede,

  When that deep soil was wet, his martial speed.

  This is the ground whereon the young Nassau,

  Emuling that day his ancestors’ renown,

  Received his hurt; admiring Belgium saw

  The youth proved worthy of his destined crown:

  All tongues his prowess on that day proclaim,

  And children lisp his praise and bless their Prince’s name.

  When thou hast reached La Haye, survey it well,

  Here was the heat and centre of the strife;

  This point must Britain hold whate’er befell,

  And here both armies were profuse of life:

  Once it was lost,.. and then a stander by

  Belike had trembled for the victory.

  Not so the leader, on whose equal mind

  Such interests hung in that momentous day;

  So well had he his motley troops assigned,

  That where the vital points of action lay,

  There had he placed those soldiers whom he knew

  No fears could quail, no dangers could subdue.

  Small was his British force, nor had he here

  The Portugals, in heart so near allied,

  The worthy comrades of his late career,

  Who fought so oft and conquered at his side,

  When with the Red Cross joined in brave advance,

  The glorious Quinas mocked the air of France.

  Now of the troops with whom he took the field,

  Some were of doubtful faith, and others raw;

  He stationed these where they might stand or yield;

  But where the stress of battle he foresaw,

  There were his links (his own strong words I speak)

  And rivets which no human force could break.

  O my brave countrymen, ye answered well

  To that heroic trust! Nor less did ye,

  Whose worth your grateful country aye shall tell,

  True children of our sister Germany,

  Who while she groaned beneath the oppressor’s chain,

  Fought for her freedom in the fields of Spain.

  La Haye, bear witness! sacred is it hight,

  And sacred is it truly from that day;

  For never braver blood was spent in fight

  Than Britain here hath mingled with the clay.

  Set where thou wilt thy foot, thou scarce canst tread

  Here on a spot unhallowed by the dead.

  Here was it that the Highlanders withstood

  The tide of hostile power, received its weight

  With resolute strength, and stemmed and turned the flood;

  And fitly here, as in that Grecian straight,

  The funeral stone might say, Go, traveller, tell

  Scotland, that in our duty here we fell.

  Still eastward from this point thy way pursue.

  There grows a single hedge along the lane,..

  No other is there far or near in view:

  The raging enemy essayed in vain

  To pass that line,.. a braver foe withstood,

  And this whole ground was moistened with their blood.

  Leading his gallant men as he was wont,

  The hot assailants’ onset to repel,

  Advancing hat in hand, here in the front

  Of battle and of danger, Picton fell;

  Lamented Chief! than whom no braver name

  His country’s annals shall consign to fame.

  Scheldt had not seen us, had his voice been heard,

  Return with shame from her disastrous coast:

  But Fortune soon to fairer fields preferred

  His worth approved, which Cambria long may boast:

  France felt him then, and Portugal and Spain

  His honoured memory will for aye retain.

  Hence to the high-walled house of Papelot,

  The battle’s boundary on the left, incline;

  Here thou seest Frischermont not far remote,

  From whence, like ministers of wrath divine,

  The Prussians issuing on the yielding foe,

  Consummated their great and total overthrow.

  Deem not that I the martial skill should boast

  Where horse and foot were stationed, here to tell,

  What points were occupied by either host,

  And how the battle raged, and what befell,

  And how our great Commander’s eagle eye

  Which comprehended all, secured the victory.r />
  This were the historian’s, not the poet’s part;

  Such task would ill the gentle Muse beseem,

  Who to the thoughtful mind and pious heart,

  Comes with her offering from this awful theme;

  Content if what she saw and gathered there

  She may in unambitious song declare.

  Look how upon the Ocean’s treacherous face

  The breeze and summer sunshine softly play,

  And the green-heaving billows bear no trace

  Of all the wrath and wreck of yesterday;..

  So from the field which here we looked upon,

  The vestiges of dreadful war were gone.

  Earth had received into her silent womb

  Her slaughtered creatures: horse and man they lay,

  And friend and foe, within the general tomb.

  Equal had been their lot; one fatal day

  For all,.. one labour,.. and one place of rest

  They found within their common parent’s breast.

  The passing seasons had not yet effaced

  The stamp of numerous hoofs impressed by force

  Of cavalry, whose path might still be traced.

  Yet Nature every where resumed her course;

  Low pansies to the sun their purple gave,

  And the soft poppy blossomed on the grave.

  In parts the careful farmer had renewed

  His labours, late by battle frustrated;

  And where the unconscious soil had been imbued

  With blood, profusely there like water shed,

  There had his plough-share turned the guilty ground,

  And the green corn was springing all around.

  The graves he left for natural thought humane

  Untouched; and here and there where in the strife

  Contending feet had trampled down the grain,

  Some hardier roots were found, which of their life

  Tenacious, had put forth a second head,

  And sprung, and eared, and ripened on the dead.

  Some marks of wreck were scattered all around,

  As shoe, and belt, and broken bandoleer,