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name by which the Romans designated that portion of Europe. "Prague" is Praga a suburb of Warsaw, on the opposite side of the Vistula, and joined to the main city by a bridge of boats.

O

SACRED Truth! thy triumph ceased awhile,

And Hope, thy sister, ceased with thee to smile, When leagued Oppression poured to Northern wars Her whiskered pandoors* and her fierce hussars, Waved her dread standard to the breeze of morn, Pealed her loud drum, and twanged her trumpet horn ; Tumultuous horror brooded o'er her van,

Presaging wrath to Poland and to man!

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Warsaw's last champion from her heights surveyed,
Wide o'er the fields, a waste of ruin laid.

"O Heaven!" he cried, "my bleeding country save!
Is there no hand on high to shield the brave?
Yet, though destruction sweep those lovely plains,
Rise, fellow-men! our country yet remains!

By that dread name, we wave the sword on high,
And swear for her to live, with her to die!"

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He said, and on the rampart-heights arrayed
His trusty warriors, few, but undismayed;
Firm-paced and slow, a horrid front they form,
Still as the breeze, but dreadful as the storm;
Low murmuring sounds along their banners fly,
Revenge or death, the watchword and reply;
Then pealed the notes, omnipotent to charm,
And the loud tocsin tolled their last alarm!
In vain, alas! in vain, ye gallant few!
From rank to rank your volleyed thunder flew :—
O, bloodiest picture in the book of Time,
Sarmatia fell, unwept, without a crime ;

Found not a generous friend, a pitying foe,

"Pandoor." One of a body of light infantry soldiers in the service of Austria; so called because originally raised from the mountainous districts, near the village of Pandur, in Lower Hungary.

Strength in her arms, nor mercy in her woe!

Dropped from her nerveless grasp the shattered spear,
Closed her bright eye, and curbed her high career:
Hope, for a season, bade the world farewell,
And freedom shrieked, as Kosciusko fell!

The sun went down, nor ceased the carnage there,
Tumultuous murder shook the midnight air,
On Prague's proud arch the fires of ruin glow,
His blood-dyed waters murmuring far below;
The storm prevails, the rampart yields a way,
Bursts the wild cry of horror and dismay !
Hark, as the smouldering piles with thunder fall,
A thousand shrieks for hopeless mercy call!
Earth shook,red meteors flashed along the sky,
And conscious Nature shuddered at the cry!

O righteous Heaven! ere Freedom found a grave,
Why slept the sword, omnipotent to save?
Where was thine arm, O Vengeance! where thy rod,
That smote the foes of Zion and of God;

That crushed proud Ammon, when his iron car
Was yoked in wrath, and thundered from afar?
Where was the storm that slumbered till the host
Of blood-stained Pharaoh left their trembling coast,
Then bade the deep in wild commotion flow,
And heaved an ocean on their march below?
Departed spirits of the mighty dead!

Ye that at Marathon and Leuctra bled!

Friends of the world! restore your swords to man,
Fight in his sacred cause, and lead the van!
Yet for Sarmatia's tears of blood atone,
And make her arm puissant as your own!
O, once again to Freedom's cause return
The patriot Tell, the Bruce of Bannockburn!
Ye fond adorers of departed fame,

Who warm at Scipio's worth or Tully's name!

Ye that, in fancied vision, can admire
The sword of Brutus and the Theban lyre! *
Rapt in historic ardor, who adore

Each classic haunt and well-remembered shore,
Where valor tuned, amidst her chosen throng,
The Thracian trumpet and the Spartan song;
Or, wandering thence, behold the later charms
Of England's glory, and Helvetia's arms!
See Roman fire in Hampden's bosom swell,
And fate and freedom in the shaft of Tell!
Say, ye fond zealots to the worth of yore,
Hath Valor left the world to live no more?
No more shall Brutus bid a tyrant die,

And sternly smile with vengeance in his eye?
Hampden no more, when suffering Freedom calls,
Encounter Fate, and triumph as he falls?
Nor Tell disclose, through peril and alarm,
The might that slumbers in a peasant's arm?
Yes, in that generous cause, forever strong,
The patriot's virtue and the poet's song,
Still, as the tide of ages rolls away,

Shall charm the world, unconscious of decay.

Yes, there are hearts, prophetic Hope may trust,

That slumber yet in uncreated dust,

Ordained to fire the adoring sons of earth,

With every charm of wisdom and of worth;
Ordained to light with intellectual day,
The mazy wheels of nature as they play,

Or, warm with Fancy's energy, to glow,

And rival all but Shakespeare's name below.

"The Theban lyre." The poetry of Pindar, a celebrated lyric poet, born in Thebes.

XXII. - OPPOSITION TO INDEPENDENCE.

WEBSTER.

THIS lesson and that which succeeds it are both taken from Mr. Webster's "Eulogy on Adams and Jefferson," delivered in Faneuil Hall. Boston, August 2, 1826. The first speech presents such arguments as might have been urged against the declaration of the independence of the Colonies, by a man of timid and desponding temperament; and the views of bolder and far-seeing statesmen are uttered by the lips of Mr. Adams. Many persons have supposed that the speech put into the mouth of Mr. Adams was really delivered by him, but this is not the case. It was written by Mr. Webster.

L

ET us pause! This step, once taken, cannot be retraced. This resolution, once passed, will cut off all hope of reconciliation. If success attend the arms of England, we shall then be no longer Colonies, with charters and with privileges; these will all be forfeited by this act; and we shall be in the condition of other conquered people, at the mercy of the conquerors.

For ourselves, we may be ready to run the hazard; but are we ready to carry the country to that length? Is success so probable as to justify it? Where is the military, where the naval power, by which we are to resist the whole strength of the arm of England; for she will exert that strength to the utmost? Can we rely on the constancy and perseverance of the people? or will they not act as the people of other countries have acted, and, wearied with a long war, submit, in the end, to a worse oppression? While we stand on our old ground and insist on redress of grievances, we know we are right and are not answerable for consequences. Nothing, then, can be imputed to us.

But if we now change our object, carry our pretensions further, and set up for absolute independence, we shall lose the sympathy of mankind. We shall no longer be defending what we possess, but struggling for something

which we never did possess, and which we have solemnly and uniformly disclaimed all intention of pursuing, from the very outset of the troubles. Abandoning thus our old ground, of resistance only to arbitrary acts of oppression, the nations will believe the whole to have been mere pretence, and they will look on us, not as injured, but as ambitious, subjects. I shudder before this responsibility.

It will be on us, if, relinquishing the ground we have stood on so long, and stood on so safely, we now proclaim independence, and carry on the war for that object, while these cities burn, these pleasant fields whiten and bleach with the bones of their owners, and these streams run blood. It will be upon us, it will be upon us, if, failing to maintain this unseasonable and ill-judged declaration, a sterner despotism, maintained by military power, shall be established over our posterity, when we ourselves, given up by an exhausted, a harassed, a misled people, shall have expiated our rashness and atoned for our presumption on the scaffold.

SIN

XXIII. MR. ADAMS'S REPLY.

INK or swim, live or die, survive or perish, I give my hand and my heart to this vote. It is true, indeed,

that in the beginning we aimed not at independence. But there's a divinity which shapes our ends. The injustice of England has driven us to arms; and, blinded to her own interest for our good, she has obstinately persisted, till independence is now within our grasp. We have but to reach forth to it, and it is ours. Why, then, should we defer the declaration?

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