Iberia Won 30
XXVIII.
From every quarter sweeps an iron shower--
Cannon and musketry in front and rear--
From nearest horn and distant fort and tower,
From rampart, bastion, curtain, cavalier.
Up, up the breach they climb and laugh at fear!
The summit’s gained--it seems the verge of Hell--
A gulf impassable! Live thunder near
Leaps forth from guns whose momentary knell
Rings for the brave who fall where late they stood so well.
XXIX.
Still swarms the fiery brink. Who now will dare
Leap the dire chasm--who like Empedocles
Will plunge into the Ætna flaming there,
And be esteemed a God? Who to appease
Hesperia’s manes, like the youth who sees
The barathrum profound i’ the Forum yawn,
Spurs his strong courser, is engulfed, and frees
Great Rome--who now, by patriot impulse drawn,
Will sound that fell abyss, and haste fair Freedom’s dawn?
XXX.
Oh frightful precipice! Full many an eye
Glares on its horrid depth and back recoils.
Madly to plunge were hopelessly to die,
Or torn and shattered fall into the toils.
Even lingering here is death! As rankest soils
Are strown with richest growths, the valiant strew
That gory Scylla’s crest. Charybdis boils
With vortex under. What may heroes do?
Advance? In vain. Recede? No, Britons’ hearts be true!
XXXI.
Up climbs a multitude of strenuous men,
Who thick as forest-leaves autumnal fall,
So keen for entrance to the lion’s den,
Not death at every footstep can appal!
Sore doth that storm of fire their valour gall,
And slowly with reluctant pride they sink,
Till stubborn planted on the lower wall
They stand beneath the fiery torrent’s brink,
While ever and anon their chain doth lose a link.
XXXII.
Thrice to the deadly summit of the breach
Did Morton rush, and thrice was backward borne,
Like mariner that, dashed on stormy beach,
Swayed by the surge against the cliffs is torn.
But nought could drown unconquerable scorn
Of death in that young hero. Up once more
He rushed to the crest, and fell. Young Blanca, mourn!
Thy lover’s heart is pierced, he totters o’er,
And falls ’mid heaps of slain--his dirge the artillery’s roar:--
The Rally.
1.
As a torrent that bounds
From its mountainous dwelling
Obstruction but chafes
Into foamier swelling;
As snorts the wild bull
Whom the banderils pierce,
So the death-scattered breach
Makes the phalanx more fierce!
2.
Each shower that is cast
From the foemen’s fell cannon
But makes the assault
To lift prouder its pennon.
Each shaft from the walls
Gives to Valour new wings;
O’er each hero that falls
See, a new hero springs!
3.
There is that to be done
At which nations shall wonder;
The scarp shall be our’s,
Although tenfold its thunder;
In spite of wide Earth,
And in spite of deep Hell.
Where a Briton resolved,
Could a Gaul ever quell?
4.
Come, cannon and musquet,
Rain grapeshot and mortar!
We laugh at the rattling,
We ask for no quarter.
By the breach shall we climb
To yon turret-clad town,
And the tricolor tear
From the cavalier down!
5.
On the death-dealing fort
Shall we plant our proud standard.
Was red-coat e’er seen,
Who to cowardice pandered?
Each traverse we’ll cross
With invincible steel.
Then swift to your knees,
Or the bayonet feel!
6.
See, see the breach strewn
With our corses all gory.
’Tis but the first crop
In the harvest of glory!
Sebastian is our’s,
Though it rain shot and shell.
Where a Briton resolved,
Could a Gaul ever quell?
XXXIII.
What stream is poured afresh? new Volunteers!
They come, impetuous as the Pampas steed,
Dash o’er the strand and trample craven fears,
Fly up the breach where thick-strewn heroes bleed.
They reach the crest. In vain! Snapt like a reed
Is many an oak of war. The valorous surge
Is spent in its vain fury, like seaweed
Each quivering corse depositing. Yet urge
The living on, though fire their ranks incessant scourge.
XXXIV.
Thus swarm i’ the summer ray o’er parchéd ground
Unnumbered emmets toiling onward straight.
Vain is the wrath that slays and strews around;
Unslack’d their zeal, uncheck’d their war with fate.
New myriads crowd each instant, even while wait
Unpitying feet to tread them into dust,
Indomitable. To small thus likened great,
Men swarm to the breach, and glut the gory lust
Of sternest foe, yet stand, true to their country’s trust.
XXXV.
And all--must all be slaughtered? Lord of Hosts!
Must this great valour be a Holocaust?
Must men like oxen perish at their posts,
And all the guerdon of their daring lost?
Still do they mount and slow receding, crost
Their dream of triumph, totter, sink, and fall.
Even won the prize, how terrible the cost!
The victory-flag to thousands were a pall.
Oh Lord of Hosts, arise, or butchery smites them all!
XXXVI.
With blood-red arms see Carnage, screaming hag,
Gloat o’er each gash that lets the life away,
Plash through the crimson stream, and curse if lag
The shower of death-bolts darkening bright mid-day.
See sopt her hands in gore, see ’mid the fray
Where burst her eyes from forth her grisly head,
In rapture that such numbers slaughtered lay:
While reek her tangled tresses, see her fed
On dying groans, astride like Nightmare on the dead!
HISTORICAL AND ILLUSTRATIVE NOTES TO CANTO V.
In the account of the Storming of San Sebastian, which occupies
this and part of the next Canto, I follow chiefly Napier’s
_History_, book xxii. chap. 2. The part which I assign to Nial in
leading the false assault on the night of the 29th of August was in
reality undertaken and bravely executed by Lieutenant Mc Adam of
the 9th regiment. As stated in my text, the leader was the only one
of the entire party that returned alive! The storming took place
on the morning of the 31st August, 1813. The leader, Lieutenant
Maguire of the 4th regiment (whose name I have restored to its
antique Celto-Irish form, “Mac Iar”) was struck down precisely as
described in my text. (See Napier.) The following account is from Gleig’s _Subaltern_:
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