TO ARNDT.
Against the frauds of France did Europe rise
And seize the robber who had lost his way,
Blinded with blood; she threw him upon rocks
Where none but gulls wail’d over him; she heaved
(Well may the Muses blush to speak the word)
A tallow tub on her indignant breast,
And, midst her shrieks and writhings, the sword’s point
Graved on the foul bulk-head four letters, K.I.N.G.
’Twas at thy voice, O Arndt, that Europe rose,
England’s was weak, and’Germany’s was tuned
To theatres, and lower’d to ducal ears;
But thy loud clarion waked all living, waked
The dead to march among them. Prussia saw
Her warrior burst his covenants; Bluker strode
Aside the old man’s charger, even paced
Along the path where glory shines austere,
Shedding a dim but no uncertain light.
Cry out again, brave Arndt! cry out the words
Proclaim’d of old, “Learn justice! Be forewarn’d!”
And tell the princes of thy native land
That, sprung from robbers, they are robbers too:
Cry out, “Abstain! or forfeit crown and life!”
There is a nation high above the rest
In virtue and in valour we have wrong’d,
We Englishmen have wrong’d her, we her sons.
We owe her more than riches can repay
Or penitence or sympathy atone.
Let us at least the arms we seized restore
And drive the coward invader from her coast.
Arndt! thou art stronger than the strongest arm
That wields in Germany a patriot sword;
How much then stronger than whichever wields
One temper’d not by justice. ’Tis to thee
Alone, the greatest of God’s great, I call,
I, who alone can now be heard so far,
For (let me whisper) we have ribbon’d lute
And rural fiddle; trumpet we have none.
He who had bled for Wallace, at his side,
Lies with due honours; due, but long deferr’d;
He too, the great magician, multiform,
Who sang the fate of Marmion, and convoked
From every country all who shone most high
In arms or beauty, drain’d the bowl of grief
And sleeps! Another, his compatriot bard,
Whose thunder shook the Baltic and the Nile,
And stay’d the Danaw swol’n with ice and blood,
Lies... dead as Nelson... nor more dead than he.
Our richest fruits grew under northern skies;
We have no grafts; we have but twigs and leaves.
Up thou! burst boldly through the palace-gate,
Announce thy errand, bid a king be just,
So mayest thou, good Arndt, as heretofore
When first I claspt that guiding hand at Bonn,
Return with other laurels, and enjoy
Thy ripening orchard and domestic peace.