And lighted up his faded face,

When, drifting in the gale, He with his telescope could catch, Far off, a coming sail : It was a music to his ear

To list the sea-mew's wail!

Oft would he tell how, under Smith,
Upon the Egyptian strand,
Eager to beat the boastful French,
They joined the men on land,

And plied their deadly shots, intrenched
Behind their bags of sand.

We missed him on our seaward walk;
The children went no more

To listen to his evening talk
Beside the cottage-door-
Grim palsy held him to the bed
Which health eschewed before.

"Twas harvest-time;-day after day Beheld him weaker grow; Day after day his labouring pulse Became more faint and slow; For in the chambers of his heart Life's fire was burning low.

They passed the Cronberg batteries,

To quell the Dane in fight,

His voice with vigour filled againHis veteran eye with light!

But chiefly of hot Trafalgar

The brave old man would speak;

And when he showed his oaken stump,

A glow suffused his cheek,

Till frail as frail could be;
But duly at the hour which brings

Homeward the bird and bee,

He made them prop him in his couch, To gaze upon the sea.

And now he watched the moving boat,
And now the moveless ships,

And now the western hills remote,
With gold upon their tips,

ACROSS the ocean's troubled breast
The base-born Norman came,
To win for his helm a kingly crest,
For his sons a kingly name;
And in his warlike band,
Came flashing fair and free

The brightest swords of his father's land,
With the pomp of its chivalry.

What doth the foe on England's field?

Why seeks he England's throne? Has she no chiefs her arms to wield, No warrior of her own?

But lo! in regal pride

Stern Harold comes again,

With the waving folds of his banner dyed
In the blood of the hostile Dane.

The song, the prayer, the feast were o'er,
The stars in heaven were pale,
And many a brow was bared once more
To meet the morning gale.
At length the sun's bright ray
Tinged the wide east with gold,
And the misty veil of the morning gray
Away from his forehead rolled.

And all along each crowded tract

His burning glance was thrown,
Till the polished armour sent him back
A lustre like his own.

Still flashed his silver sheen
Along the serried lines,

Where the deadly wood of spears was seen
To rise like forest-pines.

In either host was silence deep,

Save the falchion's casual ring,

When a sound arose like the first dread

sweep

Of the distant tempest's wing;
Then burst the clamour out,
Still maddening more and more,

Till the air grew troubled with the shout,
As it is at the thunder's roar.

The island phalanx firmly trod

On paths all red with gore;

For the blood of their bravest stained the sod
They proudly spurned before.
But close and closer still

They plied them blow for blow,
Till the deadly stroke of the Saxon bill
Cut loose the Norman bow.

And the stubborn foemen turned to flee,
With the Saxons on their rear,

Like hounds when they lightly cross the lea
To spring on the fallow-deer.

Each war-axe gleaming bright
Made havoc in its sway;

But in the mingled chase and flight
They lost their firm array.

From a mounted band of the Norman's best
A vengeful cry arose;

Their lances long were in the rest,

And they dashed upon their foes-
On, on, in wild career:

Alas for England, then,

When the furious thrust of the horsemen's

spear

Bore back the Kentish men!

They bore them back, that desperate band, Despite of helm or shield;

And the corslet bright and the gory brand
Lay strewed on the battle-field.

Fierce flashed the Norman's steel,
Though soiled by many a stain,
And the iron tread of his courser's heel
Crushed down the prostrate slain.

But still for life the Saxons ply,

In hope, or in despair,

And their frantic leader's rallying cry
Rings in the noontide air.

He toils; but toils in vain!

The fatal arrow flies,

The iron point has pierced his brain-
The island monarch dies.

The sounds of the dismal tale;

And many a cheek is pale.

The victor's fears are past,

The golden spoil is won,

And England's tears are flowing fast In grief for England's son.

M'DOUGALL