But all unconscious of the coming doom, The feast, the song, the revel here abounds; Strange modes of merriment the hours consume, Nor bleed these patriots with their country's wounds; Nor here War's clarion, but Love's rebeck sounds; Here Folly still his votaries enthralls, And young-eyed Lewdness walks her midnight rounds: Girt with the silent crimes of capitals, Still to the last kind Vice clings to the tottering walls. XLVII. Not so the rustic: with his trembling mate He lurks, nor casts his heavy eye afar, Lest he should view his vineyard desolate, Blasted below the dun hot breath of war. No more beneath soft Eve's consenting star Fandango twirls his jocund castanet: Ah, monarchs! could ye taste the mirth ye mar, Not in the toils of Glory would ye fret; The hoarse dull drum would sleep, and Man be happy yet. XLVIII. How carols now the lusty muleteer? Of love, romance, devotion is his lay, As whilome he was wont the leagues to cheer, His quick bells wildly jingling on the way? No! as he speeds, he chants 'Viva el Rey!' And checks his song to execrate Godoy, The royal wittol Charles, and curse the day When first Spain's queen beheld the black-eyed boy, And gore-faced Treason sprung from her adulterate joy. XLIX. On yon long level plain, at distance crowned With crags, whereon those Moorish turrets rest, Wide scattered hoof-marks dint the wounded ground; And, scathed by fire, the greensward's darkened vest Tells that the foe was Andalusia's guest: Here was the camp, the watch-flame, and the host, Here the brave peasant stormed the dragon's nest; Still does he mark it with triumphant boast, And points to yonder cliffs, which oft were won and lost. L. And whomsoe'er along the path you meet Bears in his cap the badge of crimson hue, Which tells you whom to shun and whom to greet: Woe to the man that walks in public view Without of loyalty this token true: Sharp is the knife, and sudden is the stroke; And sorely would the Gallic foemen rue, If subtle poniards, wrapt beneath the cloak, Could blunt the sabre's edge, or clear the cannon's smoke. LI. At every turn Morena's dusky height Sustains aloft the battery's iron load; And, far as mortal eye can compass sight, The mountain-howitzer, the broken road, The bristling palisade, the fosse o'erflowed, The stationed bands, the never-vacant watch, The magazine in rocky durance stowed, The holstered steed beneath the shed of thatch, The ball-piled pyramid, the ever-blazing match, LII.