And there was mounting in hot haste--the steed, The mustering squadron, and the clattering car, Went pouring forward with impetuous speed, And swiftly forming in the ranks of war,-- And the deep thunder peal on peal afar; And near, the beat of the alarming drum Roused up the soldier ere the morning star; While thronged the citizens with terror dumb, Or whispering, with white lips--‘The foe! They come! they come!’ And wild and high the ‘Camerons’ Gathering’ rose! The war-note of Lochiel, which Albyn’s hills Have heard, and heard, too, have her Saxon foes:-- How in the noon of night that pibroch thrills, Savage and shrill! But with the breath which fills Their mountain-pipe, so fill the mountaineers With the fierce native daring which instils The stirring memory of a thousand years, And Evan’s--Donald’s fame rings in each clansman’s ears! And Ardennes waves above them her green leaves, Dewy with Nature’s tear-drops, as they pass-- Grieving, if aught inanimate e’er grieves, Over the unreturning brave,--alas! Ere evening to be trodden like the grass Which now beneath them, but above shall grow In its next verdure, when this fiery mass Of living valour rolling on the foe, And burning with high hope, shall moulder cold and low. Last noon beheld them full of lusty life;-- Last eve in Beauty’s circle proudly gay; The midnight brought the signal-sound of strife, The morn the marshalling in arms,--the day Battle’s magnificently-stern array! The thunder-clouds close o’er it, which when rent The earth is covered thick with other clay, Which her own clay shall cover, heaped and pent, Rider and horse,--friend--foe,--in one red burial blent! _Lord Byron._ WOLFE LII THE BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note, As his corse to the ramparts we hurried; Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot O’er the grave where our hero we buried. We buried him darkly at dead of night, The sods with our bayonets turning, By the struggling moonbeam’s misty light, And the lantern dimly burning. No useless coffin enclosed his breast, Nor in sheet nor in shroud we wound him; But he lay like a warrior taking his rest With his martial cloak around him. Few and short were the prayers we said, And we spoke not a word of sorrow; But we steadfastly gazed on the face of the dead, And we bitterly thought of the morrow. We thought, as we hollowed his narrow bed And smoothed down his lonely pillow, How the foe and the stranger would tread o’er his head, And we far away on the billow! Lightly they’ll talk of the spirit that’s gone, And o’er his cold ashes upbraid him, But little he’ll reck, if they let him sleep on In the grave where a Briton has laid him.