[nc] {415} _And thine is that love which I will never forego_ _Though the price which I pay be Eternity's woe_.--[MS. erased] [nd] _One tear of thy sorrow, one smile_----.--[MS. erased] [308] [The "Caledonian Meeting," at which these lines were, or were intended to be, recited (see _Life_, p. 254), was a meeting of subscribers to the Highland Society, held annually in London, in support of the [Royal] _Caledonian Asylum_ "for educating and supporting children of soldiers, sailors, and marines, natives of Scotland." "To soothe," says the compiler of the _Report_ for 1814, p. 4, "by the assurance that their offspring will be reared in virtue and comfort, the minds of those brave men, through whose exposure to hardship and danger the independence of the Empire has been preserved, is no less an act of sound policy than of gratitude."] [309] {416} [As an instance of Scottish gallantry in the Peninsular War it is sufficient to cite the following list of "casualties" at the battle of Vittoria, June 21, 1813: "The battalion [the seventy-first Highland Light Infantry] suffered very severely, having had 1 field officer, 1 captain, 2 lieutenants, 6 sergeants, 1 bugler, and 78 rank and file killed; 1 field officer, 3 captains, 7 lieutenants, 13 sergeants, 2 buglers, and 255 rank and file were wounded."--_Historical Record of the 71st Highland Light Infantry_, by Lieut. Henry J. T. Hildyard, 1876, p. 91.] [310] [Compare _Temora_, bk. vii., "The king took his deathful spear, and struck the deeply-sounding shield.... Ghosts fled on every side, and rolled their gathered forms on the wind.--Thrice from the winding vale arose the voices of death."--_Works of Ossian_, 1765, ii. 160.] [311] {417} [The last six lines are printed from the MS.] [312] [Sir P. Parker fell in August, 1814, in his twenty-ninth year, whilst leading a party from his ship, the _Menelaus_, at the storming of the American camp near Baltimore. He was Byron's first cousin (his father, Christopher Parker (1761-1804), married Charlotte Augusta, daughter of Admiral the Hon. John Byron); but they had never met since boyhood. (See letter to Moore, _Letters_, 1899, iii. 150; see too _Letters_, i. 6, note 1.) The stanzas were included in _Hebrew Melodies_, 1815, and in the Ninth Edition of _Childe Harold_, 1818.] [313] [Compare Tasso's sonnet--"Questa Tomba non è, ehe non è morto," etc. _Rime Eroiche_, Parte Seconda, No. 38, _Opere di Torquato Tasso_, Venice, 1736, vi. 169.] [314] {419} [From an autograph MS. in the possession of Mr. Murray, now for the first time printed.] [ne] {421} 1. _The red light glows, the wassail flows_, _Around the royal hall;_ _And who, on earth, dare mar the mirth_ _Of that high festival?_ _The prophet dares--before thee glows_-- _Belshazzar rise, nor dare despise_ _The writing on the wall!_ 2.