He shook the fragment of his blade,
And shouted "Victory!"-
"Charge, Chester, charge!-On, Stanley, on!"
Were the last words of Marmion.
Scott's Marmion.
His hand still strained the broken brand;
His arms were smeared with blood and sand.
Scott's Marmion.
All in the castle were at rest;
When sudden on the windows shone
A lightning flash, just seen and gone!
A shot is heard-again the flame
Flashed thick and fast-a volley came!
Then echoed wildly, from within,
Of shout and scream the mingled din,
And weapon clash, and maddening cry,
Of those who kill and those who die!
As filled the hall with sulphurous smoke,
More red, more dark, the death-flash broke,
And forms were on the lattice cast,
That struck, or struggled, as they past.
Each looked to sun, and stream, and plain,
As what they ne'er might see again;
Then, foot, and point, and eye opposed,
In dubious strife they darkly closed.
Scott's Lady of the Lake.
The combat deepens. On, ye brave,
Who rush to glory, or the grave!
Wave, Munich! all thy banners wave!
And charge with all thy chivalry!
Few, few, shall part where many meet!
The snow shall be their winding-sheet,
And every turf beneath their feet
Shall be a soldier's sepulchre.
Campbell's Hohenlinden. Our bugles sang truce-for the night-cloud had
And the centinel stars set their watch in the sky; And thousands had sunk on the ground overpower'd,
The weary to sleep and the wounded to die.
Campbell's Soldier's Dream.
Twice hath the sun upon their conflict set,
And risen again, and found them grappling yet;
While steams of carnage, in his noon-tide blaze,
Smoke
up to heav'n.
Moore's Lalla Rookh.
Did ye not hear it?-No: 't was but the wind,
Or the car rattling o'er the stony street;
On with the dance! let joy be unconfined;
No sleep till morn, when youth and pleasure meet
To chase the glowing hours with flying feet.—
But hark! that heavy sound breaks in once
As if the clouds its echo would repeat;
And nearer, clearer, deadlier than before!
Arm! arm! it is-it is-the cannon's opening
roar !
Byron's Childe Harold.
By heaven! it is a splendid sight to see
Scott's Rokeby. (For one who hath no friend, no brother there)
Their rival scarfs of mix'd embroidery,
Their various arms that glitter in the air!
What gallant war-hounds rouse them from their
And O! amid that waste of life,
What various motives fired the strife!
The aspiring noble bled for fame,
The patriot for his country's claim,
This knight his youthful strength to prove,
And that to win his lady's love.
And gnash their fangs, loud yelling for the prey!
All join the chase, but few the triumph share;
Scott's Lord of the Isles. The grave shall bear the chiefest prize away,
And havoc scarce for joy can number their array.
Byron's Childe Harold.
Impetuous, active, fierce, and young,
Upon the advancing foes he sprung.
Woe to the wretch at whom is bent
Ilis brandish'd faulchion's sheer descent.
His back against a rock he bore,
And firmly placed his foot before :-
"Come one, come all! this rock shall fly
From its firm base as soon as I."
Scott's Lady of the Lake.
Hand to hand and foot to foot:
Nothing there, save death, was mute;
Stroke and thrust, and flash and cry
For quarter or for victory
Mingle there with the volleying thunder.
The fight was o'er, the flashing through the gloom,
Which robes the cannon as he wings a tomb,
Had ceased; and sulphury vapours upward driven
Had left the earth, and but polluted heaven.
Byron's Island
Byron's Siege of Corinth.-Ay, now the soul of battle is abroad,
one-to break the circling host!" It burns upon the air!-The joyous winds
Are tossing warrior plumes, the proud white foam
Of battle's roaring billows!
They form —unite-charge-waver -all is lost!
Within a narrow ring compressed, beset,
Hopeless, not heartless, strive and struggle yet,-
Ah! now they fight in firmest file no more,
Hemmed in-cut off-cleft down-and tram.
pled o'er,
But each strikes singly, silently, and home,
And sinks outwearied rather than o'ercome,
His last faint quittance rendering with his breath,
Till the blade glimmers in the grasp of death.
Byron's Corsair.
No dread of death-if with us die our foes-
Save that it seems even duller than repose:
Come when it will-
-we snatch the life of life-
When lost-what recks it-by disease or strife.
Byron's Corsair.
And one enormous shout of "Allah!" rose
In the same moment, loud as even the roar
Of war's most mortal engines, to their foes
Hurling defiance: city, stream, and shore
Resounded "Allah!"-and the clouds which close
With thick'ning canopy the conflict o'er,
Vibrate to the eternal name. Hark! through
All sounds it pierceth, "Allah! Allah! Hu!"
Byron's Don Juan.
Here pause we for the present-as even then
That awful pause, dividing life from death,
Struck for an instant on the hearts of men,
In the mid-waves of combat, as they bear
Chargers and spearmen onwards; and to make
A reckless bosom's front the buoyant mark,
On that wild current, for ten thousand sorrows;
If thus to dare were valour's noblest aim,
Lightly might fame be won!
He battles heart and arm, his own blue sky
Above him, and his own green land around.
In the world's broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of life,
Be not like dumb driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!
Then said the mother to her son,
And pointed to his shield-
"Come with it, when the battle's done,
Or on it, from the field."
Our fathers live, they guard in glory still
The grass-grown bastions of the fortress'd hill
Still ring the echoes of the trampled gorge
To God and Freedom! England and St. George!
The royal cipher on the captured gun
Thousands of whom were drawing their last Mocks the sharp night-dews and the blistering sun!
A moment, and all will be life again!
The march!--the charge!-the shouts of either Point to the summits where the brave had bled,
Where every village claims its glorious dead;
Say, where their bosoms met the bayonet's shock,
Their only corslet was the rustic frock;
Say, when they mustered to the gathering horn,
The titled chieftain curled his lip in scorn;
Yet, when their leader bade his lines advance,
Say, when they fainted in their forced retreat,
No musket wavered in the lion's glance;
They tracked the snow-drifts with their bleeding
feet;
Yet still their banners, tossing in the blast,
Bore Ever Ready, faithful to the last,
Through storm and battle, till they waved agam
On Yorktown's hills and Saratoga's plain.
O. W. Holmes
Nought under heaven so strongly doth allure
The sense of man, and all his mind possess,
As beauty's lovely bait, that doth procure
Great warriors oft their rigour to repress;
And mighty hands forget their manliness,
Drawn with the power of an heart-robbing eye,
And wrapt in fetters of a golden tress,
That can with melting pleasaunce mollify
Their harden'd hearts, enur'd to blood and cruelty.
Spenser's Fairy Queen.
For sure of all that in this mortal frame
Contained is, nought more divine doth seem,
Or that resembleth more th' immortal flame
Of heavenly light, than beauty's glorious beam.
What wonder then if with such rage extreme
Frail men, whose eyes seek heavenly things to see,
At sight thereof so much enravish'd be?
For beauty is the bait which, with delight,
Doth man allure, for to enlarge his kind;
Beauty, the burning lamp of heaven's light,
Darting her beams into each feeble mind,
Against whose power nor god nor man can find
Defence, reward the daunger of the wound;
But, being hurt, seek to be medicin'd
Of her that first did stir that mortal stownd.
Ye tradeful merchants! that with weary toil
Do seek most precious things to make your gaine,
And both the Indies of their treasures spoil;
What needeth you to seek so far in vain ?
For lo! my love doth in herself contain
All this world's riches that may far be found;
If saphyrs, lo! her eyes be saphyrs plain;
If rubies, lo! her lips be rubies sound;
If pearls, her teeth be pearls, both pure and round, If ivory, her forehead ivory ween;
If gold, her locks are finest gold on ground;
If silver, her fair hands are silver sheen:
But that which fairest is, but few behold,
Her mind, adorn'd with vertues manifold.
Her looks were like beams of the morning sun,
Forth-looking through the windows of the east,
When first the fleecie cattle have begun
Upon the pearled grass to make their feast.
The fairness of her face no tongue can tell,
For she the daughters of all wemen's race,
And angels eke, in beautie doth excell,
Sparkled on her from God's own glorious face,
And more increast by her own goodly grace,
That it doth far exceed all human thought,
Ne can on earth compared be to aught.
Spenser's Hymne of Heavenly Beautie
For she was full of amiable grace,
And manly terror mixed therewith all;
That as the one stirr'd up affections base,
So th' other did men's rash desires appall,
And hold them backe, that would in error fall:
As he that hath espied a virmill rose,
To which sharpe thornes and breeres the way forstall,
Dare not for dread his hardy hand expose,
But wishing it farr off his ydle wish doth lose.
Spenser's Fairy Queen.
Her sacred beauty hath enchanted heav'n,
And, had she liv'd before the siege of Troy,
Helen, whose beauty summon'd Greece to arms,
And drew a thousand ships to Tenedos,
Had not been nam'd in Homer's Iliad;
Her name had been in every line he wrote.
Marlo's Tamberlane the Great.
Beauty's a slipp'ry good, which decreaseth
Whilst it is increasing resembling the
Medlar, which, in the moment of his full
Ripeness, is known to be in a rottenness.
Whilst you look in the glass, it waxeth old
With time; if on the sun, parched with heat; if
On the wind, blasted with cold. A great care
To keep it, a short space to enjoy it,
A sudden time to lose it.
Why did the gods give thee a heavenly form,
And earthly thoughts to make thee proud of it?
Why do I ask? "Tis now the known disease
That beauty hath, to bear too deep a sense
Of her own self-conceived excellence.
Jonson's Cynthia's Revels.
So fair, that had you beauty's picture took,
It must like her, or not like beauty look.
Aleyn's Henry VII.
What greater torment ever could have been,
Than to enforce the fair to live retir'd?
For what is beauty if it be not seen?
Or what is 't to be seen-if not admir'd?
And though admir'd, unless in love desir'd?
Never were cheeks of roses, locks of amber,
Ordain'd to live imprison'd in a chamber.
Nature created beauty for the view,
(Like as the fire for heat, the sun for light:)
The fair do hold this privilege as due,
By ancient charter, to live most in sight,
And she that is debarr'd it, hath not right.
In vain our friends from this do us dehort,
For beauty will be where is most resort.
Daniel's Rosamund.
Beauty, sweet love, is like the morning dew,
Whose short refresh upon the tender green,
Cheers for a time, but till the sun doth show;
And straight is gone, as it had never been.
Nature was here so lavish of her store,
That she bestow'd until she had no more;
Whose treasure being weaken'd by this dame,
She thrusts into the world so many lame.
Brown's Pastorals.
Beauty, my lord, 'tis the worst part of woman,
A weak poor thing, assaulted ev'ry hour
By creeping minutes of defacing time
A superficies, which each breath of care
Blasts off; and ev'ry hum'rous stream of grief,
Which flows from forth these fountains of our eyes,
Washeth away, as rain doth winter's snow.
Goffe's Courageous Turk.
I long not for the cherries on the tree,
So much as those which on a lip I see.
And more affection bear I to the rose,
That in a cheek, than in a garden grows.
In her face, but is a copious theme,
Which would, discours'd at large of, make a
volume.
What clear arch'd brows! what sparkling eyes!
the lilies
Contending with the roses in her cheeks,
Who shall most set them off. What ruby lips!
Or unto what can I compare her neck,
But to a rock of crystal? Every limb
Proportion'd to love's wish, and in their neatness
Add lustre to the richness of her habit,
Not borrow'd from it.
No autumn, nor no age ever approach
This heavenly piece, which nature having wrought,
She lost her needle, and did then despair
Ever to work so lively and so fair.
Massinger and Field's Fatal Dowry.
Do not idolatrize; beauty's a flow'r,
Which springs and withers almost in an hour.
William Smith's Hector of Germany.
Of beauty there, and wonder without spectacles,
Write volumes of your praise, and tell the world
How envious diamonds, 'cause they could not
Reach to the lustre of your eyes, dissolv'd
To angry tears; the roses droop, and gath'ring
Their leaves together, seem to chide their blushes
That they must yield your cheek the victory:
The lilies when they're censur'd for comparing
With your more clear and native purity,
Want white to do their penance in.
Heav'n meant that beauty, nature's greatest force,
Having exceeding pow'r, should have remorse;
Valour, and it, the world should so enjoy,
As both might overcome, but not destroy.
Lord Orrery's Henry V.
My beauty, though but mean,
Needs not the painted flourish of your praise:
Beauty is bought by judgment of the eye,
Not utter'd by base sale of chapmen's tongues.
Shaks. Love's Labour Lost.
O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!
It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear:
Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear!
Shaks. Romeo and Juliet.
Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale
Her infinite variety: other women cloy
The appetites they feed; but she makes hungry,
Where most she satisfies.
Shaks. Antony and Cleopatra.
Beauty is a witch,
Against whose charms faith melteth into blood.
Shaks. Much Ado
"Tis beauty truly blent, whose red and white
Nature's own sweet and cunning hand laid on.
Shaks. Twelfth Night
Beauty is but a vain and doubtful good,
A shining gloss that fadeth suddenly,
A flower that dies when first it 'gins to bud,
A brittle glass that's broken presently:
A doubtful good, a gloss, a glass, a flower,
Lost, faded, broken, dead with an hour.
Give me a look, give me a face.
That makes simplicity a grace
Robes loosely flowing, hair as free!
Such sweet neglect more taketh me,
Than all the adulteries of art;
That strike mine eyes but not my heart.
Beauty is nature's coin, must not be hoarded,
But must be current, and the good thereof
Consists in mutual and partaken bliss,
Unsavoury in th' enjoyment of itself:
If you let slip time, like a neglected rose,
It withers on the stalk with languish'd head.
Milton's Comus.
Beauty, like the fair Hesperian tree,
Laden with blooming gold, had need the guard
Of dragon watch with unenchanted eye,
To save her blossoms and defend her fruit
From the rash hand of bold incontinence.
With goddess-like demeanour forth she went,
Not unattended, for on her as queen
A pomp of winning graces waited still,
And from about her shot darts of desire
Into all eyes to wish her still in sight.
Milton's Paradise Lost.
Grace
was in all her steps, heav'n in her eye,
In ev'ry gesture dignity and love.
Her loveliness, so absolute she seems,
And in herself complete, so well to know
Her own,
that what she wills to do or say,
Sceins wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best,
All higher knowledge in her presence falls
Degraded, wisdom in discourse with her
Loses discount'nanc'd, and like folly shows.
Milton's Paradise Lost.
Angelic, but more soft and feminine,
Her graceful innocence, her every air
Of gesture or least action overaw'd
His malice, and with rapine sweet bereav'd
His fierceness of the fierce intent it brought.
Milton's Paradise Lost.
She seizes hearts, not waiting for consent,
Like sudden death, that snatches, unprepared;
Like fire from heaven, scarce seen so soon as felt.
Lansdown's Heroic Love.
O fatal beauty! why art thou bestow'd
On hapless woman still to make her wretched!
Iseray'd by thee, how many are undone !
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Her eyes, her lips, her cheeks, her shapes, her features,
Seem to be drawn by love's own hand; by love Himself in love.
Dryden's Love Triumphant. One who would change the worship of all climates, And make a new religion where'er she comes, Unite the differing faiths of all the world, To idolize her face.
Dryden's Love Triumphant. A native grace Sat fair proportion'd on her polish'd limbs, Veil'd in a simple robe, their best attire, Beyond the pomp of dress: for loveliness Needs not the foreign aid of ornament, But is, when unadorn'd, adorn'd the most. Thomson's Seasons.
Her form was fresher than the morning rose, When the dew wets its leaves; unstain'd, and pure, As is the lily, or the mountain snow.
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