VI.

And, 'What mockery or malice have we here?' cries Hervé Riel :

'Are you mad, you Malouins? Are you cowards, fools, or

rogues ?

Talk to me of rocks and shoals, me who took the soundings, tell

On my fingers every bank, every shallow, every swell

"Twixt the offing here and Grève where the river disembogues? Are you bought by English gold? Is it love the lying's for? Morn and eve, night and day,

Have I piloted your bay,

Entered free and anchored fast at the foot of Solidor.

Burn the fleet and ruin France? That were worse than fifty Hogues!

Sirs, they know I speak the truth! Sirs, believe me there's a way!

Only let me lead the line,

Have the biggest ship to steer,

Get this Formidable' clear,

Make the others follow mine,

And I lead them, most and least, by a passage I know well,

Right to Solidor past Grève,

And there lay them safe and sound;

And if one ship misbehave,

-Keel so much as grate the ground,

Why, I've nothing but my life,

here's my head!' cries Hervé

Riel.

VII.

Not a minute more to wait.

'Steer us in, then, small and great!

Take the helm, lead the line, save the squadron!' cries its

chief.

Captains, give the sailor place!

He is Admiral, in brief.

Still the north-wind, by God's grace!

See the noble fellow's face

As the big ship, with a bound,

Clears the entry like a hound,

Keeps the passage as its inch of way were the wide sea's profound!

See, safe thro' shoal and rock,

How they follow in a flock,

Not a ship that misbehaves, not a keel that grates the ground, Not a spar that comes to grief!

The peril, see, is past,

All are harboured to the last,

And just as Hervé Riel hollas' Anchor!'-sure as fate,
Up the English come, too late!

VIII.

So, the storm subsides to calm:

They see the green trees wave

On the heights o'erlooking Grève. Hearts that bled are stanched with balm.

'Just our rapture to enhance,

Let the English rake the bay,

Gnash their teeth and glare askance

As they cannonade away!

'Neath rampired Solidor pleasant riding on the Rance!' How hope succeeds despair on each Captain's countenance ! Out burst all with one accord,

This is Paradise for Hell!

Let France, let France's king,

Thank the man that did the thing!'

What a shout, and all one word,

'Hervé Riel!'

As he stepped in front once more,
Not a symptom of surprise,
In the frank blue Breton eyes,
Just the same man as before.

IX.

Then said Damfreville, 'My friend,
I must speak out at the end,

Though I find the speaking hard.
Praise is deeper than the lips :
You have saved the King his ships,
You must name your own reward.
'Faith, our sun was near eclipse!
Demand whate'er you will,

France remains your debtor still.

Ask to heart's content and have! or my name's not Damfreville.'

X.

Then a beam of fun outbroke
On the bearded mouth that spoke,
As the honest heart laughed through
Those frank eyes of Breton blue :

Since I needs must say my say,

Since on board the duty's done,

And from Malo Roads to Croisic Point, what is it but a

run ?—

Since 'tis ask and have, I may

Since the others go ashore

Come! A good whole holiday!

Leave to go and see my wife, whom I call the Belle Aurore!' That he asked and that he got,-nothing more.

Y

XI.

Name and deed alike are lost;

Not a pillar nor a post

In his Croisic keeps alive the feat as it befell;

Not a head in white and black

On a single fishing-smack,

In memory of the man but for whom had gone to wrack All that France saved from the fight whence England bore the bell.

Go to Paris: rank on rank

Search the heroes flung pell-mell

On the Louvre, face and flank!

You shall look long enough ere you come to Hervé Riel. So, for better and for worse,

Hervé Riel, accept my verse!

In my verse, Hervé Riel, do thou once more

Save the squadron, honour France, love thy wife the Belle

Aurore!

R. Browning.

TO BOLIVAR.

BUILD up a column to Bolivar!
Build it under a tropic star!

Build it high as his mounting fame!
Crown its head with his noble name!
Let the letters tell, like a light afar,
"This is the column of Bolivar!'

Soldier in war, in peace a man,
Did he not all that a hero can ?

Wasting his life for his country's care,
Laying it down with a patriot prayer,
Shedding his blood like the summer rain,
Loving the land, though he loved in vain!
Man is a creature, good or ill,

Little or great, at his own strong will;
And he grew good, and wise, and great,
Albeit he fought with a tyrant fate,
And showered his golden gifts on men,
Who paid him in basest wrongs again!

Raise the column to Bolivar!

Firm in peace, and fierce in war!
Shout forth his noble, noble name!
Shout, till his enemies die in shame!
Shout, till Columbia's woods awaken,
Like seas by a mighty tempest shaken-
Till pity and praise and great disdain,
Sound like an Indian hurricane!
Shout, as ye shout in conquering war,
While ye build the column to Bolivar!

B. Cornwall.

MEMORIAL VERSES.

(April, 1850.)

GOETHE in Weimar sleeps, and Greece, Long since, saw Byron's struggle cease. But one such death remained to come ; The last poetic voice is dumb

We stand to-day by Wordsworth's tomb.