Lord Byron (1788–1824). Poetry of Byron. 1881.
IV. SatiricA Stormed City
A
All that the body perpetrates of bad;
All that we read, hear, dream, of man’s distresses;
All that the devil would do if run stark mad;
All that defies the worst which pen expresses;
All by which hell is peopled, or as sad
As hell—mere mortals who their power abuse—
Was here (as heretofore and since) let loose.
Was shown, and some more noble heart broke through Its bloody bond, and saved, perhaps, some pretty Child, or an aged, helpless man or two— What’s this in one annihilated city, Where thousand loves, and ties, and duties grow? Cockneys of London! Muscadins of Paris! Just ponder what a pious pastime war is. Are purchased by all agonies and crimes: Or if these do not move you, don’t forget Such doom may be your own in after-times. Meantime the Taxes, Castlereagh, and Debt, Are hints as good as sermons, or as rhymes. Read your own hearts and Ireland’s present story, Then feed her famine fat with Wellesley’s glory. Which loves so well its country and its king, A subject of sublimest exultation— Bear it, ye Muses, on your brightest wing! Howe’er the mighty locust, Desolation, Strip your green fields, and to your harvests cling, Gaunt famine never shall approach the throne— Though Ireland starve, great George weighs twenty stone. There was an end of Ismail—hapless town! Far flash’d her burning towers o’er Danube’s stream, And redly ran his blushing waters down. The horrid war-whoop and the shriller scream Rose still; but fainter were the thunders grown: Of forty thousand who had mann’d the wall, Some hundreds breathed—the rest were silent all!