Page:The Spirit of the Nation.djvu/74

62 At home, for ever in a savage mood,

His temper venom'd as his pois'nous blood.

In politics a brazen renegade,

With bigots leagu'd, his country to degrade;

First, in a foreign senate, to demand

The Saxon sword, to crush his native land;

Which ev'n their satrap with contempt denied,

Spurning the baseness of the parricide.

Again behold him impotent as vile,

Libelling our chief—the guardian of our isle,

A toothless viper mumbling at a file.

Next 'mid his tenants, see the Despot stand,

The grinding Shylock of a shuddering land—

Still on the watch, with law's deceitful mesh,

To extort his bond, and get his pound of flesh—

Even at the time that gave his Saviour birth,

Quenching the fire upon the poor man's hearth!

Ye, who would know his person and his life,

Look at his skin, and listen to his wife!—

His hapless wife, by brutal tyranny,

Driv'n to the pension-list and infamy—

His tainted skin, so loathsome to the eye,

That starv'd hyænas from its touch would fly—

Disgusting object! yet, does this impart

A feeble emblem of his fouler heart!

OF THE ORANGE OPERATIVE SOCIETY, ON HIS PROJECTED PEDESTRIAN CRUSADE.