When my poor Greece was once, as now, sur rounded;

O Cæsar's Commentaries! now impart, ye
Shadows of glory (lest I be confounded,
A portion of your fading twilight hues,
So beautiful, so fleeting, to the Muse.

LXXXIII.

When I call "fading" martial immortality,
I mean that every age and every year,
And almost every day, in sad reality,
Some sucking hero is compell'd to rear,
Who, when we come to sum up the totality
Of deeds to human happiness most dear,
Turns out to be a butcher in great business,
Afflicting young folks with a sort of dizziness.
LXXXIV.

Medals, rank, ribands, lace, embroidery, scarlet,
Are things immortal to immortal man,
As purple to the Babylonian harlot :
An uniform to boys is like a fan

To women; there is scarce a crimson varlet
But deems himself the first in Glory's van.
But Glory's glory; and if you would find
What that is ask the pig who sees the wind!

OH, blood and thunder! and oh, blood and wounds!

These are but vulgar oaths, as you may deem, Too gentle reader; and most shocking sounds. Ard so they are: yet thus is Glory's dream Unriddled; and as my true Muse expounds

At present such things, since they are her theme,

So be they her inspirers! Call them Mars, Bellona, what you will-they mean but wars.