from Canto VIII

121

In the mean time, cross-legged, with great sang froid,
     Among the scorching ruins he sat smoking
Tobacco on a little carpet;—Troy
     Saw nothing like the scene around;—yet looking
With martial stoicism, nought seemed to annoy
     His stern philosophy; but gently stroking
His beard, he puffed his pipe’s ambrosial gales,
As if he had three lives as well as tails.

122

The town was taken—whether he might yield
     Himself or bastion, little mattered now;
His stubborn valour was no future shield.
     Ismail’s no more! The crescent’s silver bow
Sunk, and the crimson cross glared o’er the field,
     But red with no redeeming gore: the glow
Of burning streets, like moonlight on the water,
Was imaged back in blood, the sea of slaughter.

123

All that the mind would shrink from of excesses;
    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.

124

If here and there some transient trait of pity
     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:

125

Think how the joys of reading a Gazette
     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.

126

But still there is unto a patriot nation,
     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.

127

But let me put an end unto my theme:
     There was an end of Ismail—hapless town!
Far flashed 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 manned the wall,
Some hundreds breathed—the rest were silent all!

128

In one thing ne’ertheless ‘tis fit to praise
     The Russian army upon this occasion,
A virtue much in fashion now-a-days,
     And therefore worthy of commemoration:
The topic’s tender, so shall be my phrase—
     Perhaps the season’s chill, and their long station
In winter’s depth, or want of rest and victual,
Had made them chaste;—they ravished very little.

129

Much did they slay, more plunder, and no less
     Might here and there occur some violation
In the other line;—but not to such excess
     As when the French, that dissipated nation,
Take towns by storm: no causes can I guess,
    Except cold weather and commiseration;
But all the ladies, save some twenty score,
Were almost as much virgins as before.

130

Some odd mistakes too happened in the dark,
    Which showed a want of lanthorns, or of taste—
Indeed the smoke was such they scarce could mark
     Their friends from foes,—besides such things from haste
Occur, though rarely, when there is a spark
    Of light to save the venerably chaste:—
But six old damsels, each of seventy years,
Were all deflowered by different Grenadiers.