ending crash--they topple--down they come--
A cloud of sparks--a feeble cheer--again!--and all is dumb.

A pause--as on that battle-day, 'twixt France and England's might,
When huge L'Orient blew up at once, in the hottest of the fight:
There was not one, they say, but wink'd, and held his breath
the while,
Though brave were they that fought that day with Nelson at the Nile.

And by to-morrow's sunrise, amid the steaming stones,
A chain of gold half-melted, and a few small white bones,
And a few rags of roasted flesh, alone shall show where died--
The noble and the beautiful, the baby and the bride!

O fire, he is a noble thing!--the sot's pipe gives him birth;
Or from the livid thunder-cloud he leaps alive on earth;
Or in the western wilderness devouring silently;
Or on the lava rocking in the womb of Stromboli.

Right well in Hamburg revell'd he--though Elbe ran rolling by--
He could have drain'd--so fierce his thirst--the mighty river dry!
With silk, and gold, and diamond, he cramm'd his hungry maw;
And he tamed the wild republicans, who knew nor lord nor law!

He feasted well in Moscow--in the city of the Tsar--
When 'fore the northern streamers paled Napoleon's lurid star:
Around the hoary Kremlin, where Moscow once had stood,
He pass'd, and left a heap behind, of ashes slaked in blood!

He feasted once in London--he feasted best of all--
When through the close-packed city, he swept from wall to wall:
Even as of old the wrath of God came down in fiery rain,
On Sodom and Gomorrha, on the Cities of the Plain!

* * * * *

POSITION AND PROSPECTS OF THE GOVERNMENT.

A recruited revenue; reviving trade and commerce; reduction in the
price of provisions; the triumphant termination of hostilities in all
parts of the world, with its great immediate prospective advantages: a
general feeling of confidence, arising from the steady administration
of public affairs, in spite of persevering and atrocious efforts to
excite dissatisfaction and alarm; nay, even the stern repose
prevailing in Ireland, preserved though it be, for a while, under
cover of artillery, and at the bayonet's point, but affording a
precious respite from agitation, and a foretaste of the blessings that
may be expected from its permanent suppression: all t