Ballads | Page 5

the gayest of all?Our beautiful city's gay places.
"Around it are gardens and flowers,?And the Cities of France on their thrones,?Each crown'd with his circlet of flowers?Sits watching this biggest of stones!?I love to go sit in the sun there,?The flowers and fountains to see,?And to think of the deeds that were done there?In the glorious year ninety-three.
"'Twas here stood the Altar of Freedom;?And though neither marble nor gilding?Was used in those days to adorn?Our simple republican building,?Corbleu! but the MERE GUILLOTINE?Cared little for splendor or show,?So you gave her an axe and a beam,?And a plank and a basket or so.
"Awful, and proud, and erect,?Here sat our republican goddess.?Each morning her table we deck'd?With dainty aristocrats' bodies.?The people each day flocked around?As she sat at her meat and her wine:?'Twas always the use of our nation?To witness the sovereign dine.
"Young virgins with fair golden tresses,?Old silver-hair'd prelates and priests,?Dukes, marquises, barons, princesses,?Were splendidly served at her feasts.?Ventrebleu! but we pamper'd our ogress?With the best that our nation could bring,?And dainty she grew in her progress,?And called for the head of a King!
"She called for the blood of our King,?And straight from his prison we drew him;?And to her with shouting we led him,?And took him, and bound him, and slew him.?'The monarchs of Europe against me?Have plotted a godless alliance?I'll fling them the head of King Louis,'?She said, 'as my gage of defiance.'
"I see him as now, for a moment,?Away from his jailers he broke;?And stood at the foot of the scaffold,?And linger'd, and fain would have spoke.?'Ho,drummer! quick! silence yon Capet,'?Says Santerre, 'with a beat of your drum.'?Lustily then did I tap it,?And the son of Saint Louis was dumb.
PART II.
"The glorious days of September?Saw many aristocrats fall;?'Twas then that our pikes drunk the blood?In the beautiful breast of Lamballe.?Pardi, 'twas a beautiful lady!?I seldom have looked on her like;?And I drumm'd for a gallant procession,?That marched with her head on a pike.
"Let's show the pale head to the Queen,?We said--she'll remember it well.?She looked from the bars of her prison,?And shriek'd as she saw it, and fell.?We set up a shout at her screaming,?We laugh'd at the fright she had shown?At the sight of the head of her minion;?How she'd tremble to part with her own.
"We had taken the head of King Capet,?We called for the blood of his wife;?Undaunted she came to the scaffold,?And bared her fair neck to the knife.?As she felt the foul fingers that touch'd her,?She shrunk, but she deigned not to speak:?She look'd with a royal disdain,?And died with a blush on her cheek!
"'Twas thus that our country was saved;?So told us the safety committee!?But psha! I've the heart of a soldier,?All gentleness, mercy, and pity.?I loathed to assist at such deeds,?And my drum beat its loudest of tunes?As we offered to justice offended?The blood of the bloody tribunes.
"Away with such foul recollections!?No more of the axe and the block;?I saw the last fight of the sections,?As they fell 'neath our guns at Saint Rock.?Young BONAPARTE led us that day;?When he sought the Italian frontier,?I follow'd my gallant young captain,?I follow'd him many a long year.
"We came to an army in rags,?Our general was but a boy?When we first saw the Austrian flags?Flaunt proud in the fields of Savoy.?In the glorious year ninety-six,?We march'd to the banks of the Po;?I carried my drum and my sticks,?And we laid the proud Austrian low.
"In triumph we enter'd Milan,?We seized on the Mantuan keys;?The troops of the Emperor ran,?And the Pope he tell down on his knees.--?Pierre's comrades here call'd a fresh bottle,?And clubbing together their wealth,?They drank to the Army of Italy,?And General Bonaparte's health.
The drummer now bared his old breast,?And show'd us a plenty of scars,?Rude presents that Fortune had made him,?In fifty victorious wars.?"This came when I follow'd bold Kleber--?'Twas shot by a Mameluke gun;?And this from an Austrian sabre,?When the field of Marengo was won.
"My forehead has many deep furrows,?But this is the deepest of all:?A Brunswicker made it at Jena,?Beside the fair river of Saal.?This cross, 'twas the Emperor gave it;?(God bless him!) it covers a blow;?I had it at Austerlitz fight,?As I beat on my drum in the snow.
"'Twas thus that we conquer'd and fought;?But wherefore continue the story??There's never a baby in France?But has heard of our chief and our glory,--?But has heard of our chief and our fame,?His sorrows and triumphs can tell,?How bravely Napoleon conquer'd,?How bravely and sadly he fell.
"It makes my old heart to beat higher,?To think of the deeds that I saw;?I follow'd bold Ney through the fire,?And charged at the side of Murat."?And so did old Peter continue?His story of twenty brave years;?His audience follow'd with comments--?Rude comments of curses and tears.
He told how the Prussians in vain?Had died in defence of their land;?His