England And Hungary In 1849 Poem by Bessie Rayner Parkes

OH cruel England! standing coldly by,
While groans of human creatures rend the sky.
The mother's darling and the sister's pride,
And many a maid's betroth'd one, side by side,
Send up the stifled sob and heartsick moan
Which break the peace of God's eternal throne.

Low-thoughted England! since you could not feel
How dear to noble souls their country's weal,
Consider'd only in the fair aspect
Of rights which ask and which command respect;
How the soul needs her own peculiar bread,
And stricken honour bows the sturdiest head.
Were all material good to Hungary left,
And only this of her desires bereft,
Were only honour lost and mourn'd in vain,
Oh Hampden's England! you might feel that stain.

But not alone her patriot or sage
Weeps as he pores upon the sullied page
Which tells how Hungary to the heart was riven,
And the lost Pleiad shone no more in heaven.
O cursed prisons! festering where you stand
With that black misery which defiles a land!

Lo, far and wide, paternal homes deplore
The gay young feet which now return no more.
When households gather round at break of day,
And lips too sad to talk are fain to pray,
The mother, gazing in a mute despair,
Turns, sick and shuddering, from each empty chair.

Oh England! slow to speak the indignant word;
Oh England! sheathing an ungenerous sword;
Deaf to the voices you have call'd divine,
From each grey tomb you consecrate a shrine,
Which say, 'Before you dare your homage pay,
Do as we had done, had we liv'd to-day,
Nor make us mourn who bend on earth our pitying eyes,
Death binds our hands whose love for freedom never dies.'