Classic Poem

Not fair Urania's aid I now beseech;
Some sterner Muse should come to shape my speech —
Some nymph with less of heaven in her mould
Should fire my thoughts, and make my stanzas bold!
O Stephen Brown! thou dim nonentity —
I gladly dedicate this song to thee!
What though thy name is nothing and thy head
Is like a lighthouse when the light is dead —
What though thy leisured moments — hours of ease —
Are spent in reckoning costs and counting fees —
What though the sleek attorney in thy shout
Glares forth like " shady " linen hanging out,
Who knows but that with all thy froth and fudge,
Some ass in power may make thee yet a Judge!
Ah! in that day when thou hast leave to don
The wig, and put the awful ermine on —
If such a day should come — do not forget
Thy humble bard! by Jove, I'll fatten yet!

Now to the bitter theme a while delayed
By admiration for the Pitt-street blade: —
O ye, whose hearths and homes are in the land
Where Wentworth shone, and Lowe, and William Bland —
Where, in the lordly elder days, the fight
Was waged for Freedom's large and liberal light —
Where, side by side, such fathers fought as him
At whose pure name the patriot's eyes grow dim —
The noble Forbes, who risked his all to save
An infant nation from a shameful grave —
Where radiant Richard Windeyer struggled on
(The shining father of a shambling son) —
O ye, who live where all these elders drew
The sword and toiled away their lives for you,
What drug hath passed your lips — what potion sealed
Your eyes, ye human cattle of the field?
Here in the land that rang with words august,
What subtle fiend has blinded you with dust?
Say have you by your conduct justified
The trust of old that looked to you with pride?
Can those whose grand grey heads are as a dream
Upon your present councils look and beam?
Ah, no indeed! From gleaming halls of Morn
Their glances fall: their high-exalted scorn.
Is yonder butcher with the faithless face
A proper man to sit in Thomson's place?
Is Hoskins, Murrumbidgee whaler, say,
A fit successor to the seat of Hay?
Where governed Arnold of the virile days,
What ass is this that sets its ears and brays?
Is feeble little William Windeyer fit
To grace the seat where Martin used to sit?
Are these the sort of men — and such as these —
To lift the State and shape the best decrees?
Are those that follow at their heels the band
To shed a living lustre on the land?
O hide for shame, ye foolish ones, and blind,
Who made a ruler of a bag of wind!
Who placed your freedom in the reach of sharks,
And fell from Pericles to — Henry Parkes!
Great statesman this! the upstart of a day
To dare to say what Bismarck would not say!
Pure patriot he who, with his motley crew,
Was fain to do what Draco would not do!
Fair leader this, who recently has tried
Across the neck of English rights to ride!
Is this your model ruler? — turn and shout,
Ye boobies, while I trot your idol out!
Here is the man who on an evil date
Was pitchforked hither through the devil's gate —
Who crouched for years outside the social pale
Nor showed his hoof, nor advertised his tail —
Whose cunning seized upon the earliest chance
When men were fooled by blatant utterance —
Who crept to power in his peculiar mode
And stuck at nothing on the nasty road —
Who ran with every wind, and gained his ends
By buying foes and sacrificing friends!
Is this your model ruler — yokels say?
Ah, hide your faces — turn and hide away!
Lo, here is he who tried to set his foot
On Freedom's flower and crush it leaf and root!
Who made a wild attempt to overreach
And kill that right august — our right of speech!
Who sought to quench the noble light that beams,
And shows him as he is — not as he seems !
A wretched flunkey in a " ducal " dress —
He bridle Liberty — he gag the Press!
He put it out — the fine imperial flame,
And make an English-speaking people tame!
A thing like him — a mushroom of the mire —
Is he the one to cope with lordly-fire?
You know he is not, and you also know
The littleness of him ye worshipped so!
The scales have fallen; and the day is nigh
When you will stamp him out — this living lie.
Then — then, the fathers who have turned in shame
Will look again and glory in your fame.
And in that radiant hour your act will crown
Your friends with fairer laurels than renown;
True friends who over you the aegis cast,
And fought the tyrant to the bitter last!
All hail, my Dalley, heated from the fight —
The shining champion of the cause of Right!
On thy victorious sword and bloodless crest,
The grateful eyes of three young nations rest,
Victoria waits with laurels past the sea;
And Queensland hath a radiant wreath for thee.
Thy own fair land has crowned thy brow with bays —
The garland of a higher prize than praise.
The love too deep and holy for acclaim
Shall shed a deathless lustre on thy name.
For when the tyrant in his evil hour,
Like black Tydides armed with fourfold power
Amazed our ancient friends and choked their speech,
Thou, strong and splendid, leaped into the breach,
And checked the wave, and waged so long the fight
Whose issue was thy glory night by night.
Like him who singly faced the foes of Rome
When Tiber's bridge was drowned in seething foam,
Thou hast the sovereign courage tried by fire —
The will that conquers, and the words of fire.
Nor, Muse, forget to hail the faithful few
Who round their chosen leader nobly drew —
Who helped with flaming lance and gleaming spear
To kill the hydra that was wallowing here!
On your illustrious heads a light divine,
Like God's own sunlight, shall from henceforth shine.
For this one fight whose trophies are your own
A people's blessings at your feet are thrown.
Be yours the honour — yours the civic wreath,
Who stamped a curse out — took away its teeth;
Who seized a social devil by the hand,
And saved from worse than death the startled land.
Your fame is won — that lordly flame which burns
Beyond the life of immemorial urns.