Emitte lucem tuam et veritatem tuam: ipsa me deduxerunt et adduxerunt in montem sanctum tuum, et in tabernacula tua.
Send forth Your light and Your fidelity: they shall lead me on and bring me to Your holy mountain And to Your dwelling-place.
AMEN
Sir John Moore Monument, St Paul's Cathedral, London, c1870-c1900
Sir John Moore Monument, St Paul's Cathedral, London, c1870-c1900. A view of the monument by John Bacon (1815) on the south wall of the south transept to Sir John Moore. General Sir John Moore commanded British forces in Spain in 1808-1809. On the advance of 200,000 enemy troops, Moore drew the French northwards towards his embarkation point in Galicia. Rearguard action at the Battle of Corunna bought breathing space to embark the British forces but resulted in Moore's death in battle. This heroic death was celebrated in poetry by Charles Wolfe. Moore was also honored by the French with a monument over his grave at La Coruna. Artist: York & Son. (Photo English Heritage/Heritage Images/Getty Images)
THE BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE
No farther seek his merits to disclose,
Or draw his frailties from their dread abode,
(There they, alike, in trembling hope, repose),
The bosom of his Father and his God
The Burial of Sir John Moore
Wolfe
Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
As his corse to the ramparts we hurried:
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our Hero we buried,
We buried him darkly; at dead of night;
The sods with our bayonets turning,
By the struggling moonbeams' misty light,
And the lantern dimly burning.
No useless coffin enclosed his breast,
Nor in sheet nor in shroud we wound him;
But he lay like a warrior taking his rest,
With his martial cloak around him.
Few and short were the prayers we said,
And we spoke not a word of sorrow;
But we steadfastly gazed on the face of the dead,
And we bitterly thought of the morrow.
We thought -- as we hollowed his narrow bed,
And smoothed down his lonely pillow --
How the foe and the stranger would tread o'ver his head
And we far away on the billow!
LIghtly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone,
And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him;
But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on
In the grave where a Briton has laid him.
But half of our heavy task was done,
When the clock tolled the hour for retiring,
And we heard the distant and random gun,
That the foe was sullenly firing. --
Slowly and sadly we laid him down,
From the field of his fame fresh and gory,
We carved not a line, we raised not a stone,
But left him -- alone with his glory!
Wolfe.
Courtesy of book "Treasury of Favorite Poems"
A collection of poems by American and English authors.
11/16/2021
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