“MAKE way for liberty!” he cried, | |
| Make way for liberty and died. | |
| In arms the Austrian phalanx stood, | |
| A living wall, a human wood; | |
| A wall,—where every conscious stone | 5 |
| Seemed to its kindred thousands grown, | |
| A rampart all assaults to bear, | |
| Till time to dust their frames should wear: | |
| A wood,—like that enchanted grove | |
| In which with fiends Rinaldo strove, | 10 |
| Where every silent tree possessed | |
| A spirit imprisoned in its breast, | |
| Which the first stroke of coming strife | |
| Might startle into hideous life: | |
| So still, so dense, the Austrians stood, | 15 |
| A living wall, a human wood. | |
| Impregnable their front appears, | |
| All-horrent with projected spears, | |
| Whose polished points before them shine, | |
| From flank to flank, one brilliant line, | 20 |
| Bright as the breakers’ splendours run | |
| Along the billows to the sun. | |
| Opposed to these, a hovering band | |
| Contended for their father-land; | |
| Peasants, whose new-found strength had broke | 25 |
| From manly necks th’ ignoble yoke, | |
| And beat their fetters into swords, | |
| On equal terms to fight their lords, | |
| And what insurgent rage had gained, | |
| In many a mortal fray maintained. | 30 |
| Marshalled once more, at freedom’s call | |
| They came to conquer or to fall, | |
| Where he who conquered, he who fell, | |
| Was deemed a dead or living Tell; | |
| Such virtue had that patriot breathed, | 35 |
| So to the soil his soul bequeathed, | |
| That wheresoe’er his arrows flew, | |
| Heroes in his own likeness grew, | |
| And warriors sprang from every sod | |
| Which his awakening footstep trod. | 40 |
| And now the work of life and death | |
| Hung on the passing of a breath; | |
| The fire of conflict burned within, | |
| The battle trembled to begin; | |
| Yet while the Austrians held their ground, | 45 |
| Point for assault was nowhere found; | |
| Where’er the impatient Switzers gazed, | |
| The unbroken line of lances blazed; | |
| That line ’twere suicide to meet, | |
| And perish at their tyrants’ feet: | 50 |
| How could they rest within their graves, | |
| To leave their homes the haunts of slaves? | |
| Would they not feel their children tread, | |
| With clanking chains, above their head? | |
| It must not be; this day, this hour | 55 |
| Annihilates th’ invader’s power; | |
| All Switzerland is in the field, | |
| She will not fly, she cannot yield, | |
| She must not fall; her better fate | |
| Here gives her an immortal date. | 60 |
| Few were the numbers she could boast, | |
| Yet every freeman was a host, | |
| And felt as ’twere a secret known, | |
| That one should turn the scale alone, | |
| While each unto himself was he, | 65 |
| On whose sole arm hung victory. | |
| It did depend on one indeed; | |
| Behold him,—Arnold Winkelreid; | |
| There sounds not to the trump of fame | |
| The echo of a nobler name. | 70 |
| Unmarked he stood amidst the throng, | |
| In rumination deep and long, | |
| Till you might see, with sudden grace, | |
| The very thought come o’er his face, | |
| And by the motion of his form, | 75 |
| Anticipate the bursting storm, | |
| And by th’ uplifting of his brow | |
| Tell where the bolt would strike, and how. | |
| But ’twas no sooner thought than done, | |
| The field was in a moment won; | 80 |
| “Make way for liberty!” he cried, | |
| Then ran, with arms extended wide, | |
| As if his dearest friend to clasp; | |
| Ten spears he swept within his grasp; | |
| “Make way for liberty!” he cried, | 85 |
| Their keen points crossed from side to side; | |
| He bowed amidst them, like a tree, | |
| And thus made way for liberty. | |
| Swift to the breach his comrades fly, | |
| “Make way for liberty!” they cry, | 90 |
| And through the Austrian phalanx dart, | |
| As rushed the spears through Arnold’s heart, | |
| While, instantaneous as his fall, | |
| Rout, ruin, panic seized them all; | |
| An earthquake could not overthrow | 95 |
| A city with a surer blow. | |
| Thus Switzerland again was free; | |
| Thus death made way for liberty. | |
| |
