XXIII.

No sooner was the Frenchman's cause embraced, Than the light Monsieur the grave Don outweighed :*

His fortune turned the scale where'er 'twas cast, Though Indian mines were in the other laid.

XXIV.

When absent, yet we conquered in his right; For, though some meaner artist's skill were shown,

In mingling colours, or in placing light,

Yet still the fair designment was his own.

XXV.

For, from all tempers he could service draw; The worth of each, with its alloy, he knew; And, as the confidant of Nature, saw

How she complexions did divide and brew.t

* In 1655 Cromwell allied himself with the rising power of France against the declining monarchy of Spain; less guided, probably, by any general views of political expedience, than by the consideration that the American and West India settlements of the latter power lay open to assault from the English fleet; while, had he embraced the other side, his own dominions were exposed to an invasion from the exiled King, with French auxiliaries. The splendid triumphs of Blake gave some ground for the poetical flourishes in the text.

It was still fashionable, in the seventeenth century, to impute the distinguishing shades of human character to the influence of complexion. The doctrine is concisely summed up in the following lines, which occur in an old мs. in the British Museum

With a red man rede thy rede,

With a brown man break thy bread,

On a pale man draw thy knife,

From a black man keep thy wife.

XXVI.

Or he their single virtues did survey,
By intuition, in his own large breast;
Where all the rich ideas of them lay,

That were the rule and measure to the rest.

XXVII.

When such heroic virtue heaven sets out,
The stars, like commons, sullenly obey;
Because it drains them when it comes about,
And therefore is a tax they seldom pay.*.

XXVIII.

From this high spring our foreign conquests flow, Which yet more glorious triumphs do portend; Since their commencement to his arms they owe, If springs as high as fountains may ascend.

XXIX.

He made us freemen of the continent,
Whom nature did like captives treat before;
To nobler preys the English lion sent,

And taught him first in Belgian walks to roar.t

* The author seems to allude to the old proverb, "Sapiens dominabitur astris." The influence of the stars yielded reluctantly to Cromwell's heroic virtues, as the commons submit sullenly to be taxed. [It may be suggested that this passage does not look as if Dryden's anti-democratic ideas were due to the Restoration merely.-ED.]

The poet alludes to the exertions of the six thousand British auxiliaries whom Cromwell sent to join Marshal Turenne in Flanders. These veterans, seasoned to the desperate and close mode of fighting which the inveteracy of civil war had introduced, astonished the French by their audacity and their contempt of the usual military precautions and calculations. There is a curious account, by Sir Thomas

XXX.

That old unquestioned pirate of the land,
Proud Rome, with dread the fate of Dunkirk

heard ;

And, trembling, wished behind more Alps to stand,

Although an Alexander were her guard.*

Morgan, of their exploits at Dunkirk and Ypres, which occurs in the third volume of the Harleian Miscellany, p. 326. The Duke of York was then with the Spanish army; and Dryden, on the change of times, lived to celebrate him for his gallant opposition to that body which he here personifies as the British Lion. See the Dedication of the "Conquest of Granada,” vol. iv. p. 13. The English were made "freemen of the continent" by the cession of Dunkirk; and it is believed that this was the first step towards giving England a share in the partition of Flanders, when that strange project was disconcerted by the death of Cromwell. There was no avoiding allusion to the British Lion. Sprat has also sent him forth, seeking whom he may devour—

*The Pope being called Alexander the Sixth [Seventh], Dryden did not disdain to turn the stanza upon an allusion to the Macedonian hero; although it is obvious, that the pontiff was not a more effectual guardian to his city by bearing that warlike name than if he had been called Benedict or Innocent. True it is, however, that the Pope feared, and with great reason, some hostile attack from the powerful English squadron which swept the Mediterranean, under the command of Blake. Conscious that his papal character rendered him the object of the most inveterate enmity to the military saints of Cromwell's Commonwealth, he had every reason to believe that they would find pride, pleasure, and profit in attacking Antichrist, even in Babylon itself.

XXXI.

By his command we boldly crossed the line,
And bravely fought where southern stars arise;
We traced the far-fetched gold unto the mine,
And that, which bribed our fathers, made our
prize.

XXXII.

Such was our prince; yet owned a soul above The highest acts it could produce to show: Thus, poor mechanic arts in public move, Whilst the deep secrets beyond practice go.

XXXIII.

Nor died he when his ebbing fame went less, But when fresh laurels courted him to live: He seemed but to prevent some new success, As if above what triumphs earth could give.

XXXIV.

His latest victories still thickest came,

As near the centre motion doth increase; Till he, pressed down by his own weighty name, Did, like the vestal, under spoils decease.+

* A powerful army and squadron were sent by Cromwell [1654], under the command of Penn and Venables, to attack Hispaniola. The commanders quarrelled, and the main design misgave: they took, however the island of Jamaica, whose importance long remained unknown; for, notwithstanding the manner in which Dryden has glossed over these operations in the West Indies, they were at the time universally considered as having been unfortunate. See "The World's Mistake in Oliver Cromwell."

Tarpeia, the virgin who betrayed a gate of Rome to the Sabines, demanded, in recompense, what they wore on their

XXXV.

But first the ocean as a tribute sent

That giant prince of all her wat'ry herd; And the isle, when her protecting Genius went, Upon his obsequies loud sighs conferred.*

XXXVI.

No civil broils have since his death arose,
But faction now by habit does obey;
And wars have that respect for his repose,

As winds for halcyons when they breed at sea.

left arms, meaning their golden bracelets. But the Sabines, detesting her treachery, or not disposed to gratify her avarice, chose to understand that her request related to their bucklers, and flung them upon her in such numbers as to kill her. ["The comparison is very forced and inappropriate," says Christie tartly: true, but it is quite in the spirit of the time.-ED.]

* The circumstance of the dreadful storm which happened on the day of Cromwell's death is noticed by all writers. Many vessels were dashed on the coast, and trees and houses were overthrown upon the land. It seemed as if that active spirit, which had rode in the whirlwind while he lived, could not depart without an universal convulsion of nature. Waller has touched upon this remarkable incident with great felicityWe must resign; heaven his great soul does claim,

In storms as loud as his immortal fame;

His dying groans, his last breath, shake our isle,

And trees uncut fall for his funeral pile;

About his palace their broad roots were tost

Into the air-so Romulus was lost;

New Rome in such a tempest missed her king,
And from obeying fell to worshipping.

But, while the authors of these threnodies explained this prodigious storm as attendant on the deification of the Protector, or at least the effects of the Genius of Britain's unbounded lamentation, the Cavaliers unanimously agreed that the tempest accompanied the transportation of his spirit to the infernal regions. ["That giant prince" is perhaps better explained by Mr. Holt White, as quoted by Christie from Ms., to mean Blake, who died a year before. ED.]