Tallis, John: Tallis's history and description of the Crystal Palace and the exhibition of the world's industry in 1851 (Band 3) (London, 1851)

OF THE WORLD'S INDUSTRY. &7

And here, 'with a clank, fit to stave in each plank,

Came, with Hagen and Guntlier, the Niebelung rank.

And sans-eulottes Cupids, a plump little throng,

From the Milanese Room, trundled, scampering along,

Not heeding poor Venus, who begg'd and beseech'd

They'd come back, like dear good little boys, to he breech'd.

Down came ' Eldon' and ' Stowell,' both stiff with the gout,

And I heard ' Eldon' whisper, while looking about,

With a shrug, ' Humph ! No good will come of It, I doubt!'

At last, lest I might be by accident crush'd

By the Statues that hitherward, thitherward, rush'd,

I made myself small, and shrank into a nook,

And plucked up a heart on the chaos to look :

When all was suddenly still as before—

The movement in each compartment was o'er,

And a shadowy form stood at every door !

And something within reveal'd to me

'Twas the Spirit of each land's Industry,

Which had gather'd itself from the objects there,

And now stood reveal'd to my wondering stare.

" France I knew, by the red cap she wore,

And the tatter'd and trailing tricolor:

Austria, by her scowl of pride

On sad, sweet Italy, crouch'd by her side :

Russia, by crown barbaric of mould,—

All malachite and Ural gold :

Germany, by her flag outspread, fc

With its motley of yellow, and black, and red;

Which Prussia slyly strove to hold back,

Protruding before it her white and black :

Switzerland stood like a mountain queen,

Sturdy of limb, and free of mien:

By broad-based Holland, half fish, half maid,

With rudder, and oar, and dyking-spade;

While Denmark and Sweden were Nomas fair,

With ice-blue eyes and amber hair;

America full well I knew,

By her stars, and stripes, and her Eagle, too,
But her hand held a scourge, and her back show'd scars,
And somehow the stripes seem'd to dim the stars;

Persia, on her cushions lying,

Her almond eyes with kohl was dyeing:

And Turkey, a slipper'd and shrouded dame,

Flash'd from her yashmac a glance of flame ;

While India show'd, with a lazy grace,

From shawls and muslins, a dusky face,

Large eyes half of languor, and half of light,

And a brow that blazed with the Koh-i-Noor's light.

" But in stature far above the rest, I marked one spirit tower,
The spirit of ray own England—a spirit of peace and power j
Her eyes were deep and clear of look, and placid was her cheek;
And in her bearing that high calm to which all else is weak ;
And as I bow'd before her, her chaste lips oped to speak:—
' Son, but now I heard a murmur in that shallow heart of thine,
That this gathering of wonders must henceforth no more be mine;
And a hard thing to thy folly it appear'd to scatter forth
All these garner'd fruits of labour, East and West, and South and North.
Know, vain heart, it is not only what they brought unto my shore
That my guests will take back with them—poorer were they than before:

VOL. III. Z