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Landon in The Literary Gazette 1825/Chevalier Bayard

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Poems (1825)
by Letitia Elizabeth Landon
Death of the Chevalier Bayard
2279567PoemsDeath of the Chevalier Bayard1825Letitia Elizabeth Landon

Literary Gazette, 22nd October, 1825, Page 684


ORIGINAL POETRY.
DEATH OF THE CHEVALIER BAYARD.

His plume was the meteor that led the band,
    His steed was the first in the line;
Like light his falchion flashed above,
    But blood soon darkened its shine.

He stood alone (for they fled or fell)
    By the wounded warrior's side;
"One charge (he cried) for St. Denis and France!"
    But the war-cry unanswered died.

He lay him beneath an aged oak,
    The life-blood gushed from his breast;
He looked not on that, but gazed where in dust
    Lay his own soiled falcon crest;

And hastened the Bourbon to see if aught
    Of human help could save,
And spoke in words of pity and grief,
    As he leant o'er the fallen brave.

But sterner grew the Knight's brow of death—
    "What hast thou in common with me?
I die for my God, my Country, my King—
    Pity, Traitor, is for thee."L. E. L.