Descriptive of the miseries of War; from a Poem called 'The Emigrants,' printed in 1793. TO a wild mountain, whose bare summit hides Its broken eminence in clouds; whose steeps Are dark with woods: where the receding rocks Are worn with torrents of dissolving snow; A wretched woman, pale and breathless, flies, And, gazing round her, listens to the sound Of hostile footsteps:--No! they die away-- Nor noise remains, but of the cataract, Or surly breeze of night, that mutters low Among the thickets, where she trembling seeks A temporary shelter--Clasping close To her quick throbbing heart her sleeping child, All she could rescue of the innocent group That yesterday surrounded her--Escaped Almost by miracle!--Fear, frantic Fear, Wing'd her weak feet; yet, half repenting now Her headlong haste, she wishes she had staid To die with those affrighted Fancy paints The lawless soldiers' victims--Hark! again The driving tempest bears the cry of Death; And with deep, sudden thunder, the dread sound Of cannon vibrates on the tremulous earth; While, bursting in the air, the murderous bomb Glares o'er her mansion--Where the splinters fall Like scatter'd comets, its destructive path Is mark'd by wreaths of flame!--Then, overwhelm'd Beneath accumulated horror, sinks The desolate mourner! The feudal chief, whose gothic battlements Frown on the plain beneath, returning home From distant lands, alone, and in disguise, Gains at the fall of night his castle walls, But, at the silent gate no porter sits To wait his lord's admittance!--In the courts All is drear stillness!--Guessing but too well The fatal truth, he shudders as he goes Through the mute hall; where, by the blunted light That the dim moon through painted casement lends, He sees that devastation has been there; Then, while each hideous image to his mind Rises terrific, o'er a bleeding corse Stumbling he falls; another intercepts His staggering feet--All, all who used to With joy to meet him, all his family Lie murder'd in his way!--And the day dawns On a wild raving maniac, whom a fate So sudden and calamitous has robb'd Of reason; and who round his vacant walls Screams unregarded, and reproaches Heaven!