Poetry

Wairarapa Standard, Volume XX, Issue 2087, 1 July 1887, Page 1 (Supplement)

Poetry

A fisMlrr Fader Napoleon.

Do you see that tumble-down cottage ibeiv. Beyond th ■ road, by the sycamore-tie ', With rag* in the broken window-panes, And thorns where the flower-pots used to be.’ You never would think, in such a place, To meet an old hero face to face — A s-ildler under Napoleon.

There’s little heroic, I confess. In the withered old man in bis corner chair : . .

Not a tooth nor a thought in his hairless head, As be sits and mumbles and grumbles there ; But if ninety Tears lake much away. His title, at least, will always stay— A soldier under Napoleon.

His dim eyes watch his daughter at woik, A thin old woman in calico ; He sometime* notes her grands .n at play With hi* painted soldiers ail in a row ; And be dearly loves bis pint of gin And hi* black clay pipe, this man who has been - A soldier under Napoleon, But Jena. Marengo, Austerlitz. And last and bloodiest, Waterloo I Will hi* eye not flash if I apeak these words, And the sluggish blood in his veins burn true 1 He’s deaf, but I*II shoot them oat till he hear.

And in memory'* light, *t last, appear A aoldier under Napoleon. *■ Good *ir,” I say, “ do you recollect That last great day when, the records tell, Ton (ought to brarely, nor quit your post Till th-; last man left of your comrades fell I” ‘ I're lost the names,” he aay* to me ; ■ I just remember I used to be A soldier under Napoleon."