Anna Letitia Barbauld: “Corsica”

Excerpt, “A Metrical History of the Life and Times of Napoleon Bonaparte: A Collection of Poems and Songs. Many from Obscure and Anonymous Sources, Selected and Arranged with Introductory Notes and Connective Narrative.” William J. Hillis. 1896.

CORSICA

The island of Corsica is situated in the Mediterranean sea, about one hundred miles from the coast of France, and almost directly south of Genoa and west of Rome. The village of Ajaccio is on the western coast of the island, and it was there, on the fifteenth day of August, 1769, that Napoleon Bonaparte, the son of Charles Bonaparte and Letitia Ramolino, was born.

Of thirteen children born to these parents, eight survived, of whom, as matter of age. Napoleon was second ; but who, in reality, from early manhood was the recognized head of the family. Charles Bonaparte died when Napoleon was sixteen years old, and it was to his mother that the future Emperor was indebted for that strength of character and brilliancy of intellect which enabled him, alone and unaided, within the short space of less than twenty years, to transform himself from a poor unknown Corsican sub-lieutenant into the greatest character of ancient or modern history. Perhaps some of the qualities which went to make up this most remarkable man may be attributed to his birthplace, rugged Corsica, so well pictured in the following lines:

CORSICA

How raptured fancy burns, while warm in thought

I trace the pictured landscape ; while I kiss

With pilgrim lips devout the sacred soil

Stained with the blood of heroes. Cyrnus, hail!

Hail to thy rocky, deep indented shores,

And pointed cliffs, which hear the chafing deep

Incessant foaming round thy shaggy sides.

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Hail to thy winding bays, thy sheltering ports,

And ample harbours, which inviting stretch

Their hospitable arms to every sail:

Thy numerous streams, that bursting from the cliffs

Down the steep channelled rock impetuous pour

With grateful murmur : on the fearful edge

Of the rude precipice, thy hamlets brown

And straw-roofed cots, which from the level vale

Scarce seen, amongst the craggy hanging cliffs

Seem like an eagle’s nest aerial built.

 .

Thy swelling mountains, brown with solemn shade

Of various trees, that wave their giant arms

O’er the rough sons of freedom ; lofty pines,

And hardy fir, and ilex ever green,

And spreading chestnut, with each humbler plant.

And shrub of fragrant leaf, that clothes their sides.

 .

With living verdure; whence the clustering bee

Extracts her golden dews : the shining box

And sweet-leaved myrtle, aromatic thyme,

The prickly juniper, and the green leaf

Which feeds the spinning worm ; while glowing bright

Beneath the various foliage, wildly spreads

The arbutus, and rears his scarlet fruit

Luxuriant, mantling o’er the craggy steeps ;

And thy own native laurel crowns the scene.

 .

Hail to thy savage forests, awful, deep ;

Thy tangled thickets, and thy crowded woods,

The haunt of herds untamed ; which sullen bound

From rock to rock with fierce, unsocial air,

And wilder gaze, as conscious of the power

That loves to reign amid the lonely scenes

Of unequalled nature ; precipices huge.

 .

And tumbling torrents ; trackless deserts, plains

Fenced in with guardian rocks, whose quarries teem

With shining steel, that to the cultured fields

And sunny hills which wave with bearded grain,

Defends their homely produce.

Young Napoleon at Le Grotte du Casone

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Liberty,

The mountain goddess, loves to range at large

Amid such scenes, and on the iron soil

Prints her majestic step. For these she scorns

The green enamelled vales, the velvet lap

Of smooth savannahs, where the pillowed head

Of luxury reposes ; balmy gales,

And bowers that breathe of bliss.

.

For these, when first

This isle, emerging like a beauteous gem

From the dark bosom of the Tyrrhene main.

.

Reared its fair front, she marked it for her own.

And with her spirit warmed. Her genuine sons,

A broken remnant, from the generous stock

Of ancient Greece, from Sparta’s sad remains.

.

True to their high descent, preserved unquenched

The sacred fire through many a barbarous age;

Whom nor the iron rod of cruel Carthage,

Nor the dread sceptre of imperial Rome,

Nor bloody Goth, nor grisly Saracen,

Nor the long galling yoke of proud Liguria,

Could crush into subjection.

 .

Still unquelled

They rose superior, bursting from their chains.

And claimed man’s dearest birthright, liberty :

And long, through many a hard unequal strife

Maintained the glorious conflict ; long withstood,

With single arm, the whole collected force

Of haughty Genoa and ambitious Gaul.