independence of the Empire has been preserved, is no less an act of
sound policy than of gratitude."]

[309] {416} [As an instance of Scottish gallantry in the Peninsular War
it is sufficient to cite the following list of "casualties" at the
battle of Vittoria, June 21, 1813: "The battalion [the seventy-first
Highland Light Infantry] suffered very severely, having had 1 field
officer, 1 captain, 2 lieutenants, 6 sergeants, 1 bugler, and 78 rank
and file killed; 1 field officer, 3 captains, 7 lieutenants, 13
sergeants, 2 buglers, and 255 rank and file were wounded."--_Historical
Record of the 71st Highland Light Infantry_, by Lieut. Henry J. T.
Hildyard, 1876, p. 91.]

[310] [Compare _Temora_, bk. vii., "The king took his deathful spear,
and struck the deeply-sounding shield.... Ghosts fled on every side, and
rolled their gathered forms on the wind.--Thrice from the winding vale
arose the voices of death."--_Works of Ossian_, 1765, ii. 160.]

[311] {417} [The last six lines are printed from the MS.]

[312] [Sir P. Parker fell in August, 1814, in his twenty-ninth year,
whilst leading a party from his ship, the _Menelaus_, at the storming of
the American camp near Baltimore. He was Byron's first cousin (his
father, Christopher Parker (1761-1804), married Charlotte Augusta,
daughter of Admiral the Hon. John Byron); but they had never met since
boyhood. (See letter to Moore, _Letters_, 1899, iii. 150; see too
_Letters_, i. 6, note 1.) The stanzas were included in _Hebrew
Melodies_, 1815, and in the Ninth Edition of _Childe Harold_, 1818.]

[313] [Compare Tasso's sonnet--"Questa Tomba non e, ehe non e morto,"
etc. _Rime Eroiche_, Parte Seconda, No. 38, _Opere di Torquato Tasso_,
Venice, 1736, vi. 169.]

[314] {419} [From an autograph MS. in the possession of Mr. Murray, now
for the first time printed.]

[ne] {421}
1.

_The red light glows, the wassail flows_,
_Around the royal hall;_
_And who, on earth, dare mar the mirth_
_Of that high festival?_
_The prophet dares--before thee glows_--
_Belshazzar rise, nor dare despise_
_The writing on the wall!_

2.

_Thy vice might raise th' avenging steel_,
_Thy meanness shield thee from the blow_--
_And they who loathe thee proudly feel_.--[MS.]

[nf] {422}
_The words of God along the wall_.--[MS. erased.]
_The word of God--the graven wall_.--[MS.]

[ng] _Behold it writte