Le canon gronde; un autre chant commence ;
Nous célébrons tant de faits éclatans.

Les rois jamais n'envahiront la France.
Dans un grenier qu'on est bien à vingt ans !

Quittons ce toit où ma raison s'enivre.

Oh ! qu'ils sont loin ces jours si regrettés !
J'échangerais ce qu'il me reste à vivre
Contre un des mois qu'ici Dieu m'a comptés,
Pour rêver gloire, amour, plaisir, folie,
Pour dépenser sa vie en peu d'instans,

D'un long espoir pour la voir embellie,
Dans un grenier qu'on est bien à vingt ans !

THE GARRET.

WITH pensive eyes the little room I view,
Where, in my youth, I weathered it so long;
With a wild mistress, a stanch friend or two,
And a light heart still breaking into song:
Making a mock of life, and all its cares,

Rich in the glory of my rising sun,
Lightly I vaulted up four pair of stairs,

In the brave days when I was twenty-one.

Yes; 'tis a garret-let him know't who willThere was my bed-full hard it was and small; My table there-and I decipher still

Half a lame couplet charcoaled on the wall. Ye joys, that Time hath swept with him away, Come to mine eyes, ye dreams of love and fun; For you I pawned my watch how many a day, In the brave days when I was twenty-one.

And see my little Jessy, first of all;

She comes with pouting lips and sparkling eyes: Behold, how roguishly she pins her shawl

Across the narrow casement, curtain-wise; Now by the bed her petticoat glides down,

And when did woman look the worse in none? I have heard since who paid for many a gown, In the brave days when I was twenty-one.

One jolly evening, when my friends and I
Made happy music with our songs and cheers,
A shout of triumph mounted up thus high,
And distant cannon opened on our ears:
We rise, we join in the triumphant strain,—
Napoleon conquers-Austerlitz is won-
Tyrants shall never tread us down again,

In the brave days when I was twenty-one.

Let us begone-the place is sad and strange-
How far, far off, these happy times appear;
All that I have to live I'd gladly change

For one such month as I have wasted hereTo draw long dreams of beauty, love, and power, From founts of hope that never will outrun,

And drink all life's quintessence in an hour,
Give me the days when I was twenty-one !

ROGER-BONTEMPS.

Aux gens atrabilaires
Pour exemple donné,
En un temps de misères
Roger-Bontemps est né.
Vivre obscur à sa guise,
Narguer les mécontens;
Eh gai! c'est la devise
Du gros Roger-Bontemps.

Du chapeau de son père
Coiffé dans les grands jours,
De roses ou de lierre
Le rajeunir toujours;

Mettre un manteau de bure,
Vieil ami de vingt ans ;
Eh gai! c'est la parure
Du gros Roger-Bontemps.

Posséder dans sa hutte
Une table, un vieux lit,
Des cartes, une flûte,
Un broc que Dieu remplit;
Un portrait de maîtresse,
Un coffre et rien dedans;
Eh gai! c'est la richesse
Du gros Roger-Bontemps.

JOLLY JACK.

WHEN fierce political debate

Throughout the isle was storming,
And Rads attacked the throne and state,
And Tories the reforming,

To calm the furious rage of each,
And right the land demented,
Heaven sent us Jolly Jack, to teach
The way to be contented.

Jack's bed was straw, 'twas warm and soft,

His chair, a three-legged stool;

His broken jug was emptied oft,

Yet, somehow, always full.

His mistress' portrait decked the wall,

His mirror had a crack;

Yet, gay and glad, though this was all

His wealth, lived Jolly Jack.

To give advice to avarice,

Teach pride its mean condition,

And preach good sense to dull pretence,
Was honest Jack's high mission.
Our simple statesman found his rule

Of moral in the flagon,

And held his philosophic school

Beneath the "George and Dragon."