IV.

  His business so augmented of late years,
    That he was forced, against his will no doubt
  (Just like those cherubs, earthly ministers),
    For some resource to turn himself about,
  And claim the help of his celestial peers,
    To aid him ere he should be quite worn out
  By the increased demand for his remarks: 
  Six angels and twelve saints were named his clerks.

  V.

  This was a handsome board—­at least for heaven;
    And yet they had even then enough to do,
  So many conquerors’ cars were daily driven,
    So many kingdoms fitted up anew;
  Each day, too, slew its thousands six or seven,
    Till at the crowning carnage, Waterloo,
  They threw their pens down in divine disgust,
  The page was so besmear’d with blood and dust.

  VI.

  This by the way; ’tis not mine to record
    What angels shrink from:  even the very devil
  On this occasion his own work abhorr’d,
    So surfeited with the infernal revel: 
  Though he himself had sharpen’d every sword,
    It almost quench’d his innate thirst of evil. 
  (Here Satan’s sole good work deserves insertion—­
  ’Tis that he has both generals in reversion.)

  VII.

  Let’s skip a few short years of hollow peace,
    Which peopled earth no better, hell as wont,
  And heaven none—­they form the tyrant’s lease,
    With nothing but new names subscribed upon’t: 
  ’Twill one day finish:  meantime they increase,
    “With seven heads and ten horns”, and all in front,
  Like Saint John’s foretold beast; but ours are born
  Less formidable in the head than horn.

  VIII.

  In the first year of freedom’s second dawn
    Died George the Third; although no tyrant, one
  Who shielded tyrants, till each sense withdrawn
    Left him nor mental nor external sun: 
  A better farmer ne’er brush’d dew from lawn,
    A worse king never left a realm undone! 
  He died—­but left his subjects still behind,
  One half as mad—­and t’other no less blind.

  IX.

  He died! his death made no great stir on earth: 
    His burial made some pomp:  there was profusion
  Of velvet, gilding, brass, and no great dearth
    Of aught but tears—­save those shed by collusion. 
  For these things may be bought at their true worth;
    Of elegy there was the due infusion—­
  Bought also; and the torches, cloaks, and banners,
  Heralds, and relics of old Gothic manners,

  X.

  Form’d a sepulchral melodrame.  Of all
    The fools who flock’d to swell or see the show,
  Who cared about the corpse?  The funeral
    Made the attraction, and the black the woe,
  There throbb’d not there a thought which pierced the pall;
    And when the gorgeous coffin was laid low,
  It seem’d the mockery of hell to fold
  The rottenness of eighty years in gold.