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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=396912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>The Patriot Engineer</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Sirs! may I shake your hands? <br>My countrymen, I see! <br>I've lived in foreign lands <br>Till England's Heaven to me. <br>A hearty shake will do me good, <br>And freshen up my sluggish blood.' </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Into his hard right hand we struck, <br>Gave the shake, and wish'd him luck. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">'-From Austria I come, <br>An English wife to win, <br>And find an English home, <br>And live and die therein. <br>Great Lord! how many a year I've pined <br>To drink old ale and speak my mind!' </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Loud rang our laughter, and the shout <br>Hills round the Meuse-boat echoed about. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">'-Ay, no offence: laugh on, <br>Young gentlemen: I'll join. <br>Had you to exile gone, <br>Where free speech is base coin, <br>You'd sigh to see the jolly nose <br>Where Freedom's native liquor flows!' </div><div style="margin:10px 0">He this time the laughter led, <br>Dabbling his oily bullet head. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">'-Give me, to suit my moods, <br>An ale-house on a heath, <br>I'll hand the crags and woods <br>To B'elzebub beneath. <br>A fig for scenery! what scene <br>Can beat a Jackass on a green?' </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Gravely he seem'd, with gaze intense, <br>Putting the question to common sense. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">'-Why, there's the ale-house bench: <br>The furze-flower shining round: <br>And there's my waiting-wench, <br>As lissome as a hound. <br>With 'hail Britannia!' ere I drink, <br>I'll kiss her with an artful wink.' </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Fair flash'd the foreign landscape while <br>We breath'd again our native Isle. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">'-The geese may swim hard-by; <br>They gabble, and you talk: <br>You're sure there's not a spy <br>To mark your name with chalk. <br>My heart's an oak, and it won't grow <br>In flower-pots, foreigners must know.' </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Pensive he stood: then shook his head <br>Sadly; held out his fist, and said: </div><div style="margin:10px 0">'-You've heard that Hungary's floor'd? <br>They've got her on the ground. <br>A traitor broke her sword: <br>Two despots held her bound. <br>I've seen her gasping her last hope: <br>I've seen her sons strung up b' the rope. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Nine gallant gentlemen <br>In Arad they strung up! <br>I work'd in peace till then:- <br>That poison'd all my cup. <br>A smell of corpses haunted me: <br>My nostril sniff'd like life for sea. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Take money for my hire <br>From butchers?-not the man! <br>I've got some natural fire, <br>And don't flash in the pan; - <br>A few ideas I reveal'd:- <br>'Twas well old England stood my shield! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Said I, 'The Lord of Hosts <br>Have mercy on your land! <br>I see those dangling ghosts, - <br>And you may keep command, <br>And hang, and shoot, and have your day: <br>They hold your bill, and you must pay. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">''You've sent them where they're strong, <br>You carrion Double-Head! <br>I hear them sound a gong <br>In Heaven above!'-I said. <br>'My God, what feathers won't you moult <br>For this!' says I: and then I bolt. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">'The Bird's a beastly Bird, <br>And what is more, a fool. <br>I shake hands with the herd <br>That flock beneath his rule. <br>They're kindly; and their land is fine. <br>I thought it rarer once than mine. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">'And rare would be its lot, <br>But that he baulks its powers: <br>It's just an earthen pot <br>For hearts of oak like ours. <br>Think! Think!-four days from those frontiers, <br>And I'm a-head full fifty years. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">'It tingles to your scalps, <br>To think of it, my boys! <br>Confusion on their Alps, <br>And all their baby toys! <br>The mountains Britain boasts are men: <br>And scale you them, my brethren!' </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Cluck, went his tongue; his fingers, snap. <br>Britons were proved all heights to cap. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">And we who worshipp'd crags, <br>Where purple splendours burn'd, <br>Our idol saw in rags, <br>And right about were turn'd. <br>Horizons rich with trembling spires <br>On violet twilights lost their fires. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">And heights where morning wakes <br>With one cheek over snow; - <br>And iron-walled lakes <br>Where sits the white moon low; - <br>For us on youthful travel bent, <br>The robing picturesque was rent. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Wherever Beauty show'd <br>The wonders of her face, <br>This man his Jackass rode, <br>High despot of the place. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Fair dreams of our enchanted life <br>Fled fast from his shrill island fife. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">And yet we liked him well; <br>We laugh'd with honest hearts:- <br>He shock'd some inner spell, <br>And rous'd discordant parts. <br>We echoed what we half abjured: <br>And hating, smilingly endured. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Moreover, could we be <br>To our dear land disloyal? <br>And were not also we <br>Of History's blood-Royal? <br>We glow'd to think how donkeys graze <br>In England, thrilling at their brays. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">For there a man may view <br>An aspect more sublime <br>Than Alps against the blue:- <br>The morning eyes of Time! <br>The very Ass participates <br>The glory Freedom radiates!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=George+Meredith">George Meredith</a><div class=q>
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<script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=396912" data-title="The Patriot Engineer de George Meredith" data-description="'Sirs! may I shake your hands? 
My countrymen, I see! 
I've lived in foreign lands 
Till England's Heaven to me. 
A hearty shake will do me good, 
And freshen up my sluggish blood.' 

Into his hard right hand we struck, 
Gave the shake, and wish'd..."></div>
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