Ay—to your end!—to your end amid the execrations of a ravaged world! Through all the ages one other only has equalled you in the betrayal of his trust. May your sin come home to you before you go, as did his! May his despair be yours! It is most desperately to be regretted that no personal suffering on your part, in this life at all events, can ever adequately requite you for the desolations you have wrought.

Outrage on outrage thunders to the sky
The tale of thy stupendous infamy,—
Thy slaughterings,—thy treacheries,—thy thefts,—
Thy broken pacts,—thy honour in the mire,—
Thy poor humanity cast off to sate thy pride;—
'Twere better thou hadst never lived,—or died
Ere come to this.

I heard a great Voice pealing through the heavens,
A Voice that dwarfed earth's thunders to a moan:—

Woe! Woe! Woe, to him by whom this came!
His house shall unto him be desolate
And, to the end of time, his name shall be
A by-word and reproach in all the lands
He repined.... And his own shall curse him
For the ruin that he brought.
Who without reason draws the sword—
By sword shall perish!
The Lord hath said.... So be it, Lord!

JOHN OXENHAM.