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1268 NOTES TO VOLUME II.
Too gallant for a song so weak as mine
Oh! could their names enshrined in monuments
Appear, how would the eyes of Sweden kindle
To read them. Coronets of gold for thee,
Were all too little recompense;-hereafter,
A crown of stars is all thine own. The foe
Lies broken by thy force and heroism:
Numerous as Denmark’s sands they came- how few
Returned their princes and their soldiery
Repulsed with scorn, while shuddering horror hung
Upon their flight-Jove’s thunderstorms assailed
Their bands of treachery, daylight was eclipsed
In thickest clouds, and the pure cause of God
And patriotism triumphed. Aye, the cause
Of Sweden’s royalty, which Denmark strove
How vainly to despoil. Our king perceived
Their rising hatred ; poets were forbid
To sing his praise-his praise beyond compare :
For this, in sooth, the land was steeped in blood ;
Even for this, the fire and sword laid waste
Our native soil. Then let each warrior bind
The laurel chaplet, and the bard exult
O’er slaughtered rebels. For the destiny
Of Charles shall yet awake the Muse’s hymns.
Ah, soon return,-O monarch of our love!
O! Sun of Sweden, waste not all thy light
To illume the crescent of the Ottomans ;
Thy absence we bewail, wandering in glooms
Of midnight sorrow-save that these bright stars
That lead us on to victory, still console
Thy people’s hearts, and bid them not despair."
Stenbock’s end was not in harmony with the glorious victory he
gained over the Danes in 1710. He was, indeed, made a field
marshal, and appointed governor in chief of Schonen, Halland, and
Blekinge. But in 1712 he crossed over to the continent in order
to meet the Danes again. He gained the victory of Gadebusch
over them (see Document 207, p. 132), but had to capitulate to the
Danes in Tönningen in 1713. He was now a prisoner of war, and
was at first treated in Copenhagen with all distinction, but at last
was thrown into a dungeon, where he died a miserable death
in 1717.
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