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Brightest in dungeons, Liberty! thou art, For there thy habitation is the heartThe heart which love of thee alone can bind; And when thy sons to fetters are consign'd

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To fetters, and the damp vault's dayless gloom,

Their country conquers with their martyrdom,

And Freedom's fame finds wings on every wind.

Chillon! thy prison is a holy place,

And thy sad floor an altar-for 'twas trod, 10 Until his very steps have left a trace Worn, as if thy cold pavement were a sod,

By Bonnivard! May none those marks efface!

For they appeal from tyranny to God.

1 Bonnivard was the "Prisoner of Chillon," the chief figure in Byron's poem of that title. A man of republican views and of high character, he was imprisoned in the stle of Chillon about 1530, and remained there for six

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But soon he knew himself the most unfit Of men to herd with Man; with whom he held

Little in common; untaught to submit His thoughts to others, though his soul was quell'd

In youth by his own thoughts; still uncompell'd,

1 Childe (the heir, of a noble house) is a title made familiar by the Old Ballads like Childe Waters, Childe Roland.

2 The first two cantos appeared in 1812, or about four years previously.

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And when they smiled because he deem'd it near,

His heart more truly knew that peal too well

Which stretch'd his father on a bloody bier,

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And roused the vengeance blood alone could quell:

He rush'd into the field, and, foremost fighting fell.

A term in falconry, applied to certain hawks that soar to a place high in the air, and from thence swoop upon their prey. V. Macb. II. iv.

This stanza refers to a ball given by the Duchess of Richmond, at Brussels, on the night before the battle of Waterloo. The boom of cannon rang through the city, and the festivity was broken up by a rush to arms.

Duke Frederick William of Brunswick, who lost his life fighting at Quatre Bras, 1815.

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