Stern Famine guards the solitary coast,
  And Winter barricades the realm of Frost;
  He comes, nor want nor cold his course delay;
  Hide, blushing Glory, hide Pultowa’s day: 
  The vanquish’d hero leaves his broken bands,
  And shows his miseries in distant lands;
  Condemn’d a needy supplicant to wait,
  While ladies interpose, and slaves debate. 
  But did not Chance at length her error mend? 
  Did no subverted empire mark his end? 
  Did rival monarchs give the fatal wound? 
  Or hostile millions press him to the ground? 
  His fall was destin’d to a barren strand,
  A petty fortress, and a dubious hand;
  He left the name, at which the world grew pale
  To point a moral, or adorn a tale. 
    All times their scenes of pompous woes afford,
  From Persia’s tyrant to Bavaria’s lord. 
  In gay hostility and barb’rous pride,
  With half mankind embattled at his side,
  Great Xerxes comes to seize the certain prey
  And starves exhausted regions in his way;
  Attendant Flatt’ry counts his myriads o’er,
  Till counted myriads soothe his pride no more;
  Fresh praise is try’d till madness fires his mind,
  The waves he lashes, and enchains the wind,
  New pow’rs are claim’d, new pow’rs are still bestow’d,
  Till rude Resistance lops the spreading god;
  The daring Greeks deride the martial show,
  And heap their valleys with the gaudy foe;
  Th’ insulted sea with humbler thoughts he gains,
  A single skiff to speed his flight remains;
  Th’ incumber’d oar scarce leaves the dreaded coast,
  Through purple billows and a floating host. 
    The bold Bavarian, in a luckless hour,
  Tries the dread summits of Caesarian pow’r,
  With unexpected legions bursts away,
  And sees defenceless realms receive his sway;
  Short sway! fair Austria spreads her mournful charms,
  The queen, the beauty, sets the world in arms;
  From hill to hill the beacon’s rousing blaze
  Spreads wide the hope of plunder and of praise;
  The fierce Croatian, and the wild Hussar,
  With all the sons of ravage crowd the war;
  The baffled prince, in honour’s flatt’ring bloom
  Of hasty greatness, finds the fatal doom;
  His foes’ derision, and his subjects’ blame,
  And steals to death from anguish and from shame. 
    Enlarge my life with multitude of days! 
  In health, in sickness, thus the suppliant prays: 
  Hides from himself his state, and shuns to know,
  That life protracted is protracted woe. 
  Time hovers o’er, impatient to destroy,
  And shuts up all the passages of joy: 
  In vain their gifts the bounteous seasons pour,
  The fruit autumnal, and the vernal flow’r;
  With listless eyes the dotard views the store,
  He views, and wonders that they please no more: 
  Now pall the tasteless meats and joyless wines,
  And Luxury with sighs her slave resigns.