His banners were floating there still.

"--Go to! I will tell you no more;
You know how the battle was lost.
Ho! fetch me a beaker of wine,
And, comrades, I'll give you a toast.
I'll give you a curse on all traitors,
Who plotted our Emperor's ruin;
And a curse on those red-coated English,
Whose bayonets help'd our undoing.

"A curse on those British assassins,
Who order'd the slaughter of Ney;
A curse on Sir Hudson, who tortured
The life of our hero away.
A curse on all Russians--I hate them--
On all Prussian and Austrian fry;
And oh! but I pray we may meet them,
And fight them again ere I die."

'Twas thus old Peter did conclude
His chronicle with curses fit.
He spoke the tale in accents rude,
In ruder verse I copied it.

Perhaps the tale a moral bears,
(All tales in time to this must come,)
The story of two hundred years
Writ on the parchment of a drum.