Horace Smith: Weapon gathering dust

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Anti-war essays, poems, short stories and literary excerpts
British writers on peace and war
Horace Smith: Selections on peace and war
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Horace Smith
From On an Ancient Lance, Hanging in an Armoury
Once in the breezy coppice didst thou dance,
And nightingales amid thy foliage sang;
Form’d by man’s cruel art into a lance,
Oft hast thou pierced, (the while the welkin rang
With trump and drum, shoutings and battle clang,)
Some foeman’s heart. Pride, pomp, and circumstance,
Have left thee, now, and thou dost silent hang,
From age to age, in deep and dusty trance.

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