<html xmlns:tei="http://www.tei-c.org/ns/1.0"><body><h1 align="center" class="head">To the Hon. Stephen Coleridge <br xmlns:exist="http://exist.sourceforge.net/NS/exist" xmlns:html="http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40"/>[On his Labours in Mitigation of Animal Suffering]</h1><div class="stanza"><p class="line">SWORDSMAN of Mercy, merciless to these</p><p class="line">Who feign that the All-Maker gladly sees</p><p class="line">His lowlier creatures racked and riven while</p><p class="line">man</p><p class="line">Buys with their agony a dreadful ease,</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Not uncompanioned fight you this good fight</p><p class="line">Lords of invisible but invincible might,</p><p class="line">The poets all are with you evermore,</p><p class="line">Marching like morn upon the camps of Night.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">They watch you 'twixt the cheers and jeers of</p><p class="line">men.</p><p class="line">Grappling with cruelty in the dragon's den,</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">I say they all are with you from of old,</p><p class="line">Partisans of that dauntless sword, your pen.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Dark are the times; Death feasts with bloody</p><p class="line">jaws,</p><p class="line">When ruth is prone in dust, who heeds your</p><p class="line">cause?</p><p class="line">Yet fight, and faint not; still the stars</p><p class="line">look on;</p><p class="line">And poets acclaim, and Shakespeare leads the</p><p class="line">applause.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">No wonder! For the ancient legends say—</p><p class="line">Telling great truth in the great Grecian way—</p><p class="line">That horsed on Pegasus was Bellerophon,</p><p class="line">When he with joy did the Chimaera slay.</p></div></body></html> · Great War