There is the moral of all human tales;
Tis but the same rehearsal of the past,
First Freedom, and then Glory — when that fails,
Wealth, vice, corruption, — barbarism at last.
From Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage. And here he is on modern Britain:
Kingdoms are shrunk to provinces, and chains
Clank over sceptred cities, nations melt
From power’s high pinnacle, when they have felt
The sunshine for a while, and downward go
Like lauwine loosen’d from the mountain’s belt:
“lauwine” is nice. “Lavin” in Swedish is an avalanche. I wonder if this is a Scots/Norse word.
“lauwine”: OED gets all Germanic about it and has the Byron as its first citation. Babel Fish translates the OED’s alternative “lawine” into German as “avalanche”.
It’s not in the Concise Scots Dictionary, but it might amuse you to know that a ‘lawin’ is a drinking party in a tavern or your share of the bill at the end of a night out! If I get a chance I’ll look in DOST – Dictionary of the Older Scots Tongue which is a wonderful thing.
Oh do look it up in DOST, please …