LXXIISENNACHERIBThe Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold,And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green,That host with their banners at sunset were seen:Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hath blown,That host on the morrow lay withered and strown.For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed;And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still!And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide,But through it there rolled not the breath of his pride:And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf,And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf.And there lay the rider distorted and pale,With the dew on his brow and the rust on his mail;And the tents were all silent, the banners alone,The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown.And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail,And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal;And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword,Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!Byron.LXXIIITHE STORMING OF CORINTHTHE SIGNALThe night is past, and shines the sunAs if that morn were a jocund one.Lightly and brightly breaks awayThe Morning from her mantle grey,And the noon will look on a sultry day.Hark to the trump, and the drum,And the mournful sound of the barbarous horn,And the flap of the banners that flit as they're borne,And the neigh of the steed, and the multitude's hum,And the clash, and the shout, ‘They come! they come!’The horsetails are plucked from the ground, and the swordFrom its sheath; and they form, and but wait for the word.Tartar, and Spahi, and Turcoman,Strike your tents, and throng to the van;Mount ye, spur ye, skirr the plain,That the fugitive may flee in vain,When he breaks from the town; and none escape,Aged or young, in the Christian shape;While your fellows on foot, in a fiery mass,Bloodstain the breach through which they pass.The steeds are all bridled, and snort to the rein;Curved is each neck, and flowing each mane;White is the foam of their champ on the bit:The spears are uplifted; the matches are lit;The cannon are pointed, and ready to roar,And crush the wall they have crumbled before:Forms in his phalanx each janizar;Alp at their head; his right arm is bare,So is the blade of his scimitar;The khan and the pachas are all at their post;The vizier himself at the head of the host.When the culverin's signal is fired, then on;Leave not in Corinth a living one—A priest at her altars, a chief in her halls,A hearth in her mansions, a stone on her walls.God and the prophet—Alla Hu!Up to the skies with that wild halloo!‘There the breach lies for passage, the ladder to scale;And your hands on your sabres, and how should ye fail?He who first downs with the red cross may craveHis heart's dearest wish; let him ask it, and have!’Thus uttered Coumourgi, the dauntless vizier;The reply was the brandish of sabre and spear,And the shout of fierce thousands in joyous ire:—Silence—hark to the signal—fire!THE ASSAULTAs the spring-tides, with heavy plash,From the cliffs invading dashHuge fragments, sapped by the ceaseless flow,Till white and thundering down they go,Like the avalanche's snowOn the Alpine vales below;Thus at length, outbreathed and worn,Corinth's sons were downward borneBy the long and oft renewedCharge of the Moslem multitude.In firmness they stood, and in masses they fell,Heaped by the host of the infidel,Hand to hand, and foot to foot:Nothing there, save death, was mute:Stroke, and thrust, and flash, and cryFor quarter or for victory,Mingle there with the volleying thunder,Which makes the distant cities wonderHow the sounding battle goes,If with them, or for their foes;If they must mourn, or may rejoiceIn that annihilating voice,Which pierces the deep hills through and throughWith an echo dread and new:You might have heard it, on that day,O'er Salamis and Megara;(We have heard the hearers say,)Even unto Piræus' bay.From the point of encountering blades to the hilt,Sabres and swords with blood were gilt;But the rampart is won, and the spoil begun,And all but the after carnage done,Shriller shrieks now mingling comeFrom within the plundered dome:Hark to the haste of flying feetThat splash in the blood of the slippery street;But here and there, where 'vantage groundAgainst the foe may still be found,Desperate groups, of twelve or ten,Make a pause, and turn again—With banded backs against the wall,Fiercely stand, or fighting fall.There stood an old man—his hairs were white,But his veteran arm was full of might:So gallantly bore he the brunt of the fray,The dead before him, on that day,In a semicircle lay;Still he combated unwounded,Though retreating, unsurrounded.Many a scar of former fightLurked beneath his corselet bright;But of every wound his body bore,Each and all had been ta'en before:Though aged, he was so iron of limb,Few of our youth could cope with him,And the foes, whom he singly kept at bay,Outnumbered his thin hairs of silver grey.From right to left his sabre swept;Many an Othman mother weptSons that were unborn, when dippedHis weapon first in Moslem gore,Ere his years could count a score.Of all he might have been the sireWho fell that day beneath his ire:For, sonless left long years ago,His wrath made many a childless foe;And since the day, when in the straitHis only boy had met his fate,His parent's iron hand did doomMore than a human hecatomb.If shades by carnage be appeased,Patroclus' spirit less was pleasedThan his, Minotti's son, who diedWhere Asia's bounds and ours divide.Buried he lay, where thousands beforeFor thousands of years were inhumed on the shore;What of them is left, to tellWhere they lie, and how they fell?Not a stone on their turf, nor a bone in their graves;But they live in the verse that immortally saves.THE MAGAZINEDarkly, sternly, and all alone,Minotti stood o'er the altar-stone:Madonna's face upon him shone,Painted in heavenly hues above,With eyes of light and looks of love;And placed upon that holy shrineTo fix our thoughts on things divine,When pictured there, we kneeling seeHer, and the boy-God on her knee,Smiling sweetly on each prayerTo heaven, as if to waft it there.Still she smiled; even now she smiles,Though slaughter streams along her aisles:Minotti lifted his aged eye,And made the sign of a cross with a sigh,Then seized a torch which blazed thereby;And still he stood, while with steel and flameInward and onward the Mussulman came.The vaults beneath the mosaic stoneContained the dead of ages gone;Their names were on the graven floor,But now illegible with gore;The carvèd crests, and curious huesThe varied marble's veins diffuse,Were smeared, and slippery, stained, and strownWith broken swords and helms o'erthrown:There were dead above, and the dead belowLay cold in many a coffined row;You might see them piled in sable state,By a pale light through a gloomy grate;But War had entered their dark caves,And stored along the vaulted gravesHer sulphurous treasures, thickly spreadIn masses by the fleshless dead:Here, throughout the siege, had beenThe Christians' chiefest magazine;To these a late formed train now led,Minotti's last and stern resourceAgainst the foe's o'erwhelming force.The foe came on, and few remainTo strive, and those must strive in vain:For lack of further lives, to slakeThe thirst of vengeance now awake,With barbarous blows they gash the dead,And lop the already lifeless head,And fell the statues from their niche,And spoil the shrines of offerings rich,And from each other's rude hands wrestThe silver vessels saints had blessed.To the high altar on they go;O, but it made a glorious show!On its table still beholdThe cup of consecrated gold;Massy and deep, a glittering prize,Brightly it sparkles to plunderers' eyes:That morn it held the holy wine,Converted by Christ to his blood so divine,Which his worshippers drank at the break of day,To shrive their souls ere they joined in the fray.Still a few drops within it lay;And round the sacred table glowTwelve lofty lamps, in splendid row,From the purest metal cast;A spoil—the richest, and the last.So near they came, the nearest stretchedTo grasp the spoil he almost reached,When old Minotti's handTouched with the torch the train—'Tis fired!Spire, vaults, the shrine, the spoil, the slain,The turbaned victors, the Christian band,All that of living or dead remain,Hurl'd on high with the shivered fane,In one wild roar expired!The shattered town—the walls thrown down—The waves a moment backward bent—The hills that shake, although unrent,As if an earthquake passed—The thousand shapeless things all drivenIn cloud and flame athwart the heavenBy that tremendous blast—Proclaimed the desperate conflict o'erOn that too long afflicted shore:Up to the sky like rockets goAll that mingled there below:Many a tall and goodly man,Scorched and shrivelled to a span,When he fell to earth againLike a cinder strewed the plain:Down the ashes shower like rain;Some fell in the gulf, which received the sprinklesWith a thousand circling wrinkles;Some fell on the shore, but far awayScattered o'er the isthmus lay;Christian or Moslem, which be they?Let their mother say and say!When in cradled rest they lay,And each nursing mother smiledOn the sweet sleep of her child,Little deemed she such a dayWould rend those tender limbs away.Not the matrons that them boreCould discern their offspring more;That one moment left no traceMore of human form or faceSave a scattered scalp or bone:And down came blazing rafters, strownAround, and many a falling stone,Deeply dinted in the clay,All blackened there and reeking lay.All the living things that heardThat deadly earth-shock disappeared:The wild birds flew; the wild dogs fled,And howling left the unburied dead;The camels from their keepers broke;The distant steer forsook the yoke—The nearer steed plunged o'er the plain,And burst his girth, and tore his rein;The bull-frog's note from out the marshDeep-mouthed arose, and doubly harsh;The wolves yelled on the caverned hillWhere echo rolled in thunder still;The jackals' troop in gathered cryBayed from afar complainingly,With a mixed and mournful sound,Like crying babe, and beaten hound:With sudden wing and ruffled breastThe eagle left his rocky nest,And mounted nearer to the sun,The clouds beneath him seemed so dun;Their smoke assailed his startled beak,And made him higher soar and shriek—Thus was Corinth lost and won!Byron.LXXIVALHAMAThe Moorish King rides up and down,Through Granada's royal town;From Elvira's gates to thoseOf Bivarambla on he goes.Woe is me, Alhama!Letters to the monarch tellHow Alhama's city fell:In the fire the scroll he threw,And the messenger he slew.Woe is me, Alhama!He quits his mule, and mounts his horse,And through the street directs his course;Through the street of ZacatinTo the Alhambra spurring in.Woe is me, Alhama!When the Alhambra walls he gained,On the moment he ordainedThat the trumpet straight should soundWith the silver clarion round.Woe is me, Alhama!And when the hollow drums of warBeat the loud alarm afar,That the Moors of town and plainMight answer to the martial strain—Woe is me, Alhama!—Then the Moors, by this aware,That bloody Mars recalled them thereOne by one, and two by two,To a mighty squadron grew.Woe is me, Alhama!Out then spake an aged MoorIn these words the king before,‘Wherefore call on us, O King?What may mean this gathering?’Woe is me, Alhama!‘Friends! ye have, alas! to knowOf a most disastrous blow;That the Christians, stern and bold,Have obtained Alhama's hold.’Woe is me, Alhama!Out then spake old Alfaqui,With his beard so white to see,‘Good King! thou art justly served,Good King! this thou hast deserved.Woe is me, Alhama!By thee were slain, in evil hour,The Abencerrage, Granada's flower;And strangers were received by theeOf Cordova the Chivalry.Woe is me, Alhama!And for this, O King! is sentOn thee a double chastisement:Thee and thine, thy crown and realm,One last wreck shall overwhelm.Woe is me, Alhama!He who holds no laws in awe,He must perish by the law;And Granada must be won,And thyself with her undone.’Woe is me, Alhama!Fire flashed from out the old Moor's eyes,The monarch's wrath began to rise,Because he answered, and becauseHe spake exceeding well of laws.Woe is me, Alhama!‘There is no law to say such thingsAs may disgust the ear of kings:’Thus, snorting with his choler, saidThe Moorish King, and doomed him dead.Woe is me, Alhama!Moor Alfaqui! Moor Alfaqui!Though thy beard so hoary be,The King hath sent to have thee seized,For Alhama's loss displeased.Woe is me, Alhama!And to fix thy head uponHigh Alhambra's loftiest stone;That this for thee should be the law,And others tremble when they saw.Woe is me, Alhama!‘Cavalier, and man of worth!Let these words of mine go forth!Let the Moorish Monarch know,That to him I nothing owe.Woe is me, Alhama!But on my soul Alhama weighs,And on my inmost spirit preys;And if the King his land hath lost,Yet others may have lost the most.Woe is me, Alhama!Sires have lost their children, wivesTheir lords, and valiant men their lives!One what best his love might claimHath lost, another wealth, or fame.Woe is me, Alhama!I lost a damsel in that hour,Of all the land the loveliest flower;Doubloons a hundred I would pay,And think her ransom cheap that day.’Woe is me, Alhama!And as these things the old Moor said,They severed from the trunk his head;And to the Alhambra's wall with speed'Twas carried, as the King decreed.Woe is me, Alhama!And men and infants therein weepTheir loss, so heavy and so deep;Granada's ladies, all she rearsWithin her walls, burst into tears.Woe is me, Alhama!And from the windows o'er the wallsThe sable web of mourning falls;The King weeps as a woman o'erHis loss, for it is much and sore.Woe is me, Alhama!Byron.LXXVFRIENDSHIPMy boat is on the shore,And my bark is on the sea;But, before I go, Tom Moore,Here's a double health to thee!Here's a sigh to those who love me,And a smile to those who hate;And, whatever sky's above me,Here's a heart for every fate.Though the ocean roar around me,Yet it still shall bear me on;Though a desert should surround me,It hath springs that may be won.Were 't the last drop in the well,As I gasped upon the brink,Ere my fainting spirit fell,'Tis to thee that I would drink.With that water, as this wine,The libation I would pourShould be, ‘Peace with thine and mine,And a health to thee, Tom Moore!’Byron.LXXVITHE RACE WITH DEATHO Venice! Venice! when thy marble wallsAre level with the waters, there shall beA cry of nations o'er thy sunken halls,A loud lament along the sweeping sea!If I, a northern wanderer, weep for thee,What should thy sons do?—anything but weep:And yet they only murmur in their sleep.In contrast with their fathers—as the slime,The dull green ooze of the receding deep,Is with the dashing of the spring-tide foamThat drives the sailor shipless to his home,Are they to those that were; and thus they creep,Crouching and crab-like, through their sapping streets.O agony! that centuries should reapNo mellower harvest! Thirteen hundred yearsOf wealth and glory turned to dust and tears,And every monument the stranger meets,Church, palace, pillar, as a mourner greets;And even the Lion all subdued appears,And the harsh sound of the barbarian drumWith dull and daily dissonance repeatsThe echo of thy tyrant's voice alongThe soft waves, once all musical to song,That heaved beneath the moonlight with the throngOf gondolas and to the busy humOf cheerful creatures, whose most sinful deedsWere but the overbeating of the heart,And flow of too much happiness, which needsThe aid of age to turn its course apartFrom the luxuriant and voluptuous floodOf sweet sensations, battling with the blood.But these are better than the gloomy errors,The weeds of nations in their last decay,When Vice walks forth with her unsoftened terrors,And Mirth is madness, and but smiles to slay;And Hope is nothing but a false delay,The sick man's lightening half an hour ere death,When Faintness, the last mortal birth of Pain,And apathy of limb, the dull beginningOf the cold staggering race which Death is winning,Steals vein by vein and pulse by pulse away;Yet so relieving the o'er-tortured clay,To him appears renewal of his breath,And freedom the mere numbness of his chain;And then he talks of life, and how againHe feels his spirits soaring—albeit weak,And of the fresher air, which he would seek:And as he whispers knows not that he gasps,That his thin finger feels not what it clasps;And so the film comes o'er him, and the dizzyChamber swims round and round, and shadows busy,At which he vainly catches, flit and gleam,Till the last rattle chokes the strangled scream,And all is ice and blackness, and the earthThat which it was the moment ere our birth.Byron.LXXVIITHE GLORY THAT WAS GREECEThe isles of Greece, the isles of Greece!Where burning Sappho loved and sung,Where grew the arts of war and peace,Where Delos rose, and Phœbus sprung!Eternal summer gilds them yet,But all except their sun is set.The Scian and the Teian muse,The hero's harp, the lover's lute,Have found the fame your shores refuse:Their place of birth alone is muteTo sounds which echo further westThan your sires' ‘Islands of the Blest.’The mountains look on Marathon—And Marathon looks on the sea;And, musing there an hour alone,I dreamed that Greece might still be free;For, standing on the Persians' grave,I could not deem myself a slave.A king sate on the rocky browWhich looks o'er sea-born Salamis;And ships by thousands lay below,And men in nations;—all were his!He counted them at break of day,And when the sun set, where were they?And where are they? and where art thou,My country? On thy voiceless shoreThe heroic lay is tuneless now,The heroic bosom beats no more!And must thy lyre, so long divine,Degenerate into hands like mine?'Tis something in the dearth of fame,Though linked among a fettered race,To feel at least a patriot's shame,Even as I sing, suffuse my face;For what is left the poet here?For Greeks a blush, for Greece a tear!Mustwebut weep o'er days more blest?Mustwebut blush? Our fathers bled.Earth! render back from out thy breastA remnant of our Spartan dead!Of the three hundred grant but three,To make a new Thermopylæ!What, silent still? and silent all?Ah! no: the voices of the deadSound like a distant torrent's fall,And answer, ‘Let one living head,But one arise,—we come, we come!’'Tis but the living who are dumb.In vain—in vain: strike other chords;Fill high the cup with Samian wine!Leave battles to the Turkish hordes,And shed the blood of Scio's vine!Hark! rising to the ignoble call,How answers each bold Bacchanal!You have the Pyrrhic dance as yet;Where is the Pyrrhic phalanx gone?Of two such lessons, why forgetThe nobler and the manlier one?You have the letters Cadmus gave;Think ye he meant them for a slave?Fill high the bowl with Samian wine!We will not think of themes like these!It made Anacreon's song divine:He served—but served Polycrates:A tyrant; but our masters thenWere still, at least, our countrymen.The tyrant of the ChersoneseWas freedom's best and bravest friend;Thattyrant was Miltiades!Oh! that the present hour would lendAnother despot of the kind!Such chains as his were sure to bind.Fill high the bowl with Samian wine!On Suli's rock and Parga's shoreExists the remnant of a lineSuch as the Doric mothers bore;And there, perhaps, some seed is sownThe Heracleidan blood might own.Trust not for freedom to the Franks—They have a king who buys and sells;In native swords and native ranksThe only hope of courage dwells:But Turkish force and Latin fraudWould break your shield, however broad.Fill high the bowl with Samian wine!Our virgins dance beneath the shade—I see their glorious black eyes shine;But, gazing on each glowing maid,My own the burning tear-drop laves,To think such breasts must suckle slaves.Place me on Sunium's marbled steep,Where nothing save the waves and IMay hear our mutual murmurs sweep;There, swan-like, let me sing and die:A land of slaves shall ne'er be mine—Dash down yon cup of Samian wine!Byron.LXXVIIIHAIL AND FAREWELL'Tis time this heart should be unmoved,Since others it hath ceased to move:Yet, though I cannot be beloved,Still let me love!My days are in the yellow leaf;The flowers and fruits of love are gone;The worm, the canker, and the griefAre mine alone!The fire that on my bosom preysIs lone as some volcanic isle;No torch is kindled at its blaze—A funeral pile.The hope, the fear, the jealous care,The exalted portion of the painAnd power of love, I cannot share,But wear the chain.But 'tis not thus, and 'tis not here,Such thoughts should shake my soul, nornowWhere glory decks the hero's bier,Or binds his brow.The sword, the banner, and the field,Glory and Greece, around me see!The Spartan borne upon his shieldWas not more free.Awake! (not Greece—sheisawake!)Awake, my spirit! Think throughwhomThy life-blood tracks its parent lake,And then strike home!Tread those reviving passions down,Unworthy manhood! unto theeIndifferent should the smile or frownOf beauty be.If thou regrett'st thy youth,why live?The lad of honourable deathIs here: up to the field, and giveAway thy breath!Seek out—less often sought than found—A soldier's grave, for thee the best;Then look around, and choose thy ground,And take thy rest.Byron.LXXIXAFTER CORUNNANot a drum was heard, not a funeral note,As his corse to the rampart we hurried;Not a soldier discharged his farewell shotO'er the grave where our hero we buried.We buried him darkly at dead of night,The sods with our bayonets turning,By the struggling moonbeam's misty light,And the lantern dimly burning.No useless coffin enclosed his breast,Nor in sheet nor in shroud we wound him;But he lay like a warrior taking his restWith his martial cloak around him.Few and short were the prayers we said,And we spoke not a word of sorrow;But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead,And we bitterly thought of the morrow.We thought, as we hollowed his narrow bedAnd smoothed down his lonely pillow,How the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head,And we far away on the billow!Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone,And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him;But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep onIn the grave where a Briton has laid him.But half of our heavy task was done,When the clock struck the hour for retiring;And we heard the distant and random gunThat the foe was sullenly firing.Slowly and sadly we laid him down,From the field of his fame fresh and gory;We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone—But we left him alone with his glory.Wolfe.LXXXTHE OLD NAVYThe captain stood on the carronade: ‘First lieutenant,’ says he,‘Send all my merry men aft here, for they must list to me;I haven't the gift of the gab, my sons—because I'm bred to the sea;That ship there is a Frenchman, who means to fight with we.And odds bobs, hammer and tongs, long as I've been to sea,I've fought 'gainst every odds—but I've gained the victory!That ship there is a Frenchman, and if we don't takeshe,'Tis a thousand bullets to one, that she will capturewe;I haven't the gift of the gab, my boys; so each man to his gun;If she's not mine in half an hour, I'll flog each mother's son.For odds bobs, hammer and tongs, long as I've been to sea,I've fought 'gainst every odds—and I've gained the victory!’We fought for twenty minutes, when the Frenchman had enough;‘I little thought,’ said he, ‘that your men were of such stuff’;Our captain took the Frenchman's sword, a low bow made tohe;‘I haven't the gift of the gab, monsieur, but polite I wish to be.And odds bobs, hammer and tongs, long as I've been to sea,I've fought 'gainst every odds—and I've gained the victory!’Our captain sent for all of us: ‘My merry men,’ said he,‘I haven't the gift of the gab, my lads, but yet I thankful be.You've done your duty handsomely, each man stood to his gun;If you hadn't, you villains, as sure as day, I'd have flogged each mother's son.For odds bobs, hammer and tongs, as long as I'm at sea,I'll fight 'gainst every odds—and I'll gain the victory!’Marryat.LXXXICASABIANCAThe boy stood on the burning deckWhence all but he had fled;The flame that lit the battle's wreckShone round him o'er the dead.Yet beautiful and bright he stood,As born to rule the storm:A creature of heroic blood,A proud though child-like form.The flames rolled on—he would not goWithout his father's word;That father, faint in death below,His voice no longer heard.He called aloud; ‘Say, father! sayIf yet my task is done!’He knew not that the chieftain layUnconscious of his son.‘Speak, father!’ once again he cried,‘If I may yet be gone!’And but the booming shots replied,And fast the flames rolled on.Upon his brow he felt their breath,And in his waving hair;He looked from that lone post of deathIn still yet brave despair,And shouted but once more aloud,‘My father! must I stay?’While o'er him fast, through sail and shroud,The wreathing fires made way.They wrapt the ship in splendour wild,They caught the flag on high,And streamed above the gallant childLike banners in the sky.There came a burst of thunder-sound—The boy—O! where was he?Ask of the winds that far aroundWith fragments strewed the sea:With mast, and helm, and pennon fair,That well had borne their part!But the noblest thing which perished thereWas that young faithful heart.Hemans.LXXXIITHE PILGRIM FATHERSThe breaking waves dashed highOn a stern and rock-bound coast,And the woods against a stormy skyTheir giant branches tossed;And the heavy night hung darkThe hills and waters o'er,When a band of exiles moored their barkOn the wild New England shore.Not as the conqueror comes,They, the true-hearted, came;Not with the roll of the stirring drums,And the trumpet that sings of fame;Not as the flying come,In silence and in fear;—They shook the depths of the desert gloomWith their hymns of lofty cheer.Amidst the storm they sang,And the stars heard and the sea;And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rangTo the anthem of the free!The ocean eagle soaredFrom his nest by the white wave's foam;And the rocking pines of the forest roared—This was their welcome home!There were men with hoary hairAmidst that pilgrim band;Why hadtheycome to wither there,Away from their childhood's land?There was woman's fearless eye,Lit by her deep love's truth;There was manhood's brow serenely high,And the fiery heart of youth.What sought they thus afar?Bright jewels of the mine?The wealth of seas, the spoils of war?They sought a faith's pure shrine!Ay, call it holy ground,The soil where first they trod.They have left unstained what there they found—Freedom to worship God.Hemans.LXXXIIITO THE ADVENTUROUSMuch have I travelled in the realms of gold,And many goodly states and kingdoms seen;Round many western islands have I beenWhich bards in fealty to Apollo hold.Oft of one wide expanse had I been toldThat deep-browed Homer ruled as his demesne:Yet did I never breathe its pure sereneTill I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold:Then felt I like some watcher of the skiesWhen a new planet swims into his ken;Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyesHe stared at the Pacific—and all his menLooked at each other with a wild surmise—Silent, upon a peak in Darien.Keats.LXXXIVHORATIUSTHE TRYSTINGLars Porsena of ClusiumBy the Nine Gods he sworeThat the great house of TarquinShould suffer wrong no more.By the Nine Gods he swore it,And named a trysting day,And bade his messengers ride forthEast and west and south and northTo summon his array.East and west and south and northThe messengers ride fast,And tower and town and cottageHave heard the trumpet's blast.Shame on the false EtruscanWho lingers in his home,When Porsena of ClusiumIs on the march for Rome.The horsemen and the footmenAre pouring in amainFrom many a stately market-place,From many a fruitful plain;From many a lonely hamletWhich, hid by beech and pine,Like an eagle's nest hangs on the crestOf purple Apennine;From lordly Volaterræ,Where scowls the far-famed holdPiled by the hands of giantsFor godlike kings of old;From sea-girt PopuloniaWhose sentinels descrySardinia's snowy mountain-topsFringing the southern sky;From the proud mart of Pisæ,Queen of the western waves,Where ride Massilia's triremesHeavy with fair-haired slaves;From where sweet Clanis wandersThrough corn and vines and flowers;From where Cortona lifts to heavenHer diadem of towers.Tall are the oaks whose acornsDrop in dark Auser's rill;Fat are the stags that champ the boughsOf the Ciminian hill;Beyond all streams ClitumnusIs to the herdsman dear;Best of all pools the fowler lovesThe great Volsinian mere.But now no stroke of woodmanIs heard by Auser's rill;No hunter tracks the stag's green pathUp the Ciminian hill;Unwatched along ClitumnusGrazes the milk-white steer;Unharmed the water-fowl may dipIn the Volsinian mere.The harvests of ArretiumThis year old men shall reap;This year young boys in UmbroShall plunge the struggling sheep;And in the vats of LunaThis year the must shall foamRound the white feet of laughing girlsWhose sires have marched to Rome.There be thirty chosen prophets,The wisest of the land,Who alway by Lars PorsenaBoth morn and evening stand:Evening and morn the ThirtyHave turned the verses o'er,Traced from the right on linen whiteBy mighty seers of yore.And with one voice the ThirtyHave their glad answer given:‘Go forth, go forth, Lars Porsena;Go forth, beloved of Heaven;Go, and return in gloryTo Clusium's royal dome,And hang round Nurscia's altarsThe golden shields of Rome.’And now hath every citySent up her tale of men;The foot are fourscore thousand,The horse are thousands ten.Before the gates of SutriumIs met the great array.A proud man was Lars PorsenaUpon the trysting day!For all the Etruscan armiesWere ranged beneath his eye,And many a banished Roman,And many a stout ally;And with a mighty followingTo join the muster cameThe Tusculan Mamilius,Prince of the Latian name.THE TROUBLE IN ROMEBut by the yellow TiberWas tumult and affright:From all the spacious champaignTo Rome men took their flight.A mile around the cityThe throng stopped up the ways;A fearful sight it was to seeThrough two long nights and days.For aged folk on crutches,And women great with child,And mothers sobbing over babesThat clung to them and smiled,And sick men borne in littersHigh on the necks of slaves,And troops of sun-burned husbandmenWith reaping-hooks and staves,And droves of mules and assesLaden with skins of wine,And endless flocks of goats and sheep,And endless herds of kine,And endless trains of waggonsThat creaked beneath the weightOf corn-sacks and of household goods,Choked every roaring gate.Now from the rock TarpeianCould the wan burghers spyThe line of blazing villagesRed in the midnight sky.The Fathers of the City,They sat all night and day,For every hour some horseman cameWith tidings of dismay.To eastward and to westwardHave spread the Tuscan bands;Nor house, nor fence, nor dovecoteIn Crustumerium stands.Verbenna down to OstiaHath wasted all the plain;Astur hath stormed Janiculum,And the stout guards are slain.I wis, in all the SenateThere was no heart so boldBut sore it ached, and fast it beat,When that ill news was told.Forthwith up rose the Consul,Up rose the Fathers all;In haste they girded up their gowns,And hied them to the wall.They held a council standingBefore the River-Gate;Short time was there, ye well may guess,For musing or debate.Out spake the Consul roundly:‘The bridge must straight go down;For, since Janiculum is lost,Nought else can save the town.’Just then a scout came flying,All wild with haste and fear:‘To arms! to arms! Sir Consul:Lars Porsena is here.’On the low hills to westwardThe Consul fixed his eye,And saw the swarthy storm of dustRise fast along the sky.And nearer fast and nearerDoth the red whirlwind come;And louder still and still more loud,From underneath that rolling cloudIs heard the trumpet's war-note proud,The trampling, and the hum.And plainly and more plainlyNow through the gloom appears,Far to left and far to right,In broken gleams of dark-blue light,The long array of helmets bright,The long array of spears.And plainly and more plainlyAbove that glimmering lineNow might ye see the bannersOf twelve fair cities shine;But the banner of proud ClusiumWas highest of them all,The terror of the Umbrian,The terror of the Gaul.And plainly and more plainlyNow might the burghers know,By port and vest, by horse and crest,Each warlike Lucumo.There Cilnius of ArretiumOn his fleet roan was seen;And Astur of the fourfold shield,Girt with the brand none else may wield,Tolumnius with the belt of gold,And dark Verbenna from the holdBy reedy Thrasymene.Fast by the royal standardO'erlooking all the war,Lars Porsena of ClusiumSate in his ivory car.By the right wheel rode Mamilius,Prince of the Latian name;And by the left false Sextus,That wrought the deed of shame.But when the face of SextusWas seen among the foes,A yell that rent the firmamentFrom all the town arose.On the house-tops was no womanBut spat towards him, and hissed;No child but screamed out curses,And shook its little fist.But the Consul's brow was sad,And the Consul's speech was low,And darkly looked he at the wall,And darkly at the foe.‘Their van will be upon usBefore the bridge goes down;And if they once may win the bridge,What hope to save the town?’Then out spake brave Horatius,The Captain of the gate:‘To every man upon this earthDeath cometh soon or late;And how can man die betterThan facing fearful odds,For the ashes of his fathersAnd the temples of his Gods,And for the tender motherWho dandled him to rest,And for the wife who nursesHis baby at her breast,And for the holy maidensWho feed the eternal flame,To save them from false SextusThat wrought the deed of shame?Hew down the bridge, Sir Consul,With all the speed ye may;I, with two more to help me,Will hold the foe in play.In yon strait path a thousandMay well be stopped by three.Now who will stand on either hand,And keep the bridge with me?’Then out spake Spurius Lartius,A Ramnian proud was he:‘Lo, I will stand at thy right hand,And keep the bridge with thee.’And out spake strong Heminius,Of Titian blood was he:‘I will abide on thy left side,And keep the bridge with thee.’‘Horatius,’ quoth the Consul,‘As thou sayest, so let it be.’And straight against that great arrayForth went the dauntless Three.For Romans in Rome's quarrelSpared neither land nor gold,Nor son nor wife, nor limb nor life,In the brave days of old.Then none was for a party;Then all were for the state;Then the great man helped the poor,And the poor man loved the great:Then lands were fairly portioned;Then spoils were fairly sold:The Romans were like brothersIn the brave days of old.Now Roman is to RomanMore hateful than a foe,And the Tribunes beard the high,And the Fathers grind the low.As we wax hot in faction,In battle we wax cold:Wherefore men fight not as they foughtIn the brave days of old.
The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold,And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.
Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green,That host with their banners at sunset were seen:Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hath blown,That host on the morrow lay withered and strown.
For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed;And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still!
And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide,But through it there rolled not the breath of his pride:And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf,And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf.
And there lay the rider distorted and pale,With the dew on his brow and the rust on his mail;And the tents were all silent, the banners alone,The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown.
And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail,And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal;And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword,Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!
Byron.
The night is past, and shines the sunAs if that morn were a jocund one.Lightly and brightly breaks awayThe Morning from her mantle grey,And the noon will look on a sultry day.Hark to the trump, and the drum,And the mournful sound of the barbarous horn,And the flap of the banners that flit as they're borne,And the neigh of the steed, and the multitude's hum,And the clash, and the shout, ‘They come! they come!’The horsetails are plucked from the ground, and the swordFrom its sheath; and they form, and but wait for the word.Tartar, and Spahi, and Turcoman,Strike your tents, and throng to the van;Mount ye, spur ye, skirr the plain,That the fugitive may flee in vain,When he breaks from the town; and none escape,Aged or young, in the Christian shape;While your fellows on foot, in a fiery mass,Bloodstain the breach through which they pass.The steeds are all bridled, and snort to the rein;Curved is each neck, and flowing each mane;White is the foam of their champ on the bit:The spears are uplifted; the matches are lit;The cannon are pointed, and ready to roar,And crush the wall they have crumbled before:Forms in his phalanx each janizar;Alp at their head; his right arm is bare,So is the blade of his scimitar;The khan and the pachas are all at their post;The vizier himself at the head of the host.When the culverin's signal is fired, then on;Leave not in Corinth a living one—A priest at her altars, a chief in her halls,A hearth in her mansions, a stone on her walls.God and the prophet—Alla Hu!Up to the skies with that wild halloo!‘There the breach lies for passage, the ladder to scale;And your hands on your sabres, and how should ye fail?He who first downs with the red cross may craveHis heart's dearest wish; let him ask it, and have!’Thus uttered Coumourgi, the dauntless vizier;The reply was the brandish of sabre and spear,And the shout of fierce thousands in joyous ire:—Silence—hark to the signal—fire!
As the spring-tides, with heavy plash,From the cliffs invading dashHuge fragments, sapped by the ceaseless flow,Till white and thundering down they go,Like the avalanche's snowOn the Alpine vales below;Thus at length, outbreathed and worn,Corinth's sons were downward borneBy the long and oft renewedCharge of the Moslem multitude.In firmness they stood, and in masses they fell,Heaped by the host of the infidel,Hand to hand, and foot to foot:Nothing there, save death, was mute:Stroke, and thrust, and flash, and cryFor quarter or for victory,Mingle there with the volleying thunder,Which makes the distant cities wonderHow the sounding battle goes,If with them, or for their foes;If they must mourn, or may rejoiceIn that annihilating voice,Which pierces the deep hills through and throughWith an echo dread and new:You might have heard it, on that day,O'er Salamis and Megara;(We have heard the hearers say,)Even unto Piræus' bay.
From the point of encountering blades to the hilt,Sabres and swords with blood were gilt;But the rampart is won, and the spoil begun,And all but the after carnage done,Shriller shrieks now mingling comeFrom within the plundered dome:Hark to the haste of flying feetThat splash in the blood of the slippery street;But here and there, where 'vantage groundAgainst the foe may still be found,Desperate groups, of twelve or ten,Make a pause, and turn again—With banded backs against the wall,Fiercely stand, or fighting fall.
There stood an old man—his hairs were white,But his veteran arm was full of might:So gallantly bore he the brunt of the fray,The dead before him, on that day,In a semicircle lay;Still he combated unwounded,Though retreating, unsurrounded.Many a scar of former fightLurked beneath his corselet bright;But of every wound his body bore,Each and all had been ta'en before:Though aged, he was so iron of limb,Few of our youth could cope with him,And the foes, whom he singly kept at bay,Outnumbered his thin hairs of silver grey.From right to left his sabre swept;Many an Othman mother weptSons that were unborn, when dippedHis weapon first in Moslem gore,Ere his years could count a score.Of all he might have been the sireWho fell that day beneath his ire:For, sonless left long years ago,His wrath made many a childless foe;And since the day, when in the straitHis only boy had met his fate,His parent's iron hand did doomMore than a human hecatomb.If shades by carnage be appeased,Patroclus' spirit less was pleasedThan his, Minotti's son, who diedWhere Asia's bounds and ours divide.Buried he lay, where thousands beforeFor thousands of years were inhumed on the shore;What of them is left, to tellWhere they lie, and how they fell?Not a stone on their turf, nor a bone in their graves;But they live in the verse that immortally saves.
Darkly, sternly, and all alone,Minotti stood o'er the altar-stone:Madonna's face upon him shone,Painted in heavenly hues above,With eyes of light and looks of love;And placed upon that holy shrineTo fix our thoughts on things divine,When pictured there, we kneeling seeHer, and the boy-God on her knee,Smiling sweetly on each prayerTo heaven, as if to waft it there.Still she smiled; even now she smiles,Though slaughter streams along her aisles:Minotti lifted his aged eye,And made the sign of a cross with a sigh,Then seized a torch which blazed thereby;And still he stood, while with steel and flameInward and onward the Mussulman came.
The vaults beneath the mosaic stoneContained the dead of ages gone;Their names were on the graven floor,But now illegible with gore;The carvèd crests, and curious huesThe varied marble's veins diffuse,Were smeared, and slippery, stained, and strownWith broken swords and helms o'erthrown:There were dead above, and the dead belowLay cold in many a coffined row;You might see them piled in sable state,By a pale light through a gloomy grate;But War had entered their dark caves,And stored along the vaulted gravesHer sulphurous treasures, thickly spreadIn masses by the fleshless dead:Here, throughout the siege, had beenThe Christians' chiefest magazine;To these a late formed train now led,Minotti's last and stern resourceAgainst the foe's o'erwhelming force.
The foe came on, and few remainTo strive, and those must strive in vain:For lack of further lives, to slakeThe thirst of vengeance now awake,With barbarous blows they gash the dead,And lop the already lifeless head,And fell the statues from their niche,And spoil the shrines of offerings rich,And from each other's rude hands wrestThe silver vessels saints had blessed.To the high altar on they go;O, but it made a glorious show!On its table still beholdThe cup of consecrated gold;Massy and deep, a glittering prize,Brightly it sparkles to plunderers' eyes:That morn it held the holy wine,Converted by Christ to his blood so divine,Which his worshippers drank at the break of day,To shrive their souls ere they joined in the fray.Still a few drops within it lay;And round the sacred table glowTwelve lofty lamps, in splendid row,From the purest metal cast;A spoil—the richest, and the last.
So near they came, the nearest stretchedTo grasp the spoil he almost reached,When old Minotti's handTouched with the torch the train—'Tis fired!Spire, vaults, the shrine, the spoil, the slain,The turbaned victors, the Christian band,All that of living or dead remain,Hurl'd on high with the shivered fane,In one wild roar expired!The shattered town—the walls thrown down—The waves a moment backward bent—The hills that shake, although unrent,As if an earthquake passed—The thousand shapeless things all drivenIn cloud and flame athwart the heavenBy that tremendous blast—Proclaimed the desperate conflict o'erOn that too long afflicted shore:Up to the sky like rockets goAll that mingled there below:Many a tall and goodly man,Scorched and shrivelled to a span,When he fell to earth againLike a cinder strewed the plain:Down the ashes shower like rain;Some fell in the gulf, which received the sprinklesWith a thousand circling wrinkles;Some fell on the shore, but far awayScattered o'er the isthmus lay;Christian or Moslem, which be they?Let their mother say and say!When in cradled rest they lay,And each nursing mother smiledOn the sweet sleep of her child,Little deemed she such a dayWould rend those tender limbs away.Not the matrons that them boreCould discern their offspring more;That one moment left no traceMore of human form or faceSave a scattered scalp or bone:And down came blazing rafters, strownAround, and many a falling stone,Deeply dinted in the clay,All blackened there and reeking lay.All the living things that heardThat deadly earth-shock disappeared:The wild birds flew; the wild dogs fled,And howling left the unburied dead;The camels from their keepers broke;The distant steer forsook the yoke—The nearer steed plunged o'er the plain,And burst his girth, and tore his rein;The bull-frog's note from out the marshDeep-mouthed arose, and doubly harsh;The wolves yelled on the caverned hillWhere echo rolled in thunder still;The jackals' troop in gathered cryBayed from afar complainingly,With a mixed and mournful sound,Like crying babe, and beaten hound:With sudden wing and ruffled breastThe eagle left his rocky nest,And mounted nearer to the sun,The clouds beneath him seemed so dun;Their smoke assailed his startled beak,And made him higher soar and shriek—Thus was Corinth lost and won!
Byron.
The Moorish King rides up and down,Through Granada's royal town;From Elvira's gates to thoseOf Bivarambla on he goes.Woe is me, Alhama!
Letters to the monarch tellHow Alhama's city fell:In the fire the scroll he threw,And the messenger he slew.Woe is me, Alhama!
He quits his mule, and mounts his horse,And through the street directs his course;Through the street of ZacatinTo the Alhambra spurring in.Woe is me, Alhama!
When the Alhambra walls he gained,On the moment he ordainedThat the trumpet straight should soundWith the silver clarion round.Woe is me, Alhama!
And when the hollow drums of warBeat the loud alarm afar,That the Moors of town and plainMight answer to the martial strain—Woe is me, Alhama!—
Then the Moors, by this aware,That bloody Mars recalled them thereOne by one, and two by two,To a mighty squadron grew.Woe is me, Alhama!
Out then spake an aged MoorIn these words the king before,‘Wherefore call on us, O King?What may mean this gathering?’Woe is me, Alhama!
‘Friends! ye have, alas! to knowOf a most disastrous blow;That the Christians, stern and bold,Have obtained Alhama's hold.’Woe is me, Alhama!
Out then spake old Alfaqui,With his beard so white to see,‘Good King! thou art justly served,Good King! this thou hast deserved.Woe is me, Alhama!
By thee were slain, in evil hour,The Abencerrage, Granada's flower;And strangers were received by theeOf Cordova the Chivalry.Woe is me, Alhama!
And for this, O King! is sentOn thee a double chastisement:Thee and thine, thy crown and realm,One last wreck shall overwhelm.Woe is me, Alhama!
He who holds no laws in awe,He must perish by the law;And Granada must be won,And thyself with her undone.’Woe is me, Alhama!
Fire flashed from out the old Moor's eyes,The monarch's wrath began to rise,Because he answered, and becauseHe spake exceeding well of laws.Woe is me, Alhama!
‘There is no law to say such thingsAs may disgust the ear of kings:’Thus, snorting with his choler, saidThe Moorish King, and doomed him dead.Woe is me, Alhama!
Moor Alfaqui! Moor Alfaqui!Though thy beard so hoary be,The King hath sent to have thee seized,For Alhama's loss displeased.Woe is me, Alhama!
And to fix thy head uponHigh Alhambra's loftiest stone;That this for thee should be the law,And others tremble when they saw.Woe is me, Alhama!
‘Cavalier, and man of worth!Let these words of mine go forth!Let the Moorish Monarch know,That to him I nothing owe.Woe is me, Alhama!
But on my soul Alhama weighs,And on my inmost spirit preys;And if the King his land hath lost,Yet others may have lost the most.Woe is me, Alhama!
Sires have lost their children, wivesTheir lords, and valiant men their lives!One what best his love might claimHath lost, another wealth, or fame.Woe is me, Alhama!
I lost a damsel in that hour,Of all the land the loveliest flower;Doubloons a hundred I would pay,And think her ransom cheap that day.’Woe is me, Alhama!
And as these things the old Moor said,They severed from the trunk his head;And to the Alhambra's wall with speed'Twas carried, as the King decreed.Woe is me, Alhama!
And men and infants therein weepTheir loss, so heavy and so deep;Granada's ladies, all she rearsWithin her walls, burst into tears.Woe is me, Alhama!
And from the windows o'er the wallsThe sable web of mourning falls;The King weeps as a woman o'erHis loss, for it is much and sore.Woe is me, Alhama!
Byron.
My boat is on the shore,And my bark is on the sea;But, before I go, Tom Moore,Here's a double health to thee!
Here's a sigh to those who love me,And a smile to those who hate;And, whatever sky's above me,Here's a heart for every fate.
Though the ocean roar around me,Yet it still shall bear me on;Though a desert should surround me,It hath springs that may be won.
Were 't the last drop in the well,As I gasped upon the brink,Ere my fainting spirit fell,'Tis to thee that I would drink.
With that water, as this wine,The libation I would pourShould be, ‘Peace with thine and mine,And a health to thee, Tom Moore!’
Byron.
O Venice! Venice! when thy marble wallsAre level with the waters, there shall beA cry of nations o'er thy sunken halls,A loud lament along the sweeping sea!If I, a northern wanderer, weep for thee,What should thy sons do?—anything but weep:And yet they only murmur in their sleep.In contrast with their fathers—as the slime,The dull green ooze of the receding deep,Is with the dashing of the spring-tide foamThat drives the sailor shipless to his home,Are they to those that were; and thus they creep,Crouching and crab-like, through their sapping streets.O agony! that centuries should reapNo mellower harvest! Thirteen hundred yearsOf wealth and glory turned to dust and tears,And every monument the stranger meets,Church, palace, pillar, as a mourner greets;And even the Lion all subdued appears,And the harsh sound of the barbarian drumWith dull and daily dissonance repeatsThe echo of thy tyrant's voice alongThe soft waves, once all musical to song,That heaved beneath the moonlight with the throngOf gondolas and to the busy humOf cheerful creatures, whose most sinful deedsWere but the overbeating of the heart,And flow of too much happiness, which needsThe aid of age to turn its course apartFrom the luxuriant and voluptuous floodOf sweet sensations, battling with the blood.But these are better than the gloomy errors,The weeds of nations in their last decay,When Vice walks forth with her unsoftened terrors,And Mirth is madness, and but smiles to slay;And Hope is nothing but a false delay,The sick man's lightening half an hour ere death,When Faintness, the last mortal birth of Pain,And apathy of limb, the dull beginningOf the cold staggering race which Death is winning,Steals vein by vein and pulse by pulse away;Yet so relieving the o'er-tortured clay,To him appears renewal of his breath,And freedom the mere numbness of his chain;And then he talks of life, and how againHe feels his spirits soaring—albeit weak,And of the fresher air, which he would seek:And as he whispers knows not that he gasps,That his thin finger feels not what it clasps;And so the film comes o'er him, and the dizzyChamber swims round and round, and shadows busy,At which he vainly catches, flit and gleam,Till the last rattle chokes the strangled scream,And all is ice and blackness, and the earthThat which it was the moment ere our birth.
Byron.
The isles of Greece, the isles of Greece!Where burning Sappho loved and sung,Where grew the arts of war and peace,Where Delos rose, and Phœbus sprung!Eternal summer gilds them yet,But all except their sun is set.
The Scian and the Teian muse,The hero's harp, the lover's lute,Have found the fame your shores refuse:Their place of birth alone is muteTo sounds which echo further westThan your sires' ‘Islands of the Blest.’
The mountains look on Marathon—And Marathon looks on the sea;And, musing there an hour alone,I dreamed that Greece might still be free;For, standing on the Persians' grave,I could not deem myself a slave.
A king sate on the rocky browWhich looks o'er sea-born Salamis;And ships by thousands lay below,And men in nations;—all were his!He counted them at break of day,And when the sun set, where were they?
And where are they? and where art thou,My country? On thy voiceless shoreThe heroic lay is tuneless now,The heroic bosom beats no more!And must thy lyre, so long divine,Degenerate into hands like mine?
'Tis something in the dearth of fame,Though linked among a fettered race,To feel at least a patriot's shame,Even as I sing, suffuse my face;For what is left the poet here?For Greeks a blush, for Greece a tear!
Mustwebut weep o'er days more blest?Mustwebut blush? Our fathers bled.Earth! render back from out thy breastA remnant of our Spartan dead!Of the three hundred grant but three,To make a new Thermopylæ!
What, silent still? and silent all?Ah! no: the voices of the deadSound like a distant torrent's fall,And answer, ‘Let one living head,But one arise,—we come, we come!’'Tis but the living who are dumb.
In vain—in vain: strike other chords;Fill high the cup with Samian wine!Leave battles to the Turkish hordes,And shed the blood of Scio's vine!Hark! rising to the ignoble call,How answers each bold Bacchanal!
You have the Pyrrhic dance as yet;Where is the Pyrrhic phalanx gone?Of two such lessons, why forgetThe nobler and the manlier one?You have the letters Cadmus gave;Think ye he meant them for a slave?
Fill high the bowl with Samian wine!We will not think of themes like these!It made Anacreon's song divine:He served—but served Polycrates:A tyrant; but our masters thenWere still, at least, our countrymen.
The tyrant of the ChersoneseWas freedom's best and bravest friend;Thattyrant was Miltiades!Oh! that the present hour would lendAnother despot of the kind!Such chains as his were sure to bind.
Fill high the bowl with Samian wine!On Suli's rock and Parga's shoreExists the remnant of a lineSuch as the Doric mothers bore;And there, perhaps, some seed is sownThe Heracleidan blood might own.
Trust not for freedom to the Franks—They have a king who buys and sells;In native swords and native ranksThe only hope of courage dwells:But Turkish force and Latin fraudWould break your shield, however broad.
Fill high the bowl with Samian wine!Our virgins dance beneath the shade—I see their glorious black eyes shine;But, gazing on each glowing maid,My own the burning tear-drop laves,To think such breasts must suckle slaves.
Place me on Sunium's marbled steep,Where nothing save the waves and IMay hear our mutual murmurs sweep;There, swan-like, let me sing and die:A land of slaves shall ne'er be mine—Dash down yon cup of Samian wine!
Byron.
'Tis time this heart should be unmoved,Since others it hath ceased to move:Yet, though I cannot be beloved,Still let me love!
My days are in the yellow leaf;The flowers and fruits of love are gone;The worm, the canker, and the griefAre mine alone!
The fire that on my bosom preysIs lone as some volcanic isle;No torch is kindled at its blaze—A funeral pile.
The hope, the fear, the jealous care,The exalted portion of the painAnd power of love, I cannot share,But wear the chain.
But 'tis not thus, and 'tis not here,Such thoughts should shake my soul, nornowWhere glory decks the hero's bier,Or binds his brow.
The sword, the banner, and the field,Glory and Greece, around me see!The Spartan borne upon his shieldWas not more free.
Awake! (not Greece—sheisawake!)Awake, my spirit! Think throughwhomThy life-blood tracks its parent lake,And then strike home!
Tread those reviving passions down,Unworthy manhood! unto theeIndifferent should the smile or frownOf beauty be.
If thou regrett'st thy youth,why live?The lad of honourable deathIs here: up to the field, and giveAway thy breath!
Seek out—less often sought than found—A soldier's grave, for thee the best;Then look around, and choose thy ground,And take thy rest.
Byron.
Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,As his corse to the rampart we hurried;Not a soldier discharged his farewell shotO'er the grave where our hero we buried.
We buried him darkly at dead of night,The sods with our bayonets turning,By the struggling moonbeam's misty light,And the lantern dimly burning.
No useless coffin enclosed his breast,Nor in sheet nor in shroud we wound him;But he lay like a warrior taking his restWith his martial cloak around him.
Few and short were the prayers we said,And we spoke not a word of sorrow;But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead,And we bitterly thought of the morrow.
We thought, as we hollowed his narrow bedAnd smoothed down his lonely pillow,How the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head,And we far away on the billow!
Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone,And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him;But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep onIn the grave where a Briton has laid him.
But half of our heavy task was done,When the clock struck the hour for retiring;And we heard the distant and random gunThat the foe was sullenly firing.
Slowly and sadly we laid him down,From the field of his fame fresh and gory;We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone—But we left him alone with his glory.
Wolfe.
The captain stood on the carronade: ‘First lieutenant,’ says he,‘Send all my merry men aft here, for they must list to me;I haven't the gift of the gab, my sons—because I'm bred to the sea;That ship there is a Frenchman, who means to fight with we.And odds bobs, hammer and tongs, long as I've been to sea,I've fought 'gainst every odds—but I've gained the victory!
That ship there is a Frenchman, and if we don't takeshe,'Tis a thousand bullets to one, that she will capturewe;I haven't the gift of the gab, my boys; so each man to his gun;If she's not mine in half an hour, I'll flog each mother's son.For odds bobs, hammer and tongs, long as I've been to sea,I've fought 'gainst every odds—and I've gained the victory!’
We fought for twenty minutes, when the Frenchman had enough;‘I little thought,’ said he, ‘that your men were of such stuff’;Our captain took the Frenchman's sword, a low bow made tohe;‘I haven't the gift of the gab, monsieur, but polite I wish to be.And odds bobs, hammer and tongs, long as I've been to sea,I've fought 'gainst every odds—and I've gained the victory!’
Our captain sent for all of us: ‘My merry men,’ said he,‘I haven't the gift of the gab, my lads, but yet I thankful be.You've done your duty handsomely, each man stood to his gun;If you hadn't, you villains, as sure as day, I'd have flogged each mother's son.For odds bobs, hammer and tongs, as long as I'm at sea,I'll fight 'gainst every odds—and I'll gain the victory!’
Marryat.
The boy stood on the burning deckWhence all but he had fled;The flame that lit the battle's wreckShone round him o'er the dead.
Yet beautiful and bright he stood,As born to rule the storm:A creature of heroic blood,A proud though child-like form.
The flames rolled on—he would not goWithout his father's word;That father, faint in death below,His voice no longer heard.
He called aloud; ‘Say, father! sayIf yet my task is done!’He knew not that the chieftain layUnconscious of his son.
‘Speak, father!’ once again he cried,‘If I may yet be gone!’And but the booming shots replied,And fast the flames rolled on.
Upon his brow he felt their breath,And in his waving hair;He looked from that lone post of deathIn still yet brave despair,
And shouted but once more aloud,‘My father! must I stay?’While o'er him fast, through sail and shroud,The wreathing fires made way.
They wrapt the ship in splendour wild,They caught the flag on high,And streamed above the gallant childLike banners in the sky.
There came a burst of thunder-sound—The boy—O! where was he?Ask of the winds that far aroundWith fragments strewed the sea:
With mast, and helm, and pennon fair,That well had borne their part!But the noblest thing which perished thereWas that young faithful heart.
Hemans.
The breaking waves dashed highOn a stern and rock-bound coast,And the woods against a stormy skyTheir giant branches tossed;
And the heavy night hung darkThe hills and waters o'er,When a band of exiles moored their barkOn the wild New England shore.
Not as the conqueror comes,They, the true-hearted, came;Not with the roll of the stirring drums,And the trumpet that sings of fame;
Not as the flying come,In silence and in fear;—They shook the depths of the desert gloomWith their hymns of lofty cheer.
Amidst the storm they sang,And the stars heard and the sea;And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rangTo the anthem of the free!
The ocean eagle soaredFrom his nest by the white wave's foam;And the rocking pines of the forest roared—This was their welcome home!
There were men with hoary hairAmidst that pilgrim band;Why hadtheycome to wither there,Away from their childhood's land?
There was woman's fearless eye,Lit by her deep love's truth;There was manhood's brow serenely high,And the fiery heart of youth.
What sought they thus afar?Bright jewels of the mine?The wealth of seas, the spoils of war?They sought a faith's pure shrine!
Ay, call it holy ground,The soil where first they trod.They have left unstained what there they found—Freedom to worship God.
Hemans.
Much have I travelled in the realms of gold,And many goodly states and kingdoms seen;Round many western islands have I beenWhich bards in fealty to Apollo hold.Oft of one wide expanse had I been toldThat deep-browed Homer ruled as his demesne:Yet did I never breathe its pure sereneTill I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold:Then felt I like some watcher of the skiesWhen a new planet swims into his ken;Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyesHe stared at the Pacific—and all his menLooked at each other with a wild surmise—Silent, upon a peak in Darien.
Keats.
Lars Porsena of ClusiumBy the Nine Gods he sworeThat the great house of TarquinShould suffer wrong no more.By the Nine Gods he swore it,And named a trysting day,And bade his messengers ride forthEast and west and south and northTo summon his array.
East and west and south and northThe messengers ride fast,And tower and town and cottageHave heard the trumpet's blast.Shame on the false EtruscanWho lingers in his home,When Porsena of ClusiumIs on the march for Rome.
The horsemen and the footmenAre pouring in amainFrom many a stately market-place,From many a fruitful plain;From many a lonely hamletWhich, hid by beech and pine,Like an eagle's nest hangs on the crestOf purple Apennine;
From lordly Volaterræ,Where scowls the far-famed holdPiled by the hands of giantsFor godlike kings of old;From sea-girt PopuloniaWhose sentinels descrySardinia's snowy mountain-topsFringing the southern sky;
From the proud mart of Pisæ,Queen of the western waves,Where ride Massilia's triremesHeavy with fair-haired slaves;From where sweet Clanis wandersThrough corn and vines and flowers;From where Cortona lifts to heavenHer diadem of towers.
Tall are the oaks whose acornsDrop in dark Auser's rill;Fat are the stags that champ the boughsOf the Ciminian hill;Beyond all streams ClitumnusIs to the herdsman dear;Best of all pools the fowler lovesThe great Volsinian mere.
But now no stroke of woodmanIs heard by Auser's rill;No hunter tracks the stag's green pathUp the Ciminian hill;Unwatched along ClitumnusGrazes the milk-white steer;Unharmed the water-fowl may dipIn the Volsinian mere.
The harvests of ArretiumThis year old men shall reap;This year young boys in UmbroShall plunge the struggling sheep;And in the vats of LunaThis year the must shall foamRound the white feet of laughing girlsWhose sires have marched to Rome.
There be thirty chosen prophets,The wisest of the land,Who alway by Lars PorsenaBoth morn and evening stand:Evening and morn the ThirtyHave turned the verses o'er,Traced from the right on linen whiteBy mighty seers of yore.
And with one voice the ThirtyHave their glad answer given:‘Go forth, go forth, Lars Porsena;Go forth, beloved of Heaven;Go, and return in gloryTo Clusium's royal dome,And hang round Nurscia's altarsThe golden shields of Rome.’
And now hath every citySent up her tale of men;The foot are fourscore thousand,The horse are thousands ten.Before the gates of SutriumIs met the great array.A proud man was Lars PorsenaUpon the trysting day!
For all the Etruscan armiesWere ranged beneath his eye,And many a banished Roman,And many a stout ally;And with a mighty followingTo join the muster cameThe Tusculan Mamilius,Prince of the Latian name.
But by the yellow TiberWas tumult and affright:From all the spacious champaignTo Rome men took their flight.A mile around the cityThe throng stopped up the ways;A fearful sight it was to seeThrough two long nights and days.
For aged folk on crutches,And women great with child,And mothers sobbing over babesThat clung to them and smiled,And sick men borne in littersHigh on the necks of slaves,And troops of sun-burned husbandmenWith reaping-hooks and staves,
And droves of mules and assesLaden with skins of wine,And endless flocks of goats and sheep,And endless herds of kine,And endless trains of waggonsThat creaked beneath the weightOf corn-sacks and of household goods,Choked every roaring gate.
Now from the rock TarpeianCould the wan burghers spyThe line of blazing villagesRed in the midnight sky.The Fathers of the City,They sat all night and day,For every hour some horseman cameWith tidings of dismay.
To eastward and to westwardHave spread the Tuscan bands;Nor house, nor fence, nor dovecoteIn Crustumerium stands.Verbenna down to OstiaHath wasted all the plain;Astur hath stormed Janiculum,And the stout guards are slain.
I wis, in all the SenateThere was no heart so boldBut sore it ached, and fast it beat,When that ill news was told.Forthwith up rose the Consul,Up rose the Fathers all;In haste they girded up their gowns,And hied them to the wall.
They held a council standingBefore the River-Gate;Short time was there, ye well may guess,For musing or debate.Out spake the Consul roundly:‘The bridge must straight go down;For, since Janiculum is lost,Nought else can save the town.’
Just then a scout came flying,All wild with haste and fear:‘To arms! to arms! Sir Consul:Lars Porsena is here.’On the low hills to westwardThe Consul fixed his eye,And saw the swarthy storm of dustRise fast along the sky.
And nearer fast and nearerDoth the red whirlwind come;And louder still and still more loud,From underneath that rolling cloudIs heard the trumpet's war-note proud,The trampling, and the hum.And plainly and more plainlyNow through the gloom appears,Far to left and far to right,In broken gleams of dark-blue light,The long array of helmets bright,The long array of spears.
And plainly and more plainlyAbove that glimmering lineNow might ye see the bannersOf twelve fair cities shine;But the banner of proud ClusiumWas highest of them all,The terror of the Umbrian,The terror of the Gaul.
And plainly and more plainlyNow might the burghers know,By port and vest, by horse and crest,Each warlike Lucumo.There Cilnius of ArretiumOn his fleet roan was seen;And Astur of the fourfold shield,Girt with the brand none else may wield,Tolumnius with the belt of gold,And dark Verbenna from the holdBy reedy Thrasymene.
Fast by the royal standardO'erlooking all the war,Lars Porsena of ClusiumSate in his ivory car.By the right wheel rode Mamilius,Prince of the Latian name;And by the left false Sextus,That wrought the deed of shame.
But when the face of SextusWas seen among the foes,A yell that rent the firmamentFrom all the town arose.On the house-tops was no womanBut spat towards him, and hissed;No child but screamed out curses,And shook its little fist.
But the Consul's brow was sad,And the Consul's speech was low,And darkly looked he at the wall,And darkly at the foe.‘Their van will be upon usBefore the bridge goes down;And if they once may win the bridge,What hope to save the town?’
Then out spake brave Horatius,The Captain of the gate:‘To every man upon this earthDeath cometh soon or late;And how can man die betterThan facing fearful odds,For the ashes of his fathersAnd the temples of his Gods,
And for the tender motherWho dandled him to rest,And for the wife who nursesHis baby at her breast,And for the holy maidensWho feed the eternal flame,To save them from false SextusThat wrought the deed of shame?
Hew down the bridge, Sir Consul,With all the speed ye may;I, with two more to help me,Will hold the foe in play.In yon strait path a thousandMay well be stopped by three.Now who will stand on either hand,And keep the bridge with me?’
Then out spake Spurius Lartius,A Ramnian proud was he:‘Lo, I will stand at thy right hand,And keep the bridge with thee.’And out spake strong Heminius,Of Titian blood was he:‘I will abide on thy left side,And keep the bridge with thee.’
‘Horatius,’ quoth the Consul,‘As thou sayest, so let it be.’And straight against that great arrayForth went the dauntless Three.For Romans in Rome's quarrelSpared neither land nor gold,Nor son nor wife, nor limb nor life,In the brave days of old.
Then none was for a party;Then all were for the state;Then the great man helped the poor,And the poor man loved the great:Then lands were fairly portioned;Then spoils were fairly sold:The Romans were like brothersIn the brave days of old.
Now Roman is to RomanMore hateful than a foe,And the Tribunes beard the high,And the Fathers grind the low.As we wax hot in faction,In battle we wax cold:Wherefore men fight not as they foughtIn the brave days of old.