The skies are wild, and the blast is cold;
Yet riot and luxury brawl within:
Slaves are waiting, in silver and gold,
Waiting the nod of a child of sin.
The fire is crackling, wine is bubbling
Up in each glass to its beaded brim:
The jesters are laughing, the parasites quaffing
"Happiness,"" honour,"-and all for him!
She who is slain in the winter weather,
Ah! she once had a village fame;
Listened to love on the moonlit heather;
Had gentleness-vanity-maiden shame;
Now her allies are the tempest howling;
Prodigals' curses; self-disdain;
Poverty; misery: Well, no matter;
There is an end unto every pain!
He who yon lordly feast enjoyeth,
He who doth rest on his couch of down,
He it was, who threw the forsaken
Under the feet of the trampling town: Liar-betrayer,-false as cruel,
What is the doom for his dastard sin?
His peers, they scorn?-high dames, they shun him? -Unbar yon palace, and gaze within.
There, yet his deeds are all trumpet-sounded,
There, upon silken seats recline
Maidens as fair as the summer morning,
Watching him rise from the sparkling wine.
Mothers all proffer their stainless daughters;
Men of high honour salute him "Friend;"
Skies! oh, where are your cleansing waters?
World! oh, where do thy wonders end?
O'ER all the plain th' Assyrian camp-fires now
Blaze high; and with the darkness a drear red
Strangely commingle. Like a burning gulf,
Sleeping till stirr'd by winds; the heaving mass
Of warriors at the mountain's foot appears;
Breast-plates, and shields, and helms, and gonfalons,
Glow blood-red here and there; but doubly dark
Elsewhere the night. Now, toward the hills all haste:
If Medes alone, or with Assyrians mixed,
I cannot know; but rapid is the speed.
The light increases: up the mountain's side,
In the red darkness faintly I discern
The slumbering myriads; and toward its foot
Onward they come; like billows of dark fire.
But farther off, in one bright blaze, the camp
Shines out a countless multitude I see,
In flaming armour pouring o'er the plain.
Like ocean glittering 'neath the ruddy sun,
The wide field flashes; like the ocean's roar
Their clamours rise.
Among the trees a crash
I hear,―a heaving of the branches. Lights
Are thickening near the hill. Ha! now I see
They rend the boughs for torches. In his hand
Each soldier bears a branch of blazing pine.
They speed toward the heights: they shake the torch:
They wave the sword: like running flame they seem.
Now up the steep they urge. A cloud of darts
And arrows from the Medes upon them pours,-
A fiery cloud; and stones are hurled-and spears ;—
Yet upward still they come. The watch-fires now
Are flaming on the hills: distinctly gleams.
Their torches they cast down;
Ha! by his star-like helm,
Assyria's king appears. He shouts: he flies:
He points towards the rocks;-he waves them on.
A warrior meets him: sword with sword they fight-
Arabia's monarch, sure.-But both are lost,-
The waves of fight roll o'er them
Meantime, along the sapphire bridge of heaven,
Far, far beyond the canopy of cloud
That mantled earth, the day-god's lightning steeds
Through the pure ether rapt his chariot-wheels,
Sounding harmonious thunder. To the height
They had ascended; and the steep decline
Half-way had measured; yet the hard-fought field
Still was contested; for, like men resolved
On that one day to peril all to come-
To die, perchance, but never to submit-
The Assyrian captains strove; and, with like fire,
Their soldiers' hearts inflamed. Aid too had come-
Chariots, and horse, and foot; who, when the scale,
Charged with Assyria's doom, was sinking fast,
Twice had its fall arrested. Once again,
When seemed that utter ruin hovered nigh,
The chariot of Assyria's beauteous queen
From rank to rank flew on: and, as they saw,
The warriors' breasts, as with new soul infused,
Like beacons freshly kindled, burst at once
Into intensest flame. Unhelmed, unarmed,
Her ebon hair loose flying in the wind,
She raised aloft her arms, her voice uplift,
And bade them on to glory. As the star
Of morning, while the sun yet sleeps below,
And the grey mist is on the dewy earth,
Her face was pale and radiant. Like a shape
From heaven descended, and to mortal harm
Impassive, gloriously and fearlessly
Through the death-laden air she flew along.
Her spirit fired the host; with deafening shouts
Onward they bore; and, for a time, the Medes
Compelled, though slowly, backward.
|