Lyra Heroica Part 39

So, on the b.l.o.o.d.y sand, Sohrab lay dead; And the great Rustum drew his horseman's cloak Down o'er his face, and sate by his dead son.

As those black granite pillars once high-reared By Jemshid in Persepolis, to bear His house, now 'mid their broken flights of steps Lie p.r.o.ne, enormous, down the mountain side, So in the sand lay Rustum by his son.

And night came down over the solemn waste, And the two gazing hosts, and that sole pair, And darkened all; and a cold fog, with night, Crept from the Oxus. Soon a hum arose, As of a great a.s.sembly loosed, and fires Began to twinkle through the fog; for now Both armies moved to camp, and took their meal; The Persians took it on the open sands Southward, the Tartars by the river marge; And Rustum and his son were left alone.

But the majestic river floated on, Out of the mist and hum of that low land, Into the frosty starlight, and there moved, Rejoicing, through the hushed Chorasmian waste, Under the solitary moon;--he flowed Right for the polar star, past Orgunje, Br.i.m.m.i.n.g, and bright, and large; then sands begin To hem his watery march, and dam his streams, And split his currents; that for many a league The shorn and parcelled Oxus strains along Through beds of sand and matted rushy isles-- Oxus, forgetting the bright speed he had In his high mountain cradle in Pamere A foiled circuitous wanderer--till at last The longed-for dash of waves is heard, and wide His luminous home of waters opens, bright And tranquil, from whose floor the new-bathed stars Emerge, and shine upon the Aral Sea.

_Arnold._

CIX

FLEE FRO' THE PRESS

O born in days when wits were fresh and clear And life ran gaily as the sparkling Thames; Before this strange disease of modern life, With its sick hurry, its divided aims, Its heads o'ertaxed, its palsied hearts, was rife-- Fly hence, our contact fear!

Still fly, plunge deeper in the bowering wood!

Averse, as Dido did with gesture stern From her false friend's approach in Hades turn, Wave us away and keep thy solitude!

Still nursing the unconquerable hope, Still clutching the inviolable shade, With a free, onward impulse brushing through, By night, the silvered branches of the glade-- Far on the forest-skirts, where none pursue, On some mild pastoral slope Emerge, and resting on the moonlit pales Freshen thy flowers as in former years With dew, or listen with enchanted ears, From the dark dingles, to the nightingales!

But fly our paths, our feverish contact fly!

For strong the infection of our mental strife, Which, though it gives no bliss, yet spoils for rest; And we should win thee from thy own fair life, Like us distracted, and like us unblest.

Soon, soon thy cheer would die, Thy hopes grow timorous, and unfixed thy powers, And thy clear aims be cross and shifting made; And then thy glad perennial youth would fade, Fade, and grow old at last, and die like ours.

Then fly our greetings, fly our speech and smiles!

As some grave Tyrian trader, from the sea, Descried at sunrise an emerging prow Lifting the cool-haired creepers stealthily, The fringes of a southward-facing brow Among the aegaean isles; And saw the merry Grecian coaster come, Freighted with amber grapes, and Chian wine, Green, bursting figs, and tunnies steeped in brine-- And knew the intruders on his ancient home,

The young light-hearted masters of the waves-- And s.n.a.t.c.hed his rudder, and shook out more sail; And day and night held on indignantly O'er the blue Midland waters with the gale, Betwixt the Syrtes and soft Sicily, To where the Atlantic raves Outside the western straits; and unbent sails There, where down cloudy cliffs, through sheets of foam, Shy traffickers, the dark Iberians come; And on the beach undid his corded bales.

_Arnold._

CX

SCHOOL FENCIBLES

We come in arms, we stand ten score, Embattled on the castle green; We grasp our firelocks tight, for war Is threatening, and we see our Queen.

And 'Will the churls last out till we Have duly hardened bones and thews For scouring leagues of swamp and sea Of braggart mobs and corsair crews?'

We ask; we fear not scoff or smile At meek attire of blue and grey, For the proud wrath that thrills our isle Gives faith and force to this array.

So great a charm is England's right, That hearts enlarged together flow, And each man rises up a knight To work the evil-thinkers woe.

And, girt with ancient truth and grace, We do our service and our suit, And each can be, whate'er his race, A Chandos or a Montacute.

Thou, Mistress, whom we serve to-day, Bless the real swords that we shall wield, Repeat the call we now obey In sunset lands, on some fair field.

Thy flag shall make some Huron rock As dear to us as Windsor's keep, And arms thy Thames hath nerved shall mock The surgings of th' Ontarian deep.

The stately music of thy Guards, Which times our march beneath thy ken, Shall sound, with spells of sacred bards, From heart to heart, when we are men.

And when we bleed on alien earth, We'll call to mind how cheers of ours Proclaimed a loud uncourtly mirth Amongst thy glowing orange bowers.

And if for England's sake we fall, So be it, so thy cross be won, Fixed by kind hands on silvered pall, And worn in death, for duty done.

Ah! thus we fondle Death, the soldier's mate, Blending his image with the hopes of youth To hallow all; meanwhile the hidden fate Chills not our fancies with the iron truth.

Death from afar we call, and Death is here, To choose out him who wears the loftiest mien; And Grief, the cruel lord who knows no peer, Breaks through the shield of love to pierce our Queen.

_Cory._

CXI

THE TWO CAPTAINS

When George the Third was reigning a hundred years ago, He ordered Captain Farmer to chase the foreign foe.

'You're not afraid of shot,' said he, 'you're not afraid of wreck, So cruise about the west of France in the frigate called _Quebec_.

Quebec was once a Frenchman's town, but twenty years ago King George the Second sent a man called General Wolfe, you know, To clamber up a precipice and look into Quebec, As you'd look down a hatchway when standing on the deck.

If Wolfe could beat the Frenchmen then so you can beat them now.

Before he got inside the town he died, I must allow.

But since the town was won for us it is a lucky name, And you'll remember Wolfe's good work, and you shall do the same.'

Then Farmer said, 'I'll try, sir,' and Farmer bowed so low That George could see his pigtail tied in a velvet bow.

George gave him his commission, and that it might be safer, Signed 'King of Britain, King of France,' and sealed it with a wafer.

Then proud was Captain Farmer in a frigate of his own, And grander on his quarter-deck than George upon the throne.

He'd two guns in his cabin, and on the spar-deck ten, And twenty on the gun-deck, and more than ten score men.

And as a huntsman scours the brakes with sixteen brace of dogs, With two-and-thirty cannon the ship explored the fogs.

From Cape la Hogue to Ushant, from Rochefort to Belleisle, She hunted game till reef and mud were rubbing on her keel.

The fogs are dried, the frigate's side is bright with melting tar, The lad up in the foretop sees square white sails afar; The east wind drives three square-sailed masts from out the Breton bay, And 'Clear for action!' Farmer shouts, and reefers yell 'Hooray!'

The Frenchman's captain had a name I wish I could p.r.o.nounce; A Breton gentleman was he, and wholly free from bounce, One like those famous fellows who died by guillotine For honour and the fleurs-de-lys and Antoinette the Queen.

The Catholic for Louis, the Protestant for George, Each captain drew as bright a sword as saintly smiths could forge; And both were simple seamen, but both could understand How each was bound to win or die for flag and native land.

The French ship was _la Surveillante_, which means the watchful maid; She folded up her head-dress and began to cannonade.

Her hull was clean, and ours was foul; we had to spread more sail.

On canvas, stays, and topsail yards her bullets came like hail.

Sore smitten were both captains, and many lads beside, And still to cut our rigging the foreign gunners tried.

A sail-clad spar came flapping down athwart a blazing gun; We could not quench the rushing flames, and so the Frenchman won.

Our quarter-deck was crowded, the waist was all aglow; Men hung upon the taffrail half scorched, but loth to go; Our captain sat where once he stood, and would not quit his chair.

He bade his comrades leap for life, and leave him bleeding there.

The guns were hushed on either side, the Frenchmen lowered boats, They flung us planks and hencoops, and everything that floats.

They risked their lives, good fellows! to bring their rivals aid.

'Twas by the conflagration the peace was strangely made.