Or if he dozed, a sound, a start Awoke him with a sunken heart. The turban on his hot brow press'd, The mail weigh'd lead-like on his breast, Though oft and long beneath its weight Upon his eyes had slumber sate, Without or couch or canopy, Except a rougher field and sky Than now might yield a warrior's bed, Than now along the heaven was spread; He could not rest, he could not stay Within his tent to wait for day, But walk'd him forth along the sand, Where thousand sleepers strew'd the strand. What pillow'd them? and why should he More wakeful than the humblest be, Since more their peril, worse their toil? And yet they fearless dream of spoil; While he alone, where thousands pass'd A night of sleep, perchance their last, In sickly vigil wander'd on, And envied all he gazed upon.

XIV

He felt his soul become more light
Beneath the freshness of the night.
Cool was the silent sky though calm,
And bathed his brow with airy balm :
Behind, the camp-before him lay,
In many a winding creek and bay,
Lepanto's gulf; and, on the brow
Of Delphi's hill, unshaken snow,
High and eternal, such as shone

Through thousand summers brightly gone,
Along the gulf, the mount, the clime;
It will not melt, like man, to time:
Tyrant and slave are swept away,
Less form'd to wear before the ray;
But that white veil, the lightest, frailest,
Which on the mighty mount thou hailest,
While tower and tree are torn and rent,
Shines o'er its craggy battlement;
In form a peak, in height a cloud,
In texture like a hovering shroud,
Thus high by parting Freedom spread,
As from her fond abode she fled,
And linger'd on the spot, where long
Her prophet spirit spake in song.
Oh, still her step at moments falters
O'er wither'd fields, and ruin'd altars,
And fain would wake, in souls too broken,
By pointing to each glorious token.
But vain her voice, till better days
Dawn in those yet remember'd rays
Which shone upon the Persian flying,
And saw the Spartan smile in dying.

XV.

Not mindless of these mighty times
Was Alp, despite his flight and crimes;
And through this night, as on he wander'd,
And o'er the past and present ponder'd,
And thought upon the glorious dead
Who there in better cause had bled,

He felt how faint and feebly dim

The fame that could accrue to him,

Who cheer'd the band, and waved the sword,

A traitor in a turban'd horde;

And led them to the lawless siege,
Whose best success were sacrilege.
Not so had those his fancy number'd,

The chiefs whose dust around him slumber'd;
Their phalanx marshall'd on the plain,
Whose bulwarks were not then in vain.
They fell devoted, but undying;
The very gale their names seem'd sighing:
The waters murmur'd of their name;
The woods were peopled with their fame;
The silent pillar, lone and gray,
Claim'd kindred with their sacred clay;
Their spirits wrapt the dusky mountain,
Their memory sparkled o'er the fountain;
The meanest rill, the mightiest river
Roll'd mingling with their fame for ever.
Despite of every yoke she bears,
That land is glory's still and theirs!
'Tis still a watchword to the earth:
When man would do a deed of worth,
He points to Greece, and turns to tread,
So sanction'd, on the tyrant's head:
He looks to her, and rushes on
Where life is lost, or freedom won.

XVI.

Still by the shore Alp mutely mused,
And woo'd the freshness Night diffused.
There shrinks no ebb in that tideless sea,3
Which changeless rolls eternally;

So that wildest of waves, in their angriest mood,
Scarce break on the bounds of the land for a rood;
And the powerless moon beholds them flow,
Heedless if she come or go:
Calm or high, in main or bay,
On their course she hath no sway.

The rock unworn its base doth bare,

And looks o'er the surf, but it comes not there;
And the fringe of the foam may be seen below,
On the line that it left long ages ago:
A smooth short space of yellow sand
Between it and the greener land.

He wander'd on, along the beach,
Till within the range of a carbine's reach
Of the leaguer'd wall; but they saw him not,
Or how could he 'scape from the hostile shot?
Did traitors lurk in the Christians' hold?

Were their hands grown stiff, or their hearts wax'd

cold?

I know not, in sooth; but from yonder wall
There flash'd no fire, and there hiss'd no ball,
Though he stood beneath the bastion's frown,
That flank'd the seaward gate of the town;
Though he heard the sound, and could almost tell
The sullen words of the sentinel,

As his measured step on the stone below
Clank'd, as he paced it to and fro;

And he saw the lean dogs beneath the wall
Hold o'er the dead their carnival,

Gorging and growling o'er carcass and limb;
They were too busy to bark at him!

From a Tartar's skull they had stripp'd the flesh,
As ye peel the fig when its fruit is fresh ;

And their white tusks craunch'd o'er the whiter

skull,4

As it slipp'd through their jaws, when their edge grew dull,

As they lazily mumbled the bones of the dead, When they scarce could rise from the spot where they fed;

So well had they broken a lingering fast
With those who had fallen for that night's repast.
And Alp knew, by the turbans that roll'd on the
sand,

The foremost of these were the best of his band:
Crimson and green were the shawls of their wear,
And each scalp had a single long tuft of hair: 5
All the rest was shaven and bare.
The scalps were in the wild dog's maw,
The hair was tangled round his jaw.

But close by the shore, on the edge of the gulf,
There sat a vulture flapping a wolf,

Who had stolen from the hills, but kept away,
Scared by the dogs, from the human prey;
But he seized on his share of a steed that lay
Pick'd by the birds, on the sands of the bay.

XVII.

Alp turn'd him from the sickening sight:
Never had shaken his nerves in fight;

But he better could brook to behold the dying,
Deep in the tide of their warm blood lying,
Scorch'd with the death-thirst, and writhing in vain,
Than the perishing dead who are past all pain.
There is something of pride in the perilous hour,
Whate'er be the shape in which death may lower;
For Fame is there to say who bleeds,
And Honor's eye on daring deeds!
But when all is past, it is humbling to tread
O'er the weltering field of the tombless dead,
And see worms of the earth and fowls of the air,
Beasts of the forest, all gathering there;
All regarding man as their prey,

All rejoicing at his decay,

XVIII.

There is a temple in ruin stands,
Fashion'd by long forgotten hands;
Two or three columns, and many a stone,
Marble and granite, with grass o'ergrown!
Out upon Time! it will leave no more

Of the things to come than the things before!
Out upon Time! who for ever will leave
But enough of the past for the future to grieve

Was it the wind, through some hollow stone,
Sent than soft and tender moan?

He lifted his head, and he look'd on the sea,
But it was unrippled as glass may be;
He look'd on the long grass-it waved not a blade
How was that gentle sound convey'd?
He look'd to the banners-each flag lay still,
So did the leaves on Cithæron's hill,
And he felt not a breath come over his cheek
What did that sudden sound bespeak?
He turn'd to the left-is he sure of sight?
There sate a lady, youthful and bright ?

XX.

He started up with more of fear
Than if an armed foe were near.
"God of my fathers! what is here?
Who art thou, and wherefore sent
So near a hostile armament?
His trembling hands refused to sign
The cross he deem'd no more divine:
He had resumed it in that hour,
But conscience wrung away the power.
He gazed, he saw: he knew the face

Of beauty, and the form of grace;

It was Francesca by his side,

The maid who might have been his bride!

The rose was yet upon her cheek,

But mellow'd with a tenderer streak:
Where was the play of her soft lips fled?
Gone was the smile that enliven'd their red.
The ocean's calm within their view,
Beside her eye had less of blue ;
But like that cold wave it stood still,
And its glance, though clear, was chill;
Around her form a thin robe twining,
Nought conceal'd her bosom shining;
Through the parting of her hair,
Floating darkly downward there,

Her rounded arm show'd white and bare:
And ere yet she made reply,

Once she raised her hand on high:

It was so wan and transparent of hue,

You might have seen the moon shine through.

XXI

must be:

What we have seen our sons shall see; Remnants of things that have pass'd away, Fragments of stone, rear'd by creatures of clay!

XIX.

He sate him down at a pillar's base,
And pass'd his hand athwart his face;
Like one in dreary musing mood,
Declining was his attitude;
His head was drooping on his breast,
Fever'd, throbbing, and opprest;
And o'er his brow, so downward bent,
Oft his beating fingers went,
Hurriedly, as you may see
Your own run over the ivory key,
Ere the measured tone is taken
By the chords you would awaken.
There he sate all heavily,

As he heard the night-wind sigh.

That I may be happy, and he
be happy, and he may be blest.
I have pass'd the guards, the gate, the wall,
Sought thee in safety through foes and all.
'Tis said the lion will turn and flee
From a maid in the pride of her purity;

And the Power on high, that can shield the good
Thus from the tyrant of the wood,

Hath extended its mercy to guard me as well
From the hands of the leaguering infidel.

I come and if I come in vain,
Never, oh never, we meet again!
Thou hast done a fearful deed

In falling away from thy father's creed:
But dash that turban to earth, and sign
The sign of the cross, and for ever be mine
Wring the black drop from thy heart,
And to-morrow unites us no more to part."

"And where should our bridal couch be spread? In the midst of the dying and the dead?

For to-morrow we give to the slaughter and flame, 'The sons and the shrines of the Christian name. None, save thou and thine, I've sworn,

Shall be left upon the morn:

But thee will I bear to a lovely spot,

Where our hands shall be joined, and our sorrow

forgot.

There thou yet shalt be my bride,
When once again I've quell'd the pride
Of Venice; and her hated race
Have felt the arm they would debase,
Scourge, with a whip of scorpions, those
Whom vice and envy made my foes."

Upon his hand she laid her own

Light was the touch, but it thrill'd to the bone,
And shot a chillness to his heart,
Which fix'd him beyond the power to start.
Though slight was that grasp so mortal cold,
He could not loose him from its hold;
But never did clasp of one so dear
Strike on the pulse with such feeling of fear,
As those thin fingers, long and white,
Froze through his blood by their touch that night.
The feverish glow of his brow was gone,

And his heart sank so still that it felt like stone,
As he look'd on the face, and beheld its hue
So deeply changed from what he knew;

Fair but faint-without the ray

Of mind, that made each feature play

Like sparkling waves on a sunny day;

And her motionless lips lay still as death,
And her words came forth without her breath,
And there rose not a heave o'er her bosom's swell,
And there seem'd not a pulse in her veins to dwell,
Though her eye shone out, yet the lids were fix'd,
And the glance that it gave was wild and unmix'd
With aught of change, as the eyes may seem,
Of the restless who walk in a troubled dream ;
Like the figures on arras, that gloomily glare,
Stirr'd by the breath of the wintry air,
So seen by the dying lamp's fitful light,
Lifeless, but life-like, and awful to sight;

As they seem, through the dimness, about to come down

From the shadowy wall where their images frown; Fearfully flitting to and fro,

As the gusts on the tapestry come and go.

"If not for love of me be given

Thus much, then, for the love of heaven,-
Again I say that turban tear
From off thy faithless brow, and swear
Thine injured country's sons to spare,
Or thou art lost; and never shalt see
Not earth-that's past-but heaven or me.
If this thou dost accord, albeit
A heavy doom 'tis thine to meet,
That doom shall half absolve thy sin,
And mercy's gate may receive thee within
But
pause one moment more, and take
The curse of Him thou didst forsake;
And look once more to heaven, and see
Its love for ever shut from thee.
There is a light cloud by the moon-
"Tis passing, and will pass full soon-
If, by the time its vapory sail
Hath ceased her shaded orb to veil,

.7

Thy heart within thee is not changed, Then God and man are both avenged; Dark will thy doom be, darker still Thine immortality of ill."

Alp look'd to heaven, and saw on high
The sign she spake of in the sky;

But his heart was swollen, and turn'd aside
By deep, interminable pride.

This first false passion of his breast
Roll'd like a torrent o'er the rest.

He sue for mercy! He dismay'd
By wild words of a timid maid!
He, wrong'd by Venice, vow to save
Her sons, devoted to the grave!
No-though that cloud were thunder's worst,
And charged to crush him—let it burst!

He look'd upon it earnestly,
Without an accent of reply;

He watch'd it passing; it is flown :
Full on his eye the clear moon shone,
And thus he spake-" Whate'er my fate,
I am no changeling-'tis too late :
The reed in storms may bow and quiver,
Then rise again; the tree must shiver.
What Venice made me, I must be,
Her foe in all, save love to thee:
But thou art safe: oh, fly with me!'
He turn'd, but she is gone!

Nothing is there but the column stone.

Hath she sunk in the earth, or melted in air ? He saw not, he knew not; but nothing is thero

XXII.

The night is past, and shines the sun
As if that morn were a jocund one.
Lightly and brightly breaks away
The Morning from her mantle gray,
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 8 are pluck'd from the ground, and the sword

From 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 crave
His heart's dearest wish; let him ask it, and have!"
Thus utter'd 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!

XXIII.

As the wolves, that headlong go

On the stately buffalo,

Though with fiery eyes, and angry roar,

And hoofs that stamp, and horns that gore,
He tramples on the earth, or tosses on high
The foremost, who rush on his strength but to die,
Thus against the wall they went,
Thus the first were backward bent;
Many a bosom, sheath'd in brass,
Strew'd the earth like broken glass,
Shiver'd by the shot, that tore

The ground whereon they moved no more;
Even as they fell, in files they lay,
Like the mower's grass at the close of day,
When his work is done on the levell'd plain;
Such was the fall of the foremost slain.

XXIV.

As the spring-tides, with heavy plash,
From the cliffs invading dash

Huge fragments, sapp'd by the ceaseless flow,
Till white and thundering down they go,
Like the avalanche's snow,

On the Alpine vales below;

Thus at length, outbreathed and worn,
Corinth's sons were downward borne

By the long and oft renew'd

Charge of the Moslem multitude.

In firmness they stood, and in masses they fell,
Heap'd, 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 cry
For quarter, or for victory,

Mingle there with the volleying thunder,
Which makes the distant cities wonder
How the sounding battle goes,

If with them, or for their foes;

If they must mourn, or may rejoice

In that annihilating voice,

Which pierces the deep hills through and through

With 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.

XXV.

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 come
From within the plunder'd dome:
Hark to the haste of flying feet,

That splash in the blood of the slippery street;
But here and there, where 'vantage ground
Against 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 fight
Lurk'd beneath his corslet bright;
But 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,
Outnumber'd his thin hairs of silver gray.
From right to left his sabre swept:
Many an Othman mother wept
Sons that were unborn, when dipp'd
His weapon first in Moslem gore,
Ere his years could count a score.
Of all he might have been the sire
Who 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 strait9
His only boy had met his fate,
His parent's iron hand did doom
More than a human hecatomb.
If shades by carnage be appeased,
Patroclus' spirit less was pleased
Than his, Minotti's son who died

Where Asia's bounds and ours divide.

Buried he lay where, thousands before

For thousands of years were inhumed on the shore; What of them is left, to tell

Where 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 immortality saves.

XXVI.

Hark to the Allah shout! a band

Of the Mussulman bravest and best is at hand; Their leader's nervous arm is bare,

Swifter to smite, and never to spareUnclothed to the shoulder it waves them on; Thus in the fight is he ever known;

Others a gaudier garb may show,

To tempt the spoil of the greedy foe,

Many a hand's on a richer hilt,

But none on a steel more ruddily gilt:

Many a loftier turban may wear,

Alp is but known by the white arm bare;

Look through the thick of the fight, 'tis there; There is not a standard on that shore

So well advanced the ranks before;

Yesternight

"Oh God! when died she?
Nor weep I for her spirit's flight:
None of my pure race shall be
Slaves to Mahomet and thee-
Come on!"-That challenge is in vain-
Alp's already with the slain!
While Minotti's words were wreaking
More revenge in bitter speaking

Than his falchion's point had found,
Had the time allow'd to wound,
From within the neighboring porch

Of a long defended church,
Where the last and desperate few

Would the failing fight renew,

The sharp shot dashed Alp to the ground;
Ere an eye could view the wound

That crash'd through the brain of the infidel,
Round he spun, and down he fell

A flash like fire within his
eyes
Blazed, as he bent no more to rise,
And then eternal darkness sunk
Through all the palpitating trunk;
Nought of life left, save a quivering
Where his limbs were slightly shivering:
They turn'd him on his back; his breast
And brow were stain'd with gore and dust,
And through his lips the life-blood oozed,
From its deep veins lately loosed;
But in his pulse there was no throb,
Nor on his lips one dying sob;
Sigh, nor word, nor struggling breath
Heralded his way to death:
Ere his very thought could pray,
Unanell'd he pass'd away,

Without a hope from mercy's aid,—
To the last a renegade.

XXVIII.

Fearfully the yell arose

Of his followers and his foes;
These in joy, in fury those;
Then again in conflict mixing,
Clashing swords, and spears transfixing,
Interchanged the blow and thrust
Hurling warriors in the dust.
Street by street, and foot by foot,
Still Minotti dares dispute
The latest portion of the land
Left beneath his high command;
With him, aiding heart and hand,
The remnant of his gallant band.
Still the church is tenable,

Whence issued late the fated ball
That half avenged the city's fall,
When Alp, her fierce assailant, fell:
Thither bending sternly back,
They leave before a bloody track;
And, with their faces to the foe,
Dealing wounds with every blow,
The chief, and his retreating train,
Join to those within the fane;
There they yet may breathe awhile,
Shelter'd by the massy pile.

XXIX.

Brief breathing-time! the turban'a host,
With adding ranks and raging boast,
Press onwards with such strength and heat,
Their numbers balk their own retreat;
For narrow the way that led to the spot
Where still the Christians yielded not;
And the foremost, if fearful, may vainly try
Through the massy column to turn and fly;
They perforce must do or die.

They die; but ere their eyes could close,
Avengers o'er their bodies rose;

Fresh and furious, fast they fill

The ranks unthinn'd, though slaughter'd still; And faint the weary Christians wax

Before the still renew'd attacks :

And now the Othman's gain the gate;

Still resists its iron weight,

And still, all deadly aim'd and hot,

From every crevice comes the shot;

From every shatter'd window pour
The volleys of the sulphurous shower:
But the portal wavering grows and weak-
The iron yields, the hinges creak-
It bends-it falls-and all is o'er;
Lost Corinth may resist no more!

XXX.

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 shrine
To fix our thoughts on things divine,
When pictured there, we kneeling see
Her, and the boy-God on her knee,
Smiling sweetly on each prayer

To heaven, as if to waft it there.

Still she smiled; even now she smiles, Though slaughter streams along her aisles: