Deaf to the fierce roar of the hungering bear,
    And the dull thunders clanging on the deep--
  Till on their waking sense the discords peal,
  And to the numb hand cleaves unfelt the steel.

  What boots long told the tale of life one war                     44
    With the relentless iron Element?
  More, day by day, the mounting snows debar
    Ev'n search for food,--yet oft the human scent
  Lures the wild beast, which, mangling while it dies,
  Bursts on the prey, to fall itself the prize!

  But as the winter deepens, ev'n the beast                         45
    Shrinks from its breath, and with the loneliness
  To Famine leaves the solitary feast.
    Suffering halts patient in its last excess.
  Closed in each tireless, lightless, foodless cave
  Cowers a dumb ghost unconscious of its grave.

  Nature hath stricken down in that waste world                     46
    All--save the Soul of Arthur! _That_, sublime,
  Hung on the wings of heavenward faith unfurl'd,
    O'er the far light of the predicted Time;
  Believe thou hast a mission to fulfil,
  And human valour grows a Godhead's will!

  Calm to that fate above the moment given                          47
    Shall thy strong soul divinely dreaming go,
  Unconscious as an eagle, entering heaven,
    Where its still shadow skims the rooks below;
  High beyond this, its actual world is wrought,
  And its true life is in its sphere of thought.

  Yet who can 'scape the infection of the heart?                    48
    Who, though himself invulnerably steel'd,
  Can boast a breast indifferent to the dart
    That threats the life his love in vain would shield?
  When some large nature, curious, we behold
  How twofold comes it from the glorious mould!

  How lone, and yet how living in the All!                          49
    When it _imagines_ how aloof from men!
  How like the ancestral Adam ere the fall,
    In Eden bowers the painless denizen!
  But when it _feels_--the lonely heaven resign'd--
  How social moves the man among mankind!

  Forth from the tomblike hamlet strays the King,                   50
    Restless with ills from which himself is free;
  In that dun air the only living thing
    He skirts the margin of the soundless sea;
  No--not alone, the musing Wanderer strays;
  For still the Dove smiles on the dismal ways.

  Nor can tongue tell, nor thought conceive how far                 51
    Into that storm-beat heart, the gentle bird
  Had built the halcyon's nest. How precious are
    In desolate hours, the Affections!--How, unheard
  Mid Noon's melodious myriads of delight,
  Thrills the low note that steals the gloom from night!

  And, in return, a human love replying                             52
    To his caress, seem'd in those eyes to dwell,
  That mellow murmur, like a human sighing,
    Seem'd from those founts that lie i' the heart to swell.
  Love wants not speech; from silence speech it builds,
  Kindness like light speaks in the air it gilds.

  That angel guide! His fate while leading on,                      53
    It follow'd each quick movement of his soul.
  As the soft shadow from the setting sun
    Precedes the splendour passing to its goal,
  Before his path the gentle herald glides,
  Its life reflected from the life it guides.

  Was Arthur sad? how sadden'd seem'd the Dove!                     54
    Did Arthur hope? how gaily soar'd its wings!
  Like to that sister spirit left above,
    The half of ours, which, torn asunder, springs
  Ever through space, yearning to join once more
  The earthlier half, its own and Heaven's before;[11]

  Like an embodied living Sympathy                                  55
    Which hath no voice and yet replies to all
  That wakes the lightest smile, the faintest sigh,--
    So did the instinct and the mystery thrall
  To the earth's son the daughter of the air;
  And pierce his soul--to place the sister there.

  She was to him as to the bard his muse                            56
    The solace of a sweet confessional:
  The hopes--the fears which manly lips refuse
    To speak to man, those leaves of thought that fall
  With every tremulous zephyr from the Tree
  Of Life, whirl'd from us down the darksome sea;--

  Those hourly springs and winters of the heart                     57
    Weak to reveal to Reason's sober eye,
  The proudest yet will to the muse impart,
    And grave in song the record of a sigh.
  And hath the muse no symbol in the Dove?--
  Both give what youth most miss'd in human love!

  Over the world of winter strays the King,                         58
    Seeking some track of hope--some savage prey
  Which, famish'd, fronts and feeds the famishing;
    Or some dim outlet in the darkling way
  From the dumb grave of snows which form with snows
  Wastes wide as realms through which a spectre goes.

  Amazed he halts:--Lo, on the rimy layer                           59
    That clothes sharp peaks--the print of human feet!
  An awe thrill'd through him, and thus spoke in prayer,
    "Thee, God, in man once more then do I greet?
  Hast thou vouchsafed the brother to the brother,
  Links which reweave thy children to each other?

  "Be they the rudest of the clay divine,                           60
    Warm with the breath of soul, how faint so ever,
  Yea, though their race but threat new ills to mine,
    All hail the bond thy sons cannot dissever!
  Bow'd to thy will, of life or death dispose,
  But if not human friends, grant human foes!"

  Thus while he pray'd, blithe from his bosom flew                  61
    The guiding Dove, along the frozen plain
  Of a mute river, winding vale-like through
    Rocks lost in vapour from the voiceless main.
  And as the man pursues, more thickly seen,
  The foot-prints tell where man before has been.

  Sudden a voice--a yell, a whistling dart!                         62
    Dim through the fog, behold a dwarf-like band
  (As from the inner earth, its goblins) start;
    Here threatening rush, there hoarsely gibbering stand!
  Halts the firm hero; mild but undismay'd,
  Grasps the charm'd hilt, but will not bare the blade.

  And with a kingly gesture eloquent,                               63
    Seems to command the peace, not shun the fray;
  Daunted they back recoil, yet not relent;
    As Indians round the forest lord at bay,
  Beyond his reach they form the deathful ring,
  And every shaft is fitted to the string.

  When in the circle a grand shape appears,                         64
    Day's lofty child amid those dwarfs of Night,
  Ev'n through the hides of beasts (its garb) it rears
    The glorious aspect of a son of light.
  Hush'd at that presence was the clamouring crowd;
  Dropp'd every hand and every knee was bow'd.

  Forth stepp'd the man, advancing towards the King;                65
    And his own language smote the Cymrian's ear,
  "What fates, unhappy one, a stranger bring
    To shores,"--he started, stopp'd,--and bounded near;
  Gazed on that front august, a moment's space,--
  Rush'd,--lock'd the wanderer in a long embrace;

  Weeping and laughing in a breath, the cheek,                      66
    The lip he kiss'd--then kneeling, clasp'd the hand;
  And gasping, sobbing, sought in vain to speak--
    Meanwhile the King the beard-grown visage scann'd:
  Amazed--he knew his Carduel's comely lord,
  And the warm heart to heart as warm restored!

  Speech came at length: first mindful of the lives,                67
    Claiming his care and perill'd for his sake,
  Not yet the account that love demands and gives
    The generous leader paused to yield and take;
  Brief words his follower's wants and woes explain;--
  "Light, warmth, and food.--_Sat verbum_," quoth Gawaine.

  Quick to his wondering and Pigmæan troops--                       68
    Quick sped the Knight; he spoke and was obey'd;
  Vanish once more the goblin-visaged groups
    And soon return caparison'd for aid;
  Laden with oil to warm and light the air,
  Flesh from the seal, and mantles from the bear.

  Back with impatient rapture bounds the King,                      69
    Smiling as he was wont to smile of yore;
  While Gawaine, blithesome as a bird of spring,
    Sends his sweet laughter ringing to the shore;
  Pains through that maze of questions, "How and Why?"
  And lost in joy stops never for reply.

  Before them roved wild dogs too numb to bark,                     70
    Led by one civilized majestic hound,
  Who scarcely deign'd his followers to remark,
    Save, when they touch'd him, by a snarl profound;
  Teaching that _plebs_, as history may my readers,
  How curs are look'd on by patrician leaders.

  Now gain'd the huts, silent with drowsy life,                     71
    That scarcely feels the quick restoring skill;
  Train'd with stern elements to wage the strife,
    The pigmy race are Nature's conquerors still.
  With practised hands they chafe the frozen veins,
  And gradual loose the chill heart from its chains;

  Heap round the limbs the fur's thick warmth of fold,              72
    And with the cheerful oil revive the air.
  Slow wake the eyes of Famine to behold
    The smiling faces and the proffer'd fare;
  Rank though the food, 'tis that which best supplies
  The powers exhausted by the withering skies.

  This done, they next the languid sufferers bear                   73
    (Wrapp'd from the cold) athwart the vapoury shade,
  Regain the vale, and show the homes that there
    Art's earliest god, Necessity, hath made;
  Abodes hewn out from winter, winter-proof,
  Ice-blocks the walls, and hollow'd ice the roof![12]

  Without, the snowy lavas, hard'ning o'er,                         74
    Hide from the beasts the buried homes of men,
  But in the dome is placed the artful door
    Through which the inmate gains or leaves the den.
  Down through the chasm each lowers the living load,
  Then from the winter seals the pent abode.

  There ever burns, sole source of warmth and light,                75
    The faithful lamp the whale or walrus gives,
  Thus, Lord of Europe, in the heart of Night,
    Unjoyous not, thy patient brother lives!
  To thee desire, to him possession sent,
  Thine worlds of wishes,--his that inch, Content!

  But Gawaine's home, more dainty than the rest,                    76
    Betray'd his tastes exotic and luxurious
  The walls of ice in furry hangings dress'd
    Form'd an apartment elegant if curious!
  Like some gigantic son of Major Ursa
  Turn'd inside out by barbarous _vice versâ_.

  Here then he lodged his royal guest and friend,                   77
    And having placed a slice of seal before him,
  Quoth he, "Thou ask'st me for my tale, attend;
    Then give me thine, _Heus renovo dolorem_!"
  Therewith the usage villanous and rough,
  Schemed in cold blood by that malignant chough;

  The fraudful dinner (its dessert a wife);                         78
    The bridal roof with nose assaulting glaive;
  The oak whose leaves with pinching imps were rife;
    The atrocious trap into the Viking's cave;
  The chief obdurate in his damn'd idea,
  Of proving Freedom by a roast to Freya;

  The graphic portrait of the Nuptial goddess;                      79
    And diabolic if symbolic spit;
  The hierarch's heresy on types and bodies;
    And how at last he posed and silenced it;
  All facts traced clearly to that _corvus niger_,
  Were told with pathos that had touch'd a tiger,

  So far the gentle sympathising Nine                               80
    In dulcet strains have sung Sir Gawaine's woes;
  What now remains they bid the historic line
    With Dorian dryness unadorn'd disclose;
  So counsel all the powers of fancy stretch,
  Then leave the judge to finish off the wretch!

  Along the beach Sir Gawaine and the hound                         81
    Roved all the night, and at the dawn of day
  Came unawares upon a squadron bound
    To fish for whales, arrested in a bay
  For want of winds, which certain Norway hags
  Had squeezed from heaven and bottled up in bags.[13]

  Straight when the seamen, fretting on the shore,                  82
    Behold a wanderer clad as Freya's priest,
  They rush, and round him kneeling, they implore
    The runes, by which the winds may be released:
  The spurious priest a gracious answer made,
  And told them Freya sent him to their aid;

  Bade them conduct himself and hound on board,                     83
    And broil two portions of their choicest meat.
  "The spell," quoth he, "our sacred arts afford
    To free the wind is in the food we eat;
  We dine, and dining exorcise the witches,
  And loose the bags from their infernal stitches.

  "Haste then, my children, and dispel the wind;                    84
    Haste, for the bags are awfully inflating!"
  The ship is gain'd. Both priest and dog have dined;
    The crews assembled on the decks are waiting.
  A heavier man arose the audacious priest,
  And stately stepp'd he west and stately east!

  Mutely invoked St. David and St. Brân                             85
    To charge a stout north-western with their blessing;
  Then clear'd his throat and lustily began
    A howl of vowels huge from Taliessin.
  Prone fell the crews before the thundering tunes,
  In words like mountains roll'd the enormous runes!

  The excited hound, symphonious with the song,                     86
    Yell'd as if heaven and earth were rent asunder;
  The rocks Orphéan seem'd to dance along;
    The affrighted whales plunged waves affrighted under;
  Polyphlosboian, onwards booming bore
  The deaf'ning, strident, rauque, Homeric roar!

  As lions lash themselves to louder ire,                           87
    By his own song the Knight sublimely stung
  Caught the full oestro of the poet's fire,
    And grew more stunning every note he sung!
  In each dread blast a patriot's soul exhales,
  And Norway quakes before the storm of Wales.

  Whether, as grateful Cymri should believe,                        88
    That blatant voice heroic burst the bags,
  (For sure it might the caves of Boreas cleave
    Much more the stitchwork of such losel hags!)
  Or heaven, on any terms, resolved on peace;
  The wind sprang up before the Knight would cease.

  Never again hath singer heard such praise                         89
    As Gawaine heard; for never since hath song
  Found out the secret how the wind to raise!--
    Around the charmer now the seamen throng,
  And bribe his blest attendance on their toil,
  With bales of bear-skin and with tuns of oil.

  Well pleased to leave the inhospitable shores,                    90
    The artful Knight yet slowly seem'd to yield.--
  Now through the ocean plunge the brazen prores;
    They pass the threshold of the world congeal'd;
  Surprise the snorting mammoths of the main;
  And pile the decks with Pelions of the slain.

  When, in the midmost harvest of the spoil,                        91
    Pounce comes a storm unspeakably more hideous
  Than that which drove upon the Lybian soil
    Anchises' son, the pious and perfidious,
  When whooping Notus, as the Nine assure us,
  Rush'd out to play with Africus and Eurus.

  Torn each from each, or down the maëlstrom whirl'd,               92
    Or grasp'd and gulph'd by the devouring sea,
  Or on the ribs of hurrying icebergs hurl'd,
    The sunder'd vessels vanish momently.
  Scarce through the blasts which swept his own, Gawaine
  Heard the crew shrieking "Chant the runes again!"

  Far other thoughts engaged the prescient knight,                  93
    Fast to a plank he lash'd himself and hound;
  Scarce done, than, presto, shooting out of sight,
    The enormous eddy spun him round and round,
  Along the deck a monstrous wave had pour'd,
  Caught up the plank and toss'd it overboard.

  What of the ship became, saith history not.                       94
    What of the man--the man himself shall show.
  "Like stone from sling," quoth Gawaine, "I was shot
    Into a ridge of what they call a _floe_,[14]
  There much amazed, but rescued from the waters,
  Myself and hound took up our frigid quarters.

  "Freed from the plank, drench'd, spluttering, stunn'd, and        95
          bruised,
    We peer'd about us on the sweltering deep,
  And seeing nought, and being much confused,
    Crept side by side and nestled into sleep.
  The nearest kindred most avoid each other,
  So to shun Death, we visited his brother,

  "Awaked at last, we found the waves had stranded                  96
    A store of waifs portentous and nefarious;
  Here a dead whale was at my elbow landed,
    There a sick polypus, that sea-Briareus,
  Stretch'd out its claws to incorporate my corpus;
  While howl'd the hound half buried by a porpoise!

  "Nimbly I rose, disporpoising my friend;--                        97
    Around me scatter'd lay more piteous wrecks,
  With every wave the accursed Tritons send
    Some sad memento of submergent decks,
  Prows, rudders, casks, ropes, blubber, hides, and hooks,
  Sailors, salt beef, tubs, cabin boys, and cooks.

  "Graves on the dead, with pious care bestow'd,                    98
    (Graves in the ice hewn out with mickle pain
  By axe and bill, which with the waifs had flow'd
    To that strange shore) I next collect the gain;
  Placed in a hollow cleft--and cover'd o'er;--
  Then Knight and hound proceeded to explore.

  "Far had we wander'd, for the storm had join'd                    99
    To a great isle of ice, our friend the _floe_,
  When as the day (three hours its length!) declined,
    Out bray'd a roar; I stared around, and lo
  A flight of dwarfs about the size of sea-moths,
  Chased by two bears that might have eat behemoths!

  "Arm'd with the axe the Tritons had ejected,                     100
    I rush'd to succour the Pigmæan nation,
  In strife our valour, I have oft suspected,
    Proportions safety to intoxication,
  As drunken men securely walk on walls
  From which the wretch who keeps his senses falls;

  "Let but the noble frenzy seize the brain,                       101
    And strength divine seems breathed into the form;
  The rill when swollen swallows up a plain,
    The breeze runs mad before it blows a storm;
  To do great deeds, first lose your wits,--then do them!
  In fine--I burst upon the bears, and slew them!

  "The dwarfs, deliver'd, kneel, and pull their noses;[15]         102
    In tugs which mean to say 'The Pigmy Nation
  A vote of thanks respectfully proposes
    From all the noses of the corporation!'
  Your Highness knows '_Magister Artis Venter_:'
  On signs for breakfast my replies concenter!

  "Quick they conceive, and quick obey; the beasts                 103
    Are skinn'd, and drawn, and quarter'd in a trice,
  But Vulcan leaves Diana to the feasts,
    And not a wood-nymph consecrates the ice--
  Bear is but so-so, when 'tis cook'd the best,
  But bear just skinn'd and perfectly undrest!

  "Then I bethink me of the planks and casks                       104
    Stow'd in the cleft--for fuel _quantum suff_:
  I draw the dwarfs--sore chattering, from their tasks,
    Choose out the morsels least obdurely tough;
  With these I load the Pigmies--bid them follow--
  Regain the haven, and review the hollow.

  "But when those minnow-men beheld the whale                      105
    It really was a spectacle affecting!
  They shout, they sob, they leap--embrace the tail,
    Peep in the jaws; then, round me re-collecting,
  Draw forth these noselings from their hiding places,
  Which serve as public speakers to their faces!

  "While I revolve what this salute may mean,                      106
    They rush once more upon the poor balæna,
  Clutch--rend--gnaw--bolt the blubber; but the lean
    Reject as drying to the duodena!
  This done,--my broil they aid me to obtain,
  And, while I eat--the noses go again!

  "My tale is closed--the grateful Pigmies lead                    107
    Myself and hound across the ice defiles;
  Regain their people and recite my deed,
    Describe the monsters and display the spoils;
  With royal rank my feats the dwarfs repay,
  And build the palace which you now survey!

  "The vanquish'd bears are trophied on the wall;                  108
    The oil you scent once floated in the whale;
  I had a vision to illume the hall
    With lights less fragrant,--human hopes are frail!
  With cares ingenious from the bruins' fat,
  I made some candles,--which the ladies ate!

  "'Tis now your turn to tell the tale, Sir King,--                109
    And by the way our comrade, Lancelot?
  I hope he found a raven in the ring!
    _Monstrum horrendum!_--Sire, I question not
  That in your justice you have heard enough
  When we get home--to crucify that chough!"

  "Gawaine," said Arthur, with his sunny smile,                    110
    "Methinks thy heart will soon absolve the raven,
  Thy friend had perish'd in this icy isle
    But for thy voyage to the Viking's haven,
  In every ill which gives thee such offence,
  Thou seest the raven, I the Providence!"

  The Knight reluctant shook his learned head;                     111
    "So please you, Sire, you cannot find a thief
  Who picks our pouch, but Providence hath led
    His steps to pick it;--yet, to my belief,
  There's not a judge who'd scruple to exhibit
  That proof of Providence upon a gibbet!

  "The chough was sent by Providence:--Agreed:                     112
    We send the chough to Providence, in turn!
  Yet in the hound and not the chough, indeed,
    Your friendly sight should Providence discern;
  For had the hound been just a whit less nimble,
  Thanks to the chough, your friend had been a symbol!"

  "Thy logic," answer'd Arthur, "is unsound,                       113
    But for the chough thou never had'st been married;
  But for the wife thou ne'er hadst seen the hound;--
    The _Ab initio_ to the chough is carried:
  The hound is but the effect--the chough the cause,"
  The generous Gawaine murmur'd his applause.

  "_Do veniam Corvo!_ Sire, the chough's acquitted!"               114
    "For Lancelot next," quoth Arthur, "be at ease,
  The task fulfill'd to which he was permitted,
    The ring veer'd home--I left him on the seas.
  Ere this, be sure he hails the Cymrian shore,
  And gives to Carduel one great bulwark more."

  Then Arthur told of fair Genevra flying                          115
    From the scorn'd nuptials of the heathen fane;
  Her Runic bark to his emprise supplying
    The steed that bore him to the Northern main;
  While she, with cheeks that blush'd and looks that fell,
  Implored a Christian's home in Carduel.

  The gentle King well versed in woman's heart,                    116
    And all the vestal thoughts that tend its shrine,
  On Lancelot smiled--and answer'd, "Maid, depart;
    Though o'er our roofs the thunder clouds combine,
  Yet love shall guard, whatever war betide,
  The Saxon's daughter--or the Cymrian's bride."

  A stately ship from glittering Spezia bore                       117
    To Cymrian ports the lovers from the King;
  Then on, the Seeker of the Shield, once more,
    With patient soul pursued the heavenly wing.
  Wild though that crew, his heart enthralls their own;--
  The great are kings wherever they are thrown.

  Nought of that mystery which the Spirit's priest,                118
    True Love, draws round the aisles behind the veil,
  Could Arthur bare to that light joyous breast,--
    Life hath its inward as its outward tale,
  Our lips reveal our deeds,--our sufferings shun;
  What we have felt, how few can tell to one!

  The triple task--the sword not sought in vain,                   119
    The shield yet hidden in the caves of Lok,
  Of these spoke Arthur,--"Certes," quoth Gawaine,
    When the King ceased--"strange legends of a rock
  Where a fierce Dwarf doth guard a shield of light,
  Oft have I heard my pigmy friends recite;

  "Permit me now your royal limbs to wrap                          120
    In these warm relics of departed bears;
  And while from Morpheus you decoy a nap,
    My skill the grain shall gather from the tares.
  The Pigmy tongue my erudite pursuits
  Have traced _ad unguem_--to the nasal roots!"

  Slumbers the King--slumber his ghastly crew:                     121
    How long they know not, guess not--night and dawn
  Long since commingled in one livid hue:
    Like that long twilight o'er the portals drawn,
  Behind whose threshold spreads eternity!
  When the sleep burst, and sudden in the sky

  Stands the great Sun!--Like the first glorious breath            122
    Of Freedom to the slave, like Hope upon
  The hush of woe, or through the mists of death
    A cheerful Angel--comes to earth the Sun!
  Ice still on land--still vapour in the air,
  But light--the victor Lord--but Light is there!

  On siege-worn cities, when their war is spent,                   123
    From the far hill as, gleam on gleam, arise
  The spears of some great aiding armament--
    Grow the dim splendours, broadening up the skies,
  Till bright and brighter, the sublime array
  Flings o'er the world the banners of the Day!

  Behold them where they kneel! the starry King,                   124
    The dwarfs of night, the giants of the sea!
  Each with the other linked in solemn ring,
    Too blest for words!--Man's sever'd Family,
  All made akin once more beneath those eyes
  Which on their Father smiled in Paradise!

NOTES TO BOOK IX.

1.--Page 346, stanza i.

    _Form'd of the frost-gems ages labour forth_

  The mountains of hard and perfect ice are the gradual production,
  perhaps, of many centuries.--_LESLIE'S Polar Seas and Regions._

2.--Page 346, stanza ii.

    _Here did the venturous Ithacan explore._

  Ulysses. _Odys._, lib. xi.

3.--Page 347, stanza iii.

    _And, with the birth of fairy forests rife,
    Blushes the world of white._

  The phenomenon of the red snow on the Arctic mountains is formed by
  innumerable vegetable bodies; and the olive green of the Greenland Sea
  by Medusan animalcules, the number of which Mr. Scoresby illustrates
  by supposing that 80,000 persons would have been employed since the
  creation in counting it.--See LESLIE.

4.--Page 347, stanza iv.

    _The morse emerging rears the face of man._

  The Morse, or Walrus, supposed to be the original of the Merman; from
  the likeness its face presents at a little distance to that of a human
  being.

5.--Page 347, stanza viii.

    _Floats the vast ice-field with its glassy blink._

  The ice-blink seen on the horizon.

6.--Page 348, stanza xiii.

    _While the dire pest-scourge of the frozen zone._

  Though the fearful disease known by the name of the scurvy is not
  peculiar to the northern latitudes; and Dr. Budd has ably disproved
  (in the Library of Practical Medicine) the old theory that it
  originated in cold and moisture; yet the disease was known in the
  north of Europe from the remotest ages, while no mention is made of
  its appearance in more genial climates before the year 1260.

7.--Page 349, stanza xxii.

    _And round and round the bark the narwal sweeps._

  The Sea Unicorn.

8.--Page 350, stanza xxv.

                  _front after front they rise
    With their bright stare._

  The eye of the Walrus is singularly bright.

9.--Page 351, stanza xxxvii.

    _The ravening glaucus sudden shooting o'er._

  The Larus Glaucus, the great bird of prey in the Polar regions.

10.--Page 352, stanza xl.

    _Blithe from the turf the Dove the blessèd leaves._

  Herbs which act as the antidotes to the scurvy (the cochlearia, &c.)
  are found under the snows, when all other vegetation seems to cease.

11.--Page 354, stanza liv.

    _The earthlier half, its own and Heaven's before._

  In allusion to the well-known Platonic fancy, that love is the
  yearning of the soul for the twin soul with which it was united in
  a former existence, and which it instinctively recognizes below.
  Schiller, in one of his earlier poems, has enlarged on this idea
  with earnest feeling and vigorous fancy.

12.--Page 357, stanza lxxiii.

    _Ice-blocks the walls, and hollow'd ice the roof!_

  The houses of the Esquimaux who received Captain Lyon were thus
  constructed:--the frozen snow being formed into slabs of about two
  feet long and half a foot thick; the benches were made with snow,
  strewed with twigs, and covered with skins; and the lamp suspended
  from the roof, fed with seal or walrus oil, was the sole substitute
  for the hearth, and furnished light and fire for cooking.

  The Esquimaux were known to the settlers and pirates of Norway by
  the contemptuous name of dwarfs or pigmies--(_Skroellings_).

13.--Page 358, stanza lxxxi.

                      _which certain Norway hags
    Had squeezed from heaven and bottled up in bags._

  A well-known popular superstition, not, perhaps, quite extinct at this
  day, amongst the Baltic mariners.

14.--Page 360, stanza xciv.

                              "_I was shot
    Into a ridge of what they call a_ floe.

  The smaller kind of ice-field is called by the northern whale-fishers
  "a floe,"--the name is probably of very ancient date.

15.--Page 361, stanza cii.

    _"The dwarfs, deliver'd, kneel, and pull their noses._

  A salutation still in vogue among certain tribes of the Esquimaux.

BOOK X.

ARGUMENT.

The Polar Spring--The Boreal Lights and apparition of a double sun--The
Rocky Isle--The Bears--The mysterious Shadow from the Crater of the
extinct Volcano--The Bears scent the steps of Man: their movements
described--Arthur's approach--The Bears emerge from their coverts--The
Shadow takes form and life--The Demon Dwarf described--His parley with
Arthur--The King follows the Dwarf into the interior of the volcanic
rock--The Antediluvian Skeletons--The Troll-Fiends and their tasks--
Arthur arrives at the Cave of Lok--The Corpses of the armed Giants--The
Valkyrs at their loom--The Wars that they weave--The Dwarf addresses
Arthur--The King's fear--He approaches the sleeping Fiend, and the
curtains close around him--Meanwhile Gawaine and the Norwegians
have tracked Arthur's steps on the snow, and arrive at the Isle--Are
attacked by the Bears--The noises and eruption from the Volcano--The
re-appearance of Arthur--The change in him--Freedom and its
characteristics--Arthur and his band renew their way along the coast;
ships are seen--How Arthur obtains a bark from the Rugen Chieftain;
and how Gawaine stores it--The Dove now leads homeward--Arthur reaches
England; and, sailing up a river, enters the Mercian territory--He
follows the Dove through a forest to the ruins built by the earliest
Cimmerians--The wisdom and civilization of the ancestral Druidical
races, as compared with their idolatrous successors at the time of the
Roman Conquerors, whose remains alone are left to our age--Arthur lies
down to rest amidst the moonlit ruins--The Dove vanishes--The nameless
horror that seizes the King.

  Spring on the Polar Seas!--not violet-crown'd                      1
    By dewy Hours, nor to cerulean halls
  Melodious hymn'd, yet Light itself around
    Her stately path, sheds starry coronals.
  Sublime she comes, as when, from Dis set free,
  Came, through the flash of Jove, Persephoné:

  She comes--that grand Aurora of the North!                         2
    By steeds of fire her glorious chariot borne,
  From Boreal courts the meteors flaming forth,
    Ope heav'n on heav'n, before the mighty Morn:
  And round the rebel giants of the night
  On earth's last confines bursts the storm of light.

  Wonder and awe! lo, where against the Sun                          3
    A second Sun[1] his lurid front uprears!
  As if the first-born lost Hyperion,
    Hurl'd down of old, from his Uranian spheres,
  Rose from the hell-rocks on his writhings pil'd,
  And glared defiance on his Titan child.

  Now life, the polar life, returns once more,                       4
    The reindeer roots his mosses from the snows;
  The whirring sea-gulls shriek along the shore;
    Through oozing rills the cygnet gleaming goes;
  And, where the ice some happier verdure frees,
  Laugh into light frank-eyed anemones.

  Out from the seas still solid, frown'd a lone                      5
    Chaos of chasm and precipice and rock,
  There, while the meteors on their revels shone,
    Growling hoarse glee, in many a grauly flock,
  With their huge young, the sea-bears sprawling play'd
  Near the charr'd crater some mute Hecla made.

  Sullen before that cavern's vast repose,                           6
    Like the lorn wrecks of a despairing race
  Chased to their last hold by triumphant foes,
    Darkness and Horror stood! But from the space
  Within the cave, and o'er the ice-ground wan,
  Quivers a Shadow vaguely mocking man.

  Like man's the Shadow falls, yet falling loses                     7
    The shape it took, each moment changefully;
  As when the wind on Runic waves confuses
    The weird boughs toss'd from some prophetic tree.
  Fantastic, goblin-like, and fitful thrown,
  Comes the strange Shadow from the drear Unknown.

  It is _not_ man's--for they, man's savage foes,                    8
    Whose sense ne'er fails them when the scent is blood,
  Sport in the shadow the Unseen One throws,
    Nor hush their young to sniff the human food;
  But, undisturbed as if their home were there,
  Pass to and fro the light-defying lair.

  So the bears gamboll'd, so the Shadow play'd,                      9
    When sudden halts the uncouth merriment.
  Now man, in truth, draws near, man's steps invade
    The men-devourers!--Snorting to the scent,
  Lo, where they stretch dread necks of shaggy snow,
  Grin with white fangs, and greed the blood to flow!

  Grotesquely undulating, moves the flock,                          10
    Low grumbling as the grisly ranks divide;
  Some heave their slow bulk peering up the rock,
    Some stand erect, and shift from side to side
  The keen quick ear, the red dilating eye,
  And steam the hard air with a hungry sigh.

  At length unquiet and amazed--as rings                            11
    On to their haunt direct, the dauntless stride,
  With the sharp instinct of all savage things
    That doubt a prey by which they are defied,
  They send from each to each a troubled stare;
  And huddle close, suspicious of the snare.

  Then a huge leader, with concerted wile,                          12
    Creeps lumbering on, and, to his guidance slow
  The shaggèd armies move, in cautious file;
    Till one by one, in ambush for the foe,
  Drops into chasm and cleft,--and vanishing
  With stealthy murther girds the coming King!

  He comes,--the Conqueror in the Halls of Time,                    13
    Known by his silver herald in the Dove,
  By his imperial tread, and front sublime
    With power as tranquil as the lids of Jove,--
  All shapes of death the realms around afford:--
  From Fiends God guard him!--from all else his sword

  For he, with spring the huts of ice had left                      14
    And the small People of the world of snows:
  Their food the seal, their camp, at night, the cleft,
    His bold Norwegians follow where he goes;
  Now in the rear afar, their chief they miss,
  And grudge the danger which they deem a bliss.

  Ere yet the meteors from the morning sky                          15
    Chased large Orion,--in the hour when sleep
  Reflects its ghost-land stillest on the eye,
    Had stol'n the lonely King; and o'er the deep
  Sought, by the clue the dwarfmen-legends yield,
  And the Dove's wing--the demon-guarded Shield.

  The Desert of the Desolate is won.                                16
    Still lurks, unseen, the ambush horrible--
  Nought stirs around beneath the twofold sun
    Save that strange Shadow, where before it fell,
  Still falling;--varying, quivering to and fro,
  From the black cavern on the glaring snow.

  Slow the devourers rise, and peer around:                         17
    Now crag and cliff move dire with savage life,
  And rolling downward,--all the dismal ground
    Shakes with the roar and bristles with the strife:
  Not unprepared--(when ever are the brave?)
  Stands the firm King, and bares the diamond glaive.

  Distinct through all the meteors, streams the brand,              18
    Light'ning along the air, the sea, the rock,
  Bright as the arrow in that heavenly hand
    Which slew the Python! Blinded halt the flock,
  And the great roar, but now so rough and high,
  Sinks into terror wailing timidly.

  Yet the fierce instinct and the rabid sting                       19
    Of famine goad again the check'd array;
  And close and closer in tumultuous ring,
    Reels on the death-mass crushing towards its prey.
  A dull groan tells where first the falchion sweeps--
  When into shape the cave-born Shadow leaps!

  Out from the dark it leapt--the awful form!                       20
    Manlike, but sure not human! on its hair
  The ice-barbs bristled: like a coming storm
    The breath smote lifeless every wind in air;
  Dread form deform'd, as ere the birth of Light,
  Some son of Chaos and the Antique Night!

  At once a dwarf and giant--trunk and limb                         21
    Knit in gnarl'd strength as by a monstrous chance,
  Never chimera more grotesque and grim,
    Paled Ægypt's priesthood with its own romance,
  When, from each dire delirium Fancy knows,
  Some Typhon-type of Powers destroying rose.

  At the dread presence, ice a double cold                          22
    Conceived; the meteors from their dazzling play
  Paused; and appall'd into their azure hold
    Shrunk back with all their banners; not a ray
  Broke o'er the dead sea and the doleful shore,
  Winter's steel grasp lock'd the dumb world once more.

  Halted the war--as the wild multitude                             23
    Left the King scatheless, and their leaders slain;
  And round the giant dwarf the baleful brood
    Came with low howls of terror, wrath, and pain,
  As children round their father. _They_ depart,
  But strife remains; Fear and the Human Heart;

  For Fear was on the bold! Then spoke aloud                        24
    The horrent Image: "Child of hateful Day,
  What madness snares thee to the glooms that shroud
    The realms abandon'd to my secret sway?
  Why on mine air first breathes the human breath?
  Hath thy far world no fairer path to Death?"

  "All ways to Death, but one to Glory leads,                       25
    That which alike through earth, or air, or wave,
  Bears a bold thought to goals in noble deeds,"
    Said the pale King. "And this, methinks, the cave
  Which hides the Shield that rock'd the sleep of one
  By whom ev'n Fable shows what deeds were done!

  "I seek the talisman which guards the free,                       26
    And tread where erst the Sire of freemen trod."[2]
  "Ho!" laugh'd the dwarf, "Walhalla's child was He!
    _Man_ gluts the fiend when he assumes the god."--
  "No god, Deceiver, though man's erring creeds
  Make gods of men when godlike are their deeds;

  "And if the Only and Eternal One                                  27
    Hath, ere his last illuminate Word Reveal'd,
  Left some grand Memory on its airy throne,
    Nor smote the nations when to names they kneel'd--
  It is that each false god was some great truth!--
  To races Heroes are as Bards to youth!"

  Thus spoke the King, to whom the Enchanted Lake,                  28
    Where from all sources Wisdom ever springs,
  Had given unknown the subtle powers that wake
    Our intuitions into cloudiest things,
  Won but by those, who, after passionate dreams,
  Taste the sharp herb and dare the solemn streams.

  The Demon heard; and as a moon that shines,                       29
    Rising behind Arcturus, cold and still
  O'er Baltic headlands black with rigid pines,--
    So on his knit and ominous brows a chill
  And livid smile, revealed the gloomy night,
  To leave the terror sterner for the light.

  Thus spoke the Dwarf, "Thou wouldst survive to tell               30
    Of trophies wrested from the halls of Lok,
  Yet wherefore singly face the hosts of Hell?
    Return, and lead thy comrades to the rock;
  Never to one, on earth's less dreadful field,
  The prize of chiefs do War's fierce Valkyrs yield."

  "War," said the King, "is waged on mortal life                    31
    By men with men;--_that_, dare I with the rest:
  In conflicts awful with no human strife,
    Mightiest methinks, that soul the loneliest!
  When starry charms from Afrite caves were won,
  No Judah march'd with dauntless Solomon!"

  Fell fangs the demon gnash'd, and o'er the crowd                  32
    Wild cumbering round his feet, with hungry stare
  Greeding the man, his drooping visage bow'd;
    "Go elsewhere, sons--your prey escapes the snare:
  Yours but the food which flesh to flesh supplies;
  Here not the mortal but the soul defies."

  Then striding to the cave, he plunged within;                     33
    "Follow," he cried, and like a prison'd blast
  Along the darkness, the reverberate din
    Roll'd from the rough sides of the viewless Vast;
  As goblin echoes, through the haunted hollow,
  'Twixt groan and laughter, chimed hoarse-gibbering, "Follow!"

  The King, recoiling, paused irresolute,                           34
    Till through the cave the white wing went its way;
  Then on his breast he sign'd the cross, and mute,
    With solemn prayer, he left the world of day.
  Thick stood the night, save where the falchion gave
  Its clear sharp glimmer lengthening down the cave.

  Advancing; flashes rush'd irregular                               35
    Like subterranean lightning, fork'd and red:
  From warring matter--wandering shot the star
    Of poisonous gases; and the tortured bed
  Of the' old Volcano show'd in trailing fires,
  Where the numb'd serpent dragg'd its mangled spires.

  Broader and ruddier on the Dove's pale wings                      36
    Now glow'd the lava of the widening spaces;
  Grinn'd from the rook the jaws of giant things,
    The lurid skeletons of vanish'd races,
  They who, perchance, ere man himself had birth,
  Ruled the moist slime of uncompleted earth.

  Enormous couch'd fang'd Iguanodon,[3]                             37
    To which the monster-lizard of the Nile
  Were prey too small,--whose dismal haunts were on
    The swamps where now such golden harvests smile
  As had sufficed those myriad hosts to feed
  When all the Orient march'd behind the Mede.

  There the foul, earliest reptile spectra lay,                     38
    Distinct as when the chaos was their home;
  Half plant, half serpent, some subside away
    Into gnarl'd roots (now stone)--more hideous some,
  Half bird--half fish--seem struggling yet to spring,
  Shark-like the maw, and dragon-like the wing.

  But, life-like more, from later layers emerge                     39
    With their fell tusks deep-stricken in the stone,
  Herds,[4] that through all the thunders of the surge,
    Had to the Ark which swept relentless on
  (Denied to them)--knell'd the despairing roar
  Of sentenced races time shall know no more.

  Under the limbs of mammoths went the path,                        40
    Or through the arch immense of Dragon jaws,
  And ever on the King, in watchful wrath,
    Gazed the attendant Fiend, with artful pause
  Where dread was deadliest; had the mortal one
  Falter'd or quail'd, the Fiend his prey had won,

  And rent it limb by limb; but on the Dove                         41
    Arthur look'd steadfast, and the Fiend was foil'd.
  Now, as along the skeleton world they move,
    Strange noises jar, and flit strange shadows. Toil'd
  The Troll's[5] swart people, in their inmost home
  At work on ruin for the days to come.

  A baleful race, whose anvils forge the flash                      42
    Of iron murder for the limbs of war;
  Who ripen hostile embryos, for the crash
    Of earthquakes rolling slow to towers afar;
  Or train from Hecla's fount the lurid rills,
  To cities sleeping under shepherd hills;

  Or nurse the seeds, through patient ages rife                     43
    With the full harvest of that crowning fire,
  When for the sentenced Three--Time, Death, and Life--
    Our globe itself shall be the funeral pyre;
  And, awed, in orbs remote some race unknown
  Shall miss one star, whose smile had lit their own!

  Through the Phlegræan glare, innumerous eyes,                     44
    Fierce with the murther-lust, scowl ravening,
  And forms on which had never look'd the skies
    Stalk near and nearer, swooping round the King,
  Till from the blazing sword the foul array
  Shrink back, and wolf-like follow on the way.

  Now through waste mines of iron, whose black peaks                45
    Frown o'er dull Phlegethons of fire below,
  While, vague as worlds unform'd, sulphureous reeks
    Roll on before them huge and dun,--they go.
  Abrupt the vapours vanish, and the light
  Bursts like a flood and rushes o'er the night.

  A mighty cirque with lustre belts the mine;                       46
    Its walls of iron glittering into steel;
  Wall upon wall reflected flings the shrine
    Of armour! Vizorless the Corpses kneel,
  Their glazed eyes fix'd upon a couch where, screen'd
  With whispering curtains, sleeps the Kingly Fiend:

  Corpses of giants, who perchance had heard                        47
    The tromps of Tubal, and had leapt to strife
  Whose guilt provoked the Deluge: sepulchred
    In their world's ruins, still a frown like life
  Hung o'er vast brows,--and spears like turrets shone
  In hands whose grasp had crush'd the Mastodon.

  Around the couch, a silent solemn ring,                           48
    They whom the Teuton call the Valkyrs sate.
  Shot through pale webs their spindles glistening;
    Dread tissues woven out of human hate
  For heavenly ends!--for there is spun the woe
  Of every war that ever earth shall know.

  Below their feet a bottomless pit of gore                         49
    Yawn'd, where each web, when once the woof was done,
  Was scornful cast. Yet rising evermore
    Out of the surface, wander'd airy on
  (Till lost in upper space), pale wingèd seeds,
  The future heaven-fruit of the hell-born deeds;

  For out of every evil born of time,                               50
    God shapes a good for his eternity.
  Lo where the spindles, weaving crime on crime,
    Form the world-work of Charlemains to be;--
  How in that hall of iron lengthen forth
  The fates that ruin, to rebuild, the North!

  Here, one stern Sister smiling on the King,                       51
    Hurries the thread that twines his Nation's doom;
  And, farther down, the whirring spindles sing
    Around the woof which from his Baltic home
  Shall charm the avenging Norman, to control
  The shatter'd races into one calm whole.

  Already here, the hueless lines along,                            52
    Grows the red creed of the Arabian horde;
  Already here, the arm'd Chivalric Wrong
    Which made the cross the symbol of the sword,
  Which thy worst idol, Rome, to Judah gave,
  And worshipp'd Mars upon the Saviour's grave!

  Already the wild Tartar in his tents,                             53
    Dreamless of thrones--and the fierce Visigoth[6]
  Who on Colombia's golden armaments
    Shall loose the hell-hounds,--nurse the age-long growth
  Of Desolation--as the noiseless skein
  Clasps in its web, thy far descendants, Cain!

  Already, in the hearts of sires remote                            54
    In their rude Isle, the spell ordains the germ
  Of what shall be a Name of wonder, wrought
    From that fell feast which Glory gives the worm,
  When Rome's dark bird shall shade with thunder wings
  Calm brows that brood the doom of breathless kings![7]

  Already, though the sad unheeded eyes                             55
    Of Bards alone foresee, and none believe,
  The lightning boarded from the farthest skies
    Into the mesh the race-destroyers weave,
  When o'er our marts shall graze a stranger's fold,
  And the new Tarshish rot, as rots the old.

  Yea, ever there, each spectre hand the birth                      56
    Weaves of a war--until the angel-blast
  (Peal'd from the tromp that knells the doom of earth)
    Shall start the livid legions from their last;
  And man, with arm uplifted still to slay,
  Reel on some Alp that rolls in smoke away!

  Fierce glared the dwarf upon the silent King,                     57
    "There is the prize thy visions would achieve!
  There, where the hush'd inexorable ring
    Murder the myriads in the webs they weave,
  Behind the curtains of Incarnate War,
  Whose lightest tremour topples thrones afar,--

  "Which ev'n the Valkyrs with their bloodless hands                58
    Dare never draw aside,--go seek the Shield!
  Yet be what follows known!--yon kneeling bands
    Whose camps were Andes, and whose battle-field
  Left plains, now empires, rolling seas of gore,
  Shall near the clang and heap to life once more.

  "Roused from their task, revengeful shall arise                   59
    The never-baffled 'Choosers of the Slain;'
  The Fiend thy hand shall wake, unclose the eyes
    That flash'd on heavenly hosts their storms again,
  And thy soul wither in the mighty frown
  Before whose night an earlier sun sunk down.

  "The rocks shall close all path for flight save one,              60
    Where now the Troll-fiends wait to rend their prey,
  And each malign and monster skeleton,
    Reclothed with life as in the giant day
  When yonder seas were valleys, scent thy gore,
  And grin with fangs that gnash for food once more.

  "Ho, dost thou shudder, pale one? Back and live."                 61
    Thrice strove the King for speech, and thrice in vain;
  For he was man, and till our souls survive
    The instincts born of flesh, shall Horror reign
  In that Unknown beyond the realms of Sense,
  Where the soul's darkness seems the man's defence.

  Yet as when through uncertain troublous cloud                     62
    Breaks the sweet morning star, and from its home
  Smiles lofty peace, so through the phantom crowd
    Of fears the Eos of the world to come,
  FAITH, look'd--revealing how earth-nourish'd are
  The clouds, and how beyond their reach the star!

  Mute on his knee, amidst the kneeling dead                        63
    He sank--the dead the dreaming fiend revered,
  And he, the living God! Then terror fled,
    And all the king illumed the front he rear'd.
  Firm to the couch on which the fiend reposed
  He strode;--the curtains, murmuring, round him closed.

  Now while this chanced, without the tortured rock                 64
    Raged fierce the war between the rival might
  Of beast and man; the dwarf king's ravenous flock
    And Norway's warriors led by Cymri's knight.
  For by the foot-prints through the snows explored,
  On to the rock the bands had track'd their lord.

  Repell'd, not conquer'd, back to crag and cave,                   65
    Sullen and watchful still, the monsters go;
  And solitude resettles on the wave,
    But silence not; around, aloft, alow
  Roar the couch'd beasts, and answering from the main,
  Shrieks the shrill gull and booms the dismal crane.

  And now the rock itself from every tomb                           66
    Of its dead world within, sends voices forth,
  Sounds direr far, than in its rayless gloom
    Crash on the midnight of the farthest North.
  From beasts our world hath lost, the strident yell,
  The shout of giants and the laugh of hell.

  Reels all the isle; and every ragged steep                        67
    Hurls down an avalanche;--all the crater-cave
  Glows into swarthy red, and fire-showers leap
    From rended summits, hissing to the wave
  Through its hard ice; or in huge crags, wide-sounding
  Spring where they crash--on rushing and rebounding.

  Dizzy and blind, the staggering Northmen fall                     68
    On earth that rocks beneath them like a bark;
  Loud and more loud the tumult swells with all
    The Acheron of the discord. Swift and dark
  From every cleft the smoke-clouds burst their way,
  Rush through the void, and sweep from heaven the day.

  Smitten beneath the pestilential blast                            69
    And the great terror, senseless lay the band,
  Till the arrested life, with throes at last,
    Gasp'd back: and holy over sea and land
  Silence and light reposed. They look'd above
  And calm in calmèd air beheld the Dove!

  And o'er their prostrate lord was poised the wing;                70
    And when they rush'd and reach'd him, shouting joy,
  There came no answer from the corpse-like King;
    And when his true knight raised him, heavily
  Droop'd his pale front upon the faithful breast,
  And the closed lids seem'd leaden in their rest.

  And all his mail was dinted, hewn, and crush'd,                   71
    And the bright falchion dim with foul dark gore;
  And the strong pulse of the strong hand was hush'd;
    Like a spent storm, that might, which seem'd before
  Charged with the bolts of Jove, now from the sky
  Drew breath more feeble than an infant's sigh.

  And there was solemn change on that fair face,                    72
    Nor, whatsoe'er the fear or scorn had been,
  Did the past passion leave its haggard trace;
    But on the rigid beauty awe was seen,
  As one who on the Gorgon's aspect fell
  Had gazed, and freezing, yet survived the spell!

  Not by the chasm in which he left the day,                        73
    But through a new-made gorge the fires had cleft,
  As if with fires themselves were forced the way,
    Had rush'd the King;--and sense and sinew left
  The form that struggled till the strife was o'er:
  So faints the swimmer when he gains the shore.

  But on his arm was clasp'd the wondrous prize:                    74
    Dimm'd, tarnish'd, grimed, and black with gore and smoke,
  Still the pure metal, through each foul disguise,
    Like starlight scatter'd on dark waters, broke;
  Through gore, through smoke it shone--the silver Shield,
  Clear as dawns Freedom from her battle-field!

  Days follow'd days, ere from that speechless trance               75
    (Borne to green inlets isled amid the snows
  Where led the Dove), the King's reviving glance
    Look'd languid round on watchful, joyful brows;
  Ev'n while he slept, new flowers the earth had given,
  And on his heart brooded the bird of heaven!

  But ne'er as voice and strength and sense return'd,               76
    To his good knight the strife that won the Shield
  Did Arthur tell; deep in his soul inurn'd
    (As in the grave its secret) nor reveal'd
  To mortal ear that mystery which for ever
  Flow'd through his thought, as through the cave a river;

  Whether to Love, how true soe'er its faith,                       77
    Whether to Wisdom, whatsoe'er its skill,
  Till his last hour the struggle and the scath
    Remain'd unutter'd and unutterable;
  But aye, in solitude, in crowds, in strife,
  In joy, that memory lived within his life:

  It made not sadness, though the calm, grave smile                 78
    Never regain'd the flash that youth had given,--
  But as some shadow from a sacred pile
    Darkens the earth from shrines that speak of heaven,
  That gloom the grandeur of religion wore,
  And seem'd to hallow all it rested o'er.

  Such Freedom is, O Slave, that would be free!                     79
    Never her real struggles into life
  Hath History told! As it hath been shall be
    The Apocalypse of Nations; nursed in strife
  Not with the present, nor with living foes,
  But where the centuries shroud their long repose.

  Out from the graves of earth's primæval bones,                    80
    The shield of empire, patient Force must win:
  What made the Briton free? not crashing thrones
    Nor parchment laws. The charter must begin
  In Scythian tents, the steel of Nomad spears;
  To date the freedom, count three thousand years!

  Neither is Freedom mirth! Be free, O slave,                       81
    And dance no more beneath the lazy palm.
  Freedom's mild brow with noble care is grave,
    Her bliss is solemn as her strength is calm;
  And thought mature each childlike sport debars
  The forms erect whose look is on the stars.

  Now as the King revived, along the seas                           82
    Flow'd back, enlarged to life, the lapsing waters;
  Kiss'd from their slumber by the loving breeze,
    Glide, in light dance, the Ocean's silver daughters--
  And blithe and hopeful o'er the sunny strands,
  Listing the long-lost billow, rove the bands.

  At length, O sight of joy!--the gleam of sails                    83
    Bursts on the solitude! more near and near
  Come the white playmates of the buxom gales.--
    The whistling cords, the sounds of man, they hear.
  Shout answers shout;--light sparkles round the oar--
  And from the barks the boat skims on to shore.

  It was a race from Rugen's friendly soil,                         84
    Leagued by old ties with Cymri's land and king,
  Who, with the spring-time, to their wonted spoil
    Of seals and furs had spread the canvas wing
  To bournes their fathers never yet had known;--
  And found, amazed, hearts bolder than their own.

  Soon to the barks the Cymrian and their bands                     85
    Are borne: Bright-hair'd, above the gazing crews,
  Lone on the loftiest deck, the leader stands,
    To whom the King (his rank made known) renews
  All that his tale of mortal hope and fear
  Vouchsafes from truth to thrill a mortal's ear;

  And from the barks whose sails the chief obey,                    86
    Craves one to waft where yet the fates may guide.--
  With rugged wonder in his large survey,
    That calm grand brow the son of Ægir[8] eyed,
  And seem'd in awe, as of a god, to scan
  Him who so moved his homage, yet was man.

  Smoothing his voice, rough with accustom'd swell                  87
    Above the storms, and the wild roar of war,
  The Northman answer'd, "Skalds in winter tell
    Of the dire dwarf who guards the Shield of Thor,
  For one whose race, with Odin's blent, shall be,
  Lords of the only realm which suits the Free,

  "Ocean!--I greet thee, and this strong right hand                 88
    Place in thine own to pledge myself thy man.
  Choose as thou wilt for thee and for thy band,
    Amongst the sea-steeds in the stalls of Ran.
  Need'st thou our arms against the Saxon foe?
  Our flag shall fly where'er thy trumpets blow!"

  "Men to be free must free themselves," the King                   89
    Replied, proud-smiling. "Every father-land
  Spurns from its breast the recreant sons that cling
    For hope to standards winds not theirs have fann'd.
  Thankful through thee our foe we reach;--and then
  Cymri hath steel eno' for Cymrian men!"

  While these converse, Sir Gawaine, with his hound,                90
    Lured by a fragrant and delightsome smell
  From roasts--not meant for Freya,--makes his round,
    Shakes hands with all, and hopes their wives are well.
  From spit to spit with easy grace he walks,
  And chines astounded vanish while he talks.

  At earliest morn the bark to bear the King,                       91
    His sage discernment delicately stores,
  Rejects the blubber and disdains the ling
    For hams of rein-deers and for heads of boars,
  Connives at seal, to satisfy his men,
  But childless leaves each loud-lamenting hen.

  And now the bark the Cymrian prince ascends,                      92
    The large oars chiming to the chanting crew,
  (His leal Norwegian band) the new-found friends
    From brazen trumpets blare their loud adieu.
  Forth bounds the ship, and Gawaine, while it quickens,
  The wind propitiates--with three virgin chickens.

  Led by the Dove, more brightly day by day,                        93
    The vernal azure deepens in the sky;
  Far from the Polar threshold smiles the way--
    And lo, white Albion shimmers on the eye,
  Nurse of all nations, who to breasts severe
  Takes the rude children, the calm men to rear.

  Doubt and amaze with joy perplex the King:                        94
    Not yet the task achieved, the mission done,
  Why homeward steers the angel pilot's wing?
    Of the three labours rests the crowning one;
  Unreach'd the Iron Gates--Death's sullen hold--
  Where waits the Child-guide with the locks of gold.

  Yet still the Dove cleaves homeward through the air;              95
    Glides o'er the entrance of an inland stream;
  And rests at last on bowers of foliage, where
    Thick forests close their ramparts on the beam,
  And clasp with dipping boughs a grassy creek,
  Whose marge slopes level with the brazen beak.

  Around his neck the shield the Adventurer slung;                  96
    And girt the enchanted sword. Then, kneeling, said
  The young Ulysses of the golden tongue,
    "Not now to phantom foes the dove hath led:
  For, if I err not, this a Mercian haven,
  And from the dove peeps forth at last the raven!

  "Not lone, nor reckless, in these glooms profound,                97
    Tempt the sure ambush of some Saxon host;
  If out of sight, at least in reach of sound,
    Let our stout Northmen follow up the coast;
  Then if thou wilt, from each suspicious tree
  Shake laurels down, but share them, Sire, with me!"

  "Nay," answer'd Arthur, "ever, as before,                         98
    Alone the Pilgrim to his bourne must go;
  But range the men conceal'd along the shore;
    Set watch, from these green turrets, for the foe;
  Moor'd to the marge where broadest hangs the bough,
  Hide from the sun the glitter of the prow:--

  And so farewell!" He said; to land he leapt;                      99
    And with dull murmur from its verdant waves,
  O'er his high crest the billowy forest swept.
    As towards some fitful light the swimmer cleaves
  His stalwart way,--so through the woven shades
  Where the pale wing now glimmers and now fades.

  With strong hand parting the tough branches, goes                100
    Hour after hour the King; till light at last
  From skies long hid, in ambient silver flows
    Through opening glades, the length of gloom is past,
  And the dark pines receding stand around
  A silent hill with antique ruins crown'd.

  Day had long closed; and from the mournful deeps                 101
    Of old volcanoes spent, the livid moon
  Which through the life of planets lifeless creeps
    Her ghostly way, deaf to the choral tune
  Of spheres rejoicing, on those ruins old
  Look'd down, herself a ruin,--hush'd and cold.

  Mutely the granite wrecks the King survey'd,                     102
    And knew the work of hands Cimmerian,
  What time in starry robes, and awe array'd,
    Grey Druids spoke the oracles of man--
  Solving high riddles to Chaldean Mage,
  Or the young wonder of the Samian Sage.

  A date remounting far beyond the day                             103
    When Roman legions met the scythèd cars,
  When purer founts sublime had lapsed away
    Through the deep rents of unrecorded wars,
  And bloodstain'd altars cursed the mountain sod,[9]
  Where the first faith had hail'd the Only God.

  For all now left us of the parent Celt,                          104
    Is of that later and corrupter time,--
  Not in rude domeless fanes those Fathers knelt,
    Who lured the Brahman from his burning clime,
  Who charm'd lost science from each lone abyss,
  And wing'd the shaft of Scythian Abaris.[10]

  Yea, the grandsires of our primæval race                         105
    Saw angel tracks the earlier earth upon,
  And as a rising sun, the morning face
    Of Truth more near the flush'd horizon shone;
  Filling ev'n clouds with many a golden light,
  Lost when the orb is at the noonday height.

  Through the large ruins (now no more), the last                  106
    Perchance on earth of those diviner sires,
  With noiseless step the lone descendant pass'd;
    Not there were seen BÂL-HUAN'S amber pyres;
  No circling shafts with barbarous fragments strewn,
  Spoke creeds of carnage to the spectral moon.

  But Art, vast, simple, and sublime, was there                    107
    Ev'n in its mournful wrecks,--such Art foregone
  As the first Builders, when their grand despair
    Left Shinar's tower and city half undone,
  Taught where they wander'd o'er the newborn world.--
  Column, and vault, and roof, in ruin hurl'd,

  Still spoke of hands that founded Babylon!                       108
    So in the wrecks, the Lord of young Romance
  By fallen pillars laid him musing down.
    More large and large the moving shades advance,
  Blending in one dim silence sad and wan
  The past, the present, ruin and the man.

  Now, o'er his lids life's gentlest influence stole,              109
    Life's gentlest influence, yet the likest death!
  That nightly proof how little needs the soul
    Light from the sense, or being from the breath,
  When all life knows a life unknown supplies,
  And airy worlds around a Spirit rise.

  Still through the hazy mist of stealing sleep,                   110
    His eyes explore the watchful guardian's wing,
  There, where it broods upon the moss-grown heap,
    With plumes that all the stars are silvering.
  Slow close the lids--reopening with a start
  As shoots a nameless terror through his heart.

  That strange wild awe which haunted Childhood thrills,           111
    When waking at the dead of Dark, alone,
  A sense of sudden solitude which chills
    The blood;--a shrinking as from shapes unknown;
  An instinct both of some protection fled,
  And of the coming of some ghastly dread.

  He look'd, and lo, the Dove was seen no more,                    112
    Lone lay the lifeless wrecks beneath the moon,
  And the one loss gave all that seem'd before
    Desolate,--twofold desolation!
  How slight a thing, whose love our trust has been,
  Alters the world, when it no more is seen!

  He strove to speak, but voice was gone from him.                 113
    As in that loss new might the terror took,
  His veins congeal'd; and, interfused and dim,
    Shadow and moonlight swam before his look;
  Bristled his hair; and all the strong dismay
  Seized as an eagle when it grasps its prey.

  Senses and soul confused, and jarr'd, and blent,                 114
    Lay crush'd beneath the intolerable Power;
  Then over all, one flash, in lightning, rent
    The veil between the Immortal and the Hour;
  Life heard the voice of unembodied breath,
  And Sleep stood trembling face to face with Death.

NOTES TO BOOK X.

1.--Page 366, stanza iii.

    _A second Sun his lurid front uprears!_

  The apparition of two or more suns in the polar firmament is well
  known. Mr. Ellis saw six--they are most brilliant at daybreak--and
  though diminished in splendour, are still visible even after the
  appearance of the real sun.

2.--Page 369, stanza xxvi.

    _And tread where erst the Sire of freemen trod._

  Thor's visit to the realms of Hela and Lok forms a prominent incident
  in the romance of Scandinavian mythology.

3.--Page 370, stanza xxxvii.

    _Enormous couch'd fang'd Iguanodon._

  Dr. Mantell, in his "Wonders of Geology," computes the length of
  the Iguanodon (formerly an inhabitant of the Wealds of Sussex) at
  one hundred feet.

4.--Page 371, stanza xxxix.

    _Herds, that through all the thunders of the surge._

  The Deinotherium--supposed to have been a colossal species of
  hippopotamus.

5.--Page 371, stanza xli.

    _The Troll's swart people, in their inmost home._

  In Scandinavian mythology, the evil spirits are generally called
  Trolls (or Trolds). The name is here applied to the malignant race
  of Dwarfs, whose homes were in the earth, and who could not endure
  the sun.

6.--Page 373, stanza liii.

    _Dreamless of thrones--and the fierce Visigoth._

  Visigoth, _poeticè_ for the Spanish ravagers of Mexico and Peru.

7.--Page 373, stanza liv.

    _Calm brows that brood the doom of breathless kings!_

  Napoleon.

8.--Page 377, stanza lxxxvi.

    _That calm grand brow the son of Ægir eyed._

  Ægir, the God of the Ocean, the Scandinavian Neptune.

9.--Page 380, stanza ciii.

    _And bloodstain'd altars cursed the mountain sod._

  The testimony to be found in classical writers as to the original
  purity of the Druid worship, before it was corrupted into the idolatry
  which existed in Britain at the time of the Roman conquest, is
  strongly corroborated by the Welsh triads. These triads, indeed,
  are of various dates, but some bear the mark of a very remote
  antiquity--wholly distinct alike from the philosophy of the Romans
  and the mode of thought prevalent in the earlier ages of the Christian
  era; in short, anterior to all the recorded conquests over the Cymrian
  people. These, like proverbs, appear the wrecks and fragments of some
  primæval ethics, or philosophical religion. Nor are such remarkable
  alone for the purity of the notions they inculcate relative to the
  Deity; they have often, upon matters less spiritual, the delicate
  observation, as well as the profound thought, of reflective wisdom. It
  is easy to see in them how identified was the Bard with the Sage--that
  rare union which produces the highest kind of human knowledge. Such,
  perhaps, are the relics of that sublimer learning which, ages before
  the sacrifice of victims in wicker idols, won for the Druids the
  admiration of the cautious Aristotle, as ranking among the true
  enlighteners of men--such the teachers who (we may suppose to have)
  instructed the mystical Pythagoras; and furnished new themes for
  meditation to the musing Brahman. Nor were the Druids of Britain
  inferior to those with whom the Sages of the western and eastern
  world came more in contact. On the contrary, even to the time of
  Cæsar, the Druids of Britain excelled in science and repute those in
  Gaul; and to their schools the Neophytes of the Continent were sent.

  In the Stanzas that follow the description of the more primitive
  Cymrians, it is assumed that the rude Druid remains _now_ existent
  (as at Stonehenge, &c.), are coeval only with the later and corrupted
  state of a people degenerated to idol-worship, and that the Cymrians
  previously possessed an architecture, of which no trace now remains,
  more suited to their early civilization. If it be true that they
  worshipped the Deity only in his own works, and that it was not until
  what had been a symbol passed into an idol, that they deserted the
  mountain-top and the forest for the temple, they would certainly have
  wanted the main inducement to permanent and lofty architecture. Still
  it may be allowed, at least to a poet, to suppose that men so sensible
  as the primitive Saronides, would have held their schools and colleges
  in places more adapted to a northern climate than their favourite oak
  groves.

10.--Page 380, stanza civ.

    _And wing'd the shaft of Scythian Abaris._

  The arrow of Abaris (which bore him where he pleased) is supposed
  by some to have been the loadstone. And Abaris himself has been, by
  some ingenious speculators, identified with a Druid philosopher.

BOOK XI.

ARGUMENT.

The Siege of Carduel--The Saxon forces--Stanzas relative to Ludovick
the Vandal, in explanation of the failure of his promised aid, and in
description of the events in Vandal-land--The preparations of the Saxon
host for the final assault on the City, under cover of the approaching
night--The state of Carduel--Discord--Despondence--Famine--The apparent
impossibility to resist the coming Enemy--Dialogue between Caradoc and
Merlin--Caradoc hears his sentence, and is resigned--He takes his harp
and descends into the town--The progress of Song; in its effects upon
the multitude--Caradoc's address to the people he has roused, and the
rush to the Council Hall--Meanwhile the Saxons reach the walls----The
burst of the Cymrians--The Saxons retire into the plain between the Camp
and the City, and there take their stand--The battle described--The
single combat between Lancelot and Harold--Crida leads on his reserve;
the Cymrians take alarm and waver--The prediction invented by the noble
devotion of Caradoc--His fate--The enthusiasm of the Cymrians, and the
retreat of the enemy to their Camp--The first entrance of a Happy Soul
into Heaven--The Ghost that appears to Arthur, and leads him through
the Cimmerian tomb to the Realm of Death--The sense of time and space
are annihilated--Death, the Phantasmal Everywhere--Its brevity
and nothingness--The condition of soul is life, whether here or
hereafter--Fate and Nature identical--Arthur accosted by his Guardian
Angel--After the address of that Angel (which represents what we call
Conscience), Arthur loses his former fear both of the realm and the
Phantom--He addresses the Ghost, which vanishes without reply to his
question--The last boon--The destined Soother--Arthur recovering, as
from a trance, sees the Maiden of the Tomb--Her description--The Dove
is beheld no more--Strange resemblance between the Maiden and the
Dove--Arthur is led to his ship, and sails at once for Carduel--He
arrives on the Cymrian territory, and lands with Gawaine and the Maiden,
near Carduel, amidst the ruins of a hamlet devastated by the Saxons--He
seeks a Convent, of which only one tower, built by the Romans,
remains--From the hill-top he surveys the walls of Carduel and the Saxon
encampment--The appearance of the holy Abbess, who recognizes the King,
and conducts him and his companions to the subterranean grottos built
by the Romans for a summer retreat--He leaves the Maiden to the care
of the Abbess, and concerts with Gawaine the scheme for attack on the
Saxons--The Virgin is conducted to the cell of the Abbess--Her thoughts
and recollections, which explain her history--Her resolution--She
attempts to escape--Meets the Abbess, who hangs the Cross round her
neck, and blesses her--She departs to the Saxon Camp.

  King Crida's hosts are storming Carduel!                           1
    From vale to mount one world of armour shines,
  Round castled piles for which the forest fell,
    Spreads the white war-town of the Teuton lines;
  To countless clarions countless standards swell;
  King Crida's hosts axe storming Carduel!

  There, all its floods the Saxon deluge pours;                      2
    All the fierce tribes; from those whose fathers first,
  With their red seaxes from the southward shores,
    Carved realms for Hengist,--to the bands that burst
  Along the Humber, on the idle wall
  Rome built for manhood rotted by her thrall.

  There, wild allies from many a kindred race,                       3
    In Cymrian lands hail Teuton thrones to be:
  Dark Jutland wails her absent populace,--
    And large-limb'd sons, his waves no more shall see,
  Leave Danube desolate! afar they roam
  Where halts the Raven there to find a home!

  But wherefore fail the Vandal's promised bands?                    4
    Well said the Greek, "Not till his latest hour
  Deem man secure from Fortune;" in our hands
    We clutch the sunbeam when we grasp at power;--
  No strength detains the unsubstantial prize,
  The light escapes us as the moment flies.

  And monarchs envied Ludovick the Great!                            5
    And wisdom's seers his wiles did wisdom call,
  And Force stood sentry at his castle gate,
    And Mammon soothed the murmurers in the hall;
  For Freedom's forms disguised the despot's thought--
  He ruled by synods--and the synods bought!

  Yet empires rest not or on gold or steel;                          6
    The old in habit strike the gnarlèd root;
  But vigorous faith--the young fresh sap of zeal,
    Must make the life-blood of the planted shoot--
  And new-born states, like new religions, need
  Not the dull code, but the impassion'd creed.

  Give but a cause, a child may be a chief!                          7
    What cause to hosts can Ludovick supply?
  Swift flies the Element of Power, _Belief_,
    From all foundations hollow'd to a lie.
  One morn, a riot in the streets arose,
  And left the Vandal crownless at the close.

  A plump of spears the riot could have crush'd!                     8
    "Defend the throne, my spearmen!" cried the king.
  The spearmen arm'd, and forth the spearmen rush'd,
    When, woe! they took to reason on the thing!
  And then conviction smote them on the spot,
  That for that throne they did not care a jot.

  With scuff and scum, with urchins loosed from school,              9
    Thieves, gleemen, jugglers, beggars, swell'd the riot;
  While, like the gods of Epicurus, cool
    On crowd and crown the spearmen look'd in quiet,
  Till all its heads that Hydra call'd "The Many,"
  Stretch'd hissing forth without a stroke at any.

  At first Astutio, wrong but very wise,                            10
    Disdain'd the Hydra as a fabled creature,
  The vague invention of a Poet's lies,
    Unknown to Pliny and the laws of Nature--
  Nor till the fact was past philosophizing,
  Saith he, "That's Hydra, there is no disguising!

  "A Hydra, Sire, a Hercules demands;                               11
    So if not Hercules, assume his vizard."
  The advice is good--the Vandal wrings his hands,
    Kicks out the Sage--and rushes to a wizard.
  The wizard waves his wand--disarms the sentry
  And (wondrous man) enchants the mob--with entry.

  Thus fell, though no man touch'd him, Ludovick,                   12
    Tripp'd by the slide of his own slippery feet.
  The crown cajoled from Fortune by a trick,
    Fortune, in turn, outcheated from the cheat;
  Clapp'd her sly cap the glittering bauble on,
  Cried "Presto!"--raised it--and the gaud was gone.

  Ev'n at the last, to self and nature true,                        13
    No royal heart the breath of danger woke;
  To mean disguise habitual instinct flew,
    And the king vanish'd in a craftsman's cloak.
  While his brave princes scampering for their lives,
  _Relictis parmulis_--forgot their wives!

  King Mob succeeding to the vacant throne,                         14
    Chose for his ministers some wild Chaldeans,--
  Who told the sun to close the day at noon,
    Nor sweat to death his betters the plebeians;
  And bade the earth, unvex'd by plough and spade,
  Bring forth its wheat in quarterns ready made.

  The sun refused the astronomic fiat;                              15
    The earth declined to bake the corn it grew;
  King Mob then order'd that a second riot
    Should teach Creation what it had to do.
  "The sun shines on, the earth demands the tillage--
  Down Time and Nature, and hurrah for pillage!"

  Then rise _en masse_ the burghers of the town;                    16
    Each patriot breast the fires of Brutus fill;
  Gentle as lambs when riot reach'd the crown,
    They raged like lions when it touch'd the till.
  Rush'd all who boasted of a shop to rob,
  And stout King Money soon dethroned King Mob.

  This done, much scandalised to note the fact                      17
    That o'er the short tyrannic rise the tall,
  The middle-sized a penal law enact
    That henceforth height must be the same in all;
  For being each born equal with the other,
  What greater crime than to outgrow your brother?

  Poor Vandals, do the towers, when foes assail,                    18
    So idly soar above the level wall?
  Harmonious Order needs its music-scale;
    The Equal were the discord of the All.
  Let the wave undulate, the mountain rise;
  Nor ask from Law what Nature's self denies.

  O vagrant Muse, deserting all too long,                           19
    Freedom's grand war for frenzy's goblin dream,
  The hour runs on, and redemands from song,
    And from our Father-land the mighty theme.
  The Pale Horse rushes and the trumpets swell,
  King Crida's hosts are storming Carduel!

  Within the inmost fort by pine trees made,                        20
    The hardy women kneel to warrior gods.
  For where the Saxon armaments invade,
    All life abandons their resign'd abodes.
  The tents they pitch the all they prize contain;
  And each new march is for a new domain.

  To the stern gods the fair-hair'd women kneel,                    21
    As slow to rest the red sun glides along;
  And near and far, hammers, and clanking steel,
    Neighs from impatient barbs, and runic song
  Mutter'd o'er mystic fires by wizard priests,
  Invite the Valkyrs to the raven feasts.

  For after nine long moons of siege and storm,                     22
    Thy hold, Pendragon, trembles to its fall!
  Loftier the Roman tower uprears its form,
    From the crush'd bastion and the shatter'd wall.
  And but till night those iron floods delay
  Their rush of thunder:--Blood-red sinks the day.

  Death halts to strike, and swift the moment flies:                23
    Within the walls (than all without more fell),
  Discord with Babel tongues confounds the wise,
    And spectral Panic, like a form of hell
  Chased by a Fury, fleets,--or, stone-like, stands
  Dull-eyed Despondence, palsying nerveless hands.

  And Pride, that evil angel of the Celt,                           24
    Whispers to all "'tis servile to obey,"
  Robs order'd Union of its starry belt,
    Rends chief from chief and tribe from tribe away,
  And leaves the children wrangling for command
  Round the wild death-throes of the Father-land.

  In breadless marts, the ill-persuading fiend                      25
    Famine, stalks maddening with her wolfish stare;
  And hearts, on whose stout anchors Faith had lean'd,
    Bound at her look to treason from despair,
  Shouting, "Why shrink we from the Saxon's thrall?
  Is slavery worse than Famine smiting all?"

  Thus, in the absence of the sunlike king,                         26
    All phantoms stalk abroad; dissolve and droop
  Light and the life of nations--while the wing
    Of Carnage halts but for its rushing swoop.
  Some moan, some rave, some laze the hours away;--
  And down from Carduel blood-red sunk the day!

  Leaning against a broken parapet                                  27
    Alone with Thought, mused Caradoc the Bard,
  When a voice smote him, and he turn'd and met
    A gaze prophetic in its sad regard.
  Beside him, solemn with his hundred years,
  Stood the arch hierarch of the Cymrian seers.

  "Dost thou remember," said the Sage, "that hour                   28
    When seeking signs to Glory's distant way,
  Thou heard'st the night bird in her leafy bower,
    Singing sweet death-chaunts to her shining prey,
  While thy young poet-heart, with ravish'd breath,
  Hung on the music, nor divined the death?"[1]

  "Ay," the bard answer'd, "and ev'n now methought                  29
    I heard again the ambrosial melody!"
  "So," sigh'd the Prophet, "to the bard, unsought,
    Come the far whispers of Futurity!
  Like his own harp, his soul a wind can thrill,
  And the chord murmur, though the hand be still.

  "Wilt thou for ever, even from the tomb,                          30
    Live, yet a music, in the hearts of all;
  Arise and save thy country from its doom;
    Arise, Immortal, at the angel's call!
  The hour shall give thee all thy life implor'd,
  And make the lyre more glorious than the sword.

  "In vain through yon dull stupor of despair                       31
    Sound Geraint's tromp and Owaine's battle cry;
  In vain where yon rude clamour storms the air,
    The Council Chiefs stem madd'ning mutiny;
  From Trystan's mail the lion heart is gone,
  And on the breach stands Lancelot alone!

  "Drivelling the wise, and impotent the strong;                    32
    Fast into night the life of Freedom dies;
  Awake, Light-Bringer, wake bright soul of song,
    Kindler, reviver, re-creator rise!
  Crown thy great mission with thy parting breath,
  And teach to hosts the Bard's disdain of death!"

  Thrill'd at that voice the soul of Caradoc;                       33
    He heard, and knew his glory and his doom.
  As when in summer's noon the lightning shock
    Smites some fair elm in all its pomp of bloom,
  'Mid whose green boughs each vernal breeze had play'd,
  And air's sweet race melodious homes had made;

  So that young life bow'd sad beneath the stroke                   34
    That sear'd the Fresh and still'd the Musical,
  Yet on the sadness Thought sublimely broke:
    Holy the tree on which the bolt doth fall!
  Wild flowers shall spring the sacred roots around,
  And nightly fairies tread the haunted ground;

  There, age by age, shall youth with musing brow,                  35
    Hear Legend murmuring of the days of yore;
  There, virgin love more lasting deem the vow
    Breathed in the shade of branches green no more;
  And kind Religion keep the grand decay
  Still on the earth while forests pass away.

  "So be it, O voice from Heaven," the Bard replied,                36
    "Some grateful tears may yet embalm my name,
  Ever for human love my youth hath sigh'd
    And human love's divinest form is fame.
  Is the dream erring? shall the song remain?
  Say, can one Poet ever live in vain?"

  As the warm south on some unfathom'd sea,                         37
    Along the Magian's soul, the awful rest
  Stirr'd with the soft emotion: tenderly
    He laid his hand upon the brows he blest,
  And said, "Complete beneath a brighter sun
  That course, The Beautiful, which life begun.

  "Joyous and light, and fetterless through all                     38
    The blissful, infinite, empyreal space,
  If then thy spirit stoopeth to recall
    The ray it shed upon the human race,
  See where the ray had kindled from the dearth,
  Seeds that shall glad the garners of the earth!

  "Never true Poet lived and sung in vain!                          39
    Lost if his name, and wither'd if his wreath,
  The thoughts he woke--an element remain
    Fused in our light and blended with our breath;
  All life more noble, and all earth more fair.
  Because that soul refined man's common air!"[2]

  Then rose the Bard, and smilingly unslung                         40
    His harp of ivory sheen, from shoulders broad,
  Kissing the hand that doom'd his life, he sprung
    Light from the shatter'd wall,--and swiftly strode
  Where, herdlike huddled in the central space,
  Droop'd, in dull pause, the cowering populace.

  There, in the midst he stood! The heavens were pale               41
    With the first stars, unseen amidst the glare
  Cast from large pine-brands on the sullen mail
    Of listless legions and the streaming hair
  Of women, wailing for the absent dead,
  Or bow'd o'er infant lips that moan'd for bread.

  From out the illumed cathedral hollowly                           42
    Swell'd, like a dirge, the hymn; and through the throng
  Whose looks had lost all commerce with the sky,
    With lifted rood the slow monks swept along,
  And vanish'd hopeless; From those wrecks of man
  Fled ev'n Religion: Then the BARD began.

  Slow, pitying, soft it glides, the liquid lay,                    43
    Sad with the burthen of the Singer's soul
  Into the heart it coil'd its lulling way;
    Wave upon wave the golden river stole:
  Hush'd to his feet forgetful Famine crept,
  And Woe, reviving, veil'd the eyes that wept.

  Then stern, and harsh, clash'd the ascending strain,              44
    Telling of ills more dismal yet in store;
  Rough with the iron of the grinding chain,
    Dire with the curse of slavery evermore;
  Wild shrieks from lips belov'd pale warriors hear,
  Her child's last death-groan rends the mother's ear;

  Then trembling hands instinctive griped the swords;               45
    And men unquiet sought each other's eyes;
  Loud into pomp sonorous swell the chords,
    Like linkèd legions march the melodies;
  Till the full rapture swept the Bard along,
  And o'er the listeners rush'd the storm of song!

  And the Dead spoke! from cairns and kingly graves                 46
    The Heroes call'd;--and Saints from earliest shrines;
  And the Land spoke!--Mellifluous river-waves;
    Dim forests awful with the roar of pines;
  Mysterious caves from legion-haunted deeps;
  And torrents flashing from untrodden steeps;--

  THE LAND OF FREEDOM call'd upon the Free!                         47
    All Nature spoke; the clarions of the wind;
  The organ swell of the majestic sea;
    The choral stars! the Universal Mind
  Spoke, like the voice from which the world began,
  "No chain for Nature and the Soul of Man!"

  Then loud through all, as if mankind's reply,                     48
    Burst from the Bard the Cymrian battle hymn!
  That song which swell'd the anthems of the sky,
    The Alleluia of the Seraphim;
  When Saints led on the Children of the Lord,
  And smote the Heathen with the Angel's sword.[3]

  As leaps the warfire on the beacon hills,                         49
    Leapt in each heart the lofty flame divine;
  As into sunlight flash the molten rills,
    Flash'd the glad claymores,[4] lightening line on line;
  From cloud to cloud as thunder speeds along,
  From rank to rank rush'd forth the choral song.--

  Woman and child--all caught the fire of men,                      50
    To its own heaven that Alleluia rang,
  Life to the spectres had return'd again;
    And from the grave an armèd Nation sprang!
  Then spoke the Bard,--each crest its plumage bow'd,
  As the large voice went lengthening through the crowd

  "Hark to the measur'd march!--The Saxons come!                    51
    The sound earth quails beneath the hollow tread;
  Your fathers rush'd upon the swords of Rome
    And climb'd her war-ships, when the Cæsar fled!
  The Saxons come! why wait within the wall?
  They scale the mountain--let its torrents fall!

  "Mark, ye have swords, and shields, and armour, YE!               52
    No mail defends the Cymrian Child of Song,[5]
  But where the warrior--there the Bard shall be!
    All fields of glory to the Bard belong!
  His realm extends wherever godlike strife
  Spurns the base death, and wins immortal life.

  "Unarm'd he goes--his guard the shields of all,                   53
    Where he bounds foremost on the Saxon spear!
  Unarm'd he goes, that, falling, ev'n his fall
    Shall bring no shame, and shall bequeath no fear!
  Does his song cease?--avenge it by the deed,
  And make his sepulchre--a nation freed!"

  He said, and where the chieftains wrangling sate,                 54
    Led the grand army marshall'd by his song,
  Into the hall--and on the wild debate,
    King of all kings, A PEOPLE, pour'd along;
  And from the heart of man--the trumpet cry
  Smote faction down, "Arms, arms, and Liberty!"--

  Meanwhile roll'd on the Saxon's long array;                       55
    On to the wall the surge of slaughter roll'd;
  Slow up the mount--slow heaved its labouring way;
    The moonlight rested on the domes of gold;
  No warder peals alarum from the Keep,
  And Death comes mute, as on the realm of Sleep;

  When, as their ladders touch'd the ruin'd wall,                   56
    And to the van, high-towering, Harold strode,
  Sudden expand the brazen gates, and all
    The awful arch as with the lava glow'd;
  Torch upon torch the deathful sweep illumes,
  The burst of armour and the flash of plumes!

  Rings Owaine's shout;--rings Geraint's thunder-cry,               57
    The Saxon's death-knell in a hundred wars;
  And Cador's laugh of triumph;--through the sky
    Rush tossing banderolls swift as shooting stars,
  Trystan's white lion--Lancelot's cross of red,
  And Tudor's[6] standard with the Saxon's head.

  And high o'er all, its scalèd splendour rears                     58
    The vengeful emblem of the Dragon Kings.
  Full on the Saxon bursts the storm of spears;
    Far down the vale the charging whirlwind rings,
  While through the ranks its barbèd knightood clave,
  All Carduel follows with its roaring wave.

  And ever in the van, with robes of white                          59
    And ivory harp, shone swordless Caradoc!
  And ever floated in melodious might,
    The clear song buoyant o'er the battle shock;
  Calm as an eagle when the Olympian King
  Sends the red bolt upon the tranquil wing.

  Borne back, and wedged within the ponderous weight                60
    Of their own jarr'd and multitudinous crowd,
  Recoil'd the Saxons! As adown the height
    Of some grey mountain, rolls the cloven cloud,
  Smit by the shafts of the resistless day,--
  Down to the vale sunk dun the rent array.

  Midway between the camp and Carduel,                              61
    Halting their slow retreat, the Saxons stood:
  There, as the wall-like ocean ere it fell
    On Ægypt's chariots, gather'd up the flood;
  There, in suspended deluge, solid rose,
  And hung expectant o'er the hurrying foes!

  Right in the centre, rampired round with shields,                 62
    King Crida stood,--o'er him, its livid mane
  The horse whose pasture is the Valkyr's fields
    Flung wide;--but, foremost through the javelin-rain,
  Blazed Harold's helm, as when, through all the stars
  Distinct, pale soothsayers see the dooming Mars.

  Down dazzling sweeps the Cymrian Chivalry;                        63
    Round the bright sweep closes the Saxon wall;
  Snatch'd from the glimmer of the funeral sky,
    Raves the blind murder; and enclasp'd with all
  Its own stern hell, against the iron bar
  Pants the fierce heart of the imprison'd War.

  Only by gleaming banners and the flash                            64
    Of some large sword, the vex'd Obscure once more
  Sparkled to light. In one tumultous clash
    Merg'd every sound--as when the maëlstrom's roar
  By dire Lofoden, dulls the seaman's groan,
  And drowns the voice of tempests in its own.

  The Cymrian ranks,--disparted from their van,                     65
    And their hemm'd horsemen,--stubborn, but in vain,
  Press through the levell'd spears; yet, man by man,
    And shield to shield close-serried, they sustain
  The sleeting hail against them hurtling sent,
  From every cloud in that dread armament.

  But now, at length, cleaving the solid clang,                     66
    And o'er the dead men in their frowning sleep,
  The rallying shouts of chiefs confronted rang,--
    "Thor and Walhalla!"--answer'd swift and deep
  By "Alleluia!" and thy chanted cry,
  Young Bard sublime, "For Christ and Liberty!"

  Then the ranks open'd, and the midnight moon                      67
    Stream'd where the battle, like the scornful main,
  Ebb'd from the dismal wrecks its wrath had strewn.
    Paused either host;--lo, in the central plain
  Two chiefs had met, and in that breathless pause,
  Each to its champion left a Nation's cause.

  Now, Heaven defend thee, noble Lancelot!                          68
    For never yet such danger thee befel,
  Though loftier deeds than thine emblazon not
    The peerless Twelve of golden Carduel,
  Though oft thy breast hath singly stemm'd a field,--
  As when thy claymore clang'd on Harold's shield!

  And Lancelot knew not his majestic foe,                           69
    Save by his deeds; by Cador's cloven crest;
  By Modred's corpse; by rills of blood below,
    And shrinking helms above;--when from the rest,
  Spurring,--the steel of his uplifted brand
  Drew down the lightning of that red right hand.

  Full on the Saxon's shield the sword descends;                    70
    The strong shield clattering shivers at the stroke,
  And the bright crest with all its plumage bends
    As to the blast with all its boughs an oak:
  As from the blast an oak with all its boughs,
  Retowering slow, the crest sublime arose.

  Grasp'd with both hands, above the Cymrian swung                  71
    The axe that Odin taught his sons to wield,
  Thrice through the air the circling iron sung,
    Then crash'd resounding:--horse and horseman recl'd,
  Though slant from sword and casque the weapon shore,
  Down sword and casque the weight resistless bore.

  The bright plume mingles with the charger's mane;                 72
    Light leaves the heaven, and sense forsakes the breath;
  Aloft the axe impatient whirrs again,--
    The steed wild-snorting bounds and foils the death;
  While on its neck the reins unheeded flow,
  It shames and saves its Lord, and flies the foe.

  "Lo, Saxons, lo, what chiefs these Walloons[7] lead!"             73
    Laugh'd hollow from his helm the scornful Thane.
  Then towards the Christian knights he spurr'd his steed,
    When midway in his rush--rushes again
  The foe that rallied while he seem'd to fly,
  As wheels the falcon ere it swoops from high;--

  And as the falcon, while its talons dart                          74
    Into the crane's broad bosom, splits its own
  On the sharp beak, and, clinging heart to heart,
    Both in one plumage blent, spin whirling down,--
  So in that shock each found, and dealt the blow;
  Horse roll'd on horse, fell grappling foe on foe.

  First to his feet the slighter Cymrian leapt,                     75
    And on the Saxon's breast set firm his knee;
  Then o'er the heathen host a shudder crept,
    Rose all their voices,--wild and wailingly;
  "Woe, Harold, woe!" as from one bosom came,
  The groan of thousands, and the mighty name.

  The Cymrian starts, and stays his lifted hand,                    76
    For at that name from Harold's vizor shone
  Genevra's eyes! Back in its sheath the brand
    He plunged:--sprang Harold--and the foe was gone,--
  Lost where the Saxons rush'd along the plain,
  To save the living or avenge the slain.

  Spurr'd to the rescue every Cymrian knight,                       77
    Again confused, the onslaught raged on high;
  Again the war-shout swell'd above the fight,
    Again the chant "for Christ and Liberty,"
  When with fresh hosts unbreath'd, the Saxon king
  Forth from the wall of shields leapt thundering.

  Behind the chief the dreadful gonfanon                            78
    Spread;--the Pale Horse went rushing down the wind.--
  "On where the Valkyrs point to Carduel, on!
    On o'er the corpses to the wolf consign'd!
  On, that the Pale Horse, ere the night be o'er
  Stall'd in yon tower, may rest his hoofs of gore!"

  Thus spoke the king, and all his hosts replied;                   79
    Fill'd by his word and kindled by his look--
  (For helmless with his grey hair streaming wide,
    He strided through the spears)--the mountains shook--
  Shook the dim city--as that answer rang!
  The fierce shout chiming to the buckler's clang!

  Aghast, the Cymrians see, like Titan sons                         80
    New-born from earth,--leap forth the sudden bands:
  As when the wind's invisible tremour runs
    Through corn-sheaves ripening for the reaper's hands,
  The glittering tumult undulating flows,
  And the field quivers where the panic goes.

  The Cymrians waver--shrink--recoil--give way,                     81
    Strike with weak hands amazed; half turn to flee;
  In vain with knightly charge the chiefs delay
    The hostile mass that rolls resistlessly,
  And the pale hoofs for aye had trampled down
  The Cymrian freedom and the Dragon Crown,

  But for that arch preserver, under heaven,                        82
    Of names and states, the Bard! the hour was come
  To prove the ends for which the lyre was given:--
    Each thought divine demands its martyrdom.
  "Where round the central standard rallying flock
  The Dragon Chiefs--paused and spoke Caradoc!

  "Ye Cymrian men!" Hush'd at the calm sweet sound,                 83
    Droop'd the wild murmur, bow'd the loftiest crest,
  Meekly the haughty paladins group'd round
    The swordless hero with the mailless breast,
  Whose front, serene amid the spears, had taught
  To humbled Force the chivalry of Thought.

  "Ye Cymrian men--from Heus the Guardian's tomb                    84
    I speak the oracular promise of the Past.
  Fear not the Saxon! Till the judgment doom
    Free on their hills the Dragon race shall last,
  If from you heathen, ye this night can save
  One spot not wider than a single grave.

  "For thus the antique prophecy decrees,--                         85
    'When where the Pale Horse crushes down the dead,
  War's sons shall see the lonely child of peace
    Grasp at the mane to fall beneath the tread--
  There, where he falleth let his dust remain,
  There, bid the Dragon rest above the slain;

  "'There, let the steel-clad living watch the clay,                86
    Till on that spot their swords the grave have made,
  And the Pale Horse shall melt in cloud away,
    No stranger's step the sacred mound invade:
  A people's life that single death shall save,
  And all the land be hallow'd by a grave.'

  "So be the Guardian's prophecy fulfill'd,                         87
    Advance the Dragon, for the grave is mine."
  He ceased: while yet the silver accents thrill'd
    Each mailèd bosom down the listening line,
  Bounded his steed, and like an arrow went
  His plume, swift glancing through the armament.

  On through the tempest went it glimmering,                        88
    On through the rushing barbs and levell'd spears;
  On where, far streaming o'er the Teuton king,
    Its horrent pomp the ghastly standard rears.
  On rush'd to rescue all to whom his breath
  Left what saves Nations,--the disdain of death!

  Alike the loftiest knight and meanest man,                        89
    All the roused host, but now so panic-chill'd,
  All Cymri once more as one Cymrian,
    With the last light of that grand spirit fill'd,
  Through rank on rank, mow'd down, down trampled, sped,
  And reach'd the standard--to defend the dead.

  Wrench'd from the heathen's hand, one moment bow'd                90
    In the bright Christian's grasp the gonfanon;
  Then from a dumb amaze the countless crowd
    Swept,--and the night as with a sudden sun
  Flash'd with avenging steel; life gain'd its goal,
  And calm from lips proud-smiling went the soul!

  Leapt from his selle, the king-born Lancelot;                     91
    Leapt from the selle each paladin and knight;
  In one mute sign that where upon that spot
    The foot was planted, God forbade the flight:
  There shall the Father-land avenge the son,
  Or heap all Cymri round the grave of one.

  Then, well-nigh side by side--broad floated forth                 92
    The Cymrian Dragon and the Teuton Steed,
  The rival Powers that struggle for the North;
    The gory Idol--the chivalric Creed;
  Odin's and Christ's confronting flags unfurl'd,
  As which should save and which destroy a world!

  Then fought those Cymrian men, as if on each                      93
    All Cymri set its last undaunted hope;
  Through the steel bulwarks round them yawns the breach;
    Vistas to freedom bright'ning onwards ope;
  Crida in vain leads band on slaughter'd band,
  In vain revived falls Harold's ruthless hand;

  As on the bull the pard will fearless bound,                      94
    But if the horn that meets the spring should gore,
  Awed with fierce pain, slinks snarling from the ground;--
    So baffled in their midmost rush, before
  The abrupt assault, the savage hosts give way;--
  Yet will not own that man could thus dismay.

  "Some God more mighty than Walhalla's king,                       95
    Strikes in yon arms"--the sullen murmurs run,
  And fast and faster drives the Dragon wing--
    And shrinks and cowers the ghastly gonfanon;
  They flag--they falter--lo, the Saxons fly!--
  Lone rests the Dragon in the dawning sky!

  Lone rests the Dragon with its wings outspread,                   96
    Where the pale hoofs one holy ground had trod,
  There the hush'd victors round the martyr'd dead,
    As round an altar, lift their hearts to God.
  Calm is that brow as when a host it braved,
  And smiles that lip as on the land it saved!

  Pardon, ye shrouded and mysterious Powers,                        97
    Ye far-off shadows from the spirit-clime,
  If for that realm untrodden by the Hours,
    Awhile we leave this lazar-house of Time;
  With Song remounting to those native airs
  Of which, though exiled, still we are the heirs.

  Up from the clay and towards the Seraphim,                        98
    The Immortal, men called Caradoc, arose.
  Round the freed captive whose melodious hymn
    Had hail'd each glimmer earth, the dungeon, knows,
  Spread all the aisles by angel worship trod;
  Blazed every altar, conscious of the God.

  All the illumed creation one calm shrine;                         99
    All space one rapt adoring ecstasy;
  All the sweet stars with their untroubled shine,
    Near and more near, enlarging through the sky;
  All opening gradual on the eternal sight,
  Joy after joy, the depths of their delight.

  Paused on the marge, Heaven's beautiful New-born,                100
    Paused on the marge of that wide happiness;
  And as a lark that, poised amid the morn,
    Shakes from its wing the dews--the plumes of bliss,
  Sunn'd in the dawn of the diviner birth,
  Shook every sorrow memory bore from earth:

  Knowledge (that on the troubled waves of sense                   101
    Breaks into sparkles)--pour'd upon the soul
  Its lambent, clear, translucent affluence,
    And cold-eyed Reason loosed its hard control;
  Each godlike guess beheld the truth it sought;
  And Inspiration flash'd from what was Thought.

  Still'd evermore the old familiar train                          102
    That fill the frail Proscenium of our deeds,
  The unquiet actors on that stage, the brain,
    Which, in the spangles of their tinsell'd weeds,
  Mime the true soul's majestic royalties,
  And strut august in Wonder's credulous eyes;--

  Ambition's madness in the vain desires,                          103
    Which seek a goddess but to clasp a cloud;
  And human Passion that with fatal fires
    Consumes the shrine to which its faith is vow'd;
  And even Hope, that fairest nurse of Grief,
  Crown'd with young flowers,--a blight in every leaf;

  All these are still--abandon'd to the worm,                      104
    Their loud breath jars not on the calm above!
  Only survived, as if the single germ
    Of the new life's ambrosian being,--LOVE.
  Ah, if the bud can give such bloom to Time,
  What is the flower when in its native clime?

  Love to the radiant Stranger left alone                          105
    Of all the vanish'd hosts of memory;
  While broadening round, on splendour splendour shone,
    To earth soft-pitying dropt the veilless eye,
  And saw the shape, that love remember'd still,
  Couch'd 'mid the ruins on the moonlit hill.

  And, with the new-born vision, piercing all                      106
    Things past and future, view'd the fates ordain'd;
  The fame achieved amidst the Coral Hall;
    From war and winter Freedom's symbol gain'd,
  What rests?--the Spirit from its realm of bliss,
  Shot, loving down,--the guide to Happiness!

  Pale to the Cymrian King the Shadow came,                        107
    Its glory left it as the earth it near'd,
  In livid likeness as its corpse the same,
    Wan with its wounds the awful ghost appear'd.
  Life heard the voice of unembodied breath,
  And Sleep stood trembling side by side with Death.

  "Come," said the Voice, "Before the Iron Gate                    108
    Which hath no egress, waiting thee, behold
  Under the shadow of the brows of Fate,
    The childlike playmate with the locks of gold."
  Then rose the mortal, following, and, before,
  Moved the pale shape the angel's comrade wore.

  Where, in the centre of those ruins grey,                        109
    Immense with blind walls columnless, a tomb
  For earlier kings, whose names had pass'd away,
    Chill'd the chill moonlight with its mass of gloom,
  Through doors ajar to every prying blast
  By which to rot imperial dust had past.

  The Vision went, and went the living King;                       110
    Then strange and hard to human hear to tell
  By language moulded but by thoughts that bring
    Material images, what there befel!
  The mortal enter'd Eld's dumb burial place,
  And at the threshold, vanish'd Time and Space.

  Yea, the hard sense of time was from the mind                    111
    Rased and annihilate;--yea, space to eye
  And soul was presenceless? What rest behind?
    Thought and the Infinite! the eternal I,
  And its true realm the Limitless, whose brink
  Thought ever nears: What bounds us when we think?

  Yea, as the dupe in tales Arabian,                               112
    Dipp'd but his brow beneath the beaker's brim,
  And in that instant all the life of man
    From youth to age roll'd its slow years on him,
  And while the foot stood motionless--the soul
  Swept with deliberate wing from pole to pole,

  So when the man the Grave's still portals pass'd,                113
    Closed on the substances or cheats of earth,
  The Immaterial, for the things it glass'd,
    Shaped a new vision from the matter's dearth:
  Before the sight that saw not through the clay,
  The undefined Immeasurable lay.

  A realm not land, nor sea, nor earth, nor sky,                   114
    Like air impalpable, and yet not air;--
  "Where am I led?" ask'd Life with hollow sigh.
    "To Death, that dim phantasmal EVERY WHERE,"
  The Ghost replied. "Nature's circumfluent robe,
  Girding all life--the globule or the globe."

  "Yet," said the Mortal, "if indeed this breath                   115
    Profane the world that lies beyond the tomb;
  Where is the Spirit-race that peoples death?
    My soul surveys but unsubstantial gloom,
  A void--a blank--where none preside or dwell,
  Nor woe nor bliss is here, nor heaven nor hell."

  "And what is death?--a name for nothingness,"[8]                 116
    Replied the Dead; "the shadow of a shade;
  Death can retain no spirit!--woe and bliss,
    And heaven and hell, are for the living made;
  An instant flits between life's latest sigh
  And life's renewal;--that it is to die!

  "From the brief Here to the eternal There                        117
    We can but see the swift flash of the goal;
  Less than the space between two waves of air,
    The void between existence and a soul;
  Wherefore, look forth; and with calm sight endure
  The vague, impalpable, inane Obscure:

  "Lo, by the Iron Gate a giant cloud                              118
    From which emerge (the form itself unseen)
  Vast adamantine brows sublimely bow'd
    Over the dark,--relentlessly serene;
  Thou canst not view the hand beneath the fold,
  The work it weaveth none but God behold.

  "Yet ever from this Nothingness of Death,                        119
    That hand shapes out the myriad pomps of life;
  Receives the matter when resign'd the breath,
    Calms into Law the elemental strife;
  On each still'd atom forms afresh bestows
  (No atom lost since first Creation rose).

  "Thus seen, what men call Nature, thou surveyest,                120
    But matter boundeth not the still one's power;
  In every deed its presence thou displayest.
    It prompts each impulse, guides each wingèd hour,
  It spells the Valkyrs to their gory loom,
  It calls the blessing from the bane they doom:

  "It rides the steed, it saileth with the bark,                   121
    Wafts the first corn-seed to the herbless wild,
  Alike directing through the doom of dark,
    The age-long nation and the new-born child;
  Here the dread Power, yet loftier tasks await,
  And NATURE, twofold, takes the name of FATE.

  "Nature or Fate, Matter's material life.                         122
    Or to all spirit the spiritual guide,
  Alike with one harmonious being rife,
    Form but the whole which only names divide;
  Fate's crushing power, or Nature's gentle skill,
  Alike one Good--from one all-loving Will."

  While thus the Shade benign instructs the King,                  123
    Near the dark cloud the still brows bended o'er,
  They come: a soft wind with continuous wing
    Sighs through the gloom and trembles through the door,
  "Hark to that air," the gentle Phantom said,
  "In each faint murmur flit unseen the dead,--

  "Pass through the gate, from life the life resume,               124
    As the old impulse flies to heaven or hell."
  While spoke the Ghost, stood forth amidst the gloom,
    A lucent Image, crown'd with asphodel,
  The left hand bore a mirror crystal-bright,
  A wand star-pointed glitter'd in the right.

  "Dost thou not know me?--me, thy second soul?"                   125
    Said the bright Image, with its low sweet voice,
  "I who have led thee to each noble goal,
    Mirror'd thy heart, and starward led thy choice?
  To teach thee wisdom won in Labour's school,
  I lured thy footsteps to the forest pool,

  "Show'd all the woes which wait inebriate power,                 126
    And woke the man from youth's voluptuous dream;
  Glass'd on the crystal--let each stainless hour
    Obey the wand I lift unto the beam;
  And at the last, when yonder gates expand,
  Pass with thine angel, Conscience, hand in hand."

  Spoke the sweet Splendour, and as music dies                     127
    Into the heart that hears, subsides away;
  Then Arthur lifted his serenest eyes
    Towards the pale Shade from the celestial day,
  And said, "O thou in life belov'd so well,
  Dream I or wake?--As those last accents fell,

  "So fears that, spite of thy mild words, dismay'd,               128
    Fears not of death, but that which death conceals,
  Vanish;--my soul that trembled at thy shade,
    Yearns to the far light which the shade reveals,
  And sees how human is the dismal error
  Thad hideth God, when veiling death with terror.

  "Ev'n thus some infant, in the early spring,                     129
    Under the pale buds of the almond-tree,
  Shrinks from the wind that with an icy wing
    Shakes showering down white flakes that seem to be
  Winter's wan sleet,--till the quick sunbeam shows
  That those were blossoms which he took for snows.

  "Thou to this last and sovran mystery                            130
    Of my mysterious travail guiding sent,
  Dear as thou wert, I will not mourn for thee,
    Thou wert not shaped for earth's hard element--
  Our ends, our aims, our pleasure, and our woe,
  Thou knew'st them all, but thine we could not know.

  "Forgive that none were worthy of thy worth!                     131
    That none took heed, upon the plodding way,
  What diamond dew was on the flowers of earth,
    Till in thy soul drawn upward to the day.
  But now, why gape the wounds upon thy breast?
  What guilty hand dismiss'd thee to the Blest?

  "For blest thou art, beloved and lost? Oh, speak,                132
    Say thou art with the Angels?"--As at night
  Far off the pharos on the mountain-peak
    Sends o'er dim ocean one pale path of light,
  Lost in the wideness of the weltering Sea,
  So, that one gleam along eternity

  Vouchsafed, the radiant guide (its mission closed)               133
    Fled, and the mortal stood amidst the cloud!
  All dark above, lo at his feet reposed
    Beneath the Brow's still terror o'er it bow'd,
  With eyes that lit the gloom through which they smiled,
  A Virgin shape, half woman and half child!

  There, bright before the iron gates of Death,                    134
    Bright in the shadow of the awful Power
  Which did as Nature give the human breath,
    As Fate mature the germ and nurse the flower
  Of earth for heaven,--Toil's last and sweetest prize,
  The destined Soother lifts her fearless eyes!

  Through all the mortal's fame enraptured thrills                 135
    A subtler tide, a life ambrosial,
  Bright as the fabled element which fills
    The veins of Gods to whom in Ida's hall
  Flush'd Hebe brims the urn. The transport broke
  The charm that gave it--and the Dreamer woke.

  Was it in truth a Dream? He gazed around,                        136
    And saw the granite of sepulchral walls;
  Through open doors, along the desolate ground,
    O'er coffin dust--the morning sunbeam falls;
  On mouldering relics life its splendour flings,
  The arms of warriors and the bones of kings.--

  He stood within that Golgotha of old,                            137
    Whither the Phantom first had led the soul.
  It was no dream! lo, round those locks of gold
    Rest the young sunbeams like an auriole;
  Lo, where the day, night's mystic promise keeps,
  And in the tomb a life of beauty sleeps!

  Slow to his eyes, those lids reveal their own,                   138
    And, the lips smiling even in their sigh,
  The Virgin woke! Oh, never yet was known,
    In bower or plaisaunce under summer sky,
  Life so enrich'd with nature's happiest bloom
  As thine, thou young Aurora of the tomb!

  Words cannot paint thee, gentlest cynosure                       139
    Of all things lovely in that loveliest form,
  Souls wear--the youth of woman! brows as pure
    As Memphian skies that never knew a storm;
  Lips with such sweetness in their honey'd deeps
  As fills the rose in which a fairy sleeps;

  Eyes on whose tenderest azure aching hearts                      140
    Might look as to a heaven, and cease to grieve;
  The very blush,--as day, when it departs,
    Haloes in flushing, the mild cheek of eve,--
  Taking soft warmth in light from earth afar,
  Heralds no thought less holy than a star.

  And Arthur spoke! O ye, all noble souls,                         141
    Divine how knighthood speaks to maiden fear!
  Yet, is it fear which that young heart controuls
    And leaves its music voiceless on the ear?--
  Ye, who have felt what words can ne'er express,
  Say then, is fear as still as happiness?

  By the mute pathos of an eloquent sign,                          142
    Her rosy finger on her lip, the maid
  Seem'd to denote that on that coral shrine
    Speech was to silence vow'd. Then from the shade
  Gliding--she stood beneath the golden skies,
  Fair as the dawn that brighten'd Paradise.

  And Arthur look'd, and saw the Dove no more;                     143
    Yet, by some wild and wondrous glamoury,
  Changed to the shape the new companion wore,
    His soul the missing Angel seem'd to see;
  And, soft and silent as the earlier guide,
  The soft eyes thrill, the silent footsteps glide.

  Through paths his yester steps had fail'd to find,               144
    Adown the woodland slope she leads the king,--
  And pausing oft, she turns to look behind,
    As oft had turn'd the Dove upon the wing;
  And oft he question'd, still to find reply
  Mute on the lip, yet struggling to the eye.

  Far briefer now the way, and open more                           145
    To heaven, than those his whilom steps had won;
  And sudden, lo! his galley's brazen prore
    Beams from the greenwood burnish'd in the sun;
  Up from the sward his watchful cruisers spring,
  And loud-lipp'd welcome girds with joy the King.

  Now plies the rapid oar, now swells the sail;                    146
    All day, and deep into the heart of night,
  Flies the glad bark before the favouring gale;
    Now Sabra's virgin waters dance in light
  Under the large full moon, on margents green,
  Lone with charr'd wrecks where Saxon fires have been.

  Here furls the sail, here rests awhile the oar,                  147
    And from the crews the Cymrians and the maid
  Pass with mute breath upon the mournful shore;
    For, where yon groves the gradual hillock shade,
  A convent stood when Arthur left the land.
  God grant the shrine hath 'scaped the heathen's hand!

  Landing, on lifeless hearths, through roofless walls             148
    And casement gaps, the ghost-like starbeams peer;
  Welcomed by night and ruin, hollow falls
    The footstep of a King!--Upon the ear
  The inexpressible hush of murder lay,--
  Wide yawn'd the doors, and not a watch dog's bay!

  They pass the groves, they gain the holt, and lo!                149
    Rests of the sacred pile but one grey tower,
  A fort for luxury in the long-ago
    Of gentile gods, and Rome's voluptuous power.
  But far on walls yet spared, the moonbeams fell,--
  Far on the golden domes of Carduel!

  "Joy," cried the King, "behold, the land lives still!"           150
    Then Gawaine pointed, where in lengthening line
  The Saxon watch-fires from the haunted hill
    (Shorn of its forest old) their blood-red shine
  Fling over Isca, and with wrathful flush
  Gild the vast storm-cloud of the armèd hush.

  "Ay," said the King, "in that lull'd Massacre                    151
    Doth no ghost whisper Crida--'Sleep no more!'
  "Hark, where I stand, dark murder-chief, on thee
    I launch the doom! ye airs, that wander o'er
  Ruins and graveless bones, to Crida's sleep
  Bear Cymri's promise, which her king shall keep!"

  As thus he spoke, upon his outstretch'd arm                      152
    A light touch trembled,--turning he beheld
  The maiden of the tomb; a wild alarm
    Shone from her eyes; his own their terror spell'd.
  Struggling for speech, the pale lips writhed apart,
  And, as she clung, he heard her beating heart;

  While Arthur marvelling soothed the agony                        153
    Which, comprehending not, he still could share,
  Sudden sprang Gawaine--hark! a timorous cry
    Pierced yon dim shadows! Arthur look'd, and where
  On artful valves revolved the stony door,
  A kneeling nun his knight is bending o'er.

  Ere the nun's fears the knightly words dispel,                   154
    As towards the spot the maid and monarch came,
  On Arthur's brow the slanted moonbeams fell,
    And the nun knew the King, and call'd his name,
  And clasp'd his knees, and sobb'd through joyous tears,
  "Once more; once more! our God his people hears!"

  Kin to his blood--the welcome face of one                        155
    Known as a saint throughout the Christian land,
  Arthur recall'd, and as a pious son
    Honouring a mother--on that sacred hand
  Bent low, in murmuring--"Say, what mercy saves
  Thee, blest survivor in this shrine of graves?"

  Then the nun led them through the artful door,                   156
    Mask'd in the masonry, adown a stair
  That coil'd its windings to the grottoed floor
    Of vaulted chambers desolately fair;
  Wrought in the green hill, like an Oread's home,
  For summer heats by some soft lord of Rome,

  On shells, which nymphs from silver sands might cull,            157
    On paved mosaics, and long-silenced fount,
  On marble waifs of the far Beautiful
    By graceful spoiler garner'd from the mount
  Of vocal Delphi, or the Elean town,
  Or Sparta's rival of the violet-crown--

  Shone the rude cresset from the homely shrine                    158
    Of that new Power, upon whose Syrian Cross
  Perish'd the antique Jove! And the grave sign
    Of the glad faith (which, for the lovely loss
  Of poet-gods, their own Olympus frees
  To men!--our souls the new Uranides),

  High from the base on which of old reposed                       159
    Grape-crown'd Iacchus, spoke the Saving Woe!
  The place itself the sister's tale disclosed.
    Here, while, amidst the hamlet doom'd below,
  Raged the fierce Saxon--was retreat secured;
  Nor gnaw'd the flame where those deep vaults immured.

  To peasants, scatter'd through the neighbouring plains,          160
    The secret known;--kind hands with pious care
  Supply such humble nurture as sustains
    Lives most with fast familiar; thus and there
  The patient sisters in their faith sublime,
  Felt God was good, and waited for His time.

  Yet ever when the crimes of earth and day                        161
    Slept in the starry peace, to the lone tower
  The sainted abbess won her nightly way,
    And gazed on Carduel!--'Twas the wonted hour
  When from the opening door the Cymrian knight
  Saw the pale shadow steal along the light.

  Musing, the King the safe retreat survey'd,                      162
    And smooth'd his brow from times most anxious care;
  Here--from the strife secure, might rest the maid
    Not meet the tasks that morn must bring to share;
  She, while he mused, the nun's mild aspect eyed,
  And crept with woman's trust to woman's side.

  "King," said the gentle saint, "from what far clime              163
    Comes this fair stranger, that her eyes alone
  Answer our mountain tongue?"--"May happier time,"
    Replied the King, "her tale, her land, make known!
  Meanwhile, O kind recluse, receive the guest
  To whom these altars seem the native rest."

  The sister smiled, "In sooth those looks," she said,             164
    "Do speak a soul pure with celestial air;
  And in the morrow's awful hour of dread
    Her heart methinks will echo to our prayer,
  And breathe responsive to the hymns that swell
  The Christian's curse upon the infidel.

  "But say, if truth from rumour vague and wild                    165
    To this still world the friendly peasants bring,
  'That grief and wrath for some lost heathen child,
    Urge to yon walls the Mercian's direful king?'"--
  "Nay," said the Cymrian, "doth ambition fail
  When force needs falsehood, of the glozing tale?

  "And--but behold she droops, she faints, outworn                 166
    By the long wandering and the scorch of day!"
  Pale as a lily when the dewless morn,
    Parch'd in the fiery dog-star, wanes away
  Into the glare of noon without a cloud,
  O'er the nun's breast that flower of beauty bow'd.

  Yet still the clasp retain'd the hand that press'd,              167
    And breath came still, though heaved in sobbing sighs.
  "Leave her," the sister said, "to needful rest,
    And to such care as woman best supplies;
  And may this charge a conqueror soon recall,
  And change the refuge to a monarch's hall!"

  Though found the asylum sought, with boding mind                 168
    The crowning guerdon of his mystic toil
  To the kind nun the unwilling King resign'd;
    Nor till his step was on his mountain soil
  Did his large heart its lion calm regain,
  And o'er his soul no thought but Cymri reign.

  As towards the bark the friends resume their way,                169
    Quick they resolve the conflict's hardy scheme;
  With half the Northmen, at the break of day
    Shall Gawaine sail where Sabra's broadening stream
  Admits a reeded creek, and, landing there,
  Elude the fleet the neighbouring waters bear;

  Through secret paths with bush and bosk o'ergrown,               170
    Wind round the tented hill, and win the wall;
  With Arthur's name arouse the leaguer'd town,
    Give the pent stream the cataract's rushing fall,
  Sweep to the camp, and on the Pagan horde
  Urge all of man that yet survives the sword.

  Meanwhile on foot the king shall guide his band                  171
    Round to the rearward of the vast array
  Where yet large fragments of the forest stand
    To shroud with darkness the avenger's way;--
  Thence, when least look'd for, burst upon the foe,
  On war's own heart direct the sudden blow;

  Thus, front and rear assail'd, their numbers less                172
    (Perplex'd, distraught) avail the heathen's power.
  Dire was the peril, and the sole success
    In the nice seizure of the season'd hour;
  The high-soul'd rashness of the bold emprise;
  The fear that smites the fiercest in surprise;

  Whatever worth the enchanted boons may bear,                     173