Selected Poems (64 page)

That sidelong smile upon the knight he past;

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When Kaled saw that smile his visage fell,

As if on something recognised right well;

His memory read in such a meaning more

Than Lara’s aspect unto others wore:

Forward he sprung – a moment, both were gone,

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And all within that hall seem’d left alone;

Each had so fix’d his eye on Lara’s mien,

All had so mix’d their feelings with that scene,

That when his long dark shadow through the porch

No more relieves the glare of yon high torch,

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Each pulse beats quicker, and all bosoms seem

To bound as doubting from too black a dream,

Such as we know is false, yet dread in sooth,

Because the worst is ever nearest truth.

And they are gone – but Ezzelin is there,

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With thoughtful visage and imperious air;

But long remain’d not; ere an hour expired

He waved his hand to Otho, and retired.

XXIX

The crowd are gone, the revellers at rest;

The courteous host, and all-approving guest,

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Again to that accustom’d couch must creep

Where joy subsides, and sorrow sighs to sleep,

And man, o’erlabour’d with his being’s strife,

Shrinks to that sweet forgetfulness of life:

There lie love’s feverish hope, and cunning’s guile,

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Hate’s working brain, and lull’d ambition’s wile;

O’er each vain eye oblivion’s pinions wave,

And quench’d existence crouches in a grave.

What better name may slumber’s bed become?

Night’s sepulchre, the universal home,

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Where weakness, strength, vice, virtue, sunk supine,

Alike in naked helplessness recline;

Glad for awhile to heave unconscious breath,

Yet wake to wrestle with the dread of death,

And shun, though day but dawn on ills increased,

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That sleep, the loveliest, since it dreams the least.

Canto the Second

I

Night wanes – the vapours round the mountains curl’d

Melt into morn, and Light awakes the world.

Man has another day to swell the past,

And lead him near to little, but his last;

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But mighty Nature bounds as from her birth,

The sun is in the heavens, and life on earth;

Flowers in the valley, splendour in the beam,

Health on the gale, and freshness in the stream.

Immortal man! behold her glories shine,

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And cry, exulting inly, ‘They are thine!’

Gaze on, while yet thy gladden’d eye may see;

A morrow comes when they are not for thee:

And grieve what may above thy senseless bier,

Nor earth nor sky will yield a single tear;

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Nor cloud shall gather more, nor leaf shall fall,

Nor gale breathe forth one sigh for thee, for all;

But creeping things shall revel in their spoil,

And fit thy clay to fertilise the soil.

II

’Tis morn – ’tis noon – assembled in the hall,

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The gather’d chieftains come to Otho’s call;

’Tis now the promised hour, that must proclaim

The life or death of Lara’s future fame;

When Ezzelin his charge may here unfold,

And whatsoe’er the tale, it must be told.

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His faith was pledged, and Lara’s promise given,

To meet it in the eye of man and heaven.

Why comes he not? Such truths to be divulged,

Methinks the accuser’s rest is long indulged.

III

The hour is past, and Lara too is there,

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With self-confiding, coldly patient air;

Why comes not Ezzelin? The hour is past,

And murmurs rise, and Otho’s brow’s o’ercast.

‘I know my friend! his faith I cannot fear,

If yet he be on earth, expect him here;

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The roof that held him in the valley stands

Between my own and noble Lara’s lands;

My halls from such a guest had honour gain’d,

Nor had Sir Ezzelin his host disdain’d,

But that some previous proof forbade his stay,

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And urged him to prepare against to-day;

The word I pledged for his I pledge again,

Or will myself redeem his knighthood’s stain.’

He ceased – and Lara answer’d, ‘I am here

To lend at thy demand a listening ear

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To tales of evil from a stranger’s tongue,

Whose words alread might my heart have wrung,

But that I deem’d him scarcely less than mad,

Or, at the worst, a foe ignobly bad.

I know him not – but me it seems he knew

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In lands where – but I must not trifle too:

Produce this babbler – or redeem the pledge;

Here in thy hold, and with thy falchion’s edge.’

Proud Otho on the instant, reddening, threw

His glove on earth, and forth his sabre flew.

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‘The last alternative befits me best,

And thus I answer for mine absent guest.’

With cheek unchanging from its sallow gloom,

However near his own or other’s tomb;

With hand, whose almost careless coolness spoke

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Its grasp well-used to deal the sabre-stroke;

With eye, though calm, determined not to spare,

Did Lara too his willing weapon bare.

In vain the circling chieftains round them closed,

For Otho’s frenzy would not be opposed;

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And from his lip those words of insult fell –

His sword is good who can maintain them well.

IV

Short was the conflict; furious, blindly rash,

Vain Otho gave his bosom to the gash:

He bled, and fell; but not with deadly wound,

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Stretch’d by a dextrous sleight along the ground.

‘Demand thy life!’ He answer’d not: and then

From that red floor he ne’er had risen again,

For Lara’s brow upon the moment grew

Almost to blackness in its demon hue;

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And fiercer shook his angry falchion now

Than when his foe’s was levell’d at his brow;

Then all was stern collectedness and art,

Now rose the unleaven’d hatred of his heart;

So little sparing to the foe he fell’d,

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That when the approaching crowd his arm withheld,

He almost turn’d the thirsty point on those

Who thus for mercy dared to interpose;

But to a moment’s thought that purpose bent;

Yet look’d he on him still with eye intent,

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As if he loathed the ineffectual strife

That left a foe, howe’er o’erthrown, with life;

As if to search how far the wound he gave

Had sent its victim onward to his grave.

V

They raised the bleeding Otho, and the Leech

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Forbade all present question, sign, and speech;

The others met within a neighbouring hall,

And he, incensed and heedless of them all,

The cause and conqueror in this sudden fray,

In haughty silence slowly strode away;

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He back’d his steed, his homeward path he took,

Nor cast on Otho’s towers a single look.

VI

But where was he? that meteor of a night,

Who menaced but to disappear with light.

Where was this Ezzelin? who came and went

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To leave no other trace of his intent.

He left the dome of Otho long ere morn,

In darkness, yet so well the path was worn

He could not miss it: near his dwelling lay;

But there he was not, and with coming day

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Came fast enquiry, which unfolded nought

Except the absence of the chief it sought.

A chamber tenantless, a steed at rest,

His host alarm’d, his murmuring squires distress’d:

Their search extends along, around the path,

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In dread to meet the marks of prowlers’ wrath:

But none are there, and not a brake hath borne

Nor gout of blood, nor shred of mantle torn;

Nor fall nor struggle hath defaced the grass,

Which still retains a mark where murder was;

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Nor dabbling fingers left to tell the tale,

The bitter print of each convulsive nail,

When agonised hands that cease to guard,

Wound in that pang the smoothness of the sward.

Some such had been, if here a life was reft,

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But these were not; and doubting hope is left;

And strange suspicion, whispering Lara’s name,

Now daily mutters o’er his blacken’d fame;

Then sudden silent when his form appear’d,

Awaits the absence of the thing it fear’d

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Again its wonted wondering to renew,

And dye conjecture with a darker hue.

VII

Days roll along, and Otho’s wounds are heal’d,

But not his pride; and hate no more conceal’d:

He was a man of power, and Lara’s foe,

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The friend of all who sought to work him woe,

And from his country’s justice now demands

Account of Ezzelin at Lara’s hands.

Who else than Lara could have cause to fear

His presence? who had made him disappear,

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If not the man on whom his menaced charge

Had sate too deeply were he left at large?

The general rumour ignorantly loud,

The mystery dearest to the curious crowd;

The seeming friendlessness of him who strove

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To win no confidence, and wake no love;

The sweeping fierceness which his soul betray’d,

The skill with which he wielded his keen blade;

Where had his arm unwarlike caught that art?

Where had that fierceness grown upon his heart?

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For it was not the blind capricious rage

A word can kindle and a word assuage;

But the deep working of a soul unmix’d

With aught of pity where its wrath had fix’d;

Such as long power and overgorged success

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Concentrates into all that’s merciless:

These, link’d with that desire which ever sways

Mankind, the rather to condemn than praise,

‘Gainst Lara gathering raised at length a storm,

Such as himself might fear, and foes would form,