Jerusalem Delivered

by Torquato Tasso

  Let him the chiefs to council call, and shame

  To this emprise the slow: Their captain, he —

  I him elect, and they shall do the same,

  His subjects then, that now companions be.’

  XIII

  Such God’s command. At the immortal sound

  Gabriel to execute the task began:

  With air he girt his viewless form around,

  Yet made it subject to the sense of man;

  Limbs of a man he feigned, and human face,

  But left the light of heavenly splendour there;

  Assumed the age when youth takes childhood’s place,

  And with bright rays adorned his flaxen hair.

  XIV

  White wings, whose tips were fringed with gold he wore,

  Unflagging, swift, and pliable: with these

  He cleaves the clouds and winds, and passes o’er,

  In flight sublime, the low-lying lands and seas.

  Thus clad, the heavenly messenger descending

  Down to the world the Father’s message brings,

  And first o’er Lebanon his course suspending,

  There poised himself upon his balanced wings.

  XV

  Thence shooting downward, his precipitous flight

  Directed straightway to Tortosa’s shore;

  In the east was rising the sun’s new-born light,

  A part was out, but ‘neath the waters more.

  Godfrey was offering up his matin prayer,

  A daily habit which he never ceased,

  When with the sun, but still more bright and fair,

  Appeared the radiant angel from the east.

  XVI

  Who to Prince Godfrey said: ‘The moment, lo!

  For making war, is opportune for thee;

  Why then the opportunity forego,

  From her vile yoke Jerusalem to free?

  Do thou in council the camp’s chiefs collect,

  And spur the slothful to this glorious end;

  God for their leader doth thyself elect,

  And they to thee submissively will bend.

  XVII

  ‘In me God sends His herald — I reveal

  To thee His mind. Of glorious victory

  What hopes should thence inflame thee, and what zeal

  For the great hosts entrusted unto thee!’

  This said, he ceased; and vanishing from sight,

  Flew back to heaven’s serenest, loftiest part

  Prince Godfrey paused — the language and the light

  His eyes so dazzled, so amazed his heart.

  XVIII

  But when he had recovered and discerned

  Who came, who sent him, and what had been said,

  If erst he wished, he now intensely burned

  To end the war which he was named to head.

  Not that to see himself in heaven preferred

  Did with ambition his pure breast inspire,

  But his own will was by God’s will more stirred,

  And warmer waxed, as sparkles in a fire.

  XIX

  Then his associate heroes and brave friends,

  Near him encamped, to council he invites;

  Message on message, word on word, he sends,

  And with his summons always prayers unites.

  All that might valour wake in them that dozed,

  Or in the generous greater warmth instil,

  He seemed to have found, and with such charm disposed,

  That while he pleased the heart he forced the will.

  XX

  The leaders came, and all the rest complied,

  Except Boëmondo, with Prince Godfrey’s call.

  Part camped without, part bivouacked inside

  The rampired circuit of Tortosa’s wall.

  The army’s magnates now assembled were —

  A glorious council on a solemn day —

  When pious Godfrey with majestic air

  And voice sonorous thus began to say:

  XXI

  ‘Warriors of God, whom heaven’s great King elects,

  Of His true faith the losses to restore;

  You whom He has protected and protects

  From storms at sea and hostile arms on shore,

  So that within a few brief years our swords

  Many rebellious kingdoms overcame,

  And ‘mong the conquered and subjected hordes

  Have spread His victor ensigns and His name;

  XXII

  ‘We did not leave our cherished homes and wives,

  And tender pledges (if I judge aright),

  Nor to the faithless sea expose our lives,

  Nor seek the perils of a distant fight,

  To gain a vulgar shout of short-lived sound

  And hold possession of a barbarous coast:

  In this what poor return should we have found,

  And to our soul’s perdition, what blood lost!

  XXIII

  ‘But the great end our inmost wishes spoke

  Was to storm Sion’s noble walls, and free

  Our fellow Christians from the unworthy yoke

  Of hard and such revolting slavery;

  Founding in Palestine a new realm, where

  The faithful safely could to Jesus bow,

  And whither pious pilgrim might repair

  The Tomb to worship, and perform his vow.

  XXIV

  ‘Thus then till now our deeds in risk are great —

  Greater in labour, small in honour’s cause,

  But to our purpose nought, if we translate

  Our conquering arms to other lands, or pause.

  What good to have led from Europe to the war

  Such hosts, and ravaged Asiatic ground?

  When the results of our great movement are,

  Not kingdoms raised, but ruins scattered round.

  XXV

  ‘He who would found an empire must not seek

  To raise its structure on terrestrial base,

  Where few his faith confess or language speak,

  ‘Mid faithless myriads of an alien race;

  Where it is idle from the Greeks to hope,

  And Western succour is removed so far,

  But he makes ruins that around him ope,

  And form beneath their weight his sepulchre.

  XXVI

  ‘Turks, Persians, Antioch (an illustrious sound,

  No less magnificent in fact than name),

  Were not our own works, but from God redound,

  Nor can we such miraculous victories claim;

  But if we now distort and turn our strength

  Against that end the Giver purposed, we

  May lose, I fear, His favour, and at length

  Become a byword and a mockery.

  XXVII

  ‘Ah, God forbid! there were a single one

  That would so meanly to his grace respond.

  No — With beginnings brilliantly begun,

  Let the work’s woof and finish correspond;

  Now that the season favours our design,

  Now that the passes of the land are free,

  What hinders us to reach at Salem’s shrine,

  The goal and crowning-point of victory?

  XXVIII

  ‘Princes, to you I solemnly protest,

  And this will ever upon record stand,

  Its truth ev’n now the saints in heaven attest

  The time for our great emprise is at hand;

  That may be doubtful which is certain now,

  Less opportune for us the more delayed,

  And I forebode, if our advance be slow.

  That Egypt will the hostile Paynim aid.’

  XXIX

  He ceased: brief whispering followed on his words,

  When the famed hermit Peter rose. He made

  One of the council with the mightiest lords,

  And was prime author of the great Crusade.

 
; ‘I second what has been by Godfrey moved,

  No room for doubt there is, the truth’s so plain,

  By him established, and by you approved:

  One word I add his reasoning to sustain.

  XXX

  ‘When I the wrongs and injuries call to mind,

  Which, as if rivals, ye have borne and done,

  When cross opinions, and your plans I find

  Obstructed in their course, though scarce begun.

  To one profound original cause do I

  Attribute every quarrel and delay —

  To that authority, which, balanced by

  ‘Conflicting voice of numbers, none obey.

  XXXI

  ‘Where one alone commands not — upon whom

  The choice of his subordinates depends,

  The worthy’s honour and the culprit’s doom —

  Confusion with authority contends.

  Of friendly members, then, one body make,

  And let one head the others guide and rein,

  Let one alone the crown and sceptre take,

  Let one the semblance of a king sustain.’

  XV

  Here paused the sage. What thoughts, O sacred Fire,

  What soul is proof, blest Spirit, ‘gainst thy arts?

  Thou didst the hermit with these words inspire,

  Thou didst impress them on the warriors’ hearts,

  Removing all ingrafted, innate love,

  Of independence or ambitious aim;

  So Guelph and William are the first to move,

  And pious Godfrey as their chief proclaim.

  XXXIII

  The rest approve, and to him delegate

  Full powers in council and command to bear,

  His, laws on vanquished nations to dictate,

  And when and where he pleases war declare:

  The rest, his former equals, are to pay

  To him obedience as their sovereign head.

  Concluded this, Fame, light-winged, flew away,

  And thro’ a thousand tongues the tidings spread.

  XXXIV

  He then confronts the soldiers, and appears

  To them well worthy such high rank to bear:

  Receiving their salute and warlike cheers

  With a majestic yet benignant air.

  But when he had acknowledged their display

  Of love and loyalty, he straight withdrew,

  Commanding the whole camp, the following day

  Should, ranged in order, pass in grand review.

  XXXV

  Beyond his wont translucent and serene,

  In the flushed orient rose the morrow’s sun,

  When ‘neath his flag was each Crusader seen

  Armed, as the day to dart his beams begun;

  And showed himself in all his brave array

  To pious Godfrey, wheeling on the grass.

  He kept his place, and saw the grand display

  Of marshalled horse and foot before him pass.

  XXXVI

  O Memory! in whose charge inviolate

  The guardianship of all things is reposed,

  Inform me with thy virtue to relate

  What chiefs, what legions, that great camp composed;

  Re-echo may the glory of their morn,

  Though voiceless now, and black by ages made:

  Snatched from thy treasures, may my tongue adorn

  That which all time may hear, nor ever fade.

  XXXVII

  The French were first to muster in advance,

  Erst by Prince Hugo the king’s brother led;

  All were selected from the Isle of France,

  A fine large country by four rivers fed.

  When Hugo died, that fierce and battailous band

  The golden lilies’ cognisance pursued

  Under Clothaire’s illustrious command,

  Who, if else perfect, lacketh royal blood.

  XXXVIII

  A thousand sheathed in heaviest armour are;

  Equal in numbers the next squadron came,

  Who with the first were fully on a par,

  In look, in nature, discipline and fame:

  All Normans, guided to the holy war

  By their own Robert, Duke of Normandy.

  Then William and the pious Ademar,

  Priests of the people, lead their squadrons by.

  XXXIX

  And these, for whom nought formerly, but prayer

  And holy offices had any charms, —

  Beneath the helmet press their flowing hair,

  And practise now the cruel use of arms.

  From Orange and its confines on the Rhone,

  Four hundred cavalry the former brought;

  The latter led the men of Puy, who shone

  In equal numbers, nor less bravely fought

  XL

  Prince Baldwin next advances, leading on,

  With his own Boulognese, his brother’s band,

  Since pious Godfrey ceded him his own

  When chosen captain, captains to command.

  To him the gallant Earl of Chartres succeeds,

  A valiant knight and prudent counsellor;

  He brings four hundred horse — and Baldwin leads

  Three times that number mounted to the war.

  XLI

  Prince Guelpho occupies the adjoining space,

  Whose high estate is equalled by his worth;

  Who from his father’s Latin stock can trace

  Through Este’s house his own Italian birth;

  But German by descent in the female line,

  He’s now a Guelph, and ruleth in the west,

  Carinthia, and ‘twixt Danube and the Rhine

  Those realms the Sueves and Rhetians once possessed.

  XLII

  To that which was his mother’s heritage,

  He joined by conquest great and glorious lands,

  And hence brings those who in their generous rage

  Would face e’en Death itself, when he commands:

  Who in warm dwellings cheat the frost and snow,

  And winter pass in feasts and jovial cheer.

  Five thousand erst, but scarce a third part now

  (Sole remnant of the Persian war) is here.

  XLIII

  Next follows on that flaxen, fair-haired race

  Who dwell ‘twixt France, Germania and the main,

  Which Rhine and Meuse both inundate — a place

  Fruitful in cattle and all kinds of grain.

  And the islanders, who ‘gainst the ocean’s rise

  Make high embankments to restrain its ire;

  Which, not content with ships and merchandise,

  Swallows whole towns, and provinces entire.

  XLIV

  Each is a thousand strong; in one command

  Another Robert leads them proudly on.

  Somewhat more numerous is the British band.

  Led by Prince William, the king’s younger son.

  The English bowmen are; with them come friends

  Who dwell still nearer the north pole: all these

  From her dense woods remote Hibernia sends,

  That distant Thule of the northern seas.

  XLV

  Next comes Tancredi — nor ‘mid all is seen,

  Except Rinaldo, a more puissant knight,

  More noble in appearance or in mien,

  More chivalrous or fair; and if a slight

  Shadow of error cloud his native worth,

  The fault is Love’s, who wakened wild desires.

  Love at first sight, that took ‘mid arms its birth,

  And upon memory feeding strength acquires.

  XLVI

  The story goes, that on that glorious day

  The Franks had routed Persia in the fight,

  Victorious Tancred, wearied from the fray,

  At length desisted to pursue their flight,

  Seeking for his parched lips and droopin
g flanks

  Refreshment and repose; by chance then strayed

  To where a fountain gemm’d with emerald banks,

  Woo’d him to rest beneath the summer shade.

  XLVII

  When suddenly before him he beheld

  All arm’d except the head, a beauteous maid:

  Pagan she was, and by like cause impelled,

  Had come herself to rest beneath the shade.

  He saw, and burned: her lovely countenance

  Bewitched him so that he fell deep in love.

  Wondrous! that love scarce born should thus entrance

  The heart of man, and so all powerful prove.

  XLVIII

  She donned her casque, and but that others came,

  Would have assailed her adversary; she

  Then left her prize: nor was the haughty dame

  A fugitive but from necessity.

  But in his heart her flushed and beautiful face

  A life-like image of itself enwove,

  And present ever was the act — the place,

  Imperishable fuel to his love.

  XLIX

  And easy ’tis in his sad face to read,

  ‘This man’s in love and feeds a hopeless flame,’

  As sighing deeply without taking heed,

  Dejected, downcast, Prince Tancredi came.

  Eight hundred cavalry escorted him,

  And with him left Campania’s sunny plain,

  (That pride of nature!) and the hills that limn

  Their teeming bosoms in the blue Tyrrhene.

  L

  Behind them Greece two hundred men supplied,

  In no defensive iron armour bound;

  Each has a short sword pendent on one side,

  And bows and quivers on their backs resound.

  Hardened from work, their horses are like wire,

  Proof ‘gainst fatigue, in diet spare and slight;

  As ready to attack as to retire,

  They in loose order spread, and flying, fight

  LI

  Tatin commands the troop — the only Greek

  That Latin arms accompanied was he.

  Shame, shame, O Greece! burns not thy conscious cheek?

  Was not the battle near enough to thee?

  And yet a calm spectator thou couldst be,

  And wait those mighty deeds’ result so long!

  If thou’rt so vile a slave, thy slavery

  Is justice (nay, complain not) and no wrong.

  LII

  Lo last in order, but the first in fame,

  In valour, skill, and honourable scars,

  The hero squadron of Adventurers came,

  Terror of Asia, thunderbolts of Mars.

  Argo, no more thy Minyans vaunt; nor boast,

  Arthur, of thy knight-errants of romance:

  Your old achievements in their deeds are lost, —

  But worthy who to lead such combatants?

  LIII

  Dudon of Consa is their chief; for since

  Twas hard to judge their rank and worth between,