The exalted trophies of the soldan be?
Is it thus thy kingdom will be reacquired,
And thus revenged the outrages on thee?
Up, up! take heart, and in his camp surprise
The tyrant, under covert of the night;
In exile trust thy Araspes, nor despise
Counsels, that thou, when reigning, hast found right.
XI.
‘He nor expects, nor fears us; nay, he slights
The timorous Arabs, naked as they are,
Nor deems that those accustomed but to flights,
To raids and rapine, such a feat would dare;
But brave they will be by thy bravery made,
Nor fear a camp unarmed, in sleep reclined.’
In him her burning fury she conveyed,
As thus she spake, then mingled with the wind.
XII.
Raising his hands to heaven, the warrior spoke:
‘Oh thou whose fury doth my own excite,
Not man thou art, tho’ mortal be thy look;
Behold, I follow where thy words invite;
I’ll go, and mountains raise where now is plain,
Mountains of dead and wounded I’ll erect,
Rivers of blood I’ll make; but ah, remain,
And thro’ the lightless air my arms direct.’
XIII.
This said, the crowds he mustered, while his words
The vile incited, and cheered on the slow;
And his example fired the Arab hordes
With his own warmth to march against the foe.
Then gave Alecto the trump’s signal blast,
And the great standard with her own hands freed;
Marched the fleet host, nay sped, so that they passed
The flight of Fame in their precipitate speed.
XIV.
Alecto led, then left the army, dressed
A courier like in aspect and array,
And at the time when Nature seems to rest,
Divided dubious between night and day,
Entered Jerusalem, and passing thro’
The sad crowds, told the king, to his delight,
Of the camp’s coming; told their purpose, too,
And the hour and signal of the assault by night.
XV.
The shadows now a veil of horror spread,
Besprent and tinted of a blood-red hue;
The earth, in place of white hoar-frost, was red
With reeking vapours of ensanguined dew;
In heaven strange prodigies and monsters soared,
Yelled fiends malign in their exultant flight;
Grim Pluto emptied hell’s abyss, and poured
From gloomy Tartarus his blackest night.
XVI.
Thro’ such deep horrors the fierce soldan bent
His venturous progress toward the hostile lines;
But when the night had reached her mid ascent,
From which she after rapidly declines,
He arrived within a mile, where in their tents
Secure the Christians slept — there made a halt,
Refreshed his troops, and from an eminence
Addressed and cheered them on to the assault.
XVII.
‘Behold, my friends, a camp more famed than strong,
With spoil surcharged, and surfeited with stealth,
Which, as a ravening sea has swept along,
And in its maw absorbed all Asia’s wealth:
This the kind fates at your disposal hold
(Nor could the risk be from less peril free);
Armour, and steeds with crimson pranked, and gold,
Not their defence, but shall your plunder be.
XVIII.
‘Not this the host that, formerly so strong,
O’erthrew the Persians and Nicæa won;
Since most in war, so varied and so long,
Stretched on the field, their earthly race have run.
And were it ev’n entire, in slumbers deep
Immersed profoundly, and unarmed, it bides;
And small resistance can they make who sleep,
Since short the pass that sleep from death divides.
XIX.
‘On, then! come on! I first the trench within,
Over their languid forms will clear the way;
Let every Paynim falchion strike like mine;
Let each unequalled cruelty display;
And this very day the reign of Christ will fall,
Become illustrious you, and Asia free.’
Thus to their trials near he fired them all,
And then advanced his squadrons silently.
XX.
When, lo! before him sentinels he spies,
Thro’ the thick shadows of uncertain light,
And finds he cannot, as he hoped, surprise
The prudent chief, tho’ coming in the night.
Back they retreated, shouting loud alarms,
By the vast numbers he conducted, scared;
So that, aroused, the outposts seized their arms,
And for the fight, as best they could, prepared.
XXI.
Sure of detection now, the Arabs blew
In their barbaric brass, whose horrent clang.
Blent with their yells, to heaven’s crystallin flew,
And with them neighs and tramp of destriers rang;
Roared the tall mountains, the deep valleys roared,
Re-echoing their roars the abyss replied;
Waving hell’s torch aloft Alecto soared,
And to the town the appointed sign supplied.
XXII.
On dashed the soldan now, and was the first
To reach the guard, confused, disordered still:
With less rapidity doth whirlwind burst,
From out the bowels of a caverned hill;
River, that tears up palaces and trees,
Lightning, that blasts with its consuming fire,
Earthquake, that fills the world with horror, — these
Are but faint types of his infuriate ire.
XXIII.
Ne’er falls his sword, but doth its object hit;
Nor fully hits, but that it woundeth too;
Nor wounds, but kills. More I might say of it,
But that the simple truth might seem untrue.
He either heeds not, or dissembles well,
Or the dire strokes of others does not feel;
Tho’ clangs his stricken helmet like a bell,
And flashes horribly the smitten steel.
XXIV.
When as alone he had nigh put to flight
The Christian outposts; to support his schemes,
The Arabs rushing forwards join the fight,
Like the swoln torrent of a thousand streams.
At this, the Franks retreat with slackened rein,
Victor and vanquished mixed together go,
And in disorder the entrenchments gain,
Where all is filled with ruin, blood, and woe.
XXV.
The soldan’s casque a frightful dragon decked,
That outstretched did its scaly neck unfold;
With wings extended, and on claws erect,
It in a circle had its forked tail rolled:
Three tongues the monster darts; a livid froth
It vomits forth, and seems to hiss with ire;
And as the combat glows, it burns with wrath,
And belches forth black smoke and lurid fire.
XXVI.
As, ‘mid the flashes of a thunder-storm,
Looks the vexed ocean in the sailor’s sight,
So dreadful shone the impious soldan’s form
To all beholders, ‘mid that blaze of light
Some seize with dauntless hands the sword; to flight,
Others, base cowards, give their trembling heels;
Confusion is confounded by the night,
&nb
sp; Which multiplies the danger it conceals.
XXVII.
‘Mong those whose hearts with greatest courage glowed
Was old Latinus, on the Tiber born:
His frame as yet no sign of weakness showed,
Nor was by failing years or toil outworn.
Five gallant sons, his like, alongside him,
Whene’er he went to battle, kept their places,
Loading with armour, long before their time,
Their limbs still growing, and their beardless faces;
XXVIII.
And by example of their sire inflamed,
Their swords and anger sharpened had for blood.
‘Come boys, where you Unfaithful,’ he exclaimed,
‘Pursues our friends in such exulting mood;
Nor let the carnage he creates restrain
The daring spirit ye have always borne:
For they, my sons, but worthless honour gain,
Unless past horrors the emprise adorn.’
XXIX.
Thus her young cubs bloodthirsty lioness
To rapine leads, and peril o’er the plains,
Ere nature’s arms their horrid jaws possess,
Ere cruel claws they have, or shaggy manes:
She, by her own, inflames their savage moods
Against the hunter, who imperiously
Disturbs the quiet of their native woods,
Making from thence their weaker tenants fly.
XXX.
The imprudent five accompany their sire,
And linked together, Solyman assail,
When, in a single moment, one desire,
One thought almost doth six long spears impel;
But far too bold the eldest, undismayed,
Flings down his lance, and closes with his foe,
And tries, but vainly, with his trenchant blade
To lay the soldant powerful charger low.
XXXI.
But, as a storm bound cliff, which proudly soars
O’er the vexed ocean that beneath it raves,
Firm in itself sustains the rage that pours
From angered heaven, the thunder, and the waves;
So his audacious front preserved that Brave
Unmoved against the swords, against the spears,
And of the youth who struck his charger, clave
The skull between the eyebrows and the ears.
XXXII.
Fond Amaranté, with compassionate ruth,
Flew to support his brother, thus struck down;
But idle was the pity of the youth,
That added to another’s death his own,
Since on his arm down fell the Pagan’s sword,
And sent the pair conjoined to early death.
Prostrate they sank, and on each other poured
Their blood, commingled with their parting breath.
XXXIII.
Then having cut Sabino’s lance in two,
Which from afar had galled him, in pursuit
Of the rash boy he pricked his destrier, who
Caught him, struck down, and trampled under foot;
From his young frame the struggling spirit flies
With many a pang, thus prematurely torn
From life’s sweet-smelling gales and halcyon skies,
And the gay golden prime of boyhood’s mom.
XXXIV.
Still living Pico and Laurenté were,
Who, twin-born, made their father doubly rich,
And often caused (so like the youthful pair)
A pleasing error as to which was which;
But if fair Nature made this couple one,
A hard disunion hostile fury made:
This through the bosom the fierce soldan run,
That in the dust a headless carcase laid.
XXXV.
The wretched father (father now no more,
Since of so many sons at once deprived!)
In their five deaths beheld his own; that hour
Robbed him of all, no scion how survived.
Nor know I how, amid such agony,
Old age could breathe, much less still battle on
Against such odds; perhaps he did not see
The look and struggles of each dying son;
XXXVI.
Perhaps that bitter pang the friendly night
Concealed in mercy from the old man’s view;
Still him no hard-earned triumph could requite:
His sons had perished; he would perish too.
Of his own blood hence lavish grew the sire,
And madly coveted his foe’s to drain;
Nor know I which was greater, his desire
To slay the soldan, or himself be slain.
XXXVII.
At length he shouted out: ‘Is, then, so frail
This arm of mine that you despise its stroke?
That ev’n its greatest efforts can’t avail
‘Gainst me your innate fierceness to provoke?’
This said, he dealt him a terrific blow
That through chain armour and steel corslet tore,
A wound inflicting on his haughty foe,
From which outspuited streams of tepid gore.
XXXVIII.
His sword and ire the fell barbarian steeled
Against Latinus at that cry, that wound;
And pierced his hauberk, having pierced his shield,
Tho’ it with toughest hide was seven times bound,
Then in his bowels plunged his vengeful sword.
The wretched father gave one gasp and died,
While now from mouth and now from wound outpoured
In flow alternate an ensanguined tide.
XXXIX.
As in the Apennines an oak, whose strength
Long scorned the war of north and eastern breeze,
Uprooted by unusual storm at length,
Drags in one common wreck the neighbouring trees;
So fell Latinus, and so furious was,
That with him he dragged numbers to the ground.
Fit end, that one so violent should cause,
Ev’n dying, ruinous destruction round.
XL.
While thus exhaling his internal hate,
On blood the soldan sated his long fast;
The Arabs, as their chief exasperate,
Into sad plight the Christian warriors cast;
Henry, the English knight, and Olopherne,
Fell ‘neath thy hand, Dragutes; Ariadine
Did Gilbert and bold Philip overturn
And put to death, both born upon the Rhine.
XLI.
Ernesto fell beneath Albazar’s mace,
Engerlan ‘neath the sword of Algazel;
But who could note each death’s peculiar case,
Or count the ignoble multitudes that fell?
At the first barbarous yells Prince Godfred woke,
Nor from that moment had remained supine;
Already armed, a powerful force he took,
And at their head led on the impatient line.
XLII.
When to their yells he heard the din, that grew
Each moment louder, he at once surmised
That, to their black perfidious nature true,
The Arab robbers had the camp surprised;
For, well-informed, the cautious captain knew
They were marauding round the neighbouring lands,
Still scarcely deemed that such a rabble crew
Would venture to attack his regular bands.
XLIII.
Meanwhile he hears, as further on he goes,
‘To arms! ‘from the other side— ‘To arms! ‘reply,
At the same time that barbarous howls arose
In most unearthly discord to the sky.
This was Clorinda, who the king’s own guard
Led to the assault, Arganté at her side;
Whence, turning round to noble Gue
lph, who warred
As his lieutenant, the commander cried:
XLIV.
‘Hark! hark! how from the city and the hill
Swell the fresh blasts of clanging battle; there
Is need of all thy valour and thy skill
The first fierce onset of the foe to bear.
Fly, then, at once, and for all risks provide,
Part of my force can follow in thy train;
Meanwhile I will, upon the other side,
With the other part the hostile shock sustain.’
XLV.
This settled, equal Fortune led the pair
Of noble warriors by a diverse path;
Guelph to the hill advanced, the captain where
The Arab now no opposition hath;
But he, acquiring, as he goes, fresh strength,
At every step increasing numbers gained,
Till, grown a powerful host, he reached at length
The spot where Solyman destruction rained.
XLVI.
Thus from his native hills, in gentle course,
The Po descends, nor fills his narrow bed,
But greater grows the farther from his source,
Till, proudly teeming, by fresh torrents fed,
O’er the burst banks his bull-like brow he rears,
O’ercoming all resistance in his sweep;
And Adria’s billows butting back, appears
To carry war, not tribute to the deep.
XLVII.
Where’er his flying troops caught Godfred’s eye,
Thither to rally them, he rode apace,
Shouting:’What fear is this? ah, whither fly?
At least see who it is that gives you chase;
A rabble herd pursues, that knows not how
To give or take a blow upon the face;
Alone the lightning of your looks would cow
(If but against them turned) that craven race.’
XLVIII.
This said, he pricked his steed, and galloped where
Round him the soldan fiery ruin spread,
Cutting his way through many a bristling square,
Thro’ carnage, dust, and mountains of the dead;
Nor failed his sword and steed which he bestrode
A passage through their closest ranks to force;
Down, down to earth on either side he mowed
Armed men and arms, the horseman and the horse!
XLIX.
On, on his destrier bounded, vault on vault,
O’er piled up mounds of slaughtered Saracens;
The intrepid soldan, who the fierce assault
Perceived approaching, flies not nor declines,
But gallops forward, and prepared to smite
Draws near, uplifting his red sword on high;
O what two cavaliers the fates unite,
From earth’s antipodes their strength to try!
L.
In narrow lists ‘gainst Valour Fury fights
Jerusalem Delivered Page 81