he altar are dyed, but with scarlet of
blood!
Clang of iron-shod feet, and sheep for their shepherd who cry;
Curses and swords that flash, and the victim proffer'd to die!
--Bare thy own back to the smiter, O king, at the shrine of the dead:
Thy friend thou hast slain in thy folly; the blood of the Saint on thy
head:
Proud and priestly, thou say'st;--yet tender and faithful and pure;
True man, and so, true saint;--the crown of his martyrdom sure:--
As friend with his friend, he could brave thee and warn; thou hast
silenced the voice,
Ne'er to be heard again:--nor again will Henry rejoice!
Green Erin may yield her, fair Scotland submit; but his sunshine is o'er;
The tooth of the serpent, the child of his bosom, has smote him so sore:--
Like a wolf from the hounds he dragg'd off to his lair, not turning to
bay:--
Crying 'shame on a conquer'd king!'--the grim ghost fled sullen away.
--Then, as in gray Autumn the heavens are pour'd on the rifted hillside,
When the Rain-stars mistily gleam, and torrents leap white in their
pride,
And the valley is all one lake, and the late, unharvested shocks
Are rapt to the sea, the dwellings of man, the red kine and the flocks,--
O'er England the ramparts of law, the old landmarks of liberty fell,
As the brothers in blood and in lust, twin horror begotten of hell,
Suck'd all the life of the land to themselves, like Lofoden in flood,
One in his pride, in his subtlety one, mocking England and God.
Then tyranny's draught--once only--we drank to the dregs!--and the stain
Went crimson and black through the soul of the land, for all time, not in
vain!
We bore the bluff many-wived king, rough rival and victor of Rome;
We bore the stern despot-protector, whose dawning and sunset were gloom;
For they temper'd the self of the tyrant with love of the land,
Some touch of the heart, some remorse, refraining the grip of the hand.
But John's was blackness of darkness, a day of vileness and shame;
Shrieks of the tortured, and silence, and outrage the mouth cannot name.
--O that cry of the helpless, the weak that writhe under the foe,
Wrong man-wrought upon man, dumb unwritten annals of woe!
Cry that goes upward from earth as she rolls through the peace of the
skies
'How long? Hast thou forgotten, O God!' . . . and silence replies!
Silence:--and then was the answer;--the light o'er Windsor that broke,
The Meadow of Law--true Avalon where the true Arthur awoke!
--Not thou, whose name, as a seed o'er