Pike County Ballads | Page 6

pleases him, -?And if we narrowly read,?We will find some truth in the flunkey's praise, -?The man is a Sphinx indeed.
For the Sphinx with breast of woman?And face so debonair?Had the sleek false paws of a lion,?That could furtively seize and tear.?So far to the shoulders,--but if you took?The Beast in reverse you would find?The ignoble form of a craven cur?Was all that lay behind.
She lived by giving to simple folk?A silly riddle to read,?And when they failed she drank their blood?In cruel and ravenous greed.?But at last came one who knew her word,?And she perished in pain and shame, -?This bastard Sphinx leads the same base life?And his end will be the same.
For an OEdipus-People is coming fast?With swelled feet limping on,?If they shout his true name once aloud?His false foul power is gone.?Afraid to fight and afraid to fly,?He cowers in an abject shiver;?The people will come to their own at last, -?God is not mocked for ever.
THE SURRENDER OF SPAIN.
I.?Land of unconquered Pelayo! land of the Cid Campeador!?Sea-girdled mother of men! Spain, name of glory and power;?Cradle of world-grasping Emperors, grave of the reckless invader, How art thou fallen, my Spain! how art thou sunk at this hour!
II.?Once thy magnanimous sons trod, victors, the portals of Asia, Once the Pacific waves rushed, joyful thy banners to see;?For it was Trajan that carried the battle-flushed eagles to Dacia, Cortes that planted thy flag fast by the uttermost sea.
III.?Hast thou forgotten those days illumined with glory and honour, When the far isles of the sea thrilled to the tread of Castile? When every land under Heaven was flecked by the shade of thy banner, - When every beam of the sun flashed on thy conquering steel?
IV.?Then through red fields of slaughter, through death and defeat and disaster,?Still flared thy banner aloft, tattered, but free from a stain, - Now to the upstart Savoyard thou bendest to beg for a master! How the red flush of her shame mars the proud beauty of Spain!
V.?Has the red blood run cold that boiled by the Xenil and Darro? Are the high deeds of the sires sung to the children no more? On the dun hills of the North hast thou heard of no plough-boy Pizarro? Roams no young swine-herd Cortes hid by the Tagus' wild shore?
VI.?Once again does Hispania bend low to the yoke of the stranger! Once again will she rise, flinging her gyves in the sea!?Princeling of Piedmont! unwitting thou weddest with doubt and with danger,?King over men who have learned all that it costs to be free.
THE PRAYER OF THE ROMANS.
Not done, but near its ending,?Is the work that our eyes desired;?Not yet fulfilled, but near the goal,?Is the hope that our worn hearts fired.?And on the Alban Mountains,?Where the blushes of dawn increase,?We see the flash of the beautiful feet?Of Freedom and of Peace!
How long were our fond dreams baffled! -?Novara's sad mischance,?The Kaiser's sword and fetter-lock,?And the traitor stab of France;?Till at last came glorious Venice,?In storm and tempest home;?And now God maddens the greedy kings,?And gives to her people Rome.
Lame Lion of Caprera!?Red-shirts of the lost campaigns!?Not idly shed was the costly blood?You poured from generous veins.?For the shame of Aspromonte,?And the stain of Mentana's sod,?But forged the curse of kings that sprang?From your breaking hearts to God!
We lift our souls to Thee, O Lord?Of Liberty and of Light!?Let not earth's kings pollute the work?That was done in their despite;?Let not Thy light be darkened?In the shade of a sordid crown,?Nor pampered swine devour the fruit?Thou shook'st with an earthquake down!
Let the People come to their birthright,?And crosier and crown pass away?Like phantasms that flit o'er the marshes?At the glance of the clean, white day.?And then from the lava of AEtna?To the ice of the Alps let there be?One freedom, one faith without fetters,?One republic in Italy free!
THE CURSE OF HUNGARY.
King Saloman looked from his donjon bars,?Where the Danube clamours through sedge and sand,?And he cursed with a curse his revolting land, -?With a king's deep curse of treason and wars.
He said: "May this false land know no truth!?May the good hearts die and the bad ones flourish,?And a greed of glory but live to nourish?Envy and hate in its restless youth.
"In the barren soil may the ploughshare rust,?While the sword grows bright with its fatal labour,?And blackens between each man and neighbour?The perilous cloud of a vague distrust!
"Be the noble idle, the peasant in thrall,?And each to the other as unknown things,?That with links of hatred and pride the kings?May forge firm fetters through each for all!
"May a king wrong them as they wronged their king?May he wring their hearts as they wrung mine,?Till they pour their blood for his revels like wine,?And to women and monks their birthright fling!"
The mad king died; but the