"RUIN Seize thee, ruthless King!
Confusion on thy banners wait;
Tho' fann'd by Conquest's crimson wing,
They mock the air with idle state.
Helm, nor hauberk's twisted mail,
Nor e'en thy virtues, Tyrant, shall avail

To save thy secret soul from nightly fears,
From Cambria's curse, from Cambria's tears!
Such were the sounds that o'er the crested pride
Of the first Edward scatter'd wild dismay,
As down the steep of Snowdon's shaggy side

He wound with toilsome march his long array. Stout Glo'ster stood aghast in speechless trance: To arms!" cried Mortimer, and couch'd his quiv'ring lance.

I. 2.

On a rock, whose haughty brow
Frowns o'er cold Conway's foaming flood,

Robed in the sable garb of woe,

With haggard eyes the poet stood;
(Loose his beard, and hoary hair
Stream'd, like a meteor, to the troubled air)
And with a master's hand, and prophet's fire,
Struck the deep sorrows of his lyre.

"Hark, how each giant oak, and desert cave,
Sighs to the torrent's awful voice beneath!
O'er thee, O King! their hundred arms they wave,
Revenge on thee in hoarser murmurs breathe;

Vocal no more, since Cambria's fatal day,

To high-born Hoel's harp, or soft Llewellyn's lay.

I. 3.

"Cold is Cadwallo's tongue,

That hush'd the stormy main:
Brave Urien sleeps upon his craggy bed:
Mountains, ye mourn in vain
Modred, whose magic song

Made huge Plinlimmon bow his cloud-topt head.
On dreary Arvon's shore they lie,
Smear'd with gore, and ghastly pale;
Far, far aloof th' affrighted ravens sail;

The famish'd eagle screams, and passes by.
Dear lost companions of my tuneful art,

Dear as the light that visits these sad eyes, Dear as the ruddy drops that warm my heart,

Ye died amidst your dying country's criesNo more I weep. They do not sleep.

On yonder cliffs, a grisly band,

I see them sit, they linger yet,

Avengers of their native land:

With me in dreadful harmony they join,

And weave with bloody hands the tissue of thy line.

II. 1.

"Weave the warp, and weave the woof, The winding-sheet of Edward's race.

Give ample room, and verge enough

The characters of hell to trace,

Mark the year, and mark the night,

When Severn shall re-echo with affright

Is the sable warrior fled?

365

Shrieks of an agonizing king!

She-wolf of France, with unrelenting fangs, That tear'st the bowels of thy mangled mate,

From thee be born, who o'er thy country hangs The scourge of Heav'n. What Terrors round him wait!

Amazement in his van, with Flight combin'd,
And Sorrow's faded form, and Solitude behind.

II. 2.

"Mighty victor, mighty lord! Low on his funeral couch he lies! No pitying heart, no eye, afford A tear to grace his obsequies.

Wallows beneath the thorny shade.

Now, brothers, bending o'er the accursed loom, Stamp we our vengeance deep, and ratify his doom.

III. 1.

"Edward, lo! to sudden fate

(Weave we the woof. The thread is spun.)

Half of thy heart we consecrate. (The web is wove. The work is done.) Stay, oh stay! nor thus forlorn

Leave me unbless'd, unpitied, here to mourn:
In yon bright track, that fires the western skies,

They melt, they vanish from my eyes.
But oh! what solemn scenes on Snowdon's height
Descending slow their glittering skirts unroll

Visions of glory, spare my aching sight!
Ye unborn ages, crowd not on my soul!
No more our long-lost Arthur we bewail.

All hail, ye genuine kings, Britannia's issue, hail !

III. 2.

"Girt with many a baron bold Sublime their starry fronts they rear;

And gorgeous dames, and statesmen old

In bearded majesty, appear.

In the midst a form divine!

Her eye proclaims her of the Briton line:
Her lion-port, her awe-commanding face,
Attemper'd sweet to virgin-grace.

What strings symphonious tremble in the air,

What strains of vocal transport round her play!

Hear from the grave, great Taliessin, hear;

They breathe a soul to animate thy clay. Bright Rapture calls, and soaring as she sings, Waves in the eye of heaven her many-colored wings.

III. 3.

"The verse adorn again

Fierce War, and faithful Love,

And Truth severe, by fairy fiction drest.

In buskin'd measures move

Pale Grief, and pleasing Pain,

With Horror, tyrant of the throbbing breast.

A voice, as of the cherub-choir,

Gales from blooming Eden bear;

And distant warblings lessen on my ear,
That lost in long futurity expire.

Fond impious man, think'st thou yon sanguine cloud,

Rais'd by thy breath, has quench'd the orb of day?

To-morrow he repairs the golden flood,

And warms the nations with redoubled ray.

Enough for me; with joy I see

The different doom our fates assign. Be thine Despair, and sceptred Care,

To triumph, and to die, are mine."

He spoke, and headlong from the mountain's height

Deep in the roaring tide he plunged to endless night.

THOMAS GRAY.