Dauntless on his native sands There the thund'ring strokes begin, Check'd by the torrent-tide of blood, Where his glowing eye-balls turn, THE BARD. A PINDARIC ODE.* [IBID.] I. 1. 'RUIN seize thee, ruthless King! 'Confusion on thy banners wait; 'Though fan'd by Conquest's crimson wing, They mock the air with idle state... ‹ Helm, nor hauberk's twisted mail, Nor ev❜n 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 quivering lance. *This Ode is founded on a tradition current in Wales, that Edward the First, when he completed the conquest of that country, ordered all the Bards that fell into his hands to be put to death. I. 2. On a rock, whose haughty brow Frowns o'er old Conway's foaming flood, With haggard eyes the Poet stood; (Loose his beard, and hoary hair Stream'd, like a meteor, to the troubled air) 'Hark, how each giant-oak, and desert-cave, 'Sighs to the torrent's awful voice beneath! 'O'er thee, oh 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 'Mountains, ye mourn in vain “Modred, whose magic song bed: Made huge Plinlimmon bow his cloud-top'd head. 'On dreary Arvon's shore* they lie, * The shores of Caernarvonshire, opposite the isle of Anglesey. 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, I see them sit, they linger yet, 'Avengers of their native land: 'And weave with bloody hands the tissue of thy line.' II. 1. "Weave the warp, and weave the woof, "Mark the year, and mark the night, "The shrieks of death, through Berkley's roof that ring, "Shrieks of an agonizing King!t Cambden and others observe, that eagles used annually to build their aerie among the rocks of Snowdon. + Edward the Second, cruelly butchered in Berkley-Castle. "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. "Is the sable warrior|| fled? Thy son is gone. He rests among the dead. "The Swarm, that in thy noon-tide beam were born? "Gone to salute the rising Morn. "Fair laughs the Morn, and soft the Zephyr blows, "In gallant trim the gilded vessel goes ;§ * Isabel of France, Edward the Second's adulterous queen. + Triumphs of Edward the Third in France. Death of that King, abandoned by his children, and even robbed in his last moments by his courtiers and his mistress. Edward, the Black Prince, dead some time before his father. |