✓ PROSPICE. FEAR death ?-to feel the fog in my throat, The mist in my face, I am nearing the place, The post of the foe ; Yet the strong man must go : And the barriers fall, The reward of it all. The best and the last ! And bade me creep past. The heroes of old, Of pain, darkness and cold. The black minute 's at end, Shall dwindle, shall blend, Then a light, then thy breast, And with God be the rest ! 66 CHILDE ROLAND TO THE DARK TOWER CAME.” (See Edgar's song in “ LEAR.") I My first thought was, he lied in every word, That hoary cripple, with malicious eye Askance to watch the working of his lie Its edge, at one more victim gained thereby. II What else should he be set for, with his staff? What, save to waylay with his lies, ensnare All travellers who might find him posted there, And ask the road? I guessed what skull-like laugh Would break, what crutch 'gin write my epitaph For pastime in the dusty thoroughfare, III If at his counsel I should turn aside Into that ominous tract which, all agree, Hides the Dark Tower. Yet acquiescingly So much as gladness that some end might be. IV For, what with my whole world-wide wandering, What with my search drawn out thro' years, my hope Dwindled into a ghost not fit to cope My heart made, finding failure in its scope. V Seems dead indeed, and feels begin and end The tears and takes the farewell of each friend, And hears one bid the other go, draw breath Freelier outside, (“ since all is o'er,” he saith, “ And the blow fallen no grieving can amend ;”) VI Be room enough for this, and when a day Suits best for carrying the corpse away, He may not shame such tender love and stay. VI Heard failure prophesied so oft, been writ So many times among “ The Band ”—to wit, The knights who to the Dark Tower's search addressed Their steps—that just to fail as they, seemed best, And all the doubt was now-should I be fit? VIII So, quiet as despair, I turned from him, That hateful cripple, out of his highway Into the path he pointed. All the day Had been a dreary one at best, and dim Was settling to its close, yet shot one grim Red leer to see the plain catch its estray. IX For mark ! no sooner was I fairly found Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two, Than, pausing to throw backward a last view O’er the safe road, 't was gone; grey plain all round: Nothing but plain to the horizon's bound. I might go on; nought else remained to do. х grove ! So, on I went. I think I never saw Such starved ignoble nature ; nothing throve : For flowers—as well expect a cedar You'd think; a burr had been a treasure trove. XI In some strange sort, were the land's portion. “ Or shut your eyes,” said Nature peevishly, “ It nothing skills : I cannot help my case : “ 'T is the Last Judgment's fire must cure this place, “ Calcine its clods and set my prisoners free.” XII If there pushed any ragged thistle-stalk Above its mates, the head was chopped; the bents Were jealous else. What made those holes and rents In the dock's harsh swarth leaves, bruised as to baulk All hope of greenness ? 't is a brute must walk Pashing their life out, with a brute's intents. XIII As for the grass, it grew as scant as hair In leprosy ; thin dry blades pricked the mud Which underneath looked kneaded up with blood One stiff blind horse, his every bone a-stare, Stood stupefied, however he came there : Thrust out past service from the devil's stud ! XIV Alive? he might be dead for aught I know, With that red gaunt and colloped neck a-strain, And shut eyes underneath the rusty mane ; Seldom went such grotesqueness with such woe; I never saw a brute I hated so ; He must be wicked to deserve such pain. XV I shut my eyes and turned them on my heart. As a man calls for wine before he fights, I asked one draught of earlier, happier sights, One taste of the old time sets all to rights. XVI Not it! I fancied Cuthbert's reddening face Beneath its garniture of curly gold, Dear fellow, till I almost felt him fold Out went my heart's new fire and left it cold. XVII Giles then, the soul of honour—there he stands Frank as ten years ago when knighted first. What honest man should dare (he said) he durst. Good—but the scene shifts-faugh! what hangman hands Pin to his breast a parchment? His own bands Read it. Poor traitor, spit upon and curst ! XVIII Better this present than a past like that; Back therefore to my darkening path again! |