I heard the torrents leap and gush
O'er channelled rock and broken bush;
I saw the white-walled distant town,
And whiter sails go skimming down;
And then there was a little isle,
Which in my very face did smile,
The only one in view;

A small green isle, it seemed no more,
Scarce broader than my dungeon floor,
But in it there were three tall trees,
And o'er it blew the mountain breeze,
And by it there were waters flowing,
And on it there were young flowers growing,
Of gentle breath and hue.

The fish swam by the castle wall,

And they seemed joyous each and all;

The eagle rode the rising blast,
Methought he never flew so fast

As then to me he seemed to fly,
And then new tears came in my eye,
And I felt troubled-and would fain
I had not left my recent chain;
And when I did descend again,
The darkness of my dim abode
Fell on me as a heavy load;

It was as is a new-dug grave,
Closing o'er one we sought to save,-

And yet my glance, too much oppressed,
Had almost need of such a rest.

XIV

It might be months, or years, or days,
I kept no count-I took no note,

I had no hope my eyes to raise,

And clear them of their dreary mote:

At last men came to set me free,

I asked not why, and recked not where; It was at length the same to me, Fettered or fetterless to be,

I learned to love despair.

And thus when they appeared at last,
And all my bonds aside were cast,
These heavy walls to me had grown
A hermitage and all my own!
And half I felt as they were come
To tear me from a second home:
With spiders I had friendship made,
And watched them in their sullen trade,
Had seen the mice by moonlight play,
And why should I feel less than they?
We were all inmates of one place,
And I, the monarch of each race,
Had power to kill-yet, strange to tell!
In quiet we had learned to dwell-
My very chains and I grew friends,
So much a long communion tends
To make us what we are:-even I
Regained my freedom with a sigh.

70

HORATIUS 1

A LAY MADE ABOUT THE YEAR OF THE CITY CCCLX

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

I

Lars Porsena 2 of Clusium

By the Nine Gods 3 he swore
That the great house of Tarquin
Should suffer wrong no more.
By the Nine Gods he swore it,
And named a trysting day,
And bade his messengers ride forth,
East and west and south and north,

To summon his array.

II

East and west and south and north
The messengers ride fast,

And tower and town and cottage

Have heard the trumpet's blast.

1. Because of their tyranny, the Tarquins were banished from Rome, 509 B. C. "The banished King Tarquinius, however, soon marched with a vast Etruscan army against Rome, and drove the Romans, who had advanced beyond the Tiber to meet him, back into the city. The Romans destroyed the wooden bridge, by which they effected their retreat, and thus cut off the pursuit of the Etruscans." -Abbot's Italy. The various places mentioned are in Italy or on neighboring shores. Macaulay says of the Lays of Ancient Rome, of which this is one:

"In the poems the author speaks, not in his own person, but in the persons of ancient minstrels who know only what Roman citizens born three or four hundred years before the, Christian era may be supposed to have known, and who are in nowise above the passions and prejudices of their age and nation."

2. Lars Porsena. Emperor of the ancient Etruscans.

3. Nine Gods. The nine great gods of the Etruscans, who alone had the power of hurling the thunderbolt.

Shame on the false Etruscan
Who lingers in his home,
When Porsena of Clusium

Is on the march for Rome!

III

The horsemen and the footmen
Are pouring in amain

From many a stately market-place,

From many a fruitful plain;

From many a lonely hamlet,

Which, hid by beech and pine,

Like an eagle's nest, hangs on the crest Of purple Apennine;

IV

From lordly Volaterræ,

Where scowls the far-famed hold

Piled by the hands of giants

For godlike kings of old; From sea-girt Populonia, Whose sentinels descry Sardinia's snowy mountain-tops Fringing the southern sky;

V

From the proud mart of Pisæ,
Queen of the western waves,
Where ride Massilia's triremes 4
Heavy with fair-haired slaves;

Triremes. Warships with three banks of oars.

From where sweet Clanis wanders

Through corn and vines and flowers; From where Cortona lifts to heaven

Her diadem of towers.

VI

Tall are the oaks whose acorns
Drop in dark Auser's rill;

Fat are the stags that champ the boughs

Of the Ciminian hill;

Beyond all streams Clitumnus

Is to the herdsman dear;

Best of all pools the fowler loves

The great Volsinian mere.5

VII

But now no stroke of woodman
Is heard by Auser's rill;

No hunter tracks the stag's green path
Up the Ciminian hill;

Unwatched along Clitumnus

Grazes the milk-white steer; Unharmed the water-fowl may dip

In the Volsinian mere.

VIII

The harvests of Arretium

This year old men shall reap;
This year young boys in Umbro
Shall plunge the struggling sheep;

5. Mere. Sea, lake.