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Alfred Austin - The Human Tragedy ACT III
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 Vainly, though every dear old feeling throngs
 Back to my breast at sight of you once more:
 Vainly,—though even I knelt and could adore!

 ``Too late! Too late! Denied to me awhile,
 For ever are you ravished from me now!
 Gone from your lips the sweetly mortal smile,
 And Heaven`s pure veil protects your sacred brow.
 You are removed so far, you would beguile
 My wildest vows, as did that virgin bough
 Your straining hand, when in the mountain glade
 I lent my help!… Alas! Me none will aid!

 ``Yet though you did abjure me, and have given
 Heaven all the love I once with Heaven did share,
 The links which knitted me to you, are riven
 Tighter by time, and have survived despair.
 I may from many sins need to be shriven;
 But one weight still I shall not have to bear
 Before the judgment—seat. My love was pure,
 Even as your own, and will till death endure!

 ``When you had sought a haven in the sky,
 I, from my haven driven, put forth to sea.
 And lo! from every tower and turret high,
 Rang out the glad peal, summoning to be free,
 Free or for ever slave, the land that I
 Loved not the less, because it fathered thee!
 Land, crowned with snow and girdled by the foam,
 Fair as her Florence, outraged as her Rome!

 ``Nay, bear with me, Olympia, bear alway,
 If only for the sake of olden days.
 Rome, still forgotten, still in fetters, lay.
 I against you as soon my sword would raise
 As `gainst the altar where you kneel and pray;
 And though I lift no voice of prayer or praise,
 In half—believing awe I bend me too,
 Before the Faith that fosters such as you.

 ``Not, not against the altar did I fling
 My feeble body, counting life as dross:
 No, but from Peter`s hampered hand to wring
 The carnal sword, and leave therein the Cross:
 That Rome, unswathed, might from the sepulchre spring,
 And Italy no more bewail the loss
 Of her first—born, but grouped around her knee
 Her dear ones hail,—not fair alone, but free!

 ``Ah! half in darkness on this earth we dwell,
 Not in the light, but shadow, of the truth;
 Confounding good with evil, heaven with hell,
 Misjudging rage and hate for love and ruth.
 But, though our souls thus vainly gnaw their shell,
 And manhood seem but disillusioned youth,
 I still must hope, the lingering dawn despite,
 That slow we move, through liberty, to light.

 ``And if there be, for close of all this ache,
 This panting struggle, a celestial goal,
 Come with me there, Olympia! I will take
 My blood—stained sword, and you your snow—white soul!
 Perchance we there shall see that each doth make
 Complete the other, and a godlike whole,
 From human vision hid, will flash to life,
 In that pure atmosphere where melteth strife.

 ``But if I needs must go, leaving you here,
 Pass solitary, silent, to my doom,
 I will await you in whatever sphere
 I may awake, of sunshine or of gloom.
 For I will never, never yield you, dear!
 While soul surviveth! Meanwhile, tend my tomb;
 But still remember, that my latest breath
 Blent, with your name, the cry of `Rome or Death!```

 Faint came the final words, though tightly still
 He grasped the bladeless hilt she would release,
 To join his hands in prayer. ``Oh! do His will,
 And with the Heavenly Victor make your peace!
 My heart shall keep a nook for you until
 We meet in the Land where wrong and sorrow cease.
 But oh! bequeath me, ere you leave me lone,
 Some hope that we may meet before the Throne!

 ``Your words have meaning which you do not see.
 All betwixt Rome must choose, God`s Voice hath said,
 And endless Death!`` ``Then, Death,`` he cried, ``for me!``
 And waved his broken brand above his head;
 Then dropped the hilt, and fell back heavily.
 Dragged down by woe, she knelt beside the bed,
 And on the offending hand laid sobbing cheek:—
 For love too strong, for martyrdom too weak!

 Now with light jocund step came young—eyed Morn,
 Dancing and singing o`er the eastern hill.
 The timorous twilight, blushing, fled forlorn,
 And in each thicket awoke pipe and trill.
 The world,—the old, worn world,—seemed freshly born,
 Eden renewed, where man might drink his fill
 Of brimming joy and beauty, nor e`er know
 His naked self, that long bequest of woe!

 The sluggish mountains, donning crowns of gold,
 Uprose to greet the morning. O`er the plain
 Of blight and wreck a roseate wave was rolled.
 Glowed in the sunlight aqueduct and fane,
 No longer ruined. Happy Gods of old
 Would soon, it seemed, their ancient seat regain,
 And rule once more, from oracle and shrine,
 A scene for mortal empire too divine!

 Rome, Rome itself, bathed in auroral sheen,
 Its domes, towers, columns, fanned by buoyant gales,
 Scanned from afar, one well indeed might ween
 A sea of sunlight flecked with joyous sails.
 Here, playful fountains leaped, and laughed between;
 There, bright—trunked stone—pines spread their sombre veils
 `Twixt earth and sky; the cracks in temples hoar
 But dimples seemed, with which they smiled once more.

 From narrow humid street, in open square,
 Sun—flooded, gathered an unwonted throng;
 And most where saint—crowned pillar clave the air,
 Or spouting column soared like voice of song.
 In every eye there lurked the angry glare,
 In every nerve the self—suppression strong,
 Of panther ere it leaps;—a fearful pause,
 Ere bounds the body, and out—curve the claws!

 When, all at once, from lip to lip there flew
 The rumour that the great Deliverer`s tread
 Nearer and nearer to the city drew,
 Striding across the prostrate tyrant`s head.
 Some, shimmering in the distant sunlight blue,
 Had seen his bayonet—tips and banners red
 Stream o`er the crest of the Nomentan Way;
 And some, `twas said, had heard his trumpets bray.

 Then all the people started up and took
 Hotly their way unto the Eastern gate.
 The comfortable cripple left his nook,
 And hobbled with the crowd. With eager gait,
 Dark matrons flower and lemon stall forsook;
 While timid maidens, fearing to be late,
 Awaited not their mothers, but entwined
 Their hands with baby boys, and ran like wind.

 Yes! in the sunlight, pinnacles of steel
 Flashed, and lithe pennons floated in the air;
 And from the ranks they crested rang the peal
 Of thunderous drum and many a clarion`s blare.
 But, pitying Christ! what do those notes reveal,
 And what these ensigns, waved anear, declare?
 The Pontiff`s paean sounds `neath banners black,
 His hellish legions tramping in their track!

 On,—on,—they came, with rhythmic—moving tread,
 His hirelings first, their Gallic prop behind;
 And, last, with sullen step and unraised head,
 A haggard, footsore file, whom Death unkind
 Forgot to reap; who neither fell nor fled,
 But, caught in toils no valour could unwind
 And reft of arms, now with the craven thong
 Linking their limbs, toiled painfully along.

 Just ere the vanguard of the long array
 The gateway reached, and bright warm bayonet—tips,
 Dipping beneath its vault, from sheen of day
 Passed, for a moment, into cold eclipse,
 The crowd one last look gave, then slunk away:
 The men with muttered curses on their lips,
 Women with silent anguish in their eyes,
 And hate, in hearts of both, that never dies!

 Then, to the clang of cymbals and the sound
 Of triumph—breathing instruments, swept on
 The exultant host through solitude profound:
 Past silent—nodding wrecks of Empire gone,
 Sallust`s choked garden, Caesar`s toppled mound.
 What though bright fountain flashed, bright sunlight shone,
 Loud pealed their trumpets, proudly waved their plumes,
 Rome`s dwellings seemed as empty as her tombs!

 But as they, onward moving, roused the styes
 Where modern squalor supersedes the reign
 Of ancient ruin, swarms of black—robed spies,
 Shavelings and sbirri, and their servile train,
 Began through chink and crack with stealthy eyes
 To peer and glance, as when from hole and drain
 Foul—feeding vermin thrust suspicious snout,
 Ere to their garbage—feast they sally out.

 But when they saw the Cross—Keys waving high,
 And heard Gaul`s pompous music fill the air,
 Then out they came in shoals,—a various fry:
 Some in brown serge, with feet and foreheads bare,
 And hempen cord whence hung the rosary;
 Some robed in white, long—bearded, comely, spare,
 Whose lofty brows roofed Learning and the Law;
 And some, black—frocked, with clenched ascetic jaw.

 Sudden, as though from underground they sprung,
 File after file, came troops of tonsured boys,
 To whose slim bodies gaudy cassocks clung,
 And who from native Freedom`s healthy joys
 Had, babes, been weaned, and taught an alien tongue.
 Their pretty voices swelled the monkish noise,
 Their tender forms the sabre—sounding throng,
 Their innocent hearts the festival of wrong!

 They too, the coiners of the spurious smile,
 That round the victor`s chariot skip and bark,
 Obsequious hounds, the vilest of the vile,
 Came thick; and those, who know not light from dark,
 Meek, timorous hearts, whom fear and faith beguile,
 And who in storm cling fast to Peter`s ark:
 And, last, the sceptic souls, who from them thrust
 Man`s genial dreams, and in the fasces trust.

 So the armed host, by sycophant and slave,
 Friar, and mendicant, and boyish band,
 Followed and cheered, marched on with banners brave
 To that famed spot on hoary Tiber`s strand,
 Where Papal statues arrogantly wave
 Over the stream forgotten Pagans spanned,
 And Papal gaolers, copying the gloom
 Of death, have carved a dungeon from a tomb.

 Across the bridge they streamed, a hemmed—in crowd,
 And up the narrow squalid Borgo passed,
 Till lo! the pile, whose head with sun and cloud
 Converses, and whose feet are planted fast
 In earth`s foundation, rose before them proud,
 Stupendous, soaring, dominant, and vast:
 Type of that mighty Power which claims to quell
 Man`s soul, and rule the realms of Heaven and Hell.

 Then, as a stream that finds a wider bed,
 Over the broad piazza loose they poured,
 Between the curving colonnades, and sped
 Up the long marble steps, defaced and scored,
 Though polished smooth, by many a pilgrim`s tread;
 Until no more the glittering cupola soared
 Up in the sky, and into shade they passed,
 Like that the sun—confronting mountains cast.

  A moment more, beneath the atrium pealed
 Fresh music, and an army new drew near:
 The Church`s spiritual ranks, that wield
 `Gainst Satan`s host the crosier as a spear,
 And on their bosom wear the cross for shield:
 Music that ravished the submissive ear,
 And gorgeous companies whose pompous train
 Dazzled the eye and dizzy left the brain.

 Troops of fantastic friars, endless files
 Of eremites and missionaries brought
 From sun—scorched lands and ice—engirdled isles;
 Gold—mitred Abbots deep in prayer and thought,
 And throne—defying Prelates wreathed in smiles,
 Apparelled in rich copes with gems inwrought;
 Last, crimson—cassocked Cardinals, who curled
 Proudly their lips, as though they swayed the world.

 Sudden shrilled silver trumpets, and out—flashed,
 Quickly as sunlight flashes, mailëd men,
 Across whose doublets,—black with yellow slashed,—
 Glowed plates of burnished steel, that dazed the ken.
 Next, brazen instruments and cymbals clashed,
 Rending the lofty portico, and then,
 So dread a sight approached, that they who saw
 Dropped on their knees, and veiled their eyes for awe.

 For in mid—air, by men upborne, there came,
 Enthroned, a venerable man, arrayed
 In more than regal glory. Eyes of flame,
 Ravished from Juno`s bird, his pathway made,
 And, cushioned, shone his Triple Crown of fame.
 Closed were his lids, but on his features played
 A more than mortal radiance; and benign,
 O`er the crouched crowd he made the Holy Sign.

 When swept the long procession`s final train
 Into the august Temple`s pillared nave,
 Where statued pomp half baffles death`s disdain,
 And wrings its vauntful triumphs from the grave,
 Army and concourse poured into the fane,
 Distinguished now no more, but, like a wave,
 Over the marble pavement rippling spread,
 Till every slab was hid by human tread.

 Then, with one voice, unto the Lord of Hosts,
 Prince, priest, and people, Te Deum loudly sang:
 Who hurls the waves against earth`s granite coasts,
 Swells with His voice the wingless tempest`s clang,
 And brings to nought the Mighty`s impious boasts.
 High up the spacious dome their anthem rang,
 And in the air without, with rhythmic stroke,
 The accompanying cannon`s bounding pulses spoke.

 But with these proud Hosannas, and the boom
 Of insolent artillery that cleaved
 Rome`s arching sky, ascended too the gloom
 Of orphaned hearths, beds widowed, lives bereaved;
 Where He eternally abideth, Whom
 Eye hath not seen, ear heard, nor heart conceived.
 With sleepless eyes that scanned the nations wide,
 Brooding He sate, His justice by His side!

END OF ACT III
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