THEY led a lion from his den,
The lord of Afric's sun-scorched plain;
And there he stood, stern foe of men,
And shook his flowing mane.
There's not of all Rome's heroes, ten
That dare abide this game.
His bright eye naught of lightning lacked;
His voice was like the cataract.
They brought a dark-haired man along,
Whose limbs with gyves of brass were bound; Youthful he seemed, and bold, and strong,
And yet unscathed of wound.
Blithely he stepped among the throng,
And careless threw around
A dark eye, such as courts the path
Of him, who braves a Dacian's wrath.
Then shouted the plebeian crowd—
Rung the glad galleries with the sound;
And from the throne there spake aloud
A voice, 'Be the bold man unbound!
And, by Rome's sceptre yet unbowed,
By Rome, earth's monarch crowned,
Who dares the bold-the unequal strife,
Though doomed to death, shall save his life.”
Joy was upon that dark man's face,
And thus, with laughing eye, spake he,
'Loose ye the lord of Zara's waste,
And let my arms be free;
"He has a martial heart," thou sayest,
But oh, who will not be
A hero, when he fights for life,
And home, and country,-babes, and wife
"And thus I for the strife prepare;
The Thracian falchion to me bring,
But ask the imperial leave to spare
The shield-a useless thing.
Were I a Samnite's rage to dare,
Then o'er me should I fling
The broad orb; but to lion's wrath
The shield were but a sword of lath.'
And he has bared his shining blade,
And springs he on the shaggy foe;
Dreadful the strife, but briefly played-
The desert-king lies low,
His long and loud death-howl is made,
And there must end the show.
And when the multitude were calm,
The favorite freedman took the palm.
'Kneel down, Rome's emperor beside:'
He knelt, that dark man ;-o'er his brow
Was thrown a wreath in crimson died,
And fair words gild it now:
"Thou 'rt the bravest youth that ever tried To lay a lion low;
And from our presence forth thou go'st
To lead the Dacians of our host.'
Then flushed his cheek, but not with pride."
And grieved and gloomily spoke he:
My cabin stands where blithely glide
Proud Danube's waters to the sea;
I have a young and blooming bride,
And I have children three;
No Roman wealth nor rank can give
Such joy, as in their arms to live.
'My wife sits at the cabin door,
With throbbing heart and swollen eyes;
While tears her cheek are coursing o'er,
She speaks of sundered ties.
She bids my tender babes deplore
The death their father dies;
She tells these jewels of my home,
I bleed to please the rout of Rome.
'I cannot let these cherubs stray
Without their sire's protecting care;
And I would chase the griefs away
Which cloud my wedded fair.'
The monarch spoke, the guards obey
And gates unclosed are;
He is gone-no golden bribes divide
The Dacian from his babes and bride.
Alaric the Visigoth stormed and spoiled the city of Rome, and was afterwards buried in the channel of the river Busentius, the water of which had been diverted from its course that the body might be interred.
WHEN I am dead, no pageant train
Shall waste their sorrows at my bier,
Nor worthless pomp of homage vain
Stain it with hypocritic tear;
For I will die as I did live,
Nor take the boon I cannot give.
Ye shall not raise a marble bust
Upon the spot where I repose;
Ye shall not fawn before my dust,
In hollow circumstance of woes;
Nor sculptured clay, with lying breath,
Insult the clay that moulds beneath.
Ye shall not pile, with servile toil,
Your monuments upon my breast,
Nor yet within the common soil
Lay down the wreck of power to rest;
Where man can boast that he has trod
On him that was 'the scourge of God.'
But ye the mountain stream shall turn,
And lay its secret channel bare,
And hollow, for your sovereign's urn,
A resting-place forever there:
Then bid its everlasting springs
Flow back upon the king of kings;
And never be the secret said,
Until the deep give up his dead.
My gold and silver ye shall fling
Back to the clods, that gave them birth;-
The captured crowns of many a king,
The ransom of a conquered earth:
For, e'en though dead, will I control
The trophies of the capitol.
But when, beneath the mountain tide,
Ye've laid your monarch down to rot,
Ye shall not rear upon its side
Pillar or mound to mark the spot`;
For long enough the world has shook
Beneath the terrors of my look;
And, now that I have run my race,
The astonished realms shall rest a space.
My course was like a river deep,
And from the northern hills I burst,
Across the world, in wrath to sweep,
And where I went the spot was cursed,
Nor blade of grass again was seen
Where Alaric and his hosts had been.
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