John Conington

Fear proves a base-born soul.

Huge, awful, hideous, ghastly, blind.

Live and be blest! 'tis sweet to feel Fate's book is closed and under seal. For us, alas! that volume stern Has many another page to turn.

Fell lust of gold! abhorred, accurst! What will not men to slake such thirst?

I heard, fear-stricken and amazed, My speech tongue-tied, my hair upraised.

Dire agonies, wild terrors swarm, And Death glares grim in many a form.

We have been Trojans: Troy has been: She sat, but sits no more, a queen.

'Tis come, our fated day of death.

Fury and wrath within me rave, And tempt me to a warrior's grave.

Then come the clamour and the blare, And shouts and clarions rend the air.

I quail, E'en now, at telling of the tale.

Now dews precipitate the night, And setting stars to rest invite.

Too cruel, lady, is the pain, You bid me thus revive again.

Myself not ignorant of woe, Compassion I have learned to show.

May Heaven, if virtue claim its thought, If justice yet avail for aught; Heaven, and the sense of conscious right, With worthier meed your acts requite!

If men and mortal arms ye slight, Know there are gods who watch o'er right.

E'en here the tear of pity springs, And hearts are touched by human things.

'Is there, friend,' he cries, 'a spot That knows not Troy's unhappy lot?'

She turned, and flashed upon their view Her stately neck's purpureal hue; Ambrosial tresses round her head A more than earthly fragrance shed: Her falling robe her footprints swept, And showed the goddess as she stept.

Bear up, and live for happier days.

This suffering will yield us yet A pleasant tale to tell.

Comrades and friends! for ours is strength Has brooked the test of woes; O worse-scarred hearts! these wounds at length The Gods will heal, like those.

Then should some man of worth appear Whose stainless virtue all revere, They hush, they list: his clear voice rules Their rebel wills, their anger cools.

So vast the labor to create The fabric of the Roman state!