 | The vision of Cortes, Cain, and other poems |  |
VI.
Where are these thoughts to wring them now,Where are the early hopes that fed them,
The Cross's light upon each brow,
That, like a fire from heav'n, once led them?
Dream they, before a conquering foe,
To fly successful, o'er the waters,
Where, trembling with expecting glow,
Sit Spain's own sunny daughters?
Disdain was in that chieftain's eye,
Beyond the ire of battle high,
And, while his hoarse voice rung around,
More stirring than the trumpet's sound,
Bidding the brave again unite
In battle, with the unequal fight,
Upon his lip, scorn smiling played,
Derisive, of the tools he made;
And thus he spake, when, all in vain
He would renew the fight again.
“Now dastards, shall your flight be dear.
That ye do battle, be my care,
And if I fall, be yours to know
The stroke that fells me, lays ye low.”
A boy, even to that chieftain dear,
Came as his page—where foemen strike,
As in the courtly hall, alike.
Danger, nor toil, nor this last strait,
This bosom twin could separate!
His feeling, time, nor change could dim,
Fear'd by all else, yet loved by him,
To him he spoke—“Boy, raise your lance,
God, send you good deliverance—
This is a perilous hour for both,
Else now, our parting might be loth,
But, I remember me, your oath.
Drive your steel thro' your horse's neck,
There needs no spur, yet loose your check;
He'll leap the rank that girds us round,
And if he fail, repeat the wound—
Then gain, if yet ye can, the sound.
There, ere these dastards may be seen,
Put fire unto the, brigantine,
The fleet with which Cortes sailed for New Spain, was destroyed by his orders, but at a much earlier period than that to which the Poem has reference. The crisis, of the Poem, however, requiring it where it is, I have used the license commonly conceded to the writers of fiction, by which History may be perveried at pleasure. After stating the intrigues by which Cortes prevailed on his men, to adopt this measure, (the destruction of the fleet, Robertson proceeds to say—“Thus, from an effort of magnanimity, to which there is nothing parallel in history, five hundred men voluntarily consented to be shut up in a hostile country, filled with powerful and unknown nations; and having precluded every means of escape, left themselves without any resource, but their own valor and perseverance.” Hist. Am. vol i. p. 414.
Or, guide her quickly from the shore,
And seek your native land once more—
My native land—but not for me,
Without this day's cloud passes o'er,
That native land again to see—
Say not you have beheld them fly,
But, that you've seen your chieftain die.”
| The vision of Cortes, Cain, and other poems | |