The Dawn in Britain :: :: University of Virginia Library

Ah, when shall this dark womb of Mother-night,
The morrow's day bring forth, with cheerful face,
Ambrosial dawn, wide-shining from the East;
That seems, of righteous gods, new reign of gold?
How tarries Belin's cart again to rise!
On wretched Britons, that night-long have waked;
Day, which to dool and mourning shall be given,
For carcases, that lie cold, on the clay-ground.
Far scattered were the glast-stained hosts, to-night,
In the wind and the rain: and fasting still, for grief;

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Men deem, in holt and heath, they hear their gods;
That make lament, in forest skies, above.

Within wide-girding walls of Camulus,
Wakes Dread, and paceth up and down the streets.
Few sleep; uneasy groans Caratacus.
As childing woman longeth, in her pangs,
To bear; so by her lord, Embla, to-night,
Much having watched, to see him wake and live.
From him, she wends, with dear constraint of heart,
(Daws now the day;) to visit round the walls.

But, in that hour, the gods, that mourn, for Britain,
Another night whelmed, on her weary face.
Ride furious gusts the field; is the dark grove,
With lightnings, rent. With immane thunder-sound,
Ruin the heavens, in rain; and with sharp dint,
As shafts, smite hurled-out hail-stones, on men's shields.
Were heard as divine voices, in thick mist.
Seems dry land then vast river rolling blood.

Under the dripping eaves of bramble banks,
Neath teil-tree, thorn, broad beech and great limbed oaks;
And where the squirrel leaps in dim pine-forest,
Shield them the scattered and afflicted Britons:
They cower, in brakes, a wounded multitude!

228

Romans, when day is risen, yet keep their camps,
For hurtling rain; which chaceth tempest's rage,
Of the wild wind. Their leathern tents, till eve,
Might hold, uneath. When goes sun's eye, at length,
Down, from that bloody brow of slaughter-world;
Hand-clappings, strange; and women's funeral chant,
Sound from the dune. Down-howling, from the hills,
Wakens this sullen night, then voice of wolves:
That even the enemies rue, which cannot sleep!