University of Virginia Library

VI.

Now all upon that windward side
The fallen fence left passage wide,
And Whetu-riri's raging host
The ditch and barrier swiftly crossed;
While Tangi's men retreating, threw
Themselves inside the rampart new;
And as the palisades they passed
Made every sliding panel fast,
Till round the fort the assailant horde
Upon the second platform poured.
Then out—unable to restrain
His pent-up wrath, his fierce disdain,
Or patient wait his foes' attack;
With all his bravest at his back,—
Just as the glorious Sun again
Slipped silvery from the mountains black
With panting disc upfloating free—
Out rushed at last the ‘Sounding Sea’
In wild ferocious majesty,
His battle-cry resounding loud
Above the tumult of the crowd!
“Now, forward, now, my Sons with me—
Now forward to the Land of Death!—”
That shout o'er all the hubbub swelled
Of casual shots and bulwarks felled
And stakes that crashed and fiends that yelled,
Distinct as—from the midnight's core
Where leaps the blue sheet-lightning's blaze
And hissing rains in torrents pour,
The dread Caffrarian lion's roar
That shakes the earth to which he lays
His head and thunders—rises o'er
And deeper-volumed rolls beneath
The angry bellowings that disclose
Where stamp, upstarting from repose
Whole herds of snorting buffaloes!
Where'er that Chieftain charged, dismayed
His foes fell back like huddling sheep
The wild-dog drives into a heap;
Or brief the fight the brave essayed:
So deadly swept as on he rushed
His ponderous battle-axe's blade;
Each chief who his encounter stayed
Just met him, and with right arm crushed
Disabled from the contest slunk;
Or down at once scarce groaning sunk
With cloven skull and quivering trunk.
—The ‘Angry Star,’ for all his boast,
Not yet the veteran's path had crossed,
But, as it seemed, preferred to close
With less renowned, less dangerous foes;
Or had a craftier game to play
More sure than such a doubtful fray.
So still resistless through the fight
Old Tangi raged; still rose on high
O'er all the noise that battle-cry,
“Now forward to the realms of Night!”—
Yet still for numbers beaten back
Fresh numbers pressed the fierce attack;
The platform mounted—haply dared
To charge the very gates across
The bridges left upon the fosse
By Tangi, for retreat prepared.
But vain their toil—their fury vain;
No hold, no entrance could they gain—
Resisted all—repulsed or slain.