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MARTYRS OF HISTORY.
1. HANNIBAL.
WHO on the page of history past doth poreThere much for sorrow findeth which doth call;
The world-Christ, drinking of the cup of gall,
Stretched through the ages on the cross of war,
Whilst plague, death, flood and famine, vultures four,
On his sad vitals prey: but, over all,
For what the hostile Fates with Hannibal
Wrought in the days bygone, my heart is sore;
Far Afric's godlike son, half Italy,
Though foiled of succour by his foes at home,
Twelve years who held against the might of Rome,
And then, recalled and baffled oversea,
Draining, for Carthage sake, the envenomed bowl,
To the high Gods gave back his glorious soul.
2. CÆSAR.
NOR less for him I grieve of later years,That mightiest Julius, Rome's most goodly son,
Of all Life's nurslings sure the noblest one
That ever trod her stage of blood and tears,
That Caesar who, by witness of his peers,
E'er of free will endured to injure none,
Who, in all lands which be beneath the sun,
Came, saw and conquered hearts and eyes and ears,
And at the last, by envious Fate's reverse,
Unto the foul assassin's bloody knife
Condemned to render up his noble life,
Nor imprecation uttered neither curse,
But with his mantle veiled his mighty head
And “Et tu, Brute!” sighed and so was dead.
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3. COLUMBUS.
HE put off empire, like a worn-out wede,For hero's wearing waxen overmean,
And as the Gods immortal and serene,
That breathe an air above man's lust and greed
Nor of the imperial purple stand in need,
To show as Gods upon the worldly scene,
With the bare grandeur of his soul beseen,
Sun-crowned abode in his accomplished deed.
When such as he their fetters wear for flowers
And for chief honour hold the scorn of men,
How should we lesser mortals, now as then,
Here, in this meaner martyrdom of ours,
But for sharp laurels Life's affronts espouse,
The thorn-set crowns that bind the thinker's brows?
4. SAUL.
THY face we see but through the mists of hate:Save by the chronicles of jealousy,
Rancour and malice, nought we know of thee:
Yet may the eye of thought discriminate,—
Athwart the web, of lies and sorry Fate
Woven, wherefrom thy strong simplicity
In this waste world might never struggle free,—
One simply great as few on earth are great.
Nay, and methinks, thy mighty weary spright,
Clogged in the mesh of priestcraft and of guile,
So long on earth, when thou on Gilboa's height
With the sharp steel lett'st out, I see a smile
On thy stern face, as of a hero's soul,
Of Life content to be at last made whole.
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5. PROMETHEUS.
PRIMORDIAL Saviour, Prometheus, thou,That in the twilight of the morrowing earth,
Compassionate of mortal dole and dearth,
From thine immortal harbourage didst bow
And to the waste world's service, then as now
By the fierce Fates drained dry of joy and mirth
And peace and all that makes life living-worth,
Thyself by the fire's token didst avow;
Thee still on Caucasus the vultures tear
And still, eternal in the Eternal Aye,
Type of world's wont with all that's good and fair,
Skyward thy smile thou smil'st of sad disdain,
As the Gods knowing puppets of a day
And thee the true God on thy throne of pain.
6. ROBERT EDMUND LEE.
MY thought, at this sweet season of the prime,When hope and life new blossom, back to thee,
My eager boyhood's hero, goeth, Lee.
Near forty years, since that thy strife sublime
Was sped, have passed and men well nigh thy time
And thee forgotten have. Yet take from me
This trifling tribute to thy memory,
This word of love and of memorial rhyme.
Alack, the wrong yet lives; the right is dead;
And nothing it availeth 'gainst the flood
Of Fate to fare: but this I know full well;
When in the last red field the free South fell
And liberty with her, the tears I shed
Came from mine inmost heart, not tears, but blood.
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