University of Virginia Library

XXVII.

The monarch-spectre spoke not—in his look,
There was a speech his stern lips never spoke,
Commanding, from the living warrior's frame,
As ductile 'neath its influence, and as tame,
As any worthless thing we may not name,
That he should follow—and with silent tread,
He led the way, and swiftly onward sped,
Conqueror and victim—now no more the bold
And desperate soldier, but a form as cold,
And unresisting, in its task of pain,
As if all life had fled from ev'ry vein.
Night clos'd around them, as the city's walls
Grew into shade behind—their own footfalls
Only arousing Silence, for a pause,
In rapid dream, to spirit out the cause
Of interruption, in his dim abode,
Where sleep, fatigued, continual, throws the load
Of his o'erburthen'd frame, and, with his eyes,
Thousand in number, seeks for, and espies,
Among his visions, shadowy histories!
They strode among the slaughter'd men, who died,
The past day, both before and at their side,
There, pil'd in silent heaps, inanimate—
They fought like brutes, and won a wild-beast's fate—
And as they strode, uncertainly, and still,
The moon uprose behind a grim-fac'd hill,
And look'd, with strange smile on the fearful sight,
That grew more horrible beneath her light—
Passions, not yet extinct, were still express'd
On lips, that tell the struggle of the breast,
The innate war with death, the foeman's strife,
The shrinking, shuddering, from the fatal knife,
And love of turbulent, but valued life—
And Cortes shrunk, that never shrunk before—
There lay a fav'rite captain in his gore,
His tongue lapt o'er his teeth, which in the last,
And fearful struggle, while his spirit past,
Had torn it half in twain, and there it lay,
In dust and blood, that shouted yesterday,
In all the full expressiveness and glow
Of hearts, that see but happiness below.
And many faces saw they, that he knew,
Turn'd upwards to the heav'ns—glist'ning with dew,
That fell like sweet drops of an April rain,
Or, taintless pearls upon the crimson plain,
As if there had been mercy for the slain!