University of Virginia Library

He moved among his captains to the wine,
The revel deepened with the downward day:
By bench and column huge barbarian lengths
Round tankards threw a sprawl of chaning arm
And hugg'd their gleaming poison, with fierce eyes
Fiercer between the draughts. One leant: one lay:
One thundered out a Rhætian battle-field
Half-cancell'd in the anarchies of time,
Whereon he dealt decision like a god.
One half in shade, gigantic shadow, slept,
And some ill vision writhed his nostril's edge
And made his face a tumult, as his teeth
Ground audibly, and clenched the massive hands.
And one with fewer years and ambered hair
Told all the sweetness of his lady's eyes
To some gray swordsman on his brand declined,
Deaf to the burning word and all the rout,
But gazing with cold orbs on something far
Beyond the banquet and the banquet noise.
And most sat level at the lengthened board,
Intent alone on revel-moving wine.

And royal Alboin feasted, chief of men,
And held his state encanopied beyond
In crimson splendours, like a flushing cloud
Above the secret morning: larger he
And mightier than the congregated peers
Of all the Lombard army: he had drained
Huge draughts Falernian to his idol gods,
Who gave him pleasant seat among a land
Of waters and of summits for his own,
And lovely Pavia to his lordly rest.
And then the fierce and cheating spirit of wine
Made proud his heart. He looked upon his men
And he believed himself invincible,
Till rolling out his arrogant words he said:

“Princes and Leaders of the Lombards, hear,
Have I not led you to a pleasant land?
Who hath withstood our armies for a day?
We conquer all things with a careless hand:
The blast and forward shadow of our tread
Compel the strength of triple-cinctured towns,
And hide their men in marshes: desolate
The streets: their riches ready to our hands.
And now, behold, our large prosperity
Is founded stable as the careless hills
That wind and storm unroot not like their pines.
Much meat is ours in safety till the end
From flocks and cattle in uncounted vales:
What stint of revel when a hundred hills
Are ours, and all their vineyards to our cheer?
Wisely are we descended to these plains:
In frozen hills what empire? to dispute
Uncouth dominion in the hungry north,
This was the slender wisdom of our sires:
And we are gods to these, that in their day
Did well, as wisdom went, but we are more,
The braver fruitage of a fatter soil.
Their gods have given them rest among their snows,
And conquest to their sons with lordly ease.
I pledge the memory of their silent years:
Have I no nobler vintage than the last,
No choicest warmth of concentrated fire,
No vine-blood rare as gold? For I would crush
The purple essence of Italian heaven
To pledge them in our best since we have thriven.
Nay—while the grateful riot of their praise
Burns in my pulses to a deeper thirst,
I drink it and it trickles to my core—
I feel an evident and conquering god.
I will not pledge them in unmeaning gold,
The cup shall be more worthy than the praise,
More precious than the wine, a royal bowl:
Bring forth the lordliest beaker of my store,
The skull of Cunimund—here wrought the brain
That planned me frequent death—it holds my wine!
So fall my foes. There is no fitter cup
To pledge our fathers in eternal sleep.
Refill it yet: shall I believe the wine
Has drawn a vengeance-relish from the bone,
Gliding, as love's soft kiss between my lips,
To light a nobler tumult in my heart?
Refill again—go bear it to the Queen,
Bid her rejoice among us with her sire:
Ay, by my country's gods she shall rejoice;
Have I not sworn it—can I not compel?
Were it the blood of her detested sire,
Shall she not taste a vengeance to my foe?”

He ended in a tumult of acclaim:
So fierce the wine had stung them to a thirst
Of brutal exultation, cruelties,
And devil-vengeance: but the wiser few
Shuddered and sickly pushed their goblets by,
Waiting the issue. Helmichis alone,
Who bare the armour of the Lombard King,
Sate with the clouded thunder of his brow
Silent yet ripe to glisten into sound:
So fierce his breathing laboured, towards his brand
His touch went eager fingering out the blade
An inch, but let it linger for the event.

They bore the charnel tankard to the Queen;
She sate among her ladies at the loom.
Before the beat of nearing steps their laugh
Ceased, as the birds cease music ere a storm.
She glanced surprise upon them, with pressed palms.
She moved not in emotion beautiful,
As beautiful as thought: her gliding eyes
Of resolute azure failed not: some light cloud
Of doubt in floating wrought as light a shade,
And touched the rose confusion of her cheek
To curves that spoke command upon her lip,
One only fleck on her divine repose:
Until she heard the mandate, and beheld
The ghastly token of the hollow brow
She loved so well, and its ignoble use,
Linked with her own constraint most horrible.
Then as a watcher by a summer sea,
With rosy clouds behind it, may perceive
The landscape instant thickened, and white force
Tear down the ripple with an undertone
Of hoarse and ominous mischief, so intense
The large waves cannot lift their mounded rage,
And all the emerald weather's cope serene
Blackens and is transfigured—So her face
Changed and her pale lips trembled: her deep eyes
In tremulous shimmer, counterchanged with glare
Of rushing lights, came wildly: the light hands
Worked, as with deathbed clutches; thro' her frame
One seething shudder's long continuons creep
Convulsive shook her nature to its core.
Nor yet her proud will failed of self-command
In that excessive and tumultuous sting
Of pain and bitter wronging keen as death:
One moment and she crushed her weakness down,
And masked unrest with most unnatural calm,
And feigned obedience in her wild revolt
Of love and instinct; she controlled her voice
To speak smooth words; then with some meek incline
Tenderly raised the skull in filial hands,
And bowed her fair lips meekly to the rim.
But scarcely let the feel of that loathed wine
Moisten upon them: shuddering then she ceased
And murmured faint, “Let my lord's will be done.”
Yet ere she gave again the cup, she took
Its bony seams upon her lips, and thrice
She kissed it, thrice and closely; and these went
And bare it to Alboin: she remained
Silent among the silence of her maids,
To weave again with shuddering hands the loom,
And never shed one tear or spake a word,
And a great silence settled in her bower.

But when the pale light strengthened out its day,
Remorse on Alboin fell when that ill cheer
Of wine had left him, and he knew her wrong
Was bitter, most malignant: since her soul,
Proud in its least obedience, must recoil
From that excessive test in burning shame.
And the King thought to make her some amends,
But being proud endured not to unsay
The tumid folly of his feasting hours:
And, tho' he wished, said nothing for the day;
So left the wrong to fester unatoned.

But she arose from slumber's restless mock
Of raging dreams: one purpose of revenge
Possessed her life: all other thought became
Vassal to one endeavour's sole command.
Then sent she forth and summoned Helmichis;
To her imperial summons he repaired,
And guessed the import of her sending now:
And when he came she looked into his eyes,
And took his hand and held it as she spake:

“Dost thou remember the old days that were,
Before this King had placed me at his side
By right of conquest when my father fell.
No maiden choice was mine but to obey.
The mock of insolent conquest I assumed
Detested queendom at a victor's hand:
Surely I owe my tyrant lord much love.
But when I dwelt a girl with Cunimund,
And moulded fancies in my father's halls,
One came and whispered love, and that was thou:
Those days are dust and Alboin came between,
He made an orphan where he sought a bride,
And rooted out my race to speed his vows:
And fancied, as he dragged me at his wheels,
Submission was a nobler thing than love.

“I was his queen, and I endured this curse
Some years without complaint. I will endure
No longer: patience falters at the last.
Last night he planned strange insult at his wine,
Disgrace no daughter ever bare and throve
Thereafter and forgave it: such fierce shame
As makes submission infamy, and tears
Allegiance from the empty name of wife.
I have sworn a stedfast oath that he shall die.
Why should this tyrant trample on more souls,
Swell like a god in his impunity?
And if those former vows of thine endure,
If change has been as silent in thy heart
As mine through all the turmoil of these years,
Thine, thine shall be the hand to make me free.
I know thee brave, I know thou lovedst me once,
When this is done thou shalt not question long
If then I loved again. I cannot fear
Refusal when I look upon thy face
Heroic and recount my utter wrong!”
She ended, and he promised her desire:
What could he else? such power upon his soul
Wrought thro' her words and earnest pleading eyes.
Meantime, secure in his imperial halls,
Alboin feared no vengeance for her wrong.