University of Virginia Library

Then next on the army of Naples they turned, and drave them to flee
In rout with their craven king: scarce safe on his throne might he be;
For hard on his track followed after with fiery and terrible hand
Garibaldi, breaker of bondage, arousing the folk of the land.
But he paused in the midst of pursuit, for to Rome they called him again,
For the parley with France was ended, the month's debate was in vain:
And now a new army of Frenchmen had sailed for the south once more,
Twofold the first in its number, and trod the devoted shore.
O infamy cruel and foul! O crime that might darken the day!
O shame of a noble nation, a brand on her forehead for aye!
But Europe stood by and beheld it, the free stood by with the slaves,
As the baneful fleet of the stranger bare death to Rome o'er the waves.
And thou, fair daughter of freedom, proud isle of the tameless deep,
Was thine arm then shortened to save, or thine eyelids heavy with sleep?
Wert thou too even as others who knew not freedom of old
Drugged to a selfish stupor and bartering honour for gold?
Could even that name that thou hatedst, the evil Corsican name,
Not stir thee to send forth a champion once more to illumine thy fame,
Some Nelson or fiery Dundonald to swoop on the hostile prey
And the swarming sails of the spoiler to sweep from the ocean away,
Some Wellesley to plant in the front of a people that strove to be free
Unswerving battalions of Britain, a rock in the rage of the sea?
Not so: but thy true sons grieved; it was ill that this thing should be done,
That a people should perish for freedom and help from thy hand have none.

So now to their comrades expectant the strangers came up from the sea;
Seven times five were their thousands, the Romans' but six times three.
Yet to Oudinot even such odds could scarce give cheer for the strife,
For his base cause cankered his valour and lay as a blight on his life:
Still feared he fair fight with the Romans, the men who had smitten him sore,
And he stained with a lie his banner, the pride of the tricolor.
So worthy his errand he proved him, so fit for his vile emprise,
Fit tool of the Bonaparte traitor, the son and father of lies.
Let treason come first for assurance, then force should follow his wile
To preserve him what fraud should have gained—so plotted he darkly in guile.
And a day for the end of the truce he fixed with the Romans, and sware
That until that day should have dawned his host in its place should forbear.
So he sware, and the Romans believed him, and looked to their arms for that day—
Thus far at least would they trust him—and waited secure for the fray.
But or ever the truce was ended, by night had his army clomb
To the Marian Mount on the north, and seized on that bulwark of Rome:
Nor heeded he aught the upbraiding that shamed him from friend and foe,
But paltered with quibbling speech and devised yet a deadlier blow.
For now when a night and a morrow and yet one last night still
Were all unspent of the truce, then against the Janiculan hill
He sent forth at evening his soldiers, eight thousand men of his best,
To seize on the height by treason, where silent in darkness and rest
Four hundred were guarding the summit: then suddenly looked they, and lo,
All around rushing on to the slaughter swarmed countless the throng of the foe.
Yet swerved they no whit from the battle, but on thro' the fiery hail
Sprang forward in wrath to the onset and bore them bravely and well.
And ever where densest and fiercest the torrent of enemies poured
Blazed high in the front of the fight Garibaldi's terrible sword;
Back shrank their bravest before it, and turned in fear from the wall;
And clear as the voice of a clarion rang ever the voice of his call.
From night to the dawn and the noonday and on to the twilight again
They bare up that battle gigantic, sore spent with labour and pain.
But before and behind were the foemen, they swarmed on them twenty to one,
Till the combat unequal was o'er, the Janiculan vantage was won.
There Dandolo, worthy his Venice, lay dead in the blood-steeped throng,
Daverio, Masina, Mameli, his young breast silenced from song.
These, with the faithful who followed, their hearts unshaken of fear,
Stood forth against odds overwhelming and fell in the front with a cheer,
These, with the hundreds more who should live in their country's praise
By the lips of men and of maidens, the camp's and the hearth-stone's lays.
Nay, let not the glory sleep or the high deeds suffer wrong
That should march to the music of time and the tide of sonorous song.
By these from her ancient abasement was Italy lifted on high,
From these came the breath of her life, for they proved that her sons could die.