The Judgement of the Flood :: :: University of Virginia Library

Now, in the rear; high seated on a car,
Drawn by two Leopards; Kaël came enthroned:
Of a barbaric army chief adored.
Prince of a savage tribe, that dwelt beyond
The far Erythræan Sea; once immigrant;
From Naid, and Enos for their crimes exiled;
And, free from government, thenceforth declined
From lawless human to mere animal;
Half brute, but not half angel; and yet men,
If but as idiots. Hence, into their souls
Glimpses of reason flashed an awful light,
More piercing made by the surrounding gloom.
So had they superstitions; and from Death,
And from the Dead, were visited of dreams,

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Acceptable to Faith—high faculty,
By weakness to credulity reduced,
Yet even in weakness to be reverenced.
For them, strange meaning had the closing Year;
Since on its Last Day, at the mid of night,
The ghosts of the departed wont appear
To friends, and relatives; . . who ready made
For spiritual visitants their house,
And set the room in order, and prepared
Water to purify, and wine to welcome,
The traveller from worlds transcending this; . .
Whose coming they awaited all the night,
Until the hour appointed; then held they
Communion with their guests invisible—
Which whoso failed to do might vengeance fear.
Such vengeance fell on Kaël. Lightning smote
His eyes, and so they withered; and his frame,
Convulsed with the quick flash, in agony,
Shrunk; and, for sickness, he was cast abroad,
Into the fields where corses had been strewn,
As one already dead, or doomed to die,
Left with dry bones to perish. What great Power
Preserved the abandoned wretch? More helpless he
Than unprotected babe; yet he returned
Even from the Place of Skeletons, to health
Restored; and, by the people, thence believed
With spirits, and demons, in the haunted fields,
Communion to have held; whence, in their fear,
Him they avoided, till by priestly hands
Made pure, and then as prophet him esteemed.
—Such Kaël was; whose inspiration, now,
Armies awaited, to decide dispute
Of rituals vain: and he, with writhings torn,
Prelude of unintelligible sounds,
And other signs of ecstasy, at length

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Was of clear speech delivered; thus it ran.

‘Fools bury, fools embalm, fools burn their dead.
Fling them forth to the plains: and let the bird
Not shun them, nor the beast, as if abhorred,
And doomed to hell; but, as sweet morsels, eat,
And worthy entrance into worlds of bliss.
The feathered tribes may bear them then aloft,
Their pastimes to partake, and bathe in air;
And the four-footed creatures on the hills,
And in the forests, and by banks of streams,
Teach them new pleasures, and delightful sports.
What murmur? ha! ha! ha!’

And then he laughed,
So wild, and loud, and long, that all the rocks,
And burial places, in that field of graves,
Echoed the bitter mockery of that laugh.
Loud pealed the same from Jared's sepulchre;
Mahalaleel's replied to his dread mirth;
Cainan's that laugh resounded; and the vault
Of Enosh was alive with that mad voice;
And Seth's twin-pillared temple of repose
Was wakened with the hoarse profanity;
And Adam's tomb reverberated deep
The cachinnation; strange, and hollow tones
Of laughter, and of blasphemy prolonged.
—And well that scorn succeeded to allay
The growing tumult, which had else arisen,
And, in that prophet's infidelity,
Found reason 'gainst the judgement that pronounced
Their prejudices void; and, in their stead,
Proposed what all abhorred. But, in that pause,
A power, unfelt before, the savage swayed;
And change in his aspect, and form produced,
Whence wonder died of awe:—a gazing corse,
Not uninformed of life, but seized, and fixed

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In catalepsy, senseless—speechless—blind;
Though glaring, as restored to sudden sight.
But blind he stood a swarthy monument,
Gigantic; for his hue was as the night;
Burned by the sun, and clime where he was born,
With fervency intense; his flesh was coal,
And his blood fire, black with excessive heat.
And he was huge of size; his limbs were cast
In mould Titanian, shrivelled yet, and shrunk
From what they might have been; by indolence
Enfeebled, such as, in the wilderness,
Weakens the human rival of the brute.
Held by the charm whose spell he could not break,
He stood enrapt; and, though unwilling, spake
Words, which, though true, and because true, the more
He disbelieved.

‘Laugh, Spirits of the Dead,
Laugh, laugh; and, like the impatient battle-steed,
Cry ha! ha! to derision. Laugh; ay, laugh.
Came not the Foe your Children to subdue?
Came not the sons of mischief forth, to seek
A quarrel, and, with insult, to shed blood?
Laughed not your God in heaven as they came,
And beckoned to the Angel of the Air,
Whose sword, and symbol is the hairy Star;
Whereof none knows but He, who measured out
The appointed ages of its mystic course,
That it should wing its fiery way to earth,
And lash it with a scourge? Make from the wreck
Of worlds. The void, and formless deep returns:
Such as it was, ere moved the Spirit there;
Ere the quick fiat of his strong right hand
The Light created; when the Sun leapt forth;
And, with his left begotten, rose the Moon;
While, with his speed, were kindled the bright Stars.
—And shall I curse whom He in heaven hath blessed,

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Who lies not, nor repents? What charm is there,
Or what enchantment, 'gainst the sons of God?
Here divination fails. But, from the heights
Of Armon, I behold the sacred Ship,
Walking the waters o'er the drownèd world;
How lovelily—alone—a goodly tent,
A blessèd bark, none curse but the accursed;
And blessèd he who blesseth it, and them.’

By this were weapons flashing in the wind,
Some at the prophet's throat; he saw them not:
But now, recovering from that strange access,
Finds words of recantation, to appease
The credulous crowd:

‘I spake not, 'twas the Fiend—
The lying Fiend, commissioned to deceive;
Believe it not.’

Thus leads the blind of eye
The blind of heart. But the more politic chiefs,
Self-shamed of such absurdity, postpone
Their primal purpose; and, with ill design,
One insult with another substitute.
—So they, imprompt, about the patriarch's corse,
Funereal games, mock honour, celebrate.

Straight were the prizes placed in view of all;
Women, and vases; mares, and mules, and steeds;
And ornaments of silver, and of gold;
And instruments of music; bowls for wine;
And gems of price, and wonderous works of art,
And talents of great worth; which who possessed
Might purchase what to him gave most delight;
With sacred tripods, palms, and verdant crowns;
And arms, and vestments for the conquerours.

The trumpets blare; forth the keen Racers start,
Each eager for the goal. With various luck,
The rivals haste: nor is ill chance to lack,

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Sport making for spectators; who laugh loud
At him who slips, his feet on treacherous ground,
Or wearied with exertion. Olive crowns,
Steeds, helms, and quivers grace the victor-youths.

Then stand the Combatants in order forth;
Of shoulders broad, and strong, and large of limb;
The hand with cæstus, or with gauntlet gloved,
With clenchèd fists attacking, and attacked.
On tiptoe first erect, their arms in air,
Thrown up defiant, either head drawn back
From blow expected, they the fight provoke;
Then strike the void of air; or, on the sides,
And breast, sounds loud, or hollow next excite.
Ears, temples, jaws resound. Now this avoids,
Now that misspends his stroke—falls—rises: shame,
And skill, contending in the indignant soul,
New vigour give, add fury; and, like hail,
Incessant pelts, sans pity, blow on blow,
Till mouth, and teeth, and nostril run with blood,
And the faint head trails ghastly, sick to death,
Over the unconscious shoulder, gory, pale;
How pale—and paler by such contrast made
With that purpureal tide.

Less savage game,
The race of horse and chariot puts to proof,
O generous Steed, thy best nobility.
—Even as thy master's, on thy back enthroned;
Or, more conspicuous in the lofty car,
Lord of the reins, to guide, or goad thy speed;
Haply unskilful, from his seat of pride,
Cast, ignominious, under hoof, or wheel.

Pleased with the rapid motion, even though blind;
Kaël permits his charioteer to strive
In emulation; whirling him along,
To the far goal, how eager for the prize.

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Great was his skill—for not in steed, or car
The artist trusts; but, as a pilot guides
Through storms his vessel, with unerring hand
Drives forthright to his aim. Not his the steed,
But the strong Leopard; male, and female, as
They couple in their solitary dens:
Conscious of force, although to them denied
Sagacity of dog, or wolf; which given,
End none had been to ravage. Furnished so
With horrent teeth, set in the mouth, and jaw,
Incisor, and canine; and, in the cheek,
The lacerant, for deadliest purposes;
The tongue even armed, and the ridged palate rough.
Nor these alone; but claws, keen, long, and curved,
And each with sheath defended, skinny folds,
And callous, whereon, as a sole, the foot
Rests in progression,—with the teeth combine,
To rend the prey, dashed with the flexile paw
To ground, and irresistibly compressed.
Hunger to sate, the forest depth they leave;
Steal on with noiseless tread; or ambushed lie,
With ears astretch for slightest sound, or step
Far off; and eyes that see by day, or night.
—Slow of their gait, incapable of speed
Continuous, well behoved the charioteer,
Caution like theirs; suspicious watchfulness,
Lest swiftness him unskilful throw aback.
But Art prevails. In dusty whirlwinds driven,
Coursers are lost, and chariots hid in smoke—
And wide afield in vain contention spent.
He, by the shortest line, holds on his way
Patient; nor finds obstruction; for none deems
Such tardy motion might the crown attain.
Anon, he nears the goal; . . not unobserved;
And competition burns. Now—now—be proved
Muscular power, and force of giant size.

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‘Now—now—my leopard coursers. Brief the game;
Not far the goal—not needed swiftness long—
Start, and away.’

What speed may rival theirs?
In vain contends the horse. For what is he,
But as his rider? Nothing in himself,
By man unguided; only confident
In that superiour wisdom which controuls:
Insensate now, for idle human skill.
Not so that twain feline. Their genius waked,
Malignant, and ferocious. Agile, thus,
As with one bound, the appointed bound they gain;
Then stand—the victors they, in that career.
How beautiful of hue, and spotted well,
In rose-like circles, though irregular,
With centres coloured like the gentle fawn,
Upon a lighter yellow for its ground.
Head, neck, and limbs, and right along the back,
Dotted how thick with small unopened buds,
And of pure white the belly, chest, and neck.

Proud of the conquest; Kaël stood upright,
In triumph, and had spoken words of vaunt;
Straight by a spirit not his own constrained,
Possessed with prophecy. Hence, to the race
Of Cain, repeated he that parable,
Which Noah for that Shepherd lately spake,
In open hall, not then by Kaël heard.

‘Repent, or ye shall perish, who refuse
The sons of Abel needful corn, and oil.
Your Seed time, and your Harvest, they shall fail;
Your Cold, and Heat, shall strange mutation know;
Summer, and Winter; Day, and Night; shall cease.’
Scarce were the words pronounced, ere flashed on high
Steel in his rival's hand, a Cainite chief,

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The second victor in the chariot race;
Descending soon into the prophet's breast,
A sudden stroke, and mortal in its aim.
Back Kaël fell. But, in his driver's hand,
The scourge resounded; and, with wondrous speed,
The leopard pair fly thence, like wingèd steeds:
So, when disturbed, they frightened bear their prey,
Else on the spot devoured, to lonely place,
Glutting their raven with the carcase meal.
Thus ceased the impious games; and, from the graves,
Those wicked hosts, in wild confusion, fled;
Awed with strange fear, presaged from that event.