University of Virginia Library

HAROLD BEFORE SENLAC

The Tragedy of a Patriot

Brother, you marvel why I sit alone,
Upon the Eve of battle, and speak not;
Yet hath a gift of dreadful sight been given,
To me, and speech I scarcely understand.
On Senlac Hill my host shall be o'erthrown,
I see myself fallen blinded to the ground.
Now it is borne on me that I must die.
My single life defers the Eternal will.
For it is fated that the Norman blood
With Saxon shall be mingled happily
And dead foes on the slope shall fraternise;
And from the wine blood-red tomorrow spilled
Shall spring a fortunate vintage of the earth
And a great brew from battle shall be made,
Till from that mingling shall an Empire rise
Vaster than any gazed on by the sun;
My life alone this solemn marriage mars
Of nations, and the purposed fusion stops,
Since while I lived England to me were true.
I stand, it seems, in the great path of Fate,
And by my dying must make clear her way
Till with the years and mellowing touch of time
The Norman close with Saxon shall be knit,
And stand together in the clash of arms
On many a foreign plain and alien hill
And in one host shall conquer and o'erthrow;
In solid square or charging fury grown
Invincible, archers that with their bolt
Shall bring a sudden darkness on the foe,
And many fields in glory shall be won.
Then shall this people feel for the furthest seas,
And tempt the very foam of fairyland,
And ultimate oceans, and the very deep
Shall be as a playfield underneath their feet.
And they shall plunge Armadas in the ooze,
England shall queen the waters of the world.
Then shall she lay her hand upon the east,
And the huge orient with a remnant grasp,
A glimmering shore of pearl and emerald,
A strand of throbbing glory and of gold,
Tribes in full stare of Phœbus and aspects
Into a dimness kissed by splendid suns,
And million turbaned peoples shall she rule.
Nor here alone shall England prosper; she
A mighty river shall ascend by night,
And with the morn a new dominion seize,
Cradle of heroes, radiant, snowy clear;
And on her builded Empire never sun
Shall set, nor any star refuse to rise.
But I perceive my doom and acquiesce.
World-Destiny, no less, requires my death,
And so shall one man for the people die.
But brother be thou well assured of this,
That never Fate, nor ever curse of Rome
Shall loose my knees, or make this heart to quail.
I will not fall without much Norman blood,
The Roman curse shall string this arm to steel,
The doom of Fate give edge unto this axe;
Dying I will be liberal with death,
I will not pass alone, but with me I
Will take great company into the dark.
Now pass we through our lines, ere the light warns.