 | Three Hundred Sonnets |  |
165
GLADSTONE, AT NAPLES.
Well done, great heart! and happy shalt thou be:The poor that criéd, and the fatherless,
And he that had no helper, now shall bless
The generous zeal that will not tamely see
Such Dionysian spite and power oppress
Bodies and souls,—but vows to set them free!
For, still they look in trembling hope to thee,
Gladstone,—as under Heaven their only aid;
Those many noble, wrong'd, unguilty men,
Whom treachery and slander have betray'd
Deep to some Stygian gulf, some Ischian den;
There, there to rot, till forceful truth hath made
The tyrant, half remorseful, half afraid,
Yield up his captives to thy conquering pen.
| Three Hundred Sonnets | |