Then spoke Miltiades. "And thee, best runner of Greece, Rosily blushed the youth: he paused: but, lifting at length His eyes from the ground, it seemed as he gathered the rest of his strength Count on a worthy reward! Henceforth be allowed thee release "I am bold to believe, Pan means reward the most to my mind! Unforeseeing one! Yes, he fought on the Marathon day: So, to this day, when friend meets friend, the word of salute So is Pheidippides happy forever, the noble strong man Who could race like a god, bear the face of a god, whom a god loved so well; So to end gloriously-once to shout, thereafter be mute: I pelf. Goods. 2 meed. Reward. 3 decline. Weaken. 90 100 110 120 The trumpet, the gallop, the charge, and the might of the fight! Thousands of horsemen had gathered there on the height, With a wing pushed out to the left and a wing to the right, And who shall escape if they close? But he dashed up alone Through the great gray slope of men, Wedged themselves in between horse and horse, Fought for their lives in the narrow gap they had made Four amid thousands! and up the hill, up the hill, Galloped the gallant three hundred, the Heavy Brigade. Fell like a cannonshot, Burst like a thunderbolt, Crashed like a hurricane, Broke through the mass from below, Drove through the midst of the foe, 30 THE WHITE SHIP Henry I of England-25th November, 1120 DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI [Henry I had taken his only son to Normandy, that the Prince might be acknowledged his successor to the Dukedom. On the return voyage the vessel in which the Prince was sailing struck a rock at the mouth of the harbor and sank. Rossetti represents the story as being told in the manner of an old ballad, years after the occur. rence, by the sole survivor of the shipwreck; thus he uses a kind of ballad refrain. Twenty-three stanzas are omitted after line 151.] By none but me can the tale be told, The butcher of Rouen, poor Berold. (Lands are swayed by a king on a throne.) 'Twas a royal train put forth to sea, Yet the tale can be told by none but me. (The sea hath no king but God alone.) |