Classic Poem

The guests were seated at the festal board;
Green rushes strowed the floor; high in the hall
Was David; Emma, in her bridal robe,
In youth, in beauty, by her husband's side
Sat at the marriage feast. The monarch raised
His eyes; he saw the mariner approach;
Madoc! he cried; strong nature's impulses
Prevail'd, and with a holy joy he met
His brother's warm embrace.
With that, what peals
Of exultation shook Aberfraw's tower!
How then reichoing rang the home of Kings,
When from subduid Ocean, from the World
That he had first foreseen, he first had found,
Came her triumphant child! The mariners,
A happy band, enter the clamorous hall;
Friend greets with friend, and all are friends; one joy
Fills with one common feeling every heart,
And strangers give and take the welcoming
Of hand, and voice, and eye. That boisterous joy
At length allay'd, the board was spread anew;
Anew the horn was brimm'd, the central hearth
Built up anew for later revelries.
Now to the ready feast! the seneschal
Duly below the pillars ranged the crew;
Toward the guest's most honorable seat
The King himself led his brave brother; — then,
Eyeing the lovely Saxon as he spake,
Here, Madoc, see thy sister! thou hast been
Long absent, and our house hath felt the while
Sad diminution; but my arm at last
Hath rooted out rebellion from the land;
And I have stablished now our ancient house,
Grafting a scion from the royal tree
Of England on the sceptre; so shall peace
Bless our dear country.
Long and happy years
Await my sovereigns! — thus the Prince replied, —
And long may our dear country rest in peace!
Enough of sorrow hath our royal house
Known in the field of battles, — yet we reap'd
The harvest of renown.
Ay, — many a day,
David replied, together have we led
The onset. — Dost thou not remember, brother,
How in that hot and unexpected charge
On Keiriog's bank, we gave the enemy
Their welcoming?
And Berwyn's after-strife!
Quoth Madoc, as the memory kindled him:
The fool that day, who in his mask attire
Sported before King Henry, wished in vain
Fitlier habiliments of javelin proof!
And yet not more precipitate that fool
Dropp'd his mock weapons, than the archers cast
Desperate their bows and quivers-full away,
When we leap'd on, and in the mire and blood
Trampled their banner!
That, exclaimed the king,
That was a day indeed, which I may still
Proudly remember, proved as I have been
In conflicts of such perilous assay,
That Saxon combat seem'd like woman's war.
When with the traitor Hoel I did wage
The deadly battle, then was I in truth
Put to the proof; no vantage-ground was there,
Nor famine, nor disease, nor storms to aid,
But equal, hard, close battle, man to man,
Briton to Briton. By my soul, pursued
The tyrant, heedless how from Madoc's eye
Flash'd the quick wrath like lightning, — though I knew
The rebel's worth, his prowess then excited
Unwelcome wonder; even at the last,
When stiff with toil and faint with wounds, he raised
Feebly his broken sword, —
Then Madoc's grief
Found utterance; Wherefore, David, dost thou rouse
The memory now of that unhappy day,
That thou shouldst wish to hide from earth and heaven?
Not in Aberfraw, — not to me this tale!
Tell it the Saxon! — he will join thy triumph, —
He hates the race of Owen! — but I loved
My brother Hoel, — loved him? — that ye knew!
I was to him the dearest of his kin,
And he my own heart's brother.
David's cheek
Grew pale and dark; he bent his broad, black brow
Full upon Madoc's glowing countenance;
Art thou return'd to brave me? to my teeth
To praise the rebel bastard? to insult
The royal Saxon, my affianced friend?
I hate the Saxon! Madoc cried; not yet
Have I forgotten, how from Keiriog's shame
Flying, the coward wreak'd his cruelty
On our poor brethren! — David, seest thou never
Those eyeless spectres by thy bridal bed?
Forget that horror? — may the fire of God
Blast my right hand, or ever it be link'd
With that accursed Plantagenet's
The while,
Impatience struggled in the heaving breast
Of David; every agitated limb
Shook with ungovernable wrath; the page,
Who chafed his feet, in fear suspends his task;
In fear the guests gaze on him silently;
His eyeballs flash'd; strong anger choked his voice;
He started up — Him Emma, by the hand
Gently retaining, held, with gentle words
Calming his rage. Goervyl, too, in tears
Besought her generous brother: he had met
Emma's reproaching glance, and, self-reproved,
While the warm blood flush'd deeper o'er his cheek,
Thus he replied; I pray you pardon me,
My Sister-Queen! nay, you will learn to love
This high affection for the race of Owen,
Yourself the daughter of his royal house
By better ties than blood.
Grateful the Queen
Replied, by winning smile and eloquent eye,
Thanking the gentle Prince: a moment's pause
Ensued; Goervyl then with timely speech
Thus to the wanderer of the waters spake:
Madoc, thou hast not told us of the world
Beyond the ocean and the paths of man.
A lovely land it needs must be, my brother,
Or sure you had not sojourn'd there so long,
Of me forgetful, and my heavy hours
Of grief, and solitude, and wretched hope.
Where is Cadwallon? for one bark alone
I saw come sailing here.
The tale you ask
Is long, Goervyl, said the mariner,
And I in truth am weary. Many moons
Have wax'd and waned, since from that distant world,
The country of my dreams, and hope, and faith,
We spread the homeward sail; a goodly world,
My Sister! thou wilt see its goodliness,
And greet Cadwallon there. — But this shall be
To-morrow's tale; — indulge we now the feast!
You know not with what joy we mariners
Behold a sight like this.
Smiling he spake,
And turning, from the sewer's hand he took
The flowing mead. David, the while, relieved
From rising jealousies, with better eye
Regards his venturous brother. Let the Bard,
Exclaim'd the king, give his accustom'd lay;
For sweet, I know, to Madoc is the song
He loved in earlier years.
Then, strong of voice,
The officer proclaim'd the sovereign will,
Bidding the hall be silent; loud he spake,
And smote the sounding pillar with his wand,
And hush'd the banqueters. The chief of Bards
Then raised the ancient lay.
Thee, Lord! he sung,
O Father! Thee, whose wisdom, Thee, whose power,
Whose love — all love, all power, all wisdom, Thou
Tongue cannot utter, nor can heart conceive.
He in the lowest depth of Being framed
The imperishable mind: in every change,
Through the great circle of progressive life,
He guides and guards, till evil shall be known,
And being known as evil, cease to be;
And the pure soul, emancipate by Death,
The Enlarger, shall attain its end predoom'd,
The eternal newness of eternal joy.

He left this lofty theme; he struck the harp
To Owen's praise, swift in the course of wrath,
Father of Heroes. That proud day he sung,
When from green Erin came the insulting host,
Lochlin's long burdens of the flood, and they
Who left their distant homes in evil hour,
The death-doom'd Normen. There was heaviest toil,
There deeper tumult, where the dragon race
Of Mona trampled down the humbled head
Of haughty power; the sword of slaughter caryed
Food for the yellow-footed fowl of heaven,
And Menai's waters, burst with plunge on plunge
Curling above their banks with tempest-swell,
Their bloody billows heaved.
The long-past days
Came on the mind of Madoc, as he heard
That song of triumph; on his sun-burnt brow
Sat exultation: — other thoughts arose,
As on the fate of all his gallant house
Mournful he mused; oppressive memory swell'd
His bosom; over his fix'd eye-ball swam
The tear's dim lustre, and the loud-toned harp
Hung on his ear in vain; — its silence first
Roused him from dreams of days that were no more.