National Epics Part 45

In the end he cannot 'scape one downright blow, Which enters, between sword and s.h.i.+eld, his breast.

As perfect was the plate and corselet, so Thick was the steel wherein his paunch was drest: But the destructive weapon, falling low, Equally opened either iron vest; And cleft whate'er it swept in its descent, And to the saddle-bow, through cuira.s.s, went.

And, but that somewhat short the blow descends It would Zerbino like a cane divide; But him so little in the quick offends, This scarce beyond the skin is scarified.

More than a span in length the wound extends; Of little depth: of blood a tepid tide To his feet descending, with a crimson line, Stains the bright arms which on the warrior s.h.i.+ne.

'T is so, I sometimes have been wont to view A hand more white than alabaster, part The silver cloth with ribbon red of hue; A hand I often feel divide my heart.

Here little vantage young Zerbino drew From strength and greater daring, and from art; For in the temper of his arms and might, Too much the Tartar king excelled the knight.

The fearful stroke was mightier in show, Than in effect, by which the prince was prest; So that poor Isabel, distraught with woe, Felt her heart severed in her frozen breast.

The Scottish prince, all over in a glow, With anger and resentment was possest, And putting all his strength in either hand, Smote full the Tartar's helmet with his brand.

Almost on his steed's neck the Tartar fell, Bent by the weighty blow Zerbino sped; And, had the helmet been unfenced by spell The biting faulchion would have cleft his head.

The king, without delay, avenged him well, "Nor I for you till other season," said, "Will keep this gift;" and levelled at his crest, Hoping to part Zerbino to the chest.

Zerbino, on the watch, whose eager eye Waits on his wit, wheels quickly to the right; But not withal so quickly, as to fly The trenchant sword, which smote the s.h.i.+eld outright, And cleft from top to bottom equally; Shearing the sleeve beneath it, and the knight Smote on his arm; and next the harness rended, And even to the champion's thigh descended.

Zerbino, here and there, seeks every way By which to wound, nor yet his end obtains; For, while he smites upon that armor gay, Not even a feeble dint the coat retains.

On the other hand, the Tartar in the fray Such vantage o'er the Scottish prince obtains, Him he has wounded in seven parts or eight, And reft his s.h.i.+eld and half his helmet's plate.

He ever wastes his blood; his energies Fail, though he feels it not, as't would appear; Unharmed, the vigorous heart new force supplies To the weak body of the cavalier.

His lady, during this, whose crimson dyes Were chased by dread, to Doralice drew near, And for the love of Heaven, the damsel wooed To stop that evil and disastrous feud.

Doralice, who as courteous was as fair, And ill-a.s.sured withal, how it would end, Willingly granted Isabella's prayer, And straight to truce and peace disposed her friend.

As well Zerbino, by the other's care, Was brought his vengeful anger to suspend; And, wending where she willed, the Scottish lord, Left unachieved the adventure of the sword.

For to leave Durindana such misdeed To him appeared, it past all other woes; Though he could hardly sit upon his steed, Through mighty loss of life-blood, which yet flows.

Now, when his anger and his heat secede, After short interval, his anguish grows; His anguish grows, with such impetuous pains, He feels that life is ebbing from his veins.

For weakness can the prince no further hie, And so beside a fount is forced to stay: Him to a.s.sist the pitying maid would try, But knows not what to do, nor what to say.

For lack of comfort she beholds him die; Since every city is too far away, Where in this need she could resort to leech, Whose succor she might purchase or beseech.

She, blaming fortune, and the cruel sky, Can only utter fond complaints and vain.

"Why sank I not in ocean," (was her cry), "When first I reared my sail upon the main?"

Zerbino, who on her his languid eye Had fixt, as she bemoaned her, felt more pain Than that enduring and strong anguish bred, Through which the suffering youth was well-nigh dead.

"So be thou pleased, my heart," (Zerbino cried), "To love me yet, when I am dead and gone, As to abandon thee without a guide, And not to die, distresses me alone.

For did it me in place secure betide To end my days, this earthly journey done, I cheerful, and content, and fully blest Would die, since I should die upon thy breast

"But since to abandon thee, to whom a prize I know not, my sad fate compels, I swear, My Isabella, by that mouth, those eyes, By what enchained me first, that lovely hair; My spirit, troubled and despairing, hies Into h.e.l.l's deep and gloomy bottom; where To think, thou wert abandoned so by me, Of all its woes the heaviest pain will be."

At this the sorrowing Isabel, declining Her mournful face, which with her tears o'erflows, Towards the sufferer, and her mouth conjoining To her Zerbino's, languid as a rose; Rose gathered out of season, and which, pining Fades where it on the shadowy hedgerow grows, Exclaims, "Without me think not so, my heart, On this your last, long journey to depart.

"Of this, my heart, conceive not any fear.

For I will follow thee to heaven or h.e.l.l; It fits our souls together quit this sphere, Together go, for aye together dwell.

No sooner closed thine eyelids shall appear, Than either me internal grief will quell, Or, has it not such power, I here protest, I with this sword to-day will pierce my breast.

"I of our bodies cherish hope not light, That they shall have a happier fate when dead; Together to entomb them, may some wight, Haply by pity moved, be hither led."

She the poor remnants of his vital sprite Went on collecting, as these words she said; And while yet aught remains, with mournful lips, The last faint breath of life devoutly sips.

'T was here his feeble voice Zerbino manned, Crying, "My deity, I beg and pray, By that love witnessed, when thy father's land Thou quittedst for my sake; and, if I may In anything command thee, I command, That, with G.o.d's pleasure, thou live-out thy day; Nor ever banish from thy memory, That, well as man can love, have I loved thee.

"G.o.d haply will provide thee with good aid, To free thee from each churlish deed I fear; As when in the dark cavern thou wast stayed, He sent, to rescue thee. Andante's peer; So he (grammercy!) succored thee dismayed At sea, and from the wicked Biscayneer.

And, if thou must choose death, in place of worse, Then only choose it as a leaser curse."

I think not these last words of Scotland's knight Were so exprest, that he was understood: With these, he finished, like a feeble light, Which needs supply of wax, or other food.

--Who is there, that has power to tell aright The gentle Isabella's doleful mood?

When stiff, her loved Zerbino, with pale face, And cold as ice, remained in her embrace.

On the ensanguined corse, in sorrow drowned, The damsel throws herself, in her despair, And shrieks so loud that wood and plain resound For many miles about; nor does she spare Bosom or cheek; but still, with cruel wound, One and the other smites the afflicted fair; And wrongs her curling locks of golden grain, Aye calling on the well-loved youth in vain.

She with such rage, such fury, was possest, That, in her transport, she Zerbino's glaive Would easily have turned against her breast, Ill keeping the command her lover gave; But that a hermit, from his neighboring rest, Accustomed oft to seek the fountain-wave, His flagon at the cooling stream to fill, Opposed him to the damsel's evil will.

The reverend father, who with natural sense Abundant goodness happily combined, And, with ensamples fraught and eloquence, Was full of charity towards mankind, With efficacious reasons her did fence, And to endurance Isabel inclined; Placing, from ancient Testament and new, Women, as in a mirror, for her view.

The holy man next made the damsel see, That save in G.o.d there was no true content, And proved all other hope was transitory, Fleeting, of little worth, and quickly spent; And urged withal so earnestly his plea, He changed her ill and obstinate intent; And made her, for the rest of life, desire To live devoted to her heavenly sire.

Not that she would her mighty love forbear For her dead lord, nor yet his relics slight; These, did she halt or journey, everywhere Would Isabel have with her, day and night.

The hermit therefore seconding her care, Who, for his age, was sound and full of might, They on his mournful horse Zerbino placed, And traversed many a day that woodland waste.

He thought to bear her to Provence, where, near The city of Ma.r.s.eilles, a borough stood, Which had a sumptuous monastery; here Of ladies was a holy sisterhood.

_Rose's Translation, Canto XXIV_.

THE LUSIAD.

"The discovery of Mozambique, of Melinda, and of Calcutta has been sung by Camoens, whose poem has something of the charm of the Odyssey and of the magnificence of the Aeneid."

MONTESQUIEU.

The Portuguese epic, the Lusiad, so-called from Lusitania, the Latin name for Portugal, was written by Luis de Camoens.

He was born in Lisbon in 1524, lost his father by s.h.i.+pwreck in infancy, and was educated by his mother at the University of Coimbra. On leaving the university he appeared at court, where his graces of person and mind soon rendered him a favorite. Here a love affair with the Donna Catarina de Atayde, whom the king also loved, caused his banishment to Santarem. At this place he began the Lusiad, and continued it on the expedition against the Moors in Africa sent out by John III., an expedition on which he displayed much valor and lost an eye. He was recalled to court, but jealousies soon drove him thence to India, whither he sailed in 1553, exclaiming, "Ungrateful country, thou shall not possess my bones." In India his bravery and accomplishments won him friends, but his imprudences soon caused his exile to China, where he acc.u.mulated a small fortune and finished his poem. Happier circ.u.mstances permitted him to return to Goa; but on the way the s.h.i.+p laden with his fortune sank, and he escaped, saving only his poem. After sixteen years of misfortune abroad, Camoens returned to Lisbon in 1569. The pestilence that was then raging delayed the publication of the Lusiad until 1572. The poem received little attention; a small pension was bestowed on the poet, but was soon withdrawn, and the unfortunate Camoens was left to die in an almshouse. On his death-bed he deplored the impending fate of his country, which he alone could see. "I have loved my country. I have returned not only to die on her bosom, but to die with her."

The Lusiad tells the story of the voyage of Vasco da Gama. The sailors of Prince Henry of Portugal, commander of the Portuguese forces in Africa, had pa.s.sed Cape Nam and discovered the Cape of Storms, which the prince renamed the Cape of Good Hope. His successor Emmanuel, determined to carry out the work of his predecessor by sending out da Gama to undertake the discovery of the southern pa.s.sage to India. The Portuguese were generally hostile to the undertaking, but da Gama, his brother, and his friend Coello gathered a company, part of which consisted of malefactors whose sentence of death was reversed on condition that they undertake the voyage, and reached India.

The Lusiad is divided into ten cantos, containing one thousand one hundred and two stanzas. Its metre is the heroic iambic, in rhymed octave stanzas.

The Lusiad is marred by its mythological allusions in imitation of Homer and Virgil, but these are forgotten when the poet sings in impa.s.sioned strains of his country's past glory.

The Lusiad is simple in style; its subject is prosaic; it is a constant wonder that out of such unpromising materials Camoens could construct a poem of such interest. He could not have done so had he not been so great a poet, so impa.s.sioned a patriot.