Classic Poem

II

They sadly traveild thus, untill they came
Nigh to a castle builded strong and hye:
Then cryde the dwarfe, ‘Lo! yonder is the same,
In which my lord, my liege, doth lucklesse ly,
Thrall to that gyaunts hatefull tyranny:
Therefore, deare sir, your mightie powres assay,
The noble knight alighted by and by
From loftie steed, and badd the ladie stay,
To see what end of fight should him befall that day.
III

So with the squire, th' admirer of his might,
He marched forth towardes that castle wall;
Whose gates he fownd fast shutt, ne living-wight
To warde the same, nor answere commers call
Then tooke that squire an horne of bugle small,
Which hong adowne his side in twisted gold
And tasselles gay. Wyde wonders over all
Of that same hornes great vertues weren told,
Which had approved bene in uses manifold.
IV

Was never wight that heard that shrilling sownd,
But trembling feare did feel in every vaine
Three miles it might be easy heard arownd,
And ecchoes three aunswerd it selfe againe
No false enchauntment, nor deceiptfull traine
Might once abide the terror of that blast,
But presently was void and wholly vaine:
No gate so strong, no locke so firme and fast,
But with that percing noise flew open quite, or brast
V

The same before the geaunts gate he blew,
That all the castle quaked from the grownd,
And every dore of freewill open flew:
The gyaunt selfe dismaied with that sownd,
Where he with his Duessa dalliaunce fownd,
In hast came rushing forth from inner bowre,
With staring countenance sterne, as one astownd,
And staggering steps, to weet what suddein stowre
Had wrought that horror strange, and dar'd his dreaded powre
VI

And after him the proud Duessa came,
High mounted on her many headed beast;
And every head with fyrie tongue did flame,
And every head was crowned on his creast,
And bloody mouthed with late cruell feast
That when the knight beheld, his mightie shild
Upon his manly arme he soone addrest,
And at him fiersly flew, with corage fild,
And eger greedinesse through every member thrild.
VII

There with the gyant buckled him to fight,
Inflamd with scornefull wrath and high disdaine,
And lifting up his dreadfull club on hight,
All armd with ragged snubbes and knottie graine,
Him thought at first encounter to have slaine.
But wise and wary was that noble pere,
And lightly leaping from so monstrous maine,
Did fayre avoide the violence him nere;
It booted nought to thinke such thunderbolts to beare.
VIII

Ne shame he thought to shonne so hideous might.
The ydle stroke, enforcing furious way,
Missing the marke of his misaymed sight,
Did fall to ground, and with his heavy sway
So deepely dinted in the driven clay,
That three yardes deepe a furrow up did throw:
The sad earth, wounded with so sore assay,
Did grone full grievous underneath the blow,
And trembling with strange feare, did like an erthquake show
IX

As when almightie Joye, in wrathfull mood,
To wreake the guilt of mortall sins is bent,
Hurles forth his thundring dart with deadly food,
Enrold in flames, and smouldring dreriment,
Through riven cloudes and molten firmament;
The fiers threeforked engin, making way,
Both loftie towres and highest trees hath rent,
And all that might his angry passage stay,
And shooting in the earth, castes up a mount of clay.
X

His boystrous club, so buried in the grownd,
He could not rearen up againe so light,
But that the knight him at advantage fownd,
And whiles he strove his combred clubbe to quight
Out of the earth, with blade all burning bright
He smott of his left arme, which like a block
Did fall to ground, depriv'd of native might:
Large streames of blood out of the truncked stock
Forth gushed, like fresh water streame from riven rocke.
XI

Dismayed with so desperate deadly wound,
And eke impatient of unwonted payne,
He lowdly brayd with beastly yelling sownd,
That all the fieldes rebellowed againe:
As great a noyse, as when in Cymbrian plaine
An heard of bulles, whom kindly rage doth sting,
Doe for the milky mothers want complaine,
And fill the fieldes with troublous bellowing:
The neighbor woods arownd with hollow murmur ring
XII

That when his deare Duessa heard, and saw
The evill stownd that daungerd her estate,
Unto his aide she hastily did draw
Her dreadfull beast, who, swolne with blood of late
Came ramping forth with proud presumpteous gate,
And threatned all his heades like flaming brandes.
But him the squire made quickly to retrate,
Encountring fiers with single sword in hand,
And twixt him and his lord did like a bulwarke stand
XIII

The proud Duessa, full of wrathfull spight
And fiers disdaine, to be affronted so,
Enforst her purple beast with all her might,
That stop out of the way to overthroe,
Scorning the let of so unequall foe:
But nathemore would that corageous swayne
To her yeeld passage, gainst his lord to goe,
But with outrageous strokes did him restraine,
And with his body bard the way atwixt them twaine.
XIV

Then tooke the angrie witch her golden cup,
Which still she bore, replete with magick artes;
Death and despeyre did many thereof sup,
And secret poyson through their inner partes,
Th' eternall bale of heavie wounded harts;
Which, after charmes and some enchauntments said,
She lightly sprinkled on his weaker partes;
Therewith his sturdie corage soone was quayd,
And all his sences were with suddein dread dismayd.
XV

So downe he fell before the cruell beast,
Who on his neck his bloody clawes did seize,
That life nigh crusht out of his panting brest:
No powre he had to stirre, nor will to rize,
That when the carefull knight gan well avise,
He lightly left the foe with whom he fought,
And to the beast gan turne his enterprise;
For wondrous anguish in his hart it wrought,
To see his loved squyre into such thraldom brought.
XVI

And high advauncing his blood-thirstie blade,
Stroke one of those deformed heades so sore,
That of his puissaunce proud ensample made;
His monstrous scalpe downe to his teeth it tore,
And that misformed shape misshaped more:
A sea of blood gusht from the gaping wownd,
That her gay garments staynd with filthy gore,
And overflowed all the field arownd;
That over shoes in blood he waded on the grownd.
XVII

Thereat he rored for exceeding paine,
That, to have heard, great horror would have bred,
And scourging th' emptie ayre with his long trayne,
Through great impatience of his grieved hed,
His gorgeous ryder from her loftie sted
Would have cast downe, and trodd in durty myre,
Had not the gyaunt soone her succoured;
Who, all enrag'd with smart and frantick yre,
Came hurtling in full fiers, and forst the knight retyre.
XVIII

The force, which wont in two to be disperst,
In one alone left hand he now unites,
Which is through rage more strong then both were erst;
With which his hideous club aloft he dites,
And at his foe with furious rigor smites,
That strongest oake might seeme to overthrow:
The stroke upon his shield so heavie lites,
That to the ground it doubleth him full low:
What mortall wight could ever beare so monstrous blow?
XIX

And in his fall his shield, that covered was,
Did loose his vele by chaunce, and open flew:
The light whereof, that hevens light did pas,
Such blazing brightnesse through the ayer threw,
That eye mote not the same endure to vew.
Which when the gyaunt spyde with staring eye,
He downe let fall his arme, and soft withdrew
His weapon huge, that heaved was on hye,
For to have slain the man, that on the ground did lye.
XX

And eke the fruitfull-headed beast, amazd
At flashing beames of that sunshiny shield,
Became stark blind, and all his sences dazd,
That downe he tumbled on the durtie field,
And seemd himselfe as conquered to yield
Whom when his maistresse proud perceiv'd to fall,
Whiles yet his feeble feet for faintnesse reeld,
Unto the gyaunt lowdly she gan call,
‘O helpe, Orgoglio, helpe! or els we perish all’
XXI

At her so pitteous cry was much amoov'd
Her champion stout, and for to ayde his frend,
Againe his wonted angry weapon proov'd:
But all in vaine: for he has redd his end
In that bright shield, and all his forces spend
Them selves in vaine: for since that glauncing sight,
He hath no poure to hurt, nor to defend;
As where th' Almighties lightning brond does light,
It dimmes the dazed eyen, and daunts the sences quight
XXII

Whom when the Prince, to batteill new addrest
And threatning high his dreadfull stroke, did see,
His sparkling blade about his head he blest,
And smote off quite his right leg by the knee,
That downe he tombled; as an aged tree,
High growing on the top of rocky clift,
Whose hartstrings with keene steele nigh hewen be;
The mightie trunck halfe rent, with ragged rift
Doth roll adowne the rocks, and fall with fearefull drift
XXIII

Or as a castle, reared high and round,
By subtile engins and malitious slight
Is undermined from the lowest ground,
And her foundation forst, and feebled quight,
At last downe falles, and with her heaped hight
Her hastie ruine does more heavie make,
And yields it selfe unto the victours might;
Such was this gyaunts fall, that seemd to shake
The stedfast globe of earth, as it for feare did quake.
XXIV

The knight then, lightly leaping to the pray,
With mortall steele him smot againe so sore,
That headlesse his unweldy bodie lay,
All wallowd in his owne fowle bloody gore,
Which flowed from his wounds in wondrous store.
But soone as breath out of his brest did pas,
That huge great body, which the gyaunt bore,
Was vanisht quite, and of that monstrous mas
Was nothing left, but like an emptie blader was:
XXV

Whose grievous fall when false Duessa spyde,
Her golden cup she cast unto the ground,
And crowned mitre rudely threw asyde;
Such percing griefe her stubborne hart did wound,
That she could not endure that dolefull stound,
But leaving all behind her, fled away:
The light-foot squyre her quickly turnd around,
And by hard meanes enforcing her to stay,
So brought unto his lord, as his deserved pray.