Classic Poem

Canto the Third

The brave Argalia, who designed to raise
Through all approaching ills his weighty fate,
In smooth compliance that harsh guard obeys,
Who toward his death did prosecute their hate:

To death, which here unluckily had stained,
Maugre his friends, the ill-directed sword
Of justice, had not secret love obtained
More mercy than the strict laws dare afford.

Low in a fruitful pasture, where his flocks
Cloud with their breath those plains, whose leafy locks
Could hardly shadow them — those meadows need
No shearing — where in untold droves did feed
His bellowing herds, of which enough did come
Each day to's yoak to serve a hecatomb,
Lay old Andremon's country farm: in which,
Happy till now, being made by fortune rich,
And goodness honest; from domestic strife
Still calm and free; the upper robes of life,
Till withered, he had worn; to ease whose sad
And sullen cares less bounteous nature had
Lent him no numerous issue — all he 'd won
By prayer, confined unto his murthered son.
The blasted blossom of whose tender age,
When blooming first, taught hope how to presage
Those future virtues, which, interpreted
By action, had such fruitful branches spread,
That all indulgent parents wished to be
Immortalized in blest posterity,
Had seen in him; who, innocently good,
Still let his heart by 's tongue be understood,
In such a sacred dialect, that all
Which verged within deliberate thought did fall,
Towards heaven was graced, and in descent did prove
To 's parents duty, and to 's neighbours love.
This hopeful youth, their age's chief support,
Whose absence, though by 's own desires made short,
Their love thought tedious, having now expired
His usual hours, the aged couple tired
With expectation, to anticipate
His slow appearance to their mansion's gate,
Had softly walked where coolly shadowed by
An elm, which, planted at his birth, did vie
Age with his lord; whilst their desires pursue
Its first design, they with some pleasure view
Their busy servants, whose industrious pain
Sweats out diseases in pursuit of gain.
All which, although the chiefest pleasure that
Their thoughts contain — whose best are busied at
The mart o' the world, such small diversion lent
The aged pair, that his kind mother, spent
With a too long protracted hope, had let
E'en that expire, had not his father set
Props to that weakness, and, that mutual fear
Which filled their breasts, let his sound judgment clear,
By the proposing accidents that might,
Untouched, detain their darling from their sight.
But many minutes had not left their seals
On the records of time, ere truth reveals
Her horrid secrets. — A confused noise
First strikes their ears, which suddenly destroys
Its own imperfect embryoes, to transfer
Its object to that nearer messenger
O' the soul — the eyes, whose beamy scouts convey
A trembling fear into their souls, whilst they,
That bore their murthered son, arrived to tell
Their doleful message; which so fierce storm fell
Not long in those remoter drops, before,
Swelled to a deluge, the swift torrent bore
The bays of reason down, and in one flood
Drowned all their hopes. When purpled in his blood,
Yet pale with death — untimely death, she saw
Her hopeful son, grief violates the law
Of slower nature, and his mother's tears
In death congeals to marble: her swoln fears,
Grown for her sex a burthen far too great,
Had only left death for her dark retreat.
Although from grief's so violent effects,
Reason, conjoined with manly strength, protects
His wretched father, at that stroke his limbs
Slack their unwieldly nerves, faint sorrow dims
His eyes more than his age, his hands bereft
His hoary head of all that time had left
Unplucked before; nor had the expecting grave
Gaped longer for him, if they then had gave
His passion freedom — his own guilty hand
Had broke the glass, and shook that little sand
That yet remained into thin air, that so,
Unclogged with earth, his tortured ghost might go.
Beyond that orb of atoms that attend
Mortality; and at that journey's end
Meet theirs, soon as swift Destiny enrols
Those new-come guests within the sphere of souls.
By these sad symptoms of infectious grief,
Those best of friends that came for the relief
Of sorrow's captives, being by that surprised
They hoped to conquer, sadly sympathized
With him in woe, till the epidemic ill,
Stifling each voice, drest sorrow in a still
And dismal silence: in which sad aspect,
None needing robes or cypress to detect
A funeral march, each dolefully attends,
To death's dark mansion, their lamented friends.
Where, having now the earthy curtain drawn
O'er their cold bed, till doomsday's fatal dawn
Rally their dust, they leave them; and retire
To sorrow, which can ne'er hope to expire
In just revenge, since kept by fear in awe —
Where power offends, the poor scarce hope for law.
By sad example to confirm this truth —
From innocent and early hopes of youth
Led toward destruction; let's return to see
That noble stranger; whose captivity,
Like an unlucky accident, depends
On this sad subject. By the angry friends
Of those accused, which in that fatal strife
To death resigned the charter of their life,
He's brought unto the princess' palace; where
That age, (whose customs knew not how to bear
Such sails as these have filled with pride), was placed
The seat of justice; whose stern sword defaced
Not Pleasure's smoothest front, since now 'twas by
Her fair hand guided, whose commanding eye,
If armed with anger, seemed more dreadful then
The harshest law e'er made by wrathful men.
Here, strictly guarded, till the important crime,
Which urged her to anticipate the time
By custom known, had called her forth to that
Unwilling office, still unstartled at
The frowns of danger, did Argalia lie
An injured captive; till, commanded by
The stern reformers of offended law,
He hastes t' the bar; where come, though death ne'er saw
A brow more calm, or breast more confident,
To meet his darts, yet since the innocent
Are stained with guilt, when, in contempt of fate,
They silent fall, he means to meet their hate
With all that each beholder could expect
From dying valour, when it had to protect
An envied stranger, left no more defence
But what their hate obscures — his innocence.
The clamorous friends of Aphron, backed by those
Which knew his death the only mean to close
Almanzor's bleeding honor, to the fair
And pitiful Pharonnida repair,
With cries of vengeance; whose unwelcome sound
She by her father's strict command was bound
To hear, since that those rivulets of law,
Which from the sea of regal power did draw
Their several streams, all flowed to her, and in
That crystal fountain, pure as they had been
From heaven dispensed ere just Astraea fled
The earth, remained; yet such aversion bred
In her soft soul, that to these causes, where
The law sought blood, slowly as those that bear
The weight of guilt, she came; whose dark text she
Still comments on with noble charity.
High mounted on an ebon throne, on which
The embellished silver shewed so sadly rich,
As if its varied form strove to delight
Those solemn souls which death-pale fear did fright,
In Tyrian purple clad, the princess sate,
Between two sterner ministers of fate,
Impartial judges, whose distinguished tasks
Their varied habit to the view unmasks.
One, in whose looks, as pity strove to draw
Compassion in the tablets of the law,
Some softness dwelt, in a majestic vest
Of state-like red was clothed; the other, dressed
In dismal black, whose terrible aspect
Declared his office, served but to detect
Her slow consent, if, when the first forsook
The cause, the law so far as death did look.
Silence proclaimed, a harsh command calls forth
The undaunted prisoner, whose excelling worth,
In this low ebb of fortune, did appear
Such as we fancy virtues that come near
The excellence of angels — fear had not
Rifled one drop of blood, nor rage beg ot
More color in his cheeks — his soul in state —
Throned in the medium, constant virtue sat,
Not slighting, with the impious atheists, that
Loud storm of danger, but, safe anchored at
Religious hope, being firmly confident —
Heaven would relieve whom earth knew innocent.
All thus prepared, he hears his wrongful charge
(Envy disguising injured truth) at large,
Before the people, in such language read,
As checked their hopes in whom his worth had bred
Some seeds of pity; and to those, whose hate
Pursued him to this precipice of fate,
Dead Aphron's friends, such an advantage gave,
That Providence appeared too weak to save
One so assaulted: yet, though now depressed
E'en in opinion, which oft proves the best
Support to those whose public virtues we
Adore before their private guilt we see,
His noble soul still wings itself above
Passion's dark fogs; and like that prosperous dove,
The world's first pilot for discovery sent,
When all the floods that bound the firmament
O'erwhelmed the earth, Conscience' calm joys to increase,
Returns, fraught with the olive branch of peace.
Thus fortified from all that tyrant fear
E'er awed the guilty with, he doth appear
The court's just wonder in the brave defence
Of what, (though power, armed with the strong pretence
Of right, opposed), so prevalent had been,
T' have cleared him; if, when near triumphing in
Victorious truth, to cloud that glorious sun,
Some faithless swains, by large rewards being won
To spot their souls, had not, corrupted by
His foes, been brought, falsely to justify
Their accusations. Which beheld by him,
Whose knowledge now did hope's clear optics dim,
He ceased to plead; justly despairing then,
That innocence 'mongst mortals rested, when
Banished her own abode; so thinks it vain
To let truth's naked arms strive to maintain
The field 'gainst his more powerful foes. Not all
His virtues now protect him, he must fall
A guiltless sacrifice, to expiate
No other crime but their envenomed hate.
An ominous silence — such as oft precedes
The fatal sentence — whilst the accuser reads
His charge, possessed the pitying court, in which
Presaging calm Pharonnida, too rich
In mercy, Heaven's supreme prerogative,
To stifle tears, did with her passion strive
So long, till what at first assaulted in
Sorrow's black armour, had so often been
For pity cherished, that at length her eyes
Found there those spirits that did sympathize
With those that warmed her blood, and, unseen, move
That engine of the world, mysterious love,
The way that fate predestinated, when
'Twas first infused i' the embryo; it being then
That which espoused the active form unto
Matter, and from that passive being drew
Divine ideas; which, subsisting in
Harmonious Nature's highest sphere, do win,
In the perfection of our age, a more
Expansive power; and, nature's common store
Still to preserve, unites affections by
The mingled atoms of the serious eye.
Whilst Nature's priest, the cause of each effect,
Miscalled disease, endeavours to detect
Its unacquainted operations in
The beauteous princess, whose free soul had been
Yet guarded in her virgin ice, and now
A stranger is to what she doth allow
Such easy entrance; by those rays that fall
From either's eyes, to make reciprocal
Their yielding passions, brave Argalia felt,
E'en in the grasp of death, his functions melt
To flames, which on his heart an onset make
For sadness, such as weaker mortals take
Eternal farewells in. Yet in this high
Tide of his blood, in a soft calm to die,
His yielding spirits now prepare to meet
Death, clothed in thoughts white as his winding sheet.
That fatal doom, which unto heaven affords
The sole appeal, one of the assisting lords
Had now pronounced, whose horrid thunder could
Not strike his laurelled brow; that voice, which would
Have petrified a timorous soul, he hears
With calm attention. No disordered fears
Ruffled his fancy, nor domestic war
Raged in his breast; his every look, so far
From vulgar passions, that unless amazed
At Beauty's majesty, he sometimes gazed
Wildly on that as emblems of more great
Glories than earth afforded, from the seat
Of resolution his fixed soul had not
Been stirred to passion, which had now begot
Wonder, not fear, within him. No harsh frown
Contracts his brow, nor did his thoughts pull down
One fainting spirit, wrapt in smothered groans,
To clog his heart. From her most eminent thrones
Of sense, the eyes, the lightning of his soul
Flew with such vigor forth, it did control
All weaker passions, and at once include
With Roman valor Christian fortitude.
Pharonnida, from whom the rigid law
Extorts his fate, being now enforced to draw
The longest line she e'er could hope to move
Over his face, that beauteous sphere of love,
Unto its greatest obliquity, she leaves
Him, in his winter solstice, and bereaves
Love's hemisphere of light, not heat; yet, oft
Retreating, wished those stars, fate placed aloft
In the first magnitude of honor, might
Prove retrograde; so their contracted light
Might unto him part of their influence
In life bestow, passion would fain dispense
So far with reason, to recal again
The sentence she had past: but hope in vain
Those false suggestions moves. His jailors are
The undaunted prisoner hurrying from the bar,
His fair judge rising, the corrupted court
Upon removing, all the ruder sort
Of hearers rushing out, when, through the throng,
Kind Ariamnes (being detained so long
By strict employment) comes; at whose request
The court their seats resuming, he adrest
Himself t' the princess in a language that,
(Whilst all Argalia's foes were storming at),
E'en on her justice so prevails, that he
Reprieved till all hope could produce, to free
Her love's new care, might be examined by
His active friend; who now, being seated nigh
Pharonnida, whilst all attentive sat,
The stranger's story doth at large relate.
Pleased at this full relation, near as much
As grieved to see those jewels placed in such
A coarse cheap metal, which could never hold
The least proportion with her regal gold,
Pharonnida had now removed, if not
Thus once more stayed: — The rumor, first begot
From this sad truth, had, with the common haste
Of ill, arrived where his disease had placed
Aphron, whose ears assaulted now with words
Of more infection than that plague, affords
Room for the stronger passion: though offended,
To leave a hold it had at first intended
To keep till ruined, the imprisoned blood,
And spirits are unfettered, by that flood
To wash usurping grief from off that part
Where most she reigned; but they, drawn near the heart,
And finding enemies too strong to be
Encountered, mix in their society;
Which, thus supplied with auxiliaries, in
Contempt of weakness, (when he long had been
Languishing, underneath a tedious load
Of sickness), sends him from his safe abode,
'Mongst dangers which in death's black shape attend
His bold design, to seek his honored friend.
Come on the spur of passion to the court,
A flux of spirits from all parts resort
To prompt his anger, which abruptly broke
Forth in this language: — " Do not, sirs, provoke
A foreign power thus far — I speak to you
That have condemned this stranger — as to do
An act so opposite to all the law
Of nations, — here within your realm to draw
Blood that's so near allied unto the best
Of an adjacent state. If this request
Of mine too full of insolence appear,
We are spirits nobly born, and are near
Enough to have 't, whatever crime's the cause
Of this harsh sentence, tried by our own laws. " —
This bold opposer of stern justice (here
Pausing to see what clouds there did appear
In that fair heaven, whose influence only now
Could light to 's friend's declining stars allow),
To free the troubled court, which struggled in
A strange dilemma, had commanded been
To a more large discovery, if not by
His pitying friend, discharged in a reply,
Doubting how far irregular boldness had
Provoked just wrath. Argalia thus unclad
Amazement's dark disguise: — " To you that awe
This court (with that kneels to Pharonnida)
I now for mercy flee, that scorn to run.
From my own doom, so I might have begun
The doubtful task alone; but here to leave
My friend, from whom your justice did receive
This bold affront, in danger, is a crime
That not approaching death, which all my time
Too little for repentance calls, can be
A just excuse for; let me then set free
His person with your doubts, and join to those
What both their varied stories may compose. —
" For what this noble lord, whose goodness we
First found in needful hospitality,
From him hath differed in, impute it not
To either's error; both reports begot
From such mistakes, as nature made to be
The careful issues of necessity:
That fatal difference, whose vestigia stood,
When we Epirus left, fresh filled with blood,
By league so lately with Calabria made,
Being composed, that fame did not invade
Our ears with the report, till we had been
By a disguise secured; which, shaded in,
Whilst fearing danger, we ne'er thought to leave
Till safe at home. Thus, what did first deceive
Kind Aminander, you have heard; and now,
Without the stain of boasting, must allow
Me leave to tell you, that we there have friends,
On whom the burthen of a state depends. "
When, to the court's just wonder, thus far he,
With such unshaken confidence as we
Pray on the expanded wings of faith, displayed
His soul's integrity, the royal maid,
Whom a repented destiny had made
His pitying judge, endeavouring to evade
That doom's harsh rigor, grants him a reprieve,
Till thrice the sun, returning to relieve
Night's drooping sentinels, had circled in
So many days. In which short time, to win
The fair advantage of discovering truth,
Old Aminander, active as fresh youth
In all attempts of charity, to know
From what black spring those troubled streams did flow,
Hastes toward Andremon's; whilst Pharonnida,
Active as he toward all whence she might draw
A consequence of hope, lays speedy hold
On this design: — Commissioned to unfold
Their master's love toward her, there long had been
Ambassadors from the Epirot in
Her father's court; whose message, though it might
Wear love's pure robes, yet, in her reason's light,
Seems so much stained with policy, that all
Those blessings, which the wise foresaw to fall
As influence from that conjunction, she
Opposes as her stars' malignity.
Proud of this new command, with such a haste
As those that fear more slow delays may waste
Their precious time, the ambassadors attain
The princess' court; where come, though hoped in vain,
Only expect a speedy audience; they,
That frustrated, are soon taught to betray
More powerful passions: — the first glance o' the eye
They on the prisoners cast, kind sympathy
Proclaimed, — love gave no leave for time to rust
Their memories — both the old lords durst trust
Eyes dimmed with tears, whilst their embraces give
A sad assurance there did only live
Their last and best of comforts. Which beheld
By those from whom kind pity had expelled
All thoughts of the vindictive law, they strive
By all the power of rhetoric to drive
Those sad storms over; which good office done,
They each inform the prince, which was the son
Of nature, which adoption; withal tell how,
By their persuasions moved, they did allow
Them time to travel, which disasters had
So long protracted; for some years, with sad
And doubtful hopes, they had in vain expected
Their wished return, but that their stars directed
Their course so ill, as now near home to be
O'ertaken with so sad a destiny. —
Since such a sorrow could be cured by none,
They sadly crave the time to mourn alone.