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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
GASPARO BANDOLLO, by JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Poet's Biography First Line: Once-twice-the stunning musquetry Last Line: But as pure childhood on god's bosom | |||
AN ANECDOTE OF THE SOUTH OF ITALY. (1820.) I. Once-twice-the stunning musquetry Peals echoing down the dark ravine. Sevrini's blood wells forth like wine. Weak-footsore-faint as faint may be, And powerless to resist or flee, He drags him to a peasant's hovel. "Ha! Giambattista!-thou, good boy? One short hour's shelter! I can grovel Unseen beneath yon scattered sheaves. So!-there! Departing Daylight leaves This nook dark; and, methinks, the spot Is safe if thou betray me not. Let me but baffle those base hounds! If mine plead not, Italia's wounds May-that Italia they destroy!" #NAME? Around his limbs the light loose litter, With one deep groan-O God, how bitter!- Given to the lost land of his fathers. II. Hark! his pursuers follow after- On by the bloody track they follow. Rings their fierce yell of demon laughter Upon the winds, adown the hollow. Rings loud exulting yell on yell. -"By Heaven!-See!-here the miscreant fell And rose again!-and, if these black Leaves mock us not, here fails the track! Ha, so!-a hut! The hunted rebel Hath earthed him here. Now, comrades, treble Your care! A thousand gold zecchini Are on the head, alive or dead, Of the outlaw, Vascol³ Sevrini!" III. Half loth alike to leave or linger, In burst the slaves of Alien Law.- O! ruefullest of sights to see! Mute stands yon trembler, but his finger Points to the blood-bedabbled straw, That blushes for his perfidy. Ill-starred Sevrini, woe for thee! God be thy stay, thou Doomed One, thou! Strong hands and many are on thee now; Through the long gorge of that steep valley They drag thee up Mount Bruno's brow, And thy best bravery little skills! O! stood'st thou on Calabria's hills, With nought beside thine own good sword, With nothing save the soul that slumbers Within thee now, to quell this horde!- But, bleeding-bound-o'erborne by numbers, Thy day is by to strike and rally! Thou fallest by the hands of cravens Rock-hardened against all remorse; And Morn's red rays shall see the ravens Fleshing their foul beaks in thy corse! IV. But Heaven and Earth are hushed once more. Young Giambattista's eyes are bent In fearful glances on the floor. But little weeneth he or weeteth Of the deep cry his land repeateth In million tones of one lament. Nought pondereth he of wars of yore, Of battling Ghibelline and Guelph, And bootless fights and trampled lands, And Gallic swords and Teuton chains, His eye but marks yon dark-red stains. Those red stains now burn on himself, And in his heart, and on his hands! V. But sky and sea once more are still; The duskier shades of Eventide Are gathering round Mount Bruno's hill. The boy starts up, as from a dream; He hears a low, quick sound outside. Was it the running valley-stream? No! 'twas his father's foot that trod. Alas, poor nerveless youth! denied The kindling blood that fires thy race, Dost thou not weep, and pray thy God That Earth might ope its depths, and hide Thee from that outraged father's face? VI. The eye is dark, the cheek is hollow, To-night of Gaspar³ Bandollo, And his high brow shows worn and pale. Slight signs all of the inward strife- Of the soul's lightning, swift to strike And sure to slay, but flashing never! For Man and Earth and Heaven alike Seem for him voiceful of a tale That robs him of all rest for ever, And leaves his own right hand to sever The last link binding him to Life! Calm even to marble, stern and sad, He eyes the spots of tell-tale hue, Then, turning to the cowering lad, With stirless lips but asks him, "Who?" VII. "Oh, father!" cried the boy-then, wild With terror of some dreadful doom, He gasped for breath.-"Speak, wretched child! Who sought my asylum, and from whom?" -"O God! Sevrini!"-"From-" "The Sbirri." "The fugitive was wounded, weary?"- -"O, father! I-this dreary room-" -"And thou betrayedst him?"-"O Heaven!"- -"And thou betrayedst him?"-"I-only-" -"And thou betrayedst him?" "O! hear me, My father! I watch here so lonely All day, and feel, oh! so bereaven, With not a sight or sound to cheer me! My mind-my-But, I only pointed- I spake not!"-And, with such disjointed And feeble phrases, the poor youth, Powerless to gloss the ghastly truth, Sank on his knees with shrieks and tears Before the author of his years. #NAME? Were hidden as beneath a pall. He merely turned him to the wall, And, with closed eyes, took down his rifle. VIII. "Go forth, boy!"-"Father! father!-spare"- -"Go forth, boy! So! Now kneel in prayer!" -"My God!-my father!"-"Ay, boy, right! Hast now none other!"-There is light Enough still for a deed of blood. Stern man, whose sense of nationhood So vanquishes thy love paternal, And wilt thou, then, pollute this vernal And virgin sod with gore even now, And a son's gore? What answerest thou? -"Kneel down!" Ay! he will kneel-and fall, Will kneel, and fall to rise no more; But not by thee shall thus be sped The spirit of yon trembling thrall! Didst thou dream nought of this before? Fate slayeth him. Thy child is dead. IX. The child is dead of old Bandollo, And he, the sire, hath scarce to follow His offspring to the last dark barrow, So much hath Grief's long-rankling arrow Forestalled for him that doom of Death Which takes from Suffering nought save breath- A grief that speaks, albeit untold, And lives, where all seems dead and cold, And finds no refuge in the Past, And sees the Future overcast With broader gloom than even the Present. Better that thou, unhappy peasant, Hadst died in youth and made no sign, Nor dreamt Life's Day must have an Even. Better thy child's lot had been thine- The best lot after all! for Heaven Most careth for such weakling souls.- Onwards in power the wide flood rolls Whose thunder-waves wake evermore The caverned soul of each far shore, But when the midnight storm-wind sweeps In wrath above its broken deeps, What heart but ponders darkly over The myriad wrecks those waters cover! It is the lonely brook alone That winds its way with Music's tone By orange bower and lily-blossom, And sinks into the Parent Wave, Not as worn Age into its grave, But as pure Childhood on God's bosom. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest... |
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