FullReads

In the chair of state sat erect Dame Ruth;
She had cast aside her embroidery;
She had been a beauty, they say, in her youth,
There was much fierce fire in her bold black eye.
“Am I deceived in you both?” quoth she.
“If one spark of her father’s spirit lives
In this girl here–so, this Leigh, Ralph Leigh,
Let us hear what counsel the springald gives.”
Then I stammer’d, somewhat taken aback–
(Simon, you ale-swiller, pass the “jack”).

The dame wax’d hotter–“Speak out, lad, say,
Must we fall in that canting caitiff’s power?
Shall we yield to a knave and a turncoat? Nay,
I had liever leap from our topmost tower.
For a while we can surely await relief;
Our walls are high and our doors are strong.”
This Kerr was indeed a canting thief–
I know not rightly, some private wrong
He had done Sir Hugh, but I know this much,
Traitor or turncoat, he suffer’d as such.

Quoth Miles–“Enough! your will shall be done;
Relief may arrive by the merest chance,
But your house ere dusk will be lost and won;
They have got three pieces of ordnance.”
Then I cried, “Lord Guy, with four troops of horse,
Even now is biding at Westbrooke town;
If a rider could break through the rebel force,
He would bring relief ere the sun goes down;
Through the postern door could I make one dart,
I could baffle them all upon Britomarte.”

Miles mutter’d “Madness!” Dame Ruth look’d grave,
Said, “True, though we cannot keep one hour
The courtyard, no, nor the stables save,
They will have to batter piecemeal the tower,
And thus—-” But suddenly she halted there.
With a shining hand on my shoulder laid
Stood Gwendoline. She had left her chair,
And, “Nay, if it needs must be done,” she said,
“Ralph Leigh will gladly do it, I ween,
For the glory of God and of Gwendoline.”

I had undertaken a heavier task
For a lighter word. I saddled with care,
Nor cumber’d myself with corselet nor casque
(Being loth to burden the brave brown mare).
Young Clare kept watch on the wall–he cried,
“Now, haste, Ralph! this is the time to seize;
The rebels are round us on every side,
But here they straggle by twos and threes.”
Then out I led her, and up I sprung,
And the postern door on its hinges swung.

I had drawn this sword–you may draw it and feel,
For this is the blade that I bore that day–
There’s a notch even now on the long grey steel,
A nick that has never been rasp’d away.
I bow’d my head and I buried my spurs,
One bound brought the gliding green beneath;
I could tell by her back-flung, flatten’d ears,
She had fairly taken the bit in her teeth–
(What, Jack, have you drain’d your namesake dry,
Left nothing to quench the thirst of a fly?)

These things are done, and are done with, lad,
In far less time than your talker tells;
The sward with their hoof-strokes shook like mad,
And rang with their carbines and petronels;
And they shouted, “Cross him and cut him off,”
“Surround him,” “Seize him,” “Capture the clown,
Or kill him,” “Shall he escape to scoff
In your faces?” “Shoot him or cut him down.”
And their bullets whistled on every side;
Many were near us and more were wide.

Not a bullet told upon Britomarte;
Suddenly snorting, she launched along;
So the osprey dives where the seagulls dart,
So the falcon swoops where the kestrels throng.
And full in my front one pistol flash’d,
And right in my path their sergeant got.
How are jack-boots jarr’d, how are stirrups clash’d,
While the mare like a meteor past him shot;
But I clove his skull with a backstroke clean,
For the glory of God and of Gwendoline.