No More Learning

Since in that quarrel they are nought to blame.
Those err, nor know the usage, why by pact
Deem they were bound their horses not to maim:
Without pact made, 'twas reckoned a misdeed,
And an eternal blot to smite a steed.

LI
They level at the vizor, which is double,
And yet resists such mighty blows with pain.
The champions evermore their strokes redouble
Faster than pattering hail, which mars the grain,
And bruises branch and leaf, and stalk and stubble,
And cheats the hopes of the expecting swain.
To you is known the force of either brand,
And known the force of either warrior's hand.

LII
But yet no stroke well worthy of their might
Those peers have dealt, so cautious are the twain.
The Tartar's faulchion was the first to bite,
By which was good Rogero well nigh slain.
By one of those fell blows which either knight
So well could plant, his shield was cleft in twain;
Beneath, his cuirass opened to the stroke,
And to the quick the cruel weapon broke.

LIII
The assistants' hearts were frozen at the blow,
So did Rogero's danger them appal,
On whom the many's favor, well they know,
And wishes rest, if not of one and all.
And then (had Fortune ordered matters so,
As the most part desired they should befall)
Taken had been the Tartar king or slain;
So had that blow offended all the train.

LIV
I think that blow was by some angel stayed,
To save Rogero from the mischief near:
Yet at the king (nor answer he delayed)
He dealt a stroke more terrible than e'er.
As Mandricardo's head he aims his blade,
But such the fury of the cavalier,
And such his haste, he less my blame deserves,
If slanting from the mark his faulchion swerves.

LV
Had Balisarda smote him full, though crowned
With Hector's helm, the enchantment had been vain.
So reels the Tartar, by that stroke astound,
He from the bristle-hand lets go the rein:
Thrice with his head he threats to smite the ground,
While his unguided courser scowers the plain;
That Brigliadoro, whom by name you know,
Yet, for his change of master, full of woe.

LVI
Never raged trampled serpent, never so
Raged wounded lion, as in fell despite
Raged Mandricardo, rallying from that blow,
Which had deprived of sense the astonied knight;
And as his pride and fury waxes, grow
As much, yea more, his valour and his might.
He at Rogero makes his courser vault,
With sword uplifted high for the assault.

LVII
Poised in his stirrups stood the Tartar lord,
And aiming at his foeman's casque, believed
He with the stroke of his descending sword
Rogero to the bosom should have cleaved;
But from that youth, yet quicker in his ward,
A wound beneath his arm the king received,
Which made wide daylight in the stubborn mail,
That clothed the better armpit with its scale.

LVIII
Rogero drawing Balisarda back,
Out sprang the tepid blood of crimson stain;
Hence Mandricardo's arm did vigour lack,
And with less dint descended Durindane:
Yet on the croup the stripling tumbled back,
Closing his eyelids, through excess of pain;
And memorable aye had been that blow,
Had a worse helmet clothed the warrior's brow.

LIX
For this he pauses not, but spurs amain,
And Mandricardo smites in the right side.
Here little boots the texture of the chain,
And the well wealded metal's temper tried,
Against that sword, which never falls in vain,
Which was enchanted to no end beside,
But that against it nothing should avail,
Enchanted corselet or enchanted mail.

LX
Whate'er that sword takes-in it shears outright,
And in the Tartar's side inflicts a wound:
He curses Heaven and raves in such despite,
Less horribly the boisterous billows sound.
He now prepares to put forth all his might:
The shield, with argent bird and azure ground,
He hurls, with rage transported, from his hand,
And grasps with right and left his trenchant brand.

LXI
"Marry," (Rogero cried,) "it needs no more
To prove your title to that ensign vain,
Which now you cast away, and cleft before;
Nor can you more your right in it maintain. "
So saying, he parforce must prove how sore
The danger and the dint of Durindane;
Which smites his front, and with such weight withal,
A mountain lighter than that sword would fall.

LXII
If cleft his vizor through the midst; 'twas well
That from the sight diverged the trenchant blade,
Which on the saddle's plated pommel fell;
Nor yet its double steel the faulchion stayed:
It reached his armour (like soft wax, the shell
Oped, and the skirts wherewith 'twas overlaid)
And trenched upon his thigh a grievous wound;
So that 'twas long ere he again waxed sound.

LXIII
The spouting blood of either cavalier
Their arms had crimsoned in a double drain:
Hence diversly the people guessed, which peer
Would have the better of the warlike twain:
But soon Rogero made the matter clear
With that keen sword, so many a champion's bane:
With this he at that part in fury past
Whence Mandricardo had his buckler cast.

LXIV
He the left side of his good cuirass gored,
And found a passage to the heart below;
Which a full palm above the flank he bored;
So that parforce the Tartar must forego
His every title to the famous sword,
The blazoned buckler, and its bird of snow,
And yield, together with these seeds of strife,
-- Dearer than sword and shield -- his precious life.

LXV
Not unavenged the unhappy monarch dies;
For in the very moment he is smit,
The sword -- for little period his -- he plies,
And good Rogero's vizor would have split.
But that he stopt the stroke in wary wise,
And broke its force and vigour ere it lit;
Its force and vigour broke: for he, below
The better arm, first smote his Tartar foe.

LXVI
Smit was the Child by Mandricardo's hand,
At the same moment he that monarch slew:
He, albeit thick, divides an iron band
And good steel cap beneath it; inches two,
Lies buried in the head the trenchant brand,
The solid bone and sinew severed through.
Astound Rogero fell, on earth reversed,
And from his head a stream of life-blood burst.