No More Learning

Much grieve I that thou should'st too honoured be
By the executioner who deals the blow;
Should'st die a death too easy: since I wot,
For thee too shameful hand or pain is not.

LXXII
" `In seeing this thy death, it gives me pain,
My sacrifice should be completed ill;
For could I do by thee as I were fain,
Nothing should lack that purpose to fulfill.
May my sweet consort not the work disdain,
And for the imperfect deed accept the will!
That, without power to compass what I would,
I have been fain to slay thee as I could!

LXXIII
" `And that deserved punishment, which I
Cannot, as I desire, on thee bestow,
I hope thy soul shall have; hope to be nigh,
To see thee suffer, in the realms of woe. '
Her turbid eyes then raising to the sky,
With joyous face all over in a glow,
(She cried) `Olindro, take this victim's life,
With the good will of thine avenging wife;

LXXIV
" `And of our lord for me the grace obtain,
To be this day in paradise with thee,
If he reply, none cometh to your reign,
Without desert; say such I bring with me,
Who this fell impious monster, in his fane,
Offer, as my first-fruits; and what can be
A greater merit than to have supprest
Such loathsome and abominable pest? '

LXXV
"Her life, together with her speech, was spent;
And, even dead, her face appeared to glow
With joy, at having dealt such punishment
To him, that laid her cherished husband low.
If fierce Tanacro's spirit did prevent,
Of follow hers, I wiss not; but, I trow,
Prevented, for on him that venom rank
Yet faster wrought, because he deeper drank.

LXXVI
"Marganor, who beheld his only son
Fall and expire, his outstretched arms between,
Well nigh had with Tanacro died, o'erthrown
By that so sudden grief and unforeseen.
Two sons he had, and now was left alone;
Brought to that pass he by two wives had been;
This was the cause one spent his vital breath
With her own hand, that dealt the other death.

LXXVII
"Love, pity, sorrow, anger, and desire
Of death and vengeance, all together rend
And rack the childless and unhappy sire,
Who groans like sea, when wind and waves contend:
Towards the dame, with vengeful thoughts afire,
He goes, but sees that life is at an end;
And, goaded by his rage and hatred hot,
Seeks to offend her corse that feels it not.

LXXVIII
"As serpent, by the pointed spear pinned down,
Fixes his teeth in it, with fruitless spire;
Or as the mastiff runs towards a stone,
Which has been flung by some wayfaring wight,
And gnaws it in his rage, nor will be gone
Until he venge himself; 'tis so the knight,
Than any mastiff, any serpent, worse
Offends Drusilla's cold and lifeless corse.

LXXIX
"And, for he venteth not, nor slakes his mood,
By foul abuse upon the carcase done,
Among the women, a large multitude,
He springs, and there shows mercy unto none.
Mown are we with his impious sword, as strewed
Is grass with scythe, when dried by summer sun.
There is no 'scape; for straightways of our train
Are full a hundred maimed, and thirty slain.
LXXX
"He of his vassals is so held in dread,
There is no man who dares to lift his eyes:
The women with the meaner sort are fled,
And whosoever can, the temple flies.
His friends against the furious fit make head,
At last, with kind constraint and suppliant cries;
And, leaving every thing in tears below,
Him in his castle on the rock bestow.

LXXXI
"His wrath enduring still, to send away
The wretch determines all the female band:
In that, his will us utterly to slay
His people and his friends, with prayer, withstand;
And he bids punish, on that very day,
An order for us all to leave his land;
Placed such his pleasures on these confines: woe
To them that nearer to his castle go!

LXXXII
"Thus husbands from their wives divided are,
Mothers from sons: if hither to resort,
Despite that order, any one should dare,
Let none know this, who might the deed report!
For sorely mulcted for the transgression were
Many, and many slain in cruel sort.
A statute for his town next made the peer:
Of fouler law we neither read nor hear.

LXXXIII
"It wills, all women found within the vale,
(For thither even yet will some descend,)
His men with rods shall on the shoulders whale,
And into exile from those countries send;
But first their gowns shall clip, and parts unveil
That decency and natural shame offend;
And if with escort of an armed knight
Any wend thither, they are slain outright.

LXXXIV
"Those that an armed warrior's escort have,
By this ill man, to piety a foe,
Are dragged as victims to his children's grave,
Where his own hand inflicts the murderous blow.
Stript ignominiously of armour, glaive,
And steed, their champions to his prisons go;
And this can he compel; for, night and day,
A thousand men the tyrant's hest obey.

LXXXV
"And I will add, moreover, 'tis his will,
Does he free any one, he first shall swear
Upon the holy wafer, that he still
To woman, while he lives, will hatred bear.
If then these ladies and yourself to spill
Seem good to you, to yonder walls repair;
And put to proof withal, if prowess more
Or cruelty prevails in Marganor. "

LXXXVI
So saying, in those maids of martial might
First she such pity moved and then disdain,
That they (had it been day instead of night)
Would then have gone against that castellain.
There rest the troop; and when Aurora's light
Serves as a signal to the starry train,
That they should all before the sun recede,
They don the cuirass and remount the steed:

LXXXVII
And now, in act to go, that company
Behind them hear the stony road resound
With a long trample, when those warlike three
Look down the vale and roll their eyes around;
And they from thence, a stone's-throw distant, see
A troop, which through a narrow pathway wound:
A score they are perhaps in number, who
On horseback, or on foot, their way pursue.

LXXXVIII
They with them on a horse a woman haul,
(Whom stricken sore in years her visage shows,)
In guise wherein some doleful criminal
Condemned to gallows, fire, or prison goes;
Who, notwithstanding that wide interval,
Is by her features known, as well as clothes:
They of the village, mid the cavalcade,
Know her for fair Drusilla's chamber maid.

LXXXIX
The chamber wench, made prisoner with his prize,
By the rapacious stripling, as I shewed,
Who being trusted with that ill emprize,
The poisoned draught of foul effect had brewed.
From the others she and those solemnites
Had kept away, suspecting what ensued:
Yea, this while, from that lordship had she fled,
Where she in safety hoped to hide her head.