No More Learning

LXXI
If the thief's head be severed by the pair,
He lights and staggers till he finds it; now
Uptaken by the nose or by the hair,
And fastened to the neck, I know not how.
This sometimes Gryphon takes, and whirled through air,
Whelms in the stream; but bootless is the throw:
For like a fish can fierce Orrilo swim;
And safely, with the head, regains the brim.

LXXII
Two ladies, meetly clad in fair array,
One damsel was in black and one in white,
And who had been the occasion of that fray,
Stood by to gaze upon the cruel fight:
Either of these was a benignant fay,
Whose care had nourished one and the other knight,
Oliver's children; when the babes forlorn
They from the claws of two huge birds had torn.

LXXIII
Since, from Gismonda they had these conveyed,
Borne to a distance from their native sky.
But more to say were needless, since displaid
To the whole world has been their history.
Though the author has the father's name mis-said;
One for another (how I know not, I)
Mistaking. Now this fearful strife the pair
Of warriors waged at both the ladies' prayer.

LXXIV
Though it was noon in the happy islands, day
Had vanished in this clime, displaced by night;
And, underneath the moon's uncertain ray,
And ill-discerned, were all things hid from sight;
When to the fort Orrilo took his way.
Since both the sable sister and the white
Were pleased the furious battle to defer,
Till a new sun should in the horizon stir.

LXXV
The duke, who by their ensigns, and yet more
Had by the sight of many a vigorous blow,
Gryphon and Aquilant long time before
Agnized, to greet the brethren was not slow:
And they, who in the peer, victorious o'er
The giant, whom he led a captive, know
The BARON OF THE PARD, (so styled at court)
Him to salute, with no less love resort.

LXXVI
The ladies to repose the warriors led
To a fair palace near, their sumptuous seat:
Thence issuing courtly squire and damsel sped,
Them with lit torches in mid-way to meet.
Their goodly steeds they quit, there well bested,
Put off their arms, and in a garden sweet
Discern the ready supper duly laid
Fast by, where a refreshing fountain played.

LXXVII
Here they bid bind the giant on the green,
Fast-tethered by a strong and weighty chain
To a tough oak, whose ancient trunk they ween
May well be proof against a single strain;
With that, by ten good serjeants overseen,
Lest he by night get loose, and so the train
Assault and haply harm; while careless they
Without a guard and unsuspecting lay.

LXXVIII
At the abundant and most sumptuous board,
With costly viands (its least pleasure) fraught,
The longest topic for discourse afford
Orrilo's prowess, and the marvel wrought;
For head or arm dissevered by the sword,
They (who upon the recent wonder thought)
Might think a dream to see him re-unite,
And but return more furious to the fight.

LXXIX
Astolpho in his book had found exprest
(That which prescribed a remedy for spell)
How he who of one hair deprived the pest
Only could him in battle hope to quell:
But this plucked out or sheared, he from his breast
Parforce the felon's spirit would expell.
So says the volume; but instructs not where,
'Mid locks so thickly set, to find the hair.

LXXX
The duke no less with hope of conquest glows
Than if the palm he has already won;
As he that hopes with small expense of blows
To pluck the hair, the wizard-wight undone.
Hence does he to the youthful pair propose
The burden of that enterprize upon
Himself to take: Orrilo will he slay,
If the two brethren nought the intent gainsay,

LXXXI
But willingly to him these yield the emprize,
Assured his toil will be bestowed in vain;
And now a new Aurora climbs the skies,
And from his walls Orrilo on the plain
Drops, -- and the strife begins -- Orrilo plies
The mace, the duke the sword; he 'mid a rain
Of strokes would from the body at one blow
Divorce the spirit of the enchanted foe:

LXXXII
Together with the mace he lops the fist;
And now this arm, now the other falls to ground;
Sometimes he cleaves the corslet's iron twist,
And piecemeal shares and maims the felon round.
Orrilo re-unites the portions missed,
Found on the champagne, and again is sound:
And, though into a hundred fragments hewed,
Astolpho sees him, in a thought, renewed.

LXXXIII
After a thousand blows, Astolpho sped
One stroke, above the shoulders and below
The chin, which lopt away both helm and head:
Nor lights the duke less swiftly than his foe.
Then grasps the hair defiled with gore and red,
Springs in a moment on his horse, and lo!
Up-stream with it along Nile's margin hies,
So that the thief cannot retake the prize.

LXXXIV
That fool, who had not marked the warrior's feat,
Was searching in the dust to find his head;
But when he heard the charger in retreat,
Who through the forest with the plunder fled,
Leapt quickly into his own courser's seat,
And in pursuit of bold Astolpho sped.
Fain had Orrilo shouted "Hola! stay! "
But that the duke had borne his mouth away:

LXXXV
Yet pleased Astolpho had not in like guise
Borne off his heels, pursues with flowing rein.
Him Rabican, who marvellously flies,
Distances by a mighty length of plain.
This while the wizard's head Astolpho eyes
From poll to front, above the eyebrows twain,
Searching, in haste, if he the hair can see
Which makes Orrilo's immortality.

LXXXVI
Amid innumerable locks, no hair
Straiter or crisper than the rest was seen.
How then should good Astolpho, in his care
To slay the thief, so many choose between?
"To cut them all (he said) it better were.