No More Learning

Ventidius, Servius, Marius this have shown
In ancient days; King Lewis in our own;

III
King Lewis, stepfather of my duke's son;
Who, when his host at Santalbino fled,
Left in his clutch by whom that field was won,
Was nigh remaining shorter by the head.
Nor long before the great Corvinus run
A yet more fearful peril, worse bested:
Both throned, when overblown was their mischance,
One king of Hungary, one king of France.

IV
'Tis plain to sight, through instances that fill
The page of ancient and of modern story,
That ill succeeds to good, and good to ill;
That glory ends in shame, and shame in glory;
And that man should not trust, deluded still,
In riches, realm, or field of battle, gory
With hostile blood, nor yet despair, for spurns
Of Fortune; since her wheel for ever turns.

V
Through that fair victory, when overthrown
Were Leo and his royal sire, the knight
Who won that battle to such trust is grown,
In his good fortune and his peerless might,
He, without following, without aid, alone
(So is he prompted by his daring sprite)
Thinks, mid a thousand squadrons in array,
-- Footmen and horsemen -- sire and son to slay.

VI
But she, that wills no trust shall e'er be placed
In her by man, to him doth shortly show,
How wight by her is raised, and how abased;
How soon she is a friend, how soon a foe;
She makes him know Rogero, that in haste
Is gone to work that warrior shame and woe;
The cavalier, which in that battle dread
With much ado had from his faulchion fled.

VII
He to Ungiardo hastens to declare
The Child who put the imperial host to flight,
Whose carnage many years will not repair,
Here past the day and was to pass the night;
And saith, that Fortune, taken by the hair,
Without more trouble, and without more fight,
Will, if he prisons him, the Bulgars bring
Beneath the yoke and lordship of his king.

VIII
Ungiardo from the crowd, which had pursued
Thither their flight from the ensanguined plain,
For, troop by troop, a countless multitude
(Arrived, because not all the bridge could gain)
Knew what a cruel slaughter had ensued:
For there the moiety of the Greeks was slain;
And knew that by a cavalier alone
One host was saved, and one was overthrown;

IX
And that undriven he should have made his way
Into the net, and of his own accord,
Wondered, and showed his pleasure, at the say
In visage, gesture, and in joyful word.
He waited till Rogero sleeping lay;
Then softly sent his guard to take that lord;
And made the valiant Child, who had no dread
Of such a danger, prisoner in his bed.

X
By his own shield accused, that witness true,
The Child is captive in Novogorood,
To Ungiardo, worst among the cruel, who
Marvellous mirth to have that prisoner shewed.
And what, since he was naked, could he do,
Bound, while his eyes were yet by slumber glued?
A courier, who the news should quickly bear,
Ungiardo bids to Constantine repair.

XI
Constantine on that night with all his host,
Raising his camp, from Save's green shore had gone:
With this in Beleticche he takes post,
Androphilus', his sister's husband's town,
Father of him, whose arms in their first joust
(As if of wax had been his habergeon)
Had pierced and carved the puissant cavalier,
Now by Ungiardo pent in dungeon drear.

XII
Here from attack the emperor makes assure
The city walls and gates on every side;
Lest, from the Bulgar squadrons ill secure,
Having so good a warrior for their guide,
His broken Grecians worse than fear endure;
Deeming the rest would by his hand have died.
Now he is taken, these breed no alarms;
Nor would he fear the banded world in arms.

XIII
The emperor, swimming in a summer sea,
Knows not for very pleasure what to do:
"Truly the Bulgars may be said to be
Vanquished," he cries, with bold and cheerful brow.
As he would feel assured of victory,
That had of either arm deprived his foe;
So the emperor was assured, and so rejoiced,
When good Rogero's fate the warrior voiced.

XIV
No less occasion has the emperor's son
For joying; for besides that he anew
Trusts to acquire Belgrade, and tower and town
Throughout the Bulgars' country to subdue,
He would by favours make the knight his own,
And hopes to rank him in his warlike crew:
Nor need he envy, guarded by his blade,
King Charles', Orlando's, or Rinaldo's aid.

XV
Theodora was by other thoughts possest,
Whose son was killed by young Rogero's spear;
Which through his shoulders, entering at his breast,
Issued a palm's breadth in the stripling's rear;
Constantine's sister she, by grief opprest,
Fell down before him; and with many a tear
That dropt into her bosom, while she sued,
His heart with pity softened and subdued.

XVI
"I still before these feet will bow my knee,
Save on this felon, good my lord," (she cried)
"Who killed my son, to venge me thou agree,
Now that we have him in our hold; beside
That he thy nephew was, thou seest how thee
He loved; thou seest what feats upon thy side
That warrior wrought; thou seest if thou wilt blot
Thine own good name, if thou avenge him not.

XVII
"Thou seest how righteous Heaven by pity stirred
From the wide champaign, red with Grecian gore,
Bears that fell man; and like a reckless bird
Into the fowler's net hath made him soar;
That for short season, for revenge deferred,
My son may mourn upon the Stygian shore.
Give me, my lord, I pray, this cruel foe,
That by his torment I may soothe my woe. "

XVIII
So well she mourns; and in such moving wise
And efficacious doth she make lament;
(Nor from before the emperor will arise,
Though he three times and four the dame has hent,
And to uplift by word and action tries)
That he is forced her wishes to content;
And thus, according to her prayer, commands
The Child to be delivered to her hands;

XIX
And, not therein his orders to delay,
They take the warrior of the unicorn
To cruel Theodora; but one day
Of respite has the knight: to have him torn
In quarters, yet alive; to rend and slay
Her prisoners publicly with shame and scorn,
Seems a poor pain; and he must undergo
Other unwonted and unmeasured woe.

XX
At the commandment of that woman dread,
Chains on his neck and hands and feet they don;
And put him in a dungeon-cell, where thread
Of light was never by Apollo thrown:
He has a scanty mess of mouldy bread;
And sometimes is he left two days with none;
And one that doth the place of jailer fill
Is prompter than herself to work him ill.

XXI
Oh! if Duke Aymon's daughter brave and fair,
Of if Marphisa of exalted mind
Had heard Rogero's sad estate declare,
And how he in this guise in prison pined,
To his rescue either would have made repair,
And would have flung the fear of death behind:
Nor had bold Bradamant, intent to aid,
Respect to Beatrice or Aymon paid.

XXII
Meanwhile King Charlemagne upon his side,
Heeding his promise made in solemn sort,
That none should have the damsel for his bride,
That of her prowess in the field fell short;
Not only had his sovereign pleasure cried
With sound of trumpet in his royal court,
But in each city subject to his crown.
Hence quickly through the world the bruit was blown.

XXIII
Such the condition which he bids proclaim:
He that would with Duke Aymon's daughter wed
Must with the sword contend against that dame
From the suns rise until he seeks his bed;
And if he for that time maintains the game,
And is not overcome, without more said,
The lady is adjudged to have lost the stake;
Nor him for husband can refuse to take.

XXIV
The choice of arms must be by her foregone,
No matter who may claim it in the course:
And by the damsel this may well be done,
Good at all arms alike, on foot or horse.
Aymon, who cannot strive against the crown,
-- Cannot and will not -- yields at length parforce.
He much the matter sifts, and in the end
Resolves to court with Bradamant to wend.