No More Learning

Thus, with Marphisa matched, that hostile crew
Appears like ice, and she like burning light.
Nor her Rogero with less marvel eyes,
That she had marked his valour with surprise.

XXIV
As she had Mars in bold Rogero seen,
Perhaps Bellona he had deemed the maid,
If for a woman he had known that queen,
Who seemed the contrary, in arms arrayed;
And haply emulation had between
The pair ensued, by whom with cruel blade
Most deadly signs of prowess should be shown,
Mid that vile herd, on sinew, flesh and bone.

XXV
To rout each hostile squadron, filled with dread,
Sufficed the soul and valour of the four;
Nor better arms remained for them who fled
Than the sharp goads which on their heels they wore.
Happy was he with courser well bested!
By trot or amble they set little store;
And he who had no steed, here learned, dismayed,
How wretched is the poor foot-soldier's trade.

XXVI
The conqueror's prize remained both field and prey;
Nor was there footman left nor muleteer;
The Moor took this, Maganza took that way;
One leaves the prisoners, and one leaves the gear.
With visage glad, and yet with heart more gay,
The four united each captive cavalier;
Nor were less diligent to free from chains
The prisoned pages, and unload the wains.

XXVII
Besides good quantity of silver fine,
Wrought into different vessels, with a store
Of feminine array, of fair design,
Embroidered round about with choicest lore,
And suit of Flemish tapestry, framed to line
Royal apartments, wrought with silk and ore --
-- They, 'mid more costly things in plenty spread --
Discovered flasks of wine, and meat and bread.

XXVIII
When now the conquering troop their temples bare,
All see they have received a damsel's aid,
Known by her curling locks of golden hair,
And delicate and beauteous face displayed:
Her the knights honoured much, and to declare
Her name, so well deserving glory, prayed;
Nor she, that ever was of courteous mood
Among her friends, their instances withstood.

XXIX
With viewing her they cannot sate their eyes,
Who in the battle such had her espied,
She speaks but with the Child, but him descries;
None prizes, values none, 'twould seem, beside.
Meanwhile that ready spread a banquet lies,
To them is by the servants notified.
This they had served about a neighbouring fountain,
Screened from the sun by an o'ershadowing mountain.

XXX
This spring was one of those four fountains rare,
Of those in France produced by Merlin's sleight;
Encompassed round about with marble fair,
Shining and polished, and then milk more white.
There in the stone choice figures chisseled were,
By that magician's godlike labour dight;
Save voice was wanting, these you might have thought
Were living and with nerve and spirit fraught.
XXXI
Here, to appearance, from the forest prest
A cruel Beast and hideous to the eye,
With teeth of wolf, an ass's head and crest,
A carcass with long famine lean and dry,
And lion's claws; a fox in all the rest:
Which seemed to ravage France and Italy,
And Spain and England's desolated strands,
Europe and Asia, and in fine all lands.

XXXII
The beast the low and those of proudest port
Had slain or maimed throughout this earthly ball;
Yea, fiercest seemed on those of noble sort,
Sovereign and satrap, prince and peer, to fall;
And made most havoc in the Roman court;
For it had slaughtered Pope and Cardinal:
Had filled St. Peter's beauteous seat with scathe,
And brought foul scandal on the HOLY FAITH.

XXXIII
Whate'er she touches, wall or rampire steep,
Goes to the ground' where'er the monster wends,
Each fortress opens; neither castle-keep,
Nor city from her rage its wealth defends.
Honours divine as well that Beast would reap,
It seems (while the besotted rabble bends)
And claim withal, as to its keeping given,
The sacred keys which open Hell and Heaven.

XXXIV
Approaching next, is seen a cavalier,
His temples circled with imperial bay;
Three youths with him in company appear,
With golden lilies wrought in their array:
A lion seems against that monster drear
To issue, with the same device as they:
The name of these are on the marble read,
Some on their skirt, some written overhead.

XXXV
Of those who so against Beast advance,
One to the hilt has in his life-blood dyed
His faulchion, Francis styled the first of France;
With Austrian Maximilian at his side:
In one, who gores his gullet with the lance,
The emperor Charles the fifth is signified:
Henry the eighth of England is he hight,
Who in the monster's breast a dart has pight.

XXXVI
The TENTH, in writing, on his back displayed
The Lion, who that Beast is seen to hold
By both his ears, and him so well has bayed,
That thither troop assistants manifold.
'Twould seem the world all fear aside has laid;
And, in amendment of their errors old,
Thitherward nobles troop, but these are few;
And so that hideous Beast those hunters slew.

XXXVII
In wonder stood long time that warlike train,
Desirous, as the storied work they traced,
To know by hands of whom that Beast was slain,
Which had so many smiling lands defaced,
The names unknown to them, though figured plain
Upon the marble which that fountain cased:
They one another prayed, if any guessed
That story, he would tell it to the rest.

XXXVIII
Vivian on Malagigi turned his eyes,
Who listening stood this while, yet spake he nought.
"With thee," he cried, "to tell the meaning lies,
Who are they, by whose darts and lances dies
That shouldst by what I see in this be taught:
The hideous monster, that to bay is brought? "
-- And Malagigi -- "Hitherto their glory
No author has consigned to living story.

XXXIX
"The chiefs whose names are graved upon the stone,
Not yet have moved upon this worldly stage;
But will within seven hundred years be known,
To the great honour of a future age.
What time king Arthur filled the British throne,
This fountain Merlin made, enchanter sage;
Who things to come upon the marble fair
Made sculpture by a cunning artist's care.

XL
"This Beast, when weights and measures first were found,
Came out of nether hell; when on the plain,
Common before, men fixed the landmark's bound,
And fashioned written pacts with jealous pain;
Yet walked not every where, at first, her round:
Unvisited she left yet many a reign:
Through diverse places in our time she wends;
But the vile rabble and the crowd offends.