nd
Brought them a rumour from afar; and she said,
Lifting her head, too beautiful for anguish,
Too proud for pity,--
_It is the gods that leave the City! O, Anthony,
Anthony, the gods have forsaken us;
Because it is the end! They leave us to our doom.
Hear it!_ And unshaken in the darkness,
Dull as dropping earth upon a tomb in the distance,
They heard, as when across a wood a low wind comes,
A muttering of drums, drawing nearer,
Then louder and clearer, as when a trumpet sings
To battle, it came rushing on the wings of the wind,
A sound of sacked cities, a sound of lamentation,
A cry of desolation, as when a conquered nation
Is weeping in the darkness, because its tale is told;
And then--a sound of chariots that rolled thro' that sorrow
Trampled like a storm of wild stallions, tossing nearer,
Trampled louder, clearer, triumphantly as music,
Till lo! in that great darkness, along that vacant street,
A red light beat like a furnace on the walls,
Then--like the blast when the North-wind calls to battle,
Blaring thro' the blood-red tumult and the flame,
Shaking the proud City as they came, an hundred elephants,
Cream-white and bronze, and splashed with bitter crimson,
Trumpeting for battle as they trod, an hundred elephants,
Bronze and cream-white, and trapped with gold and purple,
Towered like tusked castles, every thunder-laden footfall
Dreadful as the shattering of a City. Yet they trod,
Rocking like an earthquake, to a great triumphant music,
And, swinging like the stars, black planets, white moons,
Thro' the stream of the torches, they brought the red chariot,
The chariot of the battle-god--Mars.
While the tall spears of Sparta tossed clashing in his train,
And a host of ghostly warriors cried aloud
_All hail!_ to those twain, and went rushing to the darkness
Like a pageantry of cloud, for their tale was told--utterly--
Told.

And following, in the fury of the vine, rushing down
Like a many-visaged torrent, with ivy-rod and thyrse,
And many a wild and foaming crown of roses,
Crowded the Bacchanals, the brown-limbed shepherds,
The red-tongued leopards, and the glory of the god!
_Iacchus! Iacchus!_ without dance, without song,
They cried and swept along to the darkness.
Only for a breath when the tumult of their torches
Crimsoned the deep window where that dark warri