is feet, and suggest an effectual
hinting 60
To the enemy's musqueteers to clear the road for the hinter:
Or again, if you want a guide by night, in a dangerous highway
Beset with the enemies' marksmen and swarming with murderous ambush,
To train your horse in the art of delicate insinuation,
Gently raising a hoof to tap at the door o' the woodsman.
But, if he persists in snoring, or pretending to snore, or is angry
At your summons to leave his lair in the arms of his wife or his
infants,
To practise your horse in the duty of stormy recalcitration,
Wheeling round to present his heels, and in mid caracoling
To send the emperor's greeting smack through the panel of oakwood[15] 70
That makes the poor man so hard of hearing imperial orders.
Arts such as these and others, the use of the sabre on horseback,
All modes of skill gymnastic, modes whether forceful or artful,
Of death-grapple if by chance a cannon-shot should un-horse you,
All modes of using the limbs with address, with speed, or enormous
Effort of brutal strength, all this did Harry Delancey
Teach to his docile pupil: and arts more nobly delightful,
Arts of the head or the heart, arts intellectual; empire
Over dead men's books, over regions of high meditation,
Comparative tactics, warfare as then conducted in ages
When powder was none, nor cannon, but brute catapultae, 81
Blind rams, brainless wild asses, the stony slinger of huge
stones.[16]
Iron was lord of the world; iron reigned, man was his engine;
But now the rule is reversed, man binds and insults over iron.
Together did they, young tutor, young pupil, Augustus, Adolphus,
Range over history martial, or read strategical authors,
Xenophon, Arrian, old Polybius, old Polyaenus
(Think not these Polys, my boy, were blooming Pollies of our days!),
And above all others, they read the laurel'd hero of heroes,
Thrice kingly Roman Julius, sun-bright leader of armies,
Who planted his god-like foot on the necks of a whole generation. 91
Such studies, such arts were those by which young Harry Delancey
Sought to discharge the trust which to him the Lady of Arnstein
Confided with hopes maternal; thus trained, he hoped that Adolphus
Would shine in his native land, for high was his place in the empire.
EDITOR'S NOTE.--This was, of course, written for
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