All tenantless, save to the crannying Wind,
Or holding dark communion with the Cloud
There was a day when they were young and proud;
Banners on high, and battles[300] passed below;
But they who fought are in a bloody shroud,
And those which waved are shredless dust ere now,[ii]
And the bleak battlements shall bear no future blow.

XLVIII.

Beneath these battlements, within those walls,
Power dwelt amidst her passions; in proud state
Each robber chief upheld his armed halls,
Doing his evil will, nor less elate
Than mightier heroes of a longer date.
What want these outlaws conquerors should have[ij][9.B.]
But History's purchased page to call them great?
A wider space--an ornamented grave?
Their hopes were not less warm, their souls were full as brave.[ik]

XLIX.

In their baronial feuds and single fields,
What deeds of prowess unrecorded died!
And Love, which lent a blazon to their shields,[301]
With emblems well devised by amorous pride,
Through all the mail of iron hearts would glide;
But still their flame was fierceness, and drew on
Keen contest and destruction near allied,
And many a tower for some fair mischief won,
Saw the discoloured Rhine beneath its ruin run.

L.

But Thou, exulting and abounding river!
Making thy waves a blessing as they flow
Through banks whose beauty would endure for ever
Could man but leave thy bright creation so,
Nor its fair promise from the surface mow[il]
With the sharp scythe of conflict, then to see
Thy valley of sweet waters, were to know[302]
Earth paved like Heaven--and to seem such to me,[im]
Even now what wants thy stream?--that it should Lethe be.

LI.

A thousand battles have assailed thy banks,
But these and half their fame have passed away,
And Slaughter heaped on high his weltering ranks:
Their very graves are gone, and what are they?[303]
Thy tide washed down the blood of yesterday,
And all was stainless, and on thy clear stream
Glassed, with its dancing light, the sunny ray;[in]
But o'er the blacken'd memory's blighting dream
Thy waves would vainly roll, all sweeping as they seem.