Impatient of the load of wretched life,

Their fierce demeanour, and denouncing death,

Each dark and frowning brow Estrildis saw,

And saw unmov'd. What ills had fate in store,
What could inventive cruelty inflict,

Which to her anxious mind the busy hand

Of fancy, in the sad and lonely hour,

In all its horrors had not yet pourtray'd?

Not so the damsel train. With piercing shrieks
They rend the air, and now with frantic gesture
Crowd round their much-lov'd mistress. On her robe
One clings in speechless woe: one bathes her hand
With tears; one fondly twines her clasping arms

About her slender waist; another seeks

To print upon her lips a parting kiss;

This, rolling in the dust, her graceful locks

Tears from the roots, and beats her wretched breast;

That with loud cries arraigns relentless heav'n.
She with mild action sooths their stormy grief,

And thanks their faithful love. Advancing now,

A rude unmanner'd ruffian from her brow,

The mark of royalty, (so will'd the queen)
The sacred fillet tore with churlish hand.

Another with opprobrious taunts revil'd.
Behind her back the harsh and galling chain

Confin'd her snowy wrists. With threat'ning voice
Now the rough soldier urg'd her trembling steps.
Her beauteous eyes, suffus'd with tears, she rais'd
With such a sweet and moving eloquence,

That all at once his savage soul was mov'd,
And his stern nature, long to sights of woe
Inur'd, and practis'd in the trade of blood,
Now first to pity yielded. Through the band
Spread swift the soft contagion. Now they saw
With alter'd mind each soul-enchanting grace
Borrowing a nameless, and resistless charm
From her sad fate. Such was the general woe,

So were their rugged bosoms mov'd, it seem'd
As if the daughter, or the wife of each

Was led to instant death. And now they came

Where held the rival queen her throned state.
Soon as impatient Guendolen beheld

The object of her hate thus fall'n, and captive,
A gloomy joy her features overspread.

"Is this," she cried, "is this the boasted form

At whose superior lustre my weak charms
Must fade away, no more to wake desire?
Is this the haughty dame, whose stern decree
Has sentenc'd Guendolen to shameful exile ?
Say, does thy mercy yet revoke the doom,
Or can no pray'rs thy stubborn heart subdue?"
Th' ungenerous insult the fair mourner heard
With silent anguish. Prostrate on the earth,
Before the feet of her relentless foe,

Awhile she wept.

"By those who gave thee birth,

By the dear name of mother," she exclaims,

"For oh, canst thou, who bear'st a mother's name,

Behold my sorrows with unpitying eyes?
Not for myself I plead. (Too well I know
What fatal doom awaits me.) But my child

She never has offended. Look on her,

Oh bend thine eyes upon her, see, she kneels,

She weeps, poor victim of her mother's guilt.
Oh let not virgin innocence in vain

On tender mercy call. Oh spare her, spare her,

And ages yet unborn shall bless thy name.

Ev'n in the gloomy regions of the dead,

Thy Locrine's spirit shall rejoicing hear,

And thank the goodness which preserves his child.
Ah, wherefore dost thou frown? Yes, let me perish,

I own my guilt, prepare new torments for me.
Patient I suffer, and in death my voice

Shall speak thy praise, so thou but bid me hope
My child, my darling Sabra may survive."
"Urge me no more," the haughty dame replies,
66 My soul is fix'd immoveable as fate."

Detested wretch! driv'n from my husband's bed,
Hurl'd from a throne, the daughter of Corineus-
By thee has wander'd forth a woeful exile.
How many heroes by thy crimes have fall'n!

What widows mourn, what orphans thou hast made!

By thee

my

Locrine died. And would'st thou now

Plead the curst fruit of thy pernicious joys

To win reluctant mercy? No, the ghosts
Of myriads in thy fatal quarrel slain,

?"

My husband's spirit, call for signal vengeance.
Thou diest, and she, the minion of thy love,
Is she not thine, and shall she hope for mercy
Thus while she speaks, Estrildis' soul is torn
With racking anguish. Now she knows all hope
Extinguish'd, and the near approach of death,
Inevitable death, beholds: now all

The mother swells her breast: with eager eyes
She gazes on her child; the galling chain
Forbids a last embrace. The tender maid
Lifts her imploring hands in pray'r to heav'n.
Now by each fond endearing name she calls
Her agonizing parent; now entreats
Remorseless Guendolen, and weeps aloud,
But, lo, the ministers of death approach.