In gloom they twain were wrapp'd, and they alone; For both the on-looking hosts on either hand eyes And laboring breath; first Rustum struck the shield Which Sohrab held stiff out; the steel-piked spear Rent the tough plates, but failed to reach the skin, And Rustum plucked it back with angry groan. Then Sohrab with his sword smote Rustum's helm, Nor clove its steel quite through; but all the crest He shore away, and that proud horsehair plume, Never till now defiled, sank to the dust; And Rustum bow'd his head; but then the gloom Grew blacker, thunder rumbled in the air, the horse, Who stood at hand, utter'd a dreadful cry; No horse's cry was that, most like the roar And Oxus curdled as it crossed his stream. But Sohrab heard, and quail'd not, but rushed on, And struck again; and again Rustum bow'd eyes Glared, and he shook on high his menacing spear, And shouted: Rustum!-Sohrab heard that shout, And shrank amazed; back he recoiled one step, And scanned with blinking eyes the advancing form; And then he stood bewildered, and he dropp'd His covering shield, and the spear pierced his side. He reeled, and staggering back, sank to the ground. And then the gloom dispersed, and the wind fell, And the bright sun broke forth, and melted all Then, with a bitter smile, Rustum began:- move His heart to take a gift, and let thee go. And then that all the Tartar host would praise Thy courage or thy craft, and spread thy fame, To glad thy father in his weak old age. Fool, thou art slain, and by an unknown man ! Dearer to the red jackals shalt thou be Than to thy friends, and to thy father old." And, with a fearless mien, Sohrab replied: "Unknown thou art; yet thy fierce vaunt is vain. Thou dost not slay me, proud and boastful man! No! Rustum slays me, and this filial heart. For were I match'd with ten such men as thee, And I were that which till to-day I was, They should be lying here, I standing there. Fall; and thy spear transfixed an unarmed foe. UP AT A VILLA DOWN IN THE CITY Had I but plenty of money, money enough and to spare, The house for me, no doubt, were a house in the city-square: Ah, such a life, such a life, as one leads at the window there! Something to see, by Bacchus, something to hear, at least! There, the whole day long, one's life is a perfect feast; While up at a villa one lives, I maintain it, no more than a beast. Well now, look at our villa! stuck like the horn of a bull Just on a mountain-edge as bare as the creature's skull, Save a mere shag of a bush with hardly a leaf to pull ! -I scratch my own, sometimes, to see if the hair's turned wool. But the city, oh, the city - the square with the houses! Why? They are stone-faced, white as a curd, there's something to take the eye! Houses in four straight lines, not a single front awry; You watch who crosses and gossips, who saunters, who hurries by; Green blinds, as a matter of course, to draw when the sun gets high; And the shops with fanciful signs which are painted properly. What of a villa? Though winter be over in March by rights, 'Tis May perhaps ere the snow shall have withered well off the heights: |