But creeping things shall revel in their spoil,
And fit thy glay to fertilize the soil.
The gathered chieftains come to Otho's call;
"Tis now the promised hour, that must proclaim
The life or death of Lara's future fame;
When Ezzelin his charge may here unfold,
And whatsoe'er the tale, it must be told.
Ilis faith was pledged, and Lara's promise given, 670
To meet it in the eye of man and heaven.
Why comes he not? Such truths to be divulged,
Methinks the accuser's rest is long indulged.
The hour is past, and Lara too is there, With self-confiding, coldly patient air; Why comes not Ezzelin? The hour is past, And murmurs rise, and Otho's brow's o'ercast. "I know my friend! his faith I cannot fear, "If yet he be on earth, expect him here; "The roof that held him in the valley stands 680 "Between my own and noble Lara's lands; "My halls from such a guest had honour gained, "Nor had Sir Ezzelin his host disdained,
"But that some pervious proof forbade his stay,
"And urged him to prepare against to-day; "The word I pledged for his I pledge again, "Or will myself redeem his knighthood's stain.” He ceased and Lara answered, "I am here "To lend at thy demand a listening ear;
"To tales of evil from a stranger's tongue, 690 "Whose words already might my heart have wrung, "But that I deemed him scarcely less than mad, "Or, at the worst, a foe ignobly bad.
but me it seems he knew "In lands where but I must not trifle too: or redeem the pledge; "Here in thy hold, and with thy falchion's edge." Proud Otho on the instant, reddening, threw His glove on earth, and forth his sabre flew. "The last alternative befits me best,
"And thus I answer for mine absent guest." With cheek unchanging from its sallow gloom, However near his own or other's tomb;
With hand, whose almost careless coolness spoke, Its grasp well-used to deal the sabre - stroke; With eye, though calm, determined not to spare, Did Lara too his willing weapon bare.
In vain the circling chieftains round them closed, For Otho's phrenzy would not be opposed;
And from his lip those words of insult fell
His sword is good who can maintain them well.
Short was the conflict; furious, blindly rash,
Vain Otho gave his bosom to the gash:
He bled, and fell; but not with deadly wound,
Stretched by a dextrous sleight along the ground.
"Demand thy life!" He answered not: and then
From that red floor he ne'er had risen again,
For Lara's brow upon the moment grew
Almost to blackness in its demon hue;
And fiercer shook his angry falchion now
Than when his foe's was levelled at his brow;
Then all was stern collectedness and art,
Now rose the unleavened hatred of his heart;
So little sparing to the foe he felled,
That when the approaching crowd his arm withheld,
He almost turned the thirsty point on those,
Who thus for mercy dared to interpose;
But to a moment's thought that purpose bent;
Yet looked he on him still with eye intent,
As if he loathed the ineffectual strife
That left a foe, howe'er o'erthrown, with life;
As if to search how far the wound he gave
Had sent its victim onward to his grave.
They raised the bleeding Otho, and the Leech
Forbade all present question, sign, and speech;
The others met within a neighbouring hall,
And he, incensed and heedless of them all,
The cause and conqueror in this sudden fray,
In haughty silence slowly strode away;
He backed his steed, his homeward path he took, 740
Nor cast on Otho's towers a single look.
But where was he? that meteor of a night,
Who menaced but to disappear with light?
Where was this Ezzelin? who came and went
To leave no other trace of his intent.
He left the dome of Otho long ere morn,
In darkness, yet so well the path was worn
He could not miss it: near his dwelling lay;
But there he was not, and with coming day
Came fast enquiry, which unfolded nought 750
Except the absence of the chief it sought.
A chamber tenantless, a steed at rest,
His host alarmed, his murmuring squires distrest:
Their search extends along, around the path,
In dread to meet the marks of prowlers' wrath :
But none are there, and not a brake hath borne,
Nor gout of blood, nor shred of mantle torn;
Nor fall nor struggle hath defaced the grass,
Which still retains a mark where murder was;
Nor dabbling fingers left to tell the tale,
The bitter print of each convulsive nail,
When agonized hands that cease to guard,
Wound in that pang the smoothness of the sward.
Some such had been, if here a life was reft,
But these were not; and doubting hope is left;
And strange suspicion whispering Lara's name,
Now daily mutters o'er his blackened fame;
Then sudden silent when his form appeared,
Awaits the absence of the thing it feared
Again its wonted wondering to renew,
And dye conjecture with a darker hue.
Days roll along, and Otho's wounds are healed, But not his pride; and hate no more concealed: He was a man of power, and Lara's foe,
The friend of all who sought to work him woe,
And from his country's justice now demands
Account of Ezzelin at Lara's hands.
Who else than Lara could have cause to fear
His presence? who had made him disappear,
If not the man on whom his menaced charge 780
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