Последний отзыв
Книгу прочитать не могу, везде ЛитРес свой нос сунул, как и где скачать полную версию бесплатно!?!?
По всем вопросам обращайтесь на: info@litportal.ru
(©) 2003-2024.
✖
Lays and Legends (Second Series)
Настройки чтения
Размер шрифта
Высота строк
Поля
They trampled on the breast and hair
Of girls their swords laid low,
And on the points of reeking spears
Tossed babies to and fro.
Alphege stood forth; his pale face gleamed
Against the dark red tide.
"Forbear, your cup of guilt is full!
Your sins are red," he cried;
"Spare these poor sheep, my lambs, for whom
The King of Heaven died!"
Drunken with blood and lust of fight,
Loud laughed Thorkill the Dane.
"Stand thou and see us shear thy sheep
Before thy foolish fane!
Hear how they weep! They bleat, thy sheep,
That thou mayst know their pain!"
He stood, and saw his monks all slain;
The altar steps ran red;
In horrid heaps men lay about,
The dying with the dead;
And the east brightened, and the sky
Grew rosy overhead.
Then from the church a tiny puff
Of smoke rose 'gainst the sky,
Out broke the fire, and flame on flame
Leaped palely out on high,
Till but the church's walls were left
For men to know it by.
And when the sweet sun laughed again
O'er fields and furrows brown,
The brave archbishop hid his eyes,
Until the tears dropped down
On the charred blackness of the wreck
Of Canterbury town.
"Now, Saxon shepherd, send a word
Unto thy timid sheep,
And bid them greaten up their hearts,
And to our feet dare creep,
And bring a ransom here which we,
Instead of thee, may keep!"
Archbishop Alphege stood alone,
Bruised, beaten, weary-eyed;
Loaded with chains, with aching heart,
And wounded in the side;
And in his hour of utmost pain
Thus to the Dane replied:
"Ye men of blood, my blood shall flow
Before this thing shall be;
If I be held till ransom come,
I never shall be free;
For by God's heart, God's poor shall never
Be robbed to ransom me!"
They flung him in a dungeon dark,
They heaped on him fresh chains,
They promised him unnumbered ills
And unimagined pains;
But still he said, "No English shall
Be taxed to profit Danes!"
Six months passed by; no ransom came;
Their threats had almost ceased,
When Thorkill held, on Easter-Eve,
A great and brutal feast;
And they sent and dragged the Christian man
Before the pagan beast.
Down the great hall, from east to west,
The long rough tables ran;
They roasted oxen, sheep, and deer,
And then the drink began —
At last in all that mighty hall
Was not one sober man.
'Twas then they brought the bishop forth
Before the drunken throng;
And "Send for ransom!" Thorkill cried,
"You are weak, and we are strong,
Or, by the hand of Thor, you die —
We have borne with you too long!"
The savage faces of the Danes
Leered redly all around;
The bones of beasts and empty cups
Lay heaped upon the ground,
And 'mid the crowd of howling wolves
The Christian saint stood bound.
He looked in Thorkill's angry eyes
And knew what thing should be,
Then spake: "By God, who died to save
The poor, and me, and thee,
Of girls their swords laid low,
And on the points of reeking spears
Tossed babies to and fro.
Alphege stood forth; his pale face gleamed
Against the dark red tide.
"Forbear, your cup of guilt is full!
Your sins are red," he cried;
"Spare these poor sheep, my lambs, for whom
The King of Heaven died!"
Drunken with blood and lust of fight,
Loud laughed Thorkill the Dane.
"Stand thou and see us shear thy sheep
Before thy foolish fane!
Hear how they weep! They bleat, thy sheep,
That thou mayst know their pain!"
He stood, and saw his monks all slain;
The altar steps ran red;
In horrid heaps men lay about,
The dying with the dead;
And the east brightened, and the sky
Grew rosy overhead.
Then from the church a tiny puff
Of smoke rose 'gainst the sky,
Out broke the fire, and flame on flame
Leaped palely out on high,
Till but the church's walls were left
For men to know it by.
And when the sweet sun laughed again
O'er fields and furrows brown,
The brave archbishop hid his eyes,
Until the tears dropped down
On the charred blackness of the wreck
Of Canterbury town.
"Now, Saxon shepherd, send a word
Unto thy timid sheep,
And bid them greaten up their hearts,
And to our feet dare creep,
And bring a ransom here which we,
Instead of thee, may keep!"
Archbishop Alphege stood alone,
Bruised, beaten, weary-eyed;
Loaded with chains, with aching heart,
And wounded in the side;
And in his hour of utmost pain
Thus to the Dane replied:
"Ye men of blood, my blood shall flow
Before this thing shall be;
If I be held till ransom come,
I never shall be free;
For by God's heart, God's poor shall never
Be robbed to ransom me!"
They flung him in a dungeon dark,
They heaped on him fresh chains,
They promised him unnumbered ills
And unimagined pains;
But still he said, "No English shall
Be taxed to profit Danes!"
Six months passed by; no ransom came;
Their threats had almost ceased,
When Thorkill held, on Easter-Eve,
A great and brutal feast;
And they sent and dragged the Christian man
Before the pagan beast.
Down the great hall, from east to west,
The long rough tables ran;
They roasted oxen, sheep, and deer,
And then the drink began —
At last in all that mighty hall
Was not one sober man.
'Twas then they brought the bishop forth
Before the drunken throng;
And "Send for ransom!" Thorkill cried,
"You are weak, and we are strong,
Or, by the hand of Thor, you die —
We have borne with you too long!"
The savage faces of the Danes
Leered redly all around;
The bones of beasts and empty cups
Lay heaped upon the ground,
And 'mid the crowd of howling wolves
The Christian saint stood bound.
He looked in Thorkill's angry eyes
And knew what thing should be,
Then spake: "By God, who died to save
The poor, and me, and thee,
Другие электронные книги автора Эдит Несбит
Другие аудиокниги автора Эдит Несбит
Последний отзыв
Книгу прочитать не могу, везде ЛитРес свой нос сунул, как и где скачать полную версию бесплатно!?!?