Classic Poem

" Pope Gregory our arms sanctificates:
By virtue of which grace we have prevailed
As far as Bari and the Grecian gates
From Capua have we banished those who haled
Their cruel tribute to the apostate East,
And had destroyed them, but our forces failed:
And now they gather strength again, increased
From Africa, Cyprus, and Sicily,
Whilst our late found advantage all is ceased.
Much therefore it behoves that speedily
Succour ride forth from home: on thee it rests
To be our good in this necessity.
Assist thou therefore unto these requests,
Most dread and sovereign lord, Gonnorides,
Despatching worthy aids: urge thy behests,
And move thy peaceful realm, as well agrees
Both with thy greatness and our exigence;
That future glory spring from present ease "
— — Of this epistle Mano made the sense
Ampler by various tidings that he brought,
And to our lords rehearsed in conference
From him we learned what evils had been wrought
To Italy about that wretched time
By warring nations, which within her fought:
When Saracens held the whole Alps maritime,
And rode the seas beneath: Lombard and Greek
In combat ranged through fair Apulia's clime:
Nor yet the Norman power was main to wreak
Vengeance on those outrageous enemies,
The Norman power, now strong, that then was weak.
— — Moreover he to the East the Norman eyes
Was first to turn, and toward Jerusalem,
Where then our pilgrims met with injuries:
What time ruled there the negro Zacharem,
Who ravaged all the Holy Sepulchre,
Doing obedience to the race of Shem: —
He quenched the sacred light, which, all aver,
At Easter burns: and strove to obliterate
The cave where Joseph did the Lord inter
Whereat a palmer, with high zeal elate
Smote with his fist the temples of a Jew,
Which deed for heinous crime the judge did rate;
And the Fatimite in raging fury slew
The man, and those who with him dared to stand,
Albeit to Italy escaped some few.
— All which our princes thought to take in hand,
And gathered closely in remembering mind,
Of the holy city and the eastern land
— — But there were letters of more heavy kind,
Which rose beyond our mortal scope and bent,
Telling how wretched earth of heaven was pined
In them 'twas read how that poor land was rent
With troubles which no mortal might resist,
About that date when all the world seemed spent.
Which revelation seemed of Antichrist,
Then sitting in God's temple, like to God;
Nor any sign of horror was there missed.
" We feel, " they wrote, " the sore avenging rod;
The famine and the unknown pest increase,
The secret fever which consumes the blood
" Men weakly wait, till death their pain bid cease,
The end their fellows little noticing,
Who for themselves desire the like release.
" Their voices through the wasted fields of spring
Sound querulous, like to the dying birds
Which on the hard soil beat their helpless wing.
" This plague invaded hath the flocks and herds,
The crops remained unsown this year; and now
What sustenance the naked field affords
" They fight for till they die: it were as though
Confounded were the elements, and nature
Followed new laws: such anger clouds heaven's brow,
" With tribulation of the whole creature:
For thrice the moon is marked with blood: the sun
Trembles to quit this circle of dark feature:
" A mighty comet through the heavens doth run
Three months: discoloured are the stars by it:
Wherefore the last days seem to be begun
" — — This sign moreover doth St. John transmit,
That in the latter days we shall be tricked
By Satan's legates, men of subtle wit.
" And this last plague that holy men depict
Is added now: one such is hither borne,
Whose glozing style lies temper and inflict
" Full many thousands have their faith forsworn
Through him, Vilgardus, named Grammaticus,
Who makes the Holy Church his mark of scorn;
" Fabling that on a summit mountainous
The demons of the poets came to him,
Juvenalis, Maro, and Horatius,
" Who hailed him their disciple, with no dim
Renown with them in realms beyond the grave,
And crowned him with a laurel garland trim
" Then he of doctrine strange began to rave,
Uttering, 'twas thought, their oracles abhorred
Through the pretensed commission which they gave. "
These were the tidings that were spread abroad
By writings, or the converse held in court
Betwixt Sir Mano and our gentle lord:
And deeply wrought they in the nobler sort.