Classic Poem

KING Henry sat upon his throne,
And, full of wrath and scorn,
His eye a recreant knight survey'd,
Sir Bernardine du Born.
While he that haughty glance return'd,
Like lion in his lair,
And loftily his unchanged brow
Gleam'd through his crisped hair.

“Thou art a traitor to the realm,
Lord of a lawless band,
The bold in speech, the fierce in broil,
The troubler of our land;
Thy castles and thy rebel towers
Are forfeit to the crown,
And thou beneath the Norman axe
Shalt end thy base renown.

“Deign'st thou no word to bar thy doom,
Thou with strange madness fired?
Hath reason quite forsook thy breast?”
Plantagenet inquired.
Sir Bernard turn'd him toward the king;
He blench'd not in his pride:
“My reason fail'd, my gracious liege,
The year Prince Henry died.”

Quick at that name a cloud of wo
Pass'd o'er the monarch's brow;
Thouch'd was that thrilling cord of love
At which the mightiest bow.
Again swept back the tide of years,
Again his first-born moved,
The fair, the graceful, the sublime,
The erring, yet beloved.

And ever, cherish'd by his side,
One chosen friend was near,
To share in boyhood's ardent sport
Or youth's untamed career.
With him the merry chase he sought
Beneath the dewy morn,
With him in knightly tourney rode
This Bernardine du Born.

Then in the mourning father's soul
Each trace of ire grew dim,
And what his buried idol loved
Seem'd cleansed of guilt to him;
And faintly through his tears he spake,
“God send his grace to thee,
And for the dear sake of the dead,
Go forth, unscathed and free.”