Page:Bohemian legends and other poems.djvu/36

That the Bohemian nation rose,
Without a fear, to do His will;
They were content for Him to die,
And for their land their blood to spill.

The royalists were beaten hard;
They fled before the Hussite band.
Once more one heard the Hussite song
Resound through the Bohemian land.
One morning in the distant west
A warrior came, of features cold;
He begged to be allowed to fight;
He said he was a warrior bold.

He spake they “were a godless set,”
Those royalists from where he came,
And offered to show Dalibor
A way to victory, and to fame.
They were to steal away at night
Along a path that he would show;
Thus easily the royal band
They could strike down with one quick blow.

Alas! alas! that Dalibor
Did listen to that lying tongue;
Ah me! he led them all to death,
And dungeon cell, as bards have sung;
And Dalibor was led in chains,
And shut in Hradčan’s dismal tower.
Oft by the loophole he would sit,
Unconscious of the passing hour.

One day he said, “Oh, jailer mine,
Thou seest I will soon be dead;
I pray thee by thy father’s ghost,
I pray thee by thy blessed dead;
Oh, give me but a violin,
That I may ease my breaking heart.
It cannot harm thee, jailer mine,
And it will soothe my bitter part.”

The jailer was a kindly man,
He let the prisoner have his way;
And all night long, poor Dalibor
Upon his instrument did play.