27
Upwards press they to the mountain-summit,
And with fearful shouts, which hills and vallies
With re-echoing voices loud repeated;
On the walls the christian hosts are gather'd,
And God's mother fills their souls with valor;
So they draw their arrows to their shoulder—
So they wave aloft their swords—the tatars
Must give way—the tatars must be vanquish'd.
Then what rage possess'd the savage tatars;
From his eyes the Khan roll’d clouds of darkness—
In three legions he his troops divided—
In three legions, lo! they storm'd the mountain;
Twenty christians fell beneath the tatar-—
All the twenty fell their posts maintaining,
And beneath the walls their bodies weltered.
Then the tatars storm'd the walls—loud shouting,
As if thunder-storms were shaking heaven:
So they rush'd upon the christians' ramparts,
‘From the walls they hurl'd their brew defenders,
Crush'd them even like worms, and left them scatter'd
On the open field—and long and bloody,
C 2
