BOOK THE SIXTH.
211
Call'd London, light the beacon. Nor aloft
Did they not flame from every smaller fort,
That firm entrenched with walls and deep-delved moats
Included Orleans. O'er the shadowy plain 360
They cast a lurid splendor; to the troops
Grateful, as to the way-worn traveller,
Wand'ring with parched feet o'er the Arabian sands,
The far-seen cistern; he for many a league
Travelling the trackless desolate, where heaved 365
With tempest swell the desart billows round,
Pauses, and shudders at his perils past,
Then wild with joy speeds on to taste the wave
So long bewail'd.
Swift as the affrighted herd
Scud o'er the plain, when frequent thro' the sky 370
Flash the fierce lightnings, speed the routed host
Of England. To the sheltering forts they haste,
Tho' safe, of safety doubtful, still appall'd
And trembling, as the pilgrim who by night
On his way wilder'd, to the wolf's deep howl 375
Did they not flame from every smaller fort,
That firm entrenched with walls and deep-delved moats
Included Orleans. O'er the shadowy plain 360
They cast a lurid splendor; to the troops
Grateful, as to the way-worn traveller,
Wand'ring with parched feet o'er the Arabian sands,
The far-seen cistern; he for many a league
Travelling the trackless desolate, where heaved 365
With tempest swell the desart billows round,
Pauses, and shudders at his perils past,
Then wild with joy speeds on to taste the wave
So long bewail'd.
Swift as the affrighted herd
Scud o'er the plain, when frequent thro' the sky 370
Flash the fierce lightnings, speed the routed host
Of England. To the sheltering forts they haste,
Tho' safe, of safety doubtful, still appall'd
And trembling, as the pilgrim who by night
On his way wilder'd, to the wolf's deep howl 375
Hears
