14
JOAN OF ARC.
Thy head; look down—behold thine orphan child!
She goes to fill her destiny; like thee,
Leaving domestic joys, in rugged arms.150
To clasp her limbs;—like thee to dare the war,
To die—yet not inglorious!
"Wild with woe
O'er my poor father's shatter'd corse I lay,
And kist his rigid cheek, and tore my vest
To bind his mangled limbs; nor, now bereft 155
Of him the only parent of my youth,
Fear'd I the horrors that prevail'd around.
Suddenly all was still: anon burst forth
The shout of conquest: from their long lov'd homes[1]
Thrust forth, the unhappy natives wander o'er 160
The
- ↑ Line 159—Some writing of this yeelding up of Harflue, doo in like sort make mention of the distresse whereto the people, then expelled out of their habitations were driven: insomuch as parents with their children, yong maids and old folke went out of the towne gates with heavie harts, (God wot) as put to their present shifts to seek them a new abode."
Holinshed, 550.This act of despotic barbarity was perpetrated by Henry that he might people the town with English inhabitants. "This doth Anglorum prælia report, saieng (not without good ground I believe) as followeth:
Tum flentes tenera cum prole parentes
Virgineusque chorus veteres liquere penates:
