Page:Poems Sackville.djvu/98

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THE HELOTS
(Sparta, 500 b.c.)

In peace and in peril
They feed on our lives,
When the war-lust is sterile,
With lashes, with knives
They goad us, and rich with our life blood the land waxes fruitful and thrives.

What pain can defeat us?
What terror dismay?
What passion may heat us—

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