Go, ask that solitary sire
Laid in his house alone;
His silent hearth without a fire,
His sons and daughters gone.
Go, ask those children in the street
Beside their mother's door;
Waiting to hear the lingering feet
That they shall hear no more.
Ask those pale soldiers round the gate
With famine-kindled eye.
They say, ' Zalona celebrates
The day that she must die.'
The charger by his manger tied
Has wasted many a day;
Yet ere the spur hath touched his side,
Behold he sinks away!
And hungry dogs with wolflike cry
Unburied corpses tear,
While their gaunt masters gaze and sigh
And scarce the feast forbear.
Now, look down from Zalona's wall;
There war the unwearied foe;
If ranks beneath the cannon fall,
New ranks for ever grow.
