VI.

Call back the gorgeous Past! The lists are set, the trumpets sound, Still as the stars, when to the breeze Sway the proud crests of stately trees, Bright eyes, from tier on tier around, Look down, where on its famous ground Murmurs and moves the bristling life Of antique Chivalry! "Forward!"[J]--the signal word is given-- Like cloud on cloud by tempest driven; Steel lightens, and arm'd thunders close! How plumes descend in flakes of snows; How the ground reels, as reels a sea, Beneath the inebriate rapture-strife Of jocund Chivalry! Who is the Victor of the Day? Thou of the delicate form and golden hair And Manhood glorious in its midst of May;-- Thou who, upon thy shield of argent, bearest The bold device, "The Loftiest is the Fairest!" As bending low thy stainless crest, "The Vestal throned by the West" Accords the old Provencal crown Which blends her own with thy renown;-- Arcadian Sidney--Nursling of the Muse, Flower of divine Romance,[K] whose bloom was fed By daintiest Helicon's most silver dews, Alas! how soon thy lovely leaves were shed-- Thee lost, no more were Grace and Force united, Grace but some flaunting Buckingham unmann'd, And Force but crush'd what Freedom vainly righted-- Behind, lo Cromwell looms, and dusks the land With the swart shadow of his giant hand.