XXVIII. To horse! to horse! he quits, for ever quits But seeks not now the harlot and the bowl. XXIX. Yet Mafra shall one moment claim delay 5 A dome, where flaunts she in such glorious sheen, That men forget the blood which she hath spilt, And bow the knee to Pomp that loves to varnish guilt. XXX. O'er vales that teem with fruits, romantic hills, (Oh, that such hills upheld a freeborn race!) Whereon to gaze the eye with joyaunce fills, Childe Harold wends through many a pleasant place. Though sluggards deem it but a foolish chace, And marvel men should quit their easy chair, The toilsome way, and long, long league to trace, Oh! there is sweetness in the mountain air, And life, that bloated Ease can never hope to share. XXXI. More bleak to view the hills at length recede, Spain's realms appear whereon her shepherds tend Flocks, whose rich fleece right well the trader knows Now must the pastor's arm his lambs defend: And all must shield their all, or share Subjection's woes. XXXII. Where Lusitania and her sister meet, ye Deem what bounds the rival realms divide? Or fence of art, like China's vasty wall?— Ne horrid crags, nor mountains dark and tall, Rise like the rocks that part Hispania's land from Gaul: XXXIII. But these between a silver streamlet glides, And scarce a name distinguisheth the brook, Though rival kingdoms press its verdant sides. Here leans the idle shepherd on his crook, And vacant on the rippling waves doth look, That peaceful still 'twixt bitterest foemen flow; For proud each peasant as the noblest duke: Well doth the Spanish hind the difference know 'Twixt him and Lusian slave, the lowest of the low." XXXIV. But ere the mingling bounds have far been pass'd In sullen billows, murmuring and vast, Of Moor and knight, in mailed splendour drest: XXXV. Oh, lovely Spain! renown'd, romantic land! Red gleam'd the cross, and wan'd the crescent pale, While Afric's echoes thrill'd with Moorish matrons' wail. * XXXVI. Teems not each ditty with the glorious tale? Ah! such, alas! the hero's amplest fate! When granite moulders and when records fail, A peasant's plaint prolongs his dubious date. Pride! bend thine eye from heaven to thine estate; See how the Mighty shrink into a song! Can Volume, Pillar, Pile preserve thee great? Or must thou trust Tradition's simple tongue, When Flattery sleeps with thee, and History does thee wrong? XXXVII. Awake, ye sons of Spain! awake! advance! When her war-song was heard on Andalusia's shore? |