[节选]Jerusalem Delivered

LXVIII

"A pinnace take thee swift as shaft from bow,

And speed thee, Henry, to the Greekish main,

There should arrive, as I by letters know

From one that never aught reports in vain,

A valiant youth in whom all virtues flow,

To help us this great conquest to obtain,

The Prince of Danes he is, and brings to war

A troop with him from under the Arctic star.



LXIX

"And for I doubt the Greekish monarch sly

Will use with him some of his wonted craft,

To stay his passage, or divert awry

Elsewhere his forces, his first journey laft,

My herald good and messenger well try,

See that these succors be not us beraft,

But send him thence with such convenient speed

As with his honor stands and with our need.



LXX

"Return not thou, but Legier stay behind,

And move the Greekish Prince to send us aid,

Tell him his kingly promise doth him bind

To give us succors, by his covenant made."

This said, and thus instruct, his letters signed

The trusty herald took, nor longer stayed,

But sped him thence to done his Lord's behest,

And thus the Duke reduced his thoughts to rest.

LXXI

Aurora bright her crystal gates unbarred,

And bridegroom-like forth stept the glorious sun,

When trumpets loud and clarions shrill were heard,

And every one to rouse him fierce begun,

Sweet music to each heart for war prepared,

The soldiers glad by heaps to harness run;

So if with drought endangered be their grain,

Poor ploughmen joy when thunders promise rain.



LXXII

Some shirts of mail, some coats of plate put on,

Some donned a cuirass, some a corslet bright,

And halbert some, and some a habergeon,

So every one in arms was quickly dight,

His wonted guide each soldier tends upon,

Loose in the wind waved their banners light,

Their standard royal toward Heaven they spread,

The cross triumphant on the Pagans dead.



LXXIII

Meanwhile the car that bears the lightning brand

Upon the eastern hill was mounted high,

And smote the glistering armies as they stand,

With quivering beams which dazed the wondering eye,

That Phaeton-like it fired sea and land,

The sparkles seemed up to the skies to fly,

The horses' neigh and clattering armors' sound

Pursue the echo over dale and down.



LXXIV

Their general did with due care provide

To save his men from ambush and from train,

Some troops of horse that lightly armed ride

He sent to scour the woods and forests main,

His pioneers their busy work applied

To even the paths and make the highways plain,

They filled the pits, and smoothed the rougher ground,

And opened every strait they closed found.



LXXV

They meet no forces gathered by their foe,

No towers defenced with rampire, moat, or wall,

No stream, no wood, no mountain could forslow

Their hasty pace, or stop their march at all;

So when his banks the prince of rivers, Po,

Doth overswell, he breaks with hideous fall

The mossy rocks and trees o'ergrown with age,

Nor aught withstands his fury and his rage.



LXXVI

The King of Tripoli in every hold

Shut up his men, munition and his treasure,

The straggling troops sometimes assail he would,

Save that he durst not move them to displeasure;

He stayed their rage with presents, gifts and gold,

And led them through his land at ease and leisure,

To keep his realm in peace and rest he chose,

With what conditions Godfrey list impose.



LXXVII

Those of Mount Seir, that neighboreth by east

The Holy City, faithful folk each one,

Down from the hill descended most and least,

And to the Christian Duke by heaps they gone,

And welcome him and his with joy and feast;

On him they smile, on him they gaze alone,

And were his guides, as faithful from that day

As Hesperus, that leads the sun his way.



LXXVIII

Along the sands his armies safe they guide

By ways secure, to them well known before,

Upon the tumbling billows fraughted ride

The armed ships, coasting along the shore,

Which for the camp might every day provide

To bring munition good and victuals store:

The isles of Greece sent in provision meet,

And store of wine from Scios came and Crete.



LXXIX

Great Neptune grieved underneath the load

Of ships, hulks, galleys, barks and brigantines,

In all the mid-earth seas was left no road

Wherein the Pagan his bold sails untwines,

Spread was the huge Armado, wide and broad,

From Venice, Genes, and towns which them confines,

From Holland, England, France and Sicil sent,

And all for Juda ready bound and bent.