The Baron's Yule Feast: A Christmas Rhyme

Excerpt

Canto I.

Right beautiful is Torksey's hall,
Adown by meadowed Trent;
Right beautiful that mouldering wall,
And remnant of a turret tall,
Shorn of its battlement.

For, while the children of the Spring
Blush into life, and die;
And Summer's joy-birds take light wing
When Autumn mists are nigh;
And soon the year—a winterling—
With its fall'n leaves doth lie;
That ruin gray—
Mirror'd, alway,
Deep in the silver stream,
Doth summon weird-wrought visions vast,
That show the actors of the past
Pictured, as in a dream.

Meseemeth, now, before mine eyes,
The pomp-clad phantoms dimly rise,
Till the full pageant bright—
A throng of warrior-barons bold,
Glittering in burnished steel and gold,
Bursts on my glowing sight.

And, mingles with the martial train,
Full many a fair-tressed beauty vain,
On palfrey and jennet—
That proudly toss the tasselled rein,
And daintily curvet;
And war-steeds prance,
And rich plumes glance
On helm and burgonet;
And lances crash,
And falchions flash
Of knights in tourney met.

Fast fades the joust!—and fierce forms frown
That man the leaguered tower,—
Nor quail to scan the kingly crown
That leads the leaguering power.

Trumpet and "rescue" ring!—and, soon,
He who began the strife
Is fain to crave one paltry boon:—
The thrall-king begs his life!

Our fathers and their throbbing toil
Are hushed in pulseless death;
Hushed is the dire and deadly broil—
The tempest of their wrath;—
Yet, of their deeds not all for spoil
Is thine, O sateless Grave!
Songs of their brother-hours shall foil
Thy triumph o'er the brave!

Their bravery take, and darkly hide
Deep in thy inmost hold!
Take all their mailëd pomp and pride
To deck thy mansions cold!
Plunderer! thou hast but purified
Their memories from alloy:
Faults of the dead we scorn to chide—
Their virtues sing with joy.

Lord of our fathers' ashes! list
A carol of their mirth;
Nor shake thy nieve, chill moralist!
To check their sons' joy-birth:—

It is the season when our sires
Kept jocund holiday;
And, now, around our charier fires,
Old Yule shall have a lay:—
A prison-bard is once more free;
And, ere he yields his voice to thee,
His song a merry-song shall be!

————

Sir Wilfrid de Thoroldfreely holds
What his stout sires held before—
Broad lands for plough, and fruitful folds,—
Though by gold he sets no store;
And he saith, from fen and woodland wolds,
From marish, heath, and moor,—
To feast in his hall,
Both free and thrall,
Shall come as they came of yore.

"Let the merry bells ring out!" saith he
To my lady of the Fosse;
"We will keep the birth-eve joyfully
Of our Lord who bore the cross!"

"Let the merry bells ring loud!" he saith
To saint Leonard's shaven prior;
"Bid thy losel monks that patter of faith
Shew works, and never tire."
Saith the lord of saint Leonard's: "The brotherhood
Will ring and never tire
For a beck or a nod of the Baron good;"—
Saith Sir Wilfrid: "They will—for hire!"

Then, turning to his daughter fair,
Who leaned on her father's carven chair,—
He said,—and smiled
On his peerless child,—
His jewel whose price no clerk could tell,
Though the clerk had told
Sea sands for gold;—
For her dear mother's sake he loved her well,—
But more for the balm her tenderness
Had poured on his widowed heart's distress;—
More, still more, for her own heart's grace
That so lovelily shone in her lovely face,
And drew all eyes its love to trace—
Left all tongues languageless!—

He said,—and smiled
On his peerless child,
"Sweet bird!...