A Lay Sung at the Feast (29)

    Fast, fast, with heels wild spurning, The dark-gray charger fled： He burst through ranks of fighting men, He sprang o'er heaps of dead. His bridle far out-streming, His flanks all blood and foam, He sought the southern mountains, The mountains of his home. The pass was steep and rugged, The wolves they howled and whined；

    But he ran like a whirlwind up the pass, And he left the wolves behind. Through many a startled hamlet Thundered his flying feet； He rushed through the gate of Tusculum, He rushed up the long white street； He rushed by tower and temple, And paused not from his race Till he stood before his master's door In the stately marketplace. And straightway round him gathered A pale and trembling

    crowd, And when they knew him, cries of rage Brake forth, and wailing loud： And women rent their tresses For their great prince's fall； And old men girt on their old swords, And went to man the wall.