220 THE TEN THOUSAND AT THE SACRED MOUNT. 



Could it aught avail to them 



That the Golden Eagle fled > 

 He who fought for Susa's diadem, 



Was among Cynaxa's dead ; 

 Their paean had drown'd the parting groan 

 Of him who struck for a grave or throne ! 



They had heard Euphrates rush 



In the might of his own deep wave; 

 They had seen the infant Tigris gush 



From his far Armenian cave; 

 They had seen the Ephesian pile, 



The hut of the mountaineer, 

 And fought through many a red defile 



With the sling, the shaft, and spear: 

 Of their brave ranks, some of the bravest lay 

 In a nameless grave of foreign clay. 



Underneath the snow-born pines 



Of the wild Carduchian hills, 

 They had thought of their country's wines 



By the foeman's icy rills : 

 At the eagle's scream, they had thought 



On the nightingales of home : 

 "Could such, " they had asked, u be the lure that wrought 



Upon Greeks from Greece to roam ? " 



As they thought of the hour when they blindly sold 

 Ten thousand swords for a stranger's gold. 



The y are scaling Thcches side 



Their van is on Theche's broir 

 What weans the pause, vf the martial tide. 



And the earthquake-cry below ? 

 To the sword the lirnl arm glanced, 



And the languid foot trod proud ; 

 Over each worn check the stern blood danced, 



Like the fire-flash over the cloud ; 

 The hero woke in each weary man 

 For they decm'd the foe was upon their van ! 



On they rush'd as to thejlght 



But it was no battle-word; 

 Far " the Sea ! the Sea ! "from the mountains height 



In a thousand shouts was heard! 

 "TiiE SEA ! THE SEA ! "that cry 



Seemed the end of toils and fears ; 

 And of all that host, not a freeman's eye 



But was dim with rapturous tears. 



Printed and Published by G. Hearder, Buckwell Street, Plymouth. 



