Thus their prayer was raved and passed: 
     Passed in peace their red sunset: 
     Hewn and earthed those men of sweat
     Who had housed him in the vast,
     Where no mortal might declare,
     There lies he—­his end was there! 
     Attila, my Attila!

     XXIX

     Kingless was the army left: 
     Of its head the race bereft. 
     Every fury of the pit
     Tortured and dismembered it. 
     Lo, upon a silent hour,
     When the pitch of frost subsides,
     Danube with a shout of power
     Loosens his imprisoned tides: 
     Wide around the frighted plains
     Shake to hear his riven chains,
     Dreadfuller than heaven in wrath,
     As he makes himself a path: 
     High leap the ice-cracks, towering pile
     Floes to bergs, and giant peers
     Wrestle on a drifted isle;
     Island on ice-island rears;
     Dissolution battles fast: 
     Big the senseless Titans loom,
     Through a mist of common doom
     Striving which shall die the last: 
     Till a gentle-breathing morn
     Frees the stream from bank to bank. 
     So the Empire built of scorn
     Agonized, dissolved and sank. 
     Of the Queen no more was told
     Than of leaf on Danube rolled. 
     Make the bed for Attila!

     Aneurin’s harp

     I

     Prince of Bards was old Aneurin;
     He the grand Gododin sang;
     All his numbers threw such fire in,
     Struck his harp so wild a twang; —
     Still the wakeful Briton borrows
     Wisdom from its ancient heat: 
     Still it haunts our source of sorrows,
     Deep excess of liquor sweet!

     II

     Here the Briton, there the Saxon,
     Face to face, three fields apart,
     Thirst for light to lay their thwacks on
     Each the other with good heart. 
     Dry the Saxon sits, ’mid dinful
     Noise of iron knits his steel: 
     Fresh and roaring with a skinful,
     Britons round the hirlas reel.

     III

     Yellow flamed the meady sunset;
     Red runs up the flag of morn. 
     Signal for the British onset
     Hiccups through the British horn. 
     Down these hillmen pour like cattle
     Sniffing pasture:  grim below,
     Showing eager teeth of battle,
     In his spear-heads lies the foe.

     IV

— Monster of the sea! we drive him Back into his hungry brine. — You shall lodge him, feed him, wive him, Look on us; we stand in line. — Pale sea-monster! foul the waters Cast him; foul he leaves our land. — You shall yield us land and daughters:  Stay the tongue, and try the hand.

     V