ARGUMENT Atlantes' magic towers Astolpho wight Destroys, and frees his thralls from prison-cell.

Bradamant finds Rogero, who in fight O'erthrows four barons from the warlike sell, When on their way to save an errant knight Doomed to devouring fire: the four who fell For impious Pinnabel maintained the strife, Whom, after, Bradamant deprives of life.

I Ye courteous dames, and to your lovers dear, You that are with one single love content; Though, 'mid so many and many, it is clear Right few of you are of such constant bent; Be not displeased at what I said whilere, When I so bitterly Gabrina shent, Nor if I yet expend some other verse In censure of the beldam's mind perverse.

II Such was she; and I hide not what is true; So was enjoined me for a task by one Whose will is law; therefore is honour due To constant heart throughout my story done.

He who betrayed his master to the Jew For thirty pence, nor Peter wronged, nor John, Nor less renowned is Hypermnestra's fame, For her so many wicked sisters' shame.

III For one I dare to censure in my lays, For so the story wills which I recite, On the other hand, a hundred will I praise, And make their virtue dim the sun's fair light; But turning to the various pile I raise, (Gramercy! dear to many) of the knight Of Scotland I was telling, who hard-by Had heard, as was rehea.r.s.ed, a piercing cry.

IV He entered, 'twixt two hills, a narrow way, From whence was heard the cry; nor far had hied, Ere to a vale he came shut out from day, Where he before him a dead knight espied.

Who I shall tell; but first I must away From France, in the Levant to wander wide, Till I the paladin Astolpho find, Who westward had his course from thence inclined.

V I in the cruel city left the peer, Whence, with the formidable bugle's roar, He had chased the unfaithful people in their fear, And has preserved himself from peril sore; And with the sound had made his comrades rear Then sail, and fly with noted scorn that sh.o.r.e.

Now following him, I say, the warrior took The Armenian road, and so that land forsook.

VI He, after some few days, in Natoly Finds himself, and towards Brusa goes his ways; Hence wending, on the hither side o' the sea, Makes Thrace; through Hungary by the Danube lays His course, and as his horse had wings to flee, Traverses in less time than twenty days Both the Moravian and Bohemian line; Threaded Franconia next, and crost the Rhine.

VII To Aix-la-Chapelle thence, through Arden's wood, Came and embarked upon the Flemish strand.

To sea, with southern breeze his vessel stood; And, so the favouring wind her canvas fanned, That he, at little distance, Albion viewed By noon, and disembarked upon her land.

He backed his horse, and so the rowels plied, In London he arrived by even-tide.

VIII Here, learning afterwards that Otho old Has lain for many months in Paris-town, And that anew nigh every baron bold Has after his renowned example done, He straightway does for France his sails unfold, And to the mouth of Thames again is gone.

Whence issuing forth, with all his canvas spread, For Calais he directs the galley's head.

IX A breeze which, from the starboard blowing light, Had tempted forth Astolpho's bark to sea, By little and by little, waxed in might, And so at last obtains the mastery, The pilot is constrained to veer outright, Lest by the billows swampt his frigate be, And he, departing from his first design, Keeps the bark straight before the cresting brine.

X Now to the right, now to the other hand, Sped by the tempest, through the foaming main, The vessel ran; she took the happy land At last nigh Rouen; and forthwith, in chain And plate Astolpho cased, and girt with brand, Bade put the saddle upon Rabicane; Departed thence, and (what availed him more Than thousands armed) with him his bugle bore;

XI And traversing a forest, at the feet Of a fair hill, arrived beside a font, What time the sheep foregoes his gra.s.sy meat, Penned in the cabin or the hollow mount; And, overcome by feverish thirst and heat, Lifted the weighty morion from his front; Tethered his courser in the thickest wood, And, with intent to drink, approached the flood.

XII His lips he had not wetted in its bed Before a youthful rustic, ambushed near, Sprang from a copse, backed Rabican, and fled With the good courser of the cavalier.

Astolpho hears the noise and lifts his head, And, when he sees his mighty loss so clear, Satiate, although he had not drunk, upstarts, And after the young churl in fury darts.

XIII That robber did not let the courser strain At speed, or he had from the warrior shot; But loosening now and tightening now the rein, Fled at a gallop or a steady trot.

From the deep forest issued forth the twain, After long round, and reached in fine the spot Where so many ill.u.s.trious lords were shent: Worse prisoners they than if in prison pent!

XIV On Rabican, who with the wind might race, The villain sped, within the enchanter's won.

Impeded by his shield and iron case, Parforce Astolpho far behind him run; Yet there arrives as well, but every trace Of what the warrior had pursued is gone.

He neither Rabican nor thief can meet, And vainly rolls his eyes and plies his feet.

XV He plies his feet, and searches still in vain Throughout the house, hall, bower, or galleried rows: Yet labours evermore, with fruitless pain And care, to find the treacherous churl; nor knows Where he can have secreted Rabicane, Who every other animal outgoes: And vainly searches all day the dome about, Above, below, within it, and without.

XVI He, wearied and confused with wandering wide, Perceived the place was by enchantment wrought, And of the book he carried at his side, By Logistilla given in India, thought; Bestowed, should new enchantment him betide, That needful succour might therein be sought.

He to the index turns, and quickly sees What pages show the proper remedies.

XVII I' the book, of that enchanted house at large Was written, and in this was taught the way To foil the enchanter, and to set at large The different prisoners, subject to his sway.

Of these illusions and these frauds in charge, A spirit pent beneath the threshold lay; And the stone raised which kept him fast below, With him the palace into smoke would go.

XVIII Astolpho with desire to bring to end An enterprise so pa.s.sing fair, delays No more, but to the task his force does bend, And prove how much the heavy marble weighs.

As old Atlantes sees the knight intend To bring to scorn his art and evil ways, Suspicious of the ill which may ensue, He moves to a.s.sail him with enchantments new.

XIX He, with his spells and shapes of devilish kind, Makes the duke different from his wont appear; To one a giant, and to one a hind, To other an ill-visaged cavalier; Each, in the form which in the thicket blind The false enchanter wore, beholds the peer.

So that they all, with purpose to have back What the magician took, the duke attack.

XX The Child, Grada.s.so, Iroldo, Bradamant, Prasildo, Brandimart, and many more, All, cheated by this new illusion, pant To slay the English baron, angered sore; But he abased their pride and haughty vaunt, Who straight bethought him of the horn be bore.

But for the succour of its echo dread, They, without fail, had laid Astolpho dead.

XXI But he no sooner has the bugle wound And poured a horrid larum, than in guise Of pigeons at the musquet's scaring sound, The troop of cavaliers affrighted flies.

No less the necromancer starts astound, No less he from his den in panic hies; Troubled and pale, and hurrying evermore Till out of hearing of the horrid roar

XXII The warder fled; with him his prisoned train, And many steeds as well are fled and gone; (These more than rope is needed to restrain) Who after their astounded masters run, Scared by the sound; nor cat nor mouse remain, Who seem to hear in it, "Lay on, lay on."

Rabican with the rest had broke his bands, But that he fell into Astolpho's hands.

XXIII He, having chased the enchanter Moor away, Upraised the heavy threshold from the ground; Beneath which, figures and more matters lay, That I omit; desirous to confound The spell which did the magic dome upstay, The duke made havock of whate'er he found, As him the book he carried taught to do: And into mist and smoke all past from view.

XXIV There he found fastened by a golden chain Rogero's famous courser, him I say Given by the wizard, that to the domain Of false Alcina him he might convey: On which, equipt with Logistilla's rein, To France Rogero had retraced his way, And had from Ind to England rounded all The right-hand side of the terrestrial ball.

XXV I know not if you recollect how tied To a tree Rogero left his rein, the day Galaphron's naked daughter from his side Vanished, and him did with that scorn appay.

The courser, to his wonder who espied, Returned to him whom he was used to obey; Beneath the old enchanter's care to dwell, And stayed with him till broken was the spell.

XXVI At nought Astolpho could more joyous be Than this; of all things fortunate the best: In that the hippogryph so happily Offered himself; that he might scower the rest, (As much he coveted) of land and sea, And in few days the ample world invest.

Him well he knew, how fit for his behoof; For of his feats he had elsewhere made proof.

XXVII Him he that day in India proved, when sped He was by sage Melissa, from the reign Of that ill woman who him, sore bested, Had changed from man to myrtle on the plain; Had marked and noted how his giddy head Was formed by Logistilla to the rein; And saw how well instructed by her care Rogero was, to guide him every where.

XXVIII Minded to take the hippogryph, he flung The saddle on him, which lay near, and bitted The steed, by choosing, all the reins among, This part or that, until his mouth was fitted: For in that place were many bridles hung, Belonging to the coursers which flitted.

And now alone, intent upon his flight, The thought of Rabicane detained the knight.

XXIX Good cause he had to love that Rabicane, For better horse was not to run with lance, And him had he from the remotest reign Of India ridden even into France: After much thought, he to some friend would fain Present him, rather than so, left to chance, Abandon there the courser, as a prey, To the first stranger who should pa.s.s that way.

x.x.x He stood upon the watch if he could view Some hunter in the forest, or some hind, To whom he might commit the charge, and who Might to some city lead the horse behind.

He waited all that day and till the new Had dawned, when, while the twilight yet was blind, He thought he saw, as he expecting stood, A cavalier approaching through the wood.

x.x.xI But it behoves that, ere the rest I say, I Bradamant and good Rogero find.

After the horn had ceased, and, far away, The beauteous pair had left the dome behind, Rogero looked, and knew what till that day He had seen not, by Atlantes rendered blind.

Atlantes had effected by his power, They should not know each other till that hour.

x.x.xII Rogero looks on Bradamant, and she Looks on Rogero in profound surprise That for so many days that witchery Had so obscurred her altered mind and eyes.

Rejoiced, Rogero clasps his lady free, Crimsoning with deeper than the rose's dyes, And his fair love's first blossoms, while he clips The gentle damsel, gathers from her lips.

x.x.xIII A thousand times they their embrace renew, And closely each is by the other prest; While so delighted are those lovers two, Their joys are ill contained within their breast.

Deluded by enchantments, much they rue That while they were within the wizard's rest, They should not e'er have one another known, And have so many happy days foregone.

x.x.xIV The gentle Bradamant, who was i' the vein To grant whatever prudent virgin might, To solace her desiring lover's pain, So that her honour should receive no slight; -- If the last fruits he of her love would gain, Nor find her ever stubborn, bade the knight, Her of Duke Aymon through fair mean demand; But be baptized before he claimed her hand.

x.x.xV Rogero good, who not alone to be A Christian for the love of her were fain, As his good sire had been, and anciently His grandsire and his whole ill.u.s.trious strain, But for her pleasure would immediately Resign whatever did of life remain, Says, "I not only, if 'tis thy desire, Will be baptized by water, but by fire."