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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>Pharsalia - Book VII: The Battle</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Ne'er to the summons of the Eternal laws<br>More slowly Titan rose, nor drave his steeds,<br>Forced by the sky revolving, up the heaven,<br>With gloomier presage; wishing to endure<br>The pangs of ravished light, and dark eclipse;<br>And drew the mists up, not to feed his flames, <br>But lest his light upon Thessalian earth<br>Might fall undimmed.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Pompeius on that morn,<br>To him the latest day of happy life,<br>In troubled sleep an empty dream conceived.<br>For in the watches of the night he heard<br>Innumerable Romans shout his name<br>Within his theatre; the benches vied<br>To raise his fame and place him with the gods;<br>As once in youth, when victory was won<br>O'er conquered tribes where swift Iberus flows, <br>And where Sertorius' armies fought and fled,<br>The west subdued, with no less majesty<br>Than if the purple toga graced the car,<br>He sat triumphant in his pure white gown<br>A Roman knight, and heard the Senate's cheer.<br>Perhaps, as ills drew near, his anxious soul,<br>Shunning the future wooed the happy past;<br>Or, as is wont, prophetic slumber showed<br>That which was not to be, by doubtful forms<br>Misleading; or as envious Fate forbade<br>Return to Italy, this glimpse of Rome<br>Kind Fortune gave. Break not his latest sleep,<br>Ye sentinels; let not the trumpet call<br>Strike on his ear: for on the morrow's night<br>Shapes of the battle lost, of death and war<br>Shall crowd his rest with terrors. Whence shalt thou<br>The poor man's happiness of sleep regain?<br>Happy if even in dreams thy Rome could see<br>Once more her captain! Would the gods had given<br>To thee and to thy country one day yet<br>To reap the latest fruit of such a love:<br>Though sure of fate to come! Thou marchest on<br>As though by heaven ordained in Rome to die;<br>She, conscious ever of her prayers for thee<br>Heard by the gods, deemed not the fates decreed<br>Such evil destiny, that she should lose<br>The last sad solace of her Magnus' tomb.<br>Then young and old had blent their tears for thee,<br>And child unbidden; women torn their hair<br>And struck their bosoms as for Brutus dead.<br>But now no public woe shall greet thy death<br>As erst thy praise was heard: but men shall grieve<br>In silent sorrow, though the victor's voice<br>Amid the clash of arms proclaims thy fall;<br>Though incense smoke before the Thunderer's shrine,<br>And shouts of welcome bid great Caesar hail.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">The stars had fled before the growing morn,<br>When eager voices (as the fates drew on<br>The world to ruin) round Pompeius' tent<br>Demand the battle signal. What! by those<br>So soon to perish, shall the sign be asked,<br>Their own, their country's doom? Ah! fatal rage<br>That hastens on the hour; no other sun<br>Upon this living host shall rise again.<br>'Pompeius fears!' they cry. 'He's slow to act;<br>Too 'kind to Caesar; and he fondly rules<br>A world of subject peoples; but with peace<br>Such rule were ended.' Eastern kings no less,<br>And peoples, eager for their distant homes,<br>Already murmured at the lengthy war.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Thus hath it pleased the gods, when woe impends<br>On guilty men, to make them seem its cause.<br>We court disaster, crave the fatal sword.<br>Of Magnus' camp Pharsalia was the prayer;<br>For Tullius, of all the sons of Rome<br>Chief orator, beneath whose civil rule<br>Fierce Catiline at the peace-compelling axe<br>Trembled and fled, arose, to Magnus' ear<br>Bearing the voice of all. To him was war<br>Grown hateful, and he longed once more to hear<br>The Senate's plaudits; and with eloquent lips<br>He lent persuasion to the weaker cause.<br>'Fortune, Pompeius, for her gifts to thee<br>Asks this one boon, that thou should'st use her now.<br>Here at thy feet thy leading captains lie;<br>And here thy monarchs, and a suppliant world<br>Entreats thee prostrate for thy kinsman's fall.<br>So long shall Caesar plunge the world in war?<br>Swift was thy tread when these proud nations fell;<br>How deep their shame, and justly, should delay<br>Now mar thy conquests! Where thy trust in Fate,<br>Thy fervour where? Ingrate! Dost dread the gods,<br>Or think they favour not the Senate's cause?<br>Thy troops unbidden shall the standards seize<br>And conquer; thou in shame be forced to win.<br>If at the Senate's orders and for us<br>The war is waged, then give to us the right<br>To choose the battle-field. Why dost thou keep<br>From Caesar's throat the swords of all the world?<br>The weapon quivers in the eager hand:<br>Scarce one awaits the signal. Strike at once,<br>Or without thee the trumpets sound the fray.<br>Art thou the Senate's comrade or her lord?<br>We wait your answer.'</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">But Pompeius groaned;<br>His mind was adverse, but he felt the fates<br>Opposed his wish, and knew the hand divine.<br>'Since all desire it, and the fates prevail,<br>So let it be; your leader now no more,<br>I share the labours of the battle-field.<br>Let Fortune roll the nations of the earth<br>In one red ruin; myriads of mankind<br>See their last sun to-day. Yet, Rome, I swear,<br>This day of blood was forced upon thy son.<br>Without a wound, the prizes of the war<br>Might have been thine, and he who broke the peace<br>In peace forgotten. Whence this lust for crime?<br>Shall bloodless victories in civil war<br>Be shunned, not sought? We've ravished from our foe<br>All boundless seas, and land; his starving troops<br>Have snatched earth's crop half-grown, in vain attempt<br>Their hunger to appease; they prayed for death,<br>Sought for the sword-thrust, and within our ranks<br>Were fain to mix their life-blood with your own.<br>Much of the war is done: the conscript youth<br>Whose heart beats high, who burns to join the fray<br>(Though men fight hard in terror of defeat),<br>The shock of onset need no longer fear.<br>Bravest is he who promptly meets the ill<br>When fate commands it and the moment comes,<br>Yet brooks delay, in prudence; and shall we,<br>Our happy state enjoying, risk it all?<br>Trust to the sword the fortunes of the world?<br>Not victory, but battle, ye demand.<br>Do thou, O Fortune, of the Roman state<br>Who mad'st Pompeius guardian, from his hands<br>Take back the charge grown weightier, and thyself<br>Commit its safety to the chance of war.<br>Nor blame nor glory shall be mine to-day.<br>Thy prayers unjustly, Caesar, have prevailed:<br>We fight! What wickedness, what woes on men,<br>Destruction on what realms this dawn shall bring!<br>Crimson with Roman blood yon stream shall run.<br>Would that (without the ruin of our cause)<br>The first fell bolt hurled on this cursed day<br>Might strike me lifeless! Else, this battle brings<br>A name of pity or a name of hate.<br>The loser bears the burden of defeat;<br>The victor wins, but conquest is a crime.'<br>Thus to the soldiers, burning for the fray,<br>He yields, forbidding, and throws down the reins.<br>So may a sailor give the winds control<br>Upon his barque, which, driven by the seas,<br>Bears him an idle burden. Now the camp<br>Hums with impatience, and the brave man's heart<br>With beats tumultuous throbs against his breast;<br>And all the host had standing in their looks <br>The paleness of the death that was to come.<br>On that day's fight 'twas manifest that Rome<br>And all the future destinies of man<br>Hung trembling; and by weightier dread possessed,<br>They knew not danger. Who would fear for self<br>Should ocean rise and whelm the mountain tops,<br>And sun and sky descend upon the earth<br>In universal chaos? Every mind<br>Is bent upon Pompeius, and on Rome.<br>They trust no sword until its deadly point<br>Glows on the sharpening stone; no lance will serve<br>Till straightened for the fray; each bow is strung<br>Anew, and arrows chosen for their work<br>Fill all the quivers; horsemen try the curb<br>And fit the bridle rein and whet the spur.<br>If toils divine with human may compare,<br>'Twas thus, when Phlegra bore the giant crew, <br>In Etna's furnace glowed the sword of Mars,<br>Neptunus' trident felt the flame once more;<br>And great Apollo after Python slain<br>Sharpened his darts afresh: on Pallas' shield<br>Was spread anew the dread Medusa's hair;<br>And broad Sicilia trembled at the blows<br>Of Vulcan forging thunderbolts for Jove.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Yet Fortune failed not, as they sought the field,<br>In various presage of the ills to come;<br>All heaven opposed their march: portentous fire<br>In columns filled the plain, and torches blazed:<br>And thirsty whirlwinds mixed with meteor bolts<br>Smote on them as they strode, whose sulphurous flames<br>Perplexed the vision. Crests were struck from helms;<br>The melted sword-blade flowed upon the hilt:<br>The spear ran liquid, and the hurtful steel<br>Smoked with a sulphur that had come from heaven.<br>Nay, more, the standards, hid by swarms of bees<br>Innumerable, weighed the bearer down,<br>Scarce lifted from the earth; bedewed with tears;<br>No more of Rome the standards, or her state.<br>And from the altar fled the frantic bull<br>To fields afar; nor was a victim found<br>To grace the sacrifice of coming doom.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">But thou, Caesar, to what gods of ill<br>Didst thou appeal? What furies didst thou call,<br>What powers of madness and what Stygian Kings<br>Whelmed in th' abyss of hell? Didst favour gain<br>By sacrifice in this thine impious war?<br>Strange sights were seen; or caused by hands divine<br>Or due to fearful fancy. Haemus' top<br>Plunged headlong in the valley, Pindus met<br>With high Olympus, while at Ossa's feet<br>Red ran Baebeis, and Pharsalia's field<br>Gave warlike voices forth in depth of night.<br>Now darkness came upon their wondering gaze,<br>Now daylight pale and wan, their helmets wreathed<br>In pallid mist; the spirits of their sires<br>Hovered in air, and shades of kindred dead<br>Passed flitting through the gloom. Yet to the host<br>Conscious of guilty prayers which sought to shed<br>The blood of sires and brothers, earth and air<br>Distraught, and horrors seething in their hearts<br>Gave happy omen of the end to come.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Was't strange that peoples whom their latest day<br>Of happy life awaited (if their minds<br>Foreknew the doom) should tremble with affright?<br>Romans who dwelt by far Araxes' stream,<br>And Tyrian Gades, in whatever clime,<br>'Neath every sky, struck by mysterious dread<br>Were plunged in sorrow -- yet rebuked the tear,<br>For yet they knew not of the fatal day.<br>Thus on Euganean hills where sulphurous fumes<br>Disclose the rise of Aponus from earth,<br>And where Timavus broadens in the meads,<br>An augur spake: 'This day the fight is fought,<br>The arms of Caesar and Pompeius meet<br>To end the impious conflict.' Or he saw<br>The bolts of Jupiter, predicting ill;<br>Or else the sky discordant o'er the space<br>Of heaven, from pole to pole; or else perchance<br>The sun was sad and misty in the height<br>And told the battle by his wasted beams.<br>By Nature's fiat that Thessalian day<br>Passed not as others; if the gifted sense<br>Of reading portents had been given to all,<br>All men had known Pharsalia. Gods of heaven!<br>How do ye mark the great ones of the earth!<br>The world gives tokens of their weal or woe;<br>The sky records their fates: in distant climes<br>To future races shall their tale be told,<br>Or by the fame alone of mighty deeds<br>Had in remembrance, or by this my care<br>Borne through the centuries: and men shall read<br>In hope and fear the story of the war<br>And breathless pray, as though it were to come,<br>For that long since accomplished; and for thee<br>Thus far, Pompeius, shall that prayer be given.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Reflected from their arms, th' opposing sun<br>Filled all the slope with radiance as they marched<br>In ordered ranks to that ill-fated fight,<br>And stood arranged for battle. On the left<br>Thou, Lentulus, had'st charge; two legions there,<br>The fourth, and bravest of them all, the first:<br>While on the right, Domitius, ever stanch,<br>Though fates be adverse, stood: in middle line<br>The hardy soldiers from Cilician lands,<br>In Scipio's care; their chief in Libyan days,<br>To-day their comrade. By Enipeus' pools<br>And by the rivulets, the mountain troops<br>Of Cappadocia, and loose of rein<br>Thy squadrons, Pontus: on the firmer ground<br>Galatia's tetrarchs and the greater kings;<br>And all the purple-robed, the slaves of Rome.<br>Numidian hordes were there from Afric shores,<br>There Creta's host and Ituraeans found<br>Full space to wing their arrows; there the tribes<br>From brave Iberia clashed their shields, and there<br>Gaul stood arrayed against her ancient foe.<br>Let all the nations be the victor's prize,<br>None grace in future a triumphal car;<br>This fight demands the slaughter of a world.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Caesar that day to send his troops for spoil<br>Had left his tent, when on the further hill<br>Behold! his foe descending to the plain.<br>The moment asked for by a thousand prayers<br>Is come, which puts his fortune on the risk<br>Of imminent war, to win or lose it all.<br>For burning with desire of kingly power<br>His eager soul ill brooked the small delay<br>This civil war compelled: each instant lost<br>Robbed from his due! But when at length he knew<br>The last great conflict come, the fight supreme,<br>Whose prize the leadership of all the world:<br>And felt the ruin nodding to its fall:<br>Swiftest to strike, yet for a little space<br>His rage for battle failed; the spirit bold<br>To pledge itself the issue, wavered now:<br>For Magnus' fortunes gave no room for hope,<br>Though Caesar's none for fear. Deep in his soul<br>Such doubt was hidden, as with mien and speech<br>That augured victory, thus the chief began:<br>'Ye conquerors of a world, my hope in all,<br>Prayed for so oft, the dawn of fight is come.<br>No more entreat the gods: with sword in hand<br>Seize on our fates; and Caesar in your deeds<br>This day is great or little. This the day<br>For which I hold since Rubicon was passed<br>Your promise given: for this we flew to arms: <br>For this deferred the triumphs we had won,<br>And which the foe refused: this gives you back<br>Your homes and kindred, and the peaceful farm,<br>Your prize for years of service in the field.<br>And by the fates' command this day shall prove<br>Whose quarrel juster: for defeat is guilt<br>To him on whom it falls. If in my cause<br>With fire and sword ye did your country wrong,<br>Strike for acquittal! Should another judge<br>This war, not Caesar, none were blameless found.<br>Not for my sake this battle, but for you,<br>To give you, soldiers, liberty and law<br>'Gainst all the world. Wishful myself for life<br>Apart from public cares, and for the gown<br>That robes the private citizen, I refuse<br>To yield from office till the law allows<br>Your right in all things. On my shoulders rest<br>All blame; all power be yours. Nor deep the blood<br>Between yourselves and conquest. Grecian schools<br>Of exercise and wrestling send us here<br>Their chosen darlings to await your swords;<br>And scarcely armed for war, a dissonant crowd<br>Barbaric, that will start to hear our trump,<br>Nay, their own clamour. Not in civil strife<br>Your blows shall fall -- the battle of to-day<br>Sweeps from the earth the enemies of Rome.<br>Dash through these cowards and their vaunted kings:<br>One stroke of sword and all the world is yours.<br>Make plain to all men that the crowds who decked<br>Pompeius' hundred pageants scarce were fit<br>For one poor triumph. Shall Armenia care<br>Who leads her masters, or barbarians shed<br>One drop of blood to make Pompeius chief<br>O'er our Italia? Rome, 'tis Rome they hate<br>And all her children; yet they hate the most<br>Those whom they know. My fate is in the hands<br>Of you, mine own true soldiers, proved in all<br>The wars we fought in Gallia. When the sword<br>Of each of you shall strike, I know the hand:<br>The javelin's flight to me betrays the arm<br>That launched it hurtling: and to-day once more<br>I see the faces stern, the threatening eyes,<br>Unfailing proofs of victory to come.<br>E'en now the battle rushes on my sight;<br>Kings trodden down and scattered senators<br>Fill all th' ensanguined plain, and peoples float<br>Unnumbered on the crimson tide of death.<br>Enough of words -- I but delay the fates;<br>And you who burn to dash into the fray,<br>Forgive the pause. I tremble with the hopes <br>Thus finding utterance. I ne'er have seen<br>The mighty gods so near; this little field<br>Alone dividing us; their hands are full<br>Of my predestined honours: for 'tis I<br>Who when this war is done shall have the power<br>O'er all that peoples, all that kings enjoy<br>To shower it where I will. But has the pole<br>Been moved, or in its nightly course some star<br>Turned backwards, that such mighty deeds should pass<br>Here on Thessalian earth? To-day we reap<br>Of all our wars the harvest or the doom.<br>Think of the cross that threats us, and the chain,<br>Limbs hacked asunder, Caesar's head displayed<br>Upon the rostra; and that narrow field<br>Piled up with slaughter: for this hostile chief<br>Is savage Sulla's pupil. 'Tis for you,<br>If conquered, that I grieve: my lot apart<br>Is cast long since. This sword, should one of you<br>Turn from the battle ere the foe be fled,<br>Shall rob the life of Caesar. O ye gods,<br>Drawn down from heaven by the throes of Rome,<br>May he be conqueror who shall not draw<br>Against the vanquished an inhuman sword,<br>Nor count it as a crime if men of Rome<br>Preferred another's standard to his own.<br>Pompeius' sword drank deep Italian blood<br>When cabined in yon space the brave man's arm<br>No more found room to strike. But you, I pray,<br>Touch not the foe who turns him from the fight,<br>A fellow citizen, a foe no more.<br>But while the gleaming weapons threaten still,<br>Let no fond memories unnerve the arm, <br>No pious thought of father or of kin;<br>But full in face of brother or of sire,<br>Drive home the blade. Unless the slain be known<br>Your foes account his slaughter as a crime;<br>Spare not our camp, but lay the rampart low<br>And fill the fosse with ruin; not a man<br>But holds his post within the ranks to-day.<br>And yonder tents, deserted by the foe,<br>Shall give us shelter when the rout is done.'</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Scarce had he paused; they snatch the hasty meal,<br>And seize their armour and with swift acclaim<br>Welcome the chief's predictions of the day,<br>Tread low their camp when rushing to the fight;<br>And take their post: nor word nor order given,<br>In fate they put their trust. Nor, had'st thou placed<br>All Caesars there, all striving for the throne<br>Of Rome their city, had their serried ranks<br>With speedier tread dashed down upon the foe.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">But when Pompeius saw the hostile troops<br>Move forth in order and demand the fight,<br>And knew the gods' approval of the day,<br>He stood astonied, while a deadly chill<br>Struck to his heart -- omen itself of woe,<br>That such a chief should at the call to arms,<br>Thus dread the issue: but with fear repressed,<br>Borne on his noble steed along the line<br>Of all his forces, thus he spake: 'The day<br>Your bravery demands, that final end<br>Of civil war ye asked for, is at hand.<br>Put forth your strength, your all; the sword to-day<br>Does its last work. One crowded hour is charged<br>With nations' destinies. Whoe'er of you<br>Longs for his land and home, his wife and child,<br>Seek them with sword. Here in mid battle-field,<br>The gods place all at stake. Our better right<br>Bids us expect their favour; they shall dip<br>Your brands in Caesar's blood, and thus shall give<br>Another sanction to the laws of Rome,<br>Our cause of battle. If for him were meant<br>An empire o'er the world, had they not put<br>An end to Magnus' life? That I am chief<br>Of all these mingled peoples and of Rome<br>Disproves an angry heaven. See here combined<br>All means of victory. Noble men have sought<br>Unasked the risks of war. Our soldiers boast<br>Ancestral statues. If to us were given<br>A Curius, if Camillus were returned,<br>Or patriot Decius to devote his life,<br>Here would they take their stand. From furthest east<br>All nations gathered, cities as the sand<br>Unnumbered, give their aid: a world complete<br>Serves 'neath our standards. North and south and all<br>Who have their being 'neath the starry vault,<br>Here meet in arms conjoined: And shall we not<br>Crush with our closing wings this paltry foe?<br>Few shall find room to strike; the rest with voice<br>Must be content to aid: for Caesar's ranks<br>Suffice not for us. Think from Rome's high walls<br>The matrons watch you with their hair unbound;<br>Think that the Senate hoar, too old for arms,<br>With snowy locks outspread; and Rome herself,<br>The world's high mistress, fearing now, alas!<br>A despot -- all exhort you to the fight.<br>Think that the people that is and that shall be<br>Joins in the prayer -- in freedom to be born,<br>In freedom die, their wish. If 'mid these vows<br>Be still found place for mine, with wife and child,<br>So far as Imperator may, I bend<br>Before you suppliant -- unless this fight<br>Be won, behold me exile, your disgrace,<br>My kinsman's scorn. From this, 'tis yours to save.<br>Then save! Nor in the latest stage of life,<br>Let Magnus be a slave.'</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Then burned their souls<br>At these his words, indignant at the thought,<br>And Rome rose up within them, and to die<br>Was welcome.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Thus alike with hearts aflame<br>Moved either host to battle, one in fear<br>And one in hope of empire. These hands shall do<br>Such work as not the rolling centuries<br>Not all mankind though free from sword and war<br>Shall e'er make good. Nations that were to live<br>This fight shall crush, and peoples pre-ordained<br>To make the history of the coming world<br>Shall come not to the birth. The Latin names<br>Shall sound as fables in the ears of men,<br>And ruins loaded with the dust of years<br>Shall hardly mark her cities. Alba's hill,<br>Home of our gods, no human foot shall tread,<br>Save of some Senator at the ancient feast<br>By Numa's orders founded -- he compelled<br>Serves his high office. Void and desolate<br>Are Veii, Cora and Laurentum's hold;<br>Yet not the tooth of envious time destroyed<br>These storied monuments -- 'twas civil war<br>That rased their citadels. Where now hath fled<br>The teeming life that once Italia knew?<br>Not all the earth can furnish her with men:<br>Untenanted her dwellings and her fields:<br>Slaves till her soil: one city holds us all:<br>Crumbling to ruin, the ancestral roof<br>Finds none on whom to fall; and Rome herself,<br>Void of her citizens, draws within her gates<br>The dregs of all the world. That none might wage<br>A civil war again, thus deeply drank<br>Pharsalia's fight the life-blood of her sons.<br>Dark in the calendar of Rome for aye,<br>The days when Allia and Cannae fell:<br>And shall Pharsalus' morn, darkest of all,<br>Stand on the page unmarked? Alas, the fates!<br>Not plague nor pestilence nor famine's rage,<br>Not cities given to the flames, nor towns<br>Trembling at shock of earthquake shall weigh down<br>Such heroes lost, when Fortune's ruthless hand<br>Lops at one blow the gift of centuries,<br>Leaders and men embattled. How great art thou,<br>Rome, in thy fall! Stretched to the widest bounds<br>War upon war laid nations at thy feet<br>Till flaming Titan nigh to either pole<br>Beheld thine empire; and the furthest east<br>Was almost thine, till day and night and sky<br>For thee revolved, and all the stars could see<br>Throughout their course was Roman. But the fates<br>In one dread day of slaughter and despair<br>Turned back the centuries and spoke thy doom.<br>And now the Indian fears the axe no more<br>Once emblem of thy power, now no more<br>The girded Consul curbs the Getan horde,<br>Or in Sarmatian furrows guides the share: <br>Still Parthia boasts her triumphs unavenged:<br>Foul is the public life; and Freedom, fled<br>To furthest Earth beyond the Tigris' stream,<br>And Rhine's broad river, wandering at her will<br>'Mid Teuton hordes and Scythian, though by sword<br>Sought, yet returns not. Would that from the day<br>When Romulus, aided by the vulture's flight,<br>Ill-omened, raised within that hateful grove<br>Rome's earliest walls, down to the crimsoned field<br>In dire Thessalia fought, she ne'er had known<br>Italia's peoples! Did the Bruti strike<br>In vain for liberty? Why laws and rights<br>Sanctioned by all the annals designate<br>With consular titles? Happier far the Medes<br>And blest Arabia, and the Eastern lands<br>Held by a kindlier fate in despot rule!<br>That nation serves the worst which serves with shame.<br>No guardian gods watch over us from heaven:<br>Jove is no king; let ages whirl along<br>In blind confusion: from his throne supreme<br>Shall he behold such carnage and restrain<br>His thunderbolts? On Mimas shall he hurl<br>His fires, on Rhodope and Oeta's woods<br>Unmeriting such chastisement, and leave<br>This life to Cassius' hand? On Argos fell<br>At grim Thyestes' feast untimely night<br>By him thus hastened; shall Thessalia's land<br>Receive full daylight, wielding kindred swords<br>In fathers' hands and brothers'? Careless of men<br>Are all the gods. Yet for this day of doom<br>Such vengeance have we reaped as deities<br>May give to mortals; for these wars shall raise<br>Our parted Caesars to the gods; and Rome<br>Shall deck their effigies with thunderbolts,<br>And stars and rays, and in the very fanes<br>Swear by the shades of men.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">With swift advance<br>They seize the space that yet delays the fates<br>Till short the span dividing. Then they gaze<br>For one short moment where may fall the spear,<br>What hand may deal their death, what monstrous task<br>Soon shall be theirs; and all in arms they see,<br>In reach of stroke, their brothers and their sires<br>With front opposing; yet to yield their ground<br>It pleased them not. But all the host was dumb<br>With horror; cold upon each loving heart,<br>Awe-struck, the life-blood pressed; and all men held<br>With arms outstretched their javelins for a time,<br>Poised yet unthrown. Now may th' avenging gods<br>Allot thee, Crastinus, not such a death<br>As all men else do suffer! In the tomb<br>May'st thou have feeling and remembrance still!<br>For thine the hand that first flung forth the dart,<br>Which stained with Roman blood Thessalia's earth.<br>Madman! To speed thy lance when Caesar's self<br>Still held his hand! Then from the clarions broke<br>The strident summons, and the trumpets blared<br>Responsive signal. Upward to the vault<br>The sound re-echoes where nor clouds may reach<br>Nor thunder penetrate; and Haemus' slopes <br>Reverberate to Pelion the din;<br>Pindus re-echoes; Oeta's lofty rocks<br>Groan, and Pangaean cliffs, till at their rage<br>Borne back from all the earth they shook for fear.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Unnumbered darts they hurl, with prayers diverse;<br>Some hope to wound: others, in secret, yearn<br>For hands still innocent. Chance rules supreme,<br>And wayward Fortune upon whom she wills<br>Makes fall the guilt. Yet for the hatred bred<br>By civil war suffices spear nor lance,<br>Urged on their flight afar: the hand must grip<br>The sword and drive it to the foeman's heart.<br>But while Pompeius' ranks, shield wedged to shield,<br>Were ranged in dense array, and scarce had space<br>To draw the blade, came rushing at the charge<br>Full on the central column Caesar's host,<br>Mad for the battle. Man nor arms could stay<br>The crash of onset, and the furious sword<br>Clove through the stubborn panoply to the flesh,<br>There only stayed. One army struck -- their foes<br>Struck not in answer; Magnus' swords were cold,<br>But Caesar's reeked with slaughter and with guilt.<br>Nor Fortune lingered, but decreed the doom<br>Which swept the ruins of a world away.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Soon as withdrawn from all the spacious plain,<br>Pompeius' horse was ranged upon the flanks;<br>Passed through the outer files, the lighter armed<br>Of all the nations joined the central strife,<br>With divers weapons armed, but all for blood<br>Of Rome athirst: then blazing torches flew,<br>Arrows and stones. and ponderous balls of lead<br>Molten by speed of passage through the air.<br>There Ituraean archers and the Mede<br>Winged forth their countless shafts till all the sky<br>Grew dark with missiles hurled; and from the night<br>Brooding above, Death struck his victims down,<br>Guiltless such blow, while all the crime was heaped<br>Upon the Roman spear. In line oblique<br>Behind the standards Caesar in reserve<br>Had placed some companies of foot, in fear<br>The foremost ranks might waver. These at his word,<br>No trumpet sounding, break upon the ranks<br>Of Magnus' horsemen where they rode at large<br>Flanking the battle. They, unshamed of fear<br>And careless of the fray, when first a steed<br>Pierced through by javelin spurned with sounding hoof<br>The temples of his rider, turned the rein,<br>And through their comrades spurring from the field<br>In panic, proved that not with warring Rome<br>Barbarians may grapple. Then arose<br>Immeasurable carnage: here the sword,<br>There stood the victim, and the victor's arm<br>Wearied of slaughter. Oh, that to thy plains,<br>Pharsalia, might suffice the crimson stream<br>From hosts barbarian, nor other blood<br>Pollute thy fountains' sources! these alone<br>Shall clothe thy pastures with the bones of men!<br>Or if thy fields must run with Roman blood<br>Then spare the nations who in times to come<br>Must be her peoples!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Now the terror spread<br>Through all the army, and the favouring fates<br>Decreed for Caesar's triumph: and the war<br>Ceased in the wider plain, though still ablaze<br>Where stood the chosen of Pompeius' force,<br>Upholding yet the fight. Not here allies<br>Begged from some distant king to wield the sword:<br>Here were the Roman sons, the sires of Rome,<br>Here the last frenzy and the last despair:<br>Here, Caesar, was thy crime: and here shall stay<br>My Muse repelled: no poesy of mine<br>Shall tell the horrors of the final strife,<br>Nor for the coming ages paint the deeds<br>Which civil war permits. Be all obscured<br>In deepest darkness! Spare the useless tear<br>And vain lament, and let the deeds that fell<br>In that last fight of Rome remain unsung.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">But Caesar adding fury to the breasts<br>Already flaming with the rage of war,<br>That each might bear his portion of the guilt<br>Which stained the host, unflinching through the ranks<br>Passed at his will. He looked upon the brands,<br>These reddened only at the point, and those<br>Streaming with blood and gory, to the hilt:<br>He marks the hand which trembling grasped the sword,<br>Or held it idle, and the cheek that grew<br>Pale at the blow, and that which at his words<br>Glowed with the joy of battle: midst the dead<br>He treads the plain and on each gaping wound<br>Presses his hand to keep the life within.<br>Thus Caesar passed: and where his footsteps fell<br>As when Bellona shakes her crimson lash,<br>Or Mavors scourges on the Thracian mares <br>When shunning the dread face on Pallas' shield,<br>He drives his chariot, there arose a night<br>Dark with huge slaughter and with crime, and groans<br>As of a voice immense, and sound of alms<br>As fell the wearer, and of sword on sword<br>Crashed into fragments. With a ready hand<br>Caesar supplies the weapon and bids strike<br>Full at the visage; and with lance reversed<br>Urges the flagging ranks and stirs the fight.<br>Where flows the nation's blood, where beats the heart,<br>Knowing, he bids them spare the common herd,<br>But seek the senators -- thus Rome he strikes,<br>Thus the last hold of Freedom. In the fray,<br>Then fell the nobles with their mighty names<br>Of ancient prowess; there Metellus' sons,<br>Corvini, Lepidi, Torquati too,<br>Not once nor twice the conquerors of kings,<br>First of all men, Pompeius' name except,<br>Lay dead upon the field.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">But, Brutus, where,<br>Where was thy sword? 'Veiled by a common helm<br>Unknown thou wanderest. Thy country's pride,<br>Hope of the Senate, thou (for none besides);<br>Thou latest scion of that race of pride,<br>Whose fearless deeds the centuries record,<br>Tempt not the battle, nor provoke the doom!<br>Awaits thee on Philippi's fated field<br>Thy Thessaly. Not here shalt thou prevail<br>'Gainst Caesar's life. Not yet hath he surpassed<br>The height of power and deserved a death<br>Noble at Brutus' hands -- then let him live,<br>Thy fated victim!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">There upon the field<br>Lay all the honour of Rome; no common stream<br>Mixed with the purple tide. And yet of all<br>Who noble fell, one only now I sing,<br>Thee, brave Domitius. Whene'er the day<br>Was adverse to the fortunes of thy chief<br>Thine was the arm which vainly stayed the fight.<br>Vanquished so oft by Caesar, now 'twas thine<br>Yet free to perish. By a thousand wounds<br>Came welcome death, nor had thy conqueror power<br>Again to pardon. Caesar stood and saw<br>The dark blood welling forth and death at hand,<br>And thus in words of scorn: 'And dost thou lie,<br>Domitius, there? And did Pompeius name<br>Thee his successor, thee? Why leavest thou then<br>His standards helpless?' But the parting life<br>Still faintly throbbed within Domitius' breast,<br>Thus finding utterance: 'Yet thou hast not won<br>Thy hateful prize, for doubtful are the fates;<br>Nor thou the master, Caesar; free as yet,<br>With great Pompeius for my leader still,<br>Warring no more, I seek the silent shades,<br>Yet with this hope in death, that thou subdued<br>To Magnus and to me in grievous guise<br>May'st pay atonement.' So he spake: no more;<br>Then closed his eyes in death.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">'Twere shame to shed,<br>When thus a world was perishing, the tear<br>Meet for each fate, or sing the wound that reft<br>Each life away. Through forehead and through throat<br>The pitiless weapon clove its deadly path,<br>Or forced the entrails forth: one fell to earth<br>Prone at the stroke; one stood though shorn of limb;<br>Glanced from this breast unharmed the quivering spear;<br>That it transfixed to earth. Here from the veins<br>Spouted the life-blood, till the foeman's arms<br>Were crimsoned. One his brother slew, nor dared<br>To spoil the corse, till severed from the neck<br>He flung the head afar. Another dashed<br>Full in his father's teeth the fatal sword,<br>By murderous frenzy striving to disprove<br>His kinship with the slain. Yet for each death<br>We find no separate dirge, nor weep for men<br>When peoples fell. Thus, Rome, thy doom was wrought<br>At dread Pharsalus. Not, as in other fields,<br>By soldiers slain, or captains; here were swept<br>Whole nations to the death; Assyria here,<br>Achaia, Pontus; and the blood of Rome<br>Gushing in torrents forth, forbade the rest<br>To stagnate on the plain. Nor life was reft,<br>Nor safety only then; but reeled the world<br>And all her manifold peoples at the blow<br>In that day's battle dealt; nor only then<br>Felt, but in all the times that were to come.<br>Those swords gave servitude to every age<br>That shall be slavish; by our sires was shaped<br>For us our destiny, the despot yoke.<br>Yet have we trembled not, nor feared to bare<br>Our throats to slaughter, nor to face the foe:<br>We bear the penalty for others' shame.<br>Such be our doom; yet, Fortune, sharing not<br>In that last battle, 'twas our right to strike<br>One blow for freedom ere we served our lord.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Now saw Pompeius, grieving, that the gods<br>Had left his side, and knew the fates of Rome<br>Passed from his governance; yet all the blood<br>That filled the field scarce brought him to confess<br>His fortunes fled. A little hill he sought<br>Whence to descry the battle raging still<br>Upon the plain, which when he nearer stood<br>The warring ranks concealed. Thence did the chief<br>Gaze on unnumbered swords that flashed in air<br>And sought his ruin; and the tide of blood<br>In which his host had perished. Yet not as those<br>Who, prostrate fallen, would drag nations down<br>To share their evil fate, Pompeius did.<br>Still were the gods thought worthy of his prayers<br>To give him solace, in that after him<br>Might live his Romans. 'Spare, ye gods,' he said,<br>'Nor lay whole peoples low; my fall attained,<br>The world and Rome may stand. And if ye need<br>More bloodshed, here on me, my wife, and sons<br>Wreak out your vengeance -- pledges to the fates<br>Such have we given. Too little for the war<br>Is our destruction? Doth the carnage fail,<br>The world escaping? Magnus' fortunes lost,<br>Why doom all else beside him?' Thus he cried,<br>And passed amid his standards, and recalled<br>His vanquished host that rushed on fate declared.<br>Not for his sake such carnage should be wrought.<br>So thought Pompeius; nor the foeman's sword<br>He feared, nor death; but lest upon his fall<br>To quit their chief his soldiers might refuse,<br>And o'er his prostrate corpse a world in arms<br>Might find its ruin: or perchance he wished<br>From Caesar's eager eyes to veil his death.<br>In vain, unhappy! for the fates decree<br>He shall behold, shorn from the bleeding trunk,<br>Again thy visage. And thou, too, his spouse,<br>Beloved Cornelia, didst cause his flight;<br>Thy longed-for features; yet he shall not die<br>When thou art present. </a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Then upon his steed,<br>Though fearing not the weapons at his back,<br>Pompeius fled, his mighty soul prepared<br>To meet his destinies. No groan nor tear,<br>But solemn grief as for the fates of Rome,<br>Was in his visage, and with mien unchanged<br>He saw Pharsalia's woes, above the frowns<br>Or smiles of Fortune; in triumphant days<br>And in his fall, her master. The burden laid<br>Of thine impending fate, thou partest free<br>To muse upon the happy days of yore.<br>Hope now has fled; but in the fleeting past<br>How wast thou great! Seek thou the wars no more,<br>And call the gods to witness that for thee<br>Henceforth dies no man. In the fights to come<br>On Afric's mournful shore, by Pharos' stream<br>And fateful Munda; in the final scene<br>Of dire Pharsalia's battle, not thy name<br>Doth stir the war and urge the foeman's arm,<br>But those great rivals biding with us yet,<br>Caesar and Liberty; and not for thee<br>But for itself the dying Senate fought,<br>When thou had'st fled the combat.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Find'st thou not<br>Some solace thus in parting from the fight<br>Nor seeing all the horrors of its close?<br>Look back upon the dead that load the plain,<br>The rivers turbid with a crimson stream;<br>Then pity thou thy victor. How shall he<br>Enter the city, who on such a field<br>Finds happiness? Trust thou in Fortune yet,<br>Her favourite ever; and whate'er, alone<br>In lands unknown, an exile, be thy lot,<br>Whate'er thy sufferings 'neath the Pharian king,<br>'Twere worse to conquer. Then forbid the tear,<br>Cease, sounds of woe, and lamentation cease,<br>And let the world adore thee in defeat,<br>As in thy triumphs. With unfaltering gaze,<br>Look on the suppliant kings, thy subjects still;<br>Search out the realms and cities which they hold,<br>Thy gift, Pompeius; and a fitting place<br>Choose for thy death.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">First witness of thy fall,<br>And of thy noble bearing in defeat,<br>Larissa. Weeping, yet with gifts of price<br>Fit for a victor, from her teeming gates<br>Poured forth her citizens, their homes and fanes<br>Flung open; wishing it had been their lot<br>With thee to share disaster. Of thy name<br>Still much survives, unto thy former self<br>Alone inferior, still could'st thou to arms<br>All nations call and challenge fate again.<br>But thus he spake: 'To cities nor to men<br>Avails the conquered aught; then pledge your faith<br>To him who has the victory.' Caesar trod<br>Pharsalia's slaughter, while his daughter's spouse<br>Thus gave him kingdoms; but Pompeius fled<br>'Mid sobs and groans and blaming of the gods<br>For this their fierce commandment; and he fled<br>Full of the fruits and knowledge of the love<br>The peoples bore him, which he knew not his<br>In times of happiness.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">When Italian blood<br>Flowed deep enough upon the fatal field,<br>Caesar bade halt, and gave their lives to those<br>Whose death had been no gain. But that their camp<br>Might not recall the foe, nor calm of night<br>Banish their fears, he bids his cohorts dash,<br>While Fortune glowed and terror filled the plain,<br>Straight on the ramparts of the conquered foe.<br>Light was the task to urge them to the spoil;<br>'Soldiers,' he said, 'the victory is ours,<br>Full and triumphant: there doth lie the prize<br>Which you have won, not Caesar; at your feet<br>Behold the booty of the hostile camp.<br>Snatched from Hesperian nations ruddy gold,<br>And all the riches of the Orient world,<br>Are piled within the tents. The wealth of kings<br>And of Pompeius here awaits its lords.<br>Haste, soldiers, and outstrip the flying foe;<br>E'en now the vanquished of Pharsalia's field<br>Anticipate your spoils.' No more he said,<br>But drave them, blind with frenzy for the gold,<br>To spurn the bodies of their fallen sires,<br>And trample chiefs in dashing on their prey.<br>What rampart had restrained them as they rushed<br>To seize the prize for wickedness and war<br>And learn the price of guilt? And though they found<br>In ponderous masses heaped for need of war<br>The trophies of a world, yet were their minds<br>Unsatisfied, that asked for all. Whate'er<br>Iberian mines or Tagus bring to day,<br>Or Arimaspians from golden sands<br>May gather, had they seized; still had they thought<br>Their guilt too cheaply sold. When pledged to them<br>Was the Tarpeian rock, for victory won,<br>And all the spoils of Rome, by Caesar's word,<br>Shall camps suffice them?</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Then plebeian limbs<br>On senators' turf took rest, on kingly couch<br>The meanest soldier; and the murderer lay<br>Where yesternight his brother or his sire.<br>In raving dreams within their waking brains<br>Yet raged the battle, and the guilty hand<br>Still wrought its deeds of blood, and restless sought<br>The absent sword-hilt. Thou had'st said that groans<br>Issued from all the plain, that parted souls<br>Had breathed a life into the guilty soil,<br>That earthly darkness teemed with gibbering ghosts<br>And Stygian terrors. Victory foully won<br>Thus claimed its punishment. The slumbering sense<br>Already heard the hiss of vengeful flames<br>As from the depths of Acheron. One saw<br>Deep in the trances of the night his sire<br>And one his brother slain. But all the dead<br>In long array were visioned to the eyes<br>Of Caesar dreaming. Not in other guise<br>Orestes saw the Furies ere he fled<br>To purge his sin within the Scythian bounds;<br>Nor in more fierce convulsions raged the soul<br>Of Pentheus raving; nor Agave's mind<br>When she had known her son. Before his gaze<br>Flashed all the javelins which Pharsalia saw,<br>Or that avenging day when drew their blades<br>The Roman senators; and on his couch,<br>Infernal monsters from the depths of hell<br>Scourged him in slumber. Thus his guilty mind<br>Brought retribution. Ere his rival died<br>The terrors that enfold the Stygian stream<br>And black Avernus, and the ghostly slain<br>Broke on his sleep.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Yet when the golden sun<br>Unveiled the butchery of Pharsalia's field <br>He shrank not from its horror, nor withdrew<br>His feasting gaze. There rolled the streams in flood<br>With crimson carnage; there a seething heap<br>Rose shrouding all the plain, now in decay<br>Slow settling down; there numbered he the host<br>Of Magnus slain; and for the morn's repast<br>That spot he chose whence he might watch the dead,<br>And feast his eyes upon Emathia's field<br>Concealed by corpses; of the bloody sight<br>Insatiate, he forbad the funeral pyre,<br>And cast Emathia in the face of heaven.<br>Nor by the Punic victor was he taught,<br>Who at the close of Cannae's fatal fight<br>Laid in the earth the Roman consul dead,<br>To find fit burial for his fallen foes;<br>For these were all his countrymen, nor yet<br>His ire by blood appeased. Yet ask we not<br>For separate pyres or sepulchres apart<br>Wherein to lay the ashes of the fallen:<br>Burn in one holocaust the nations slain;<br>Or should it please thy soul to torture more<br>Thy kinsman, pile on high from Oeta's slopes<br>And Pindus' top the woods: thus shall he see<br>While fugitive on the deep the blaze that marks<br>Thessalia. Yet by this idle rage<br>Nought dost thou profit; for these corporal frames<br>Bearing innate from birth the certain germs<br>Of dissolution, whether by decay<br>Or fire consumed, shall fall into the lap<br>Of all-embracing nature. Thus if now<br>Thou should'st deny the pyre, still in that flame<br>When all shall crumble, earth and rolling seas<br>And stars commingled with the bones of men,<br>These too shall perish. Where thy soul shall go<br>These shall companion thee; no higher flight<br>In airy realms is thine, nor smoother couch<br>Beneath the Stygian darkness; for the dead<br>No fortune favours, and our Mother Earth<br>All that is born from her receives again,<br>And he whose bones no tomb or urn protects<br>Yet sleeps beneath the canopy of heaven.<br>And thou, proud conqueror, who would'st deny<br>The rites of burial to thousands slain,<br>Why flee thy field of triumph? Why desert<br>This reeking plain? Drink, Caesar, of the streams,<br>Drink if thou can'st, and should it be thy wish<br>Breathe the Thessalian air; but from thy grasp<br>The earth is ravished, and th' unburied host,<br>Routing their victor, hold Pharsalia's field.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Then to the ghastly harvest of the war<br>Came all the beasts of earth whose facile sense<br>Of odour tracks the bodies of the slain.<br>Sped from his northern home the Thracian wolf;<br>Bears left their dens and lions from afar<br>Scenting the carnage; dogs obscene and foul<br>Their homes deserted: all the air was full<br>Of gathering fowl, who in their flight had long<br>Pursued the armies. Cranes who yearly change<br>The frosts of Thracia for the banks of Nile,<br>This year delayed their voyage. As ne'er before<br>The air grew dark with vultures' hovering wings,<br>Innumerable, for every grove and wood<br>Sent forth its denizens; on every tree<br>Dripped from their crimsoned beaks a gory dew.<br>Oft on the conquerors and their impious arms<br>Or purple rain of blood, or mouldering flesh<br>Fell from the lofty heaven; or limbs of men<br>From weary talons dropped. Yet even so<br>The peoples passed not all into the maw<br>Of ravening beast or fowl; the inmost flesh<br>Scarce did they touch, nor limbs -- thus lay the dead<br>Scorned by the spoiler; and the Roman host<br>By sun and length of days, and rain from heaven,<br>At length was mingled with Emathia's plain.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Ill-starred Thessalia! By what hateful crime<br>Didst thou offend that thus on thee alone<br>Was laid such carnage? By what length of years<br>Shalt thou be cleansed from the curse of war?<br>When shall the harvest of thy fields arise<br>Free from their purple stain? And when the share<br>Cease to upturn the slaughtered hosts of Rome?<br>First shall the battle onset sound again,<br>Again shall flow upon thy fated earth<br>A crimson torrent. Thus may be o'erthrown<br>Our sires' memorials; those erected last,<br>Or those which pierced by ancient roots have spread<br>Through broken stones their sacred urns abroad.<br>Thus shall the ploughman of Haemonia gaze<br>On more abundant ashes, and the rake<br>Pass o'er more frequent bones. Wert, Thracia, thou.<br>Our only battlefield, no sailor's hand<br>Upon thy shore should make his cable fast;<br>No spade should turn, the husbandman should flee<br>Thy fields, the resting-place of Roman dead;<br>No lowing kine should graze, nor shepherd dare<br>To leave his fleecy charge to browse at will<br>On fields made fertile by our mouldering dust;<br>All bare and unexplored thy soil should lie,<br>As past man's footsteps, parched by cruel suns,<br>Or palled by snows unmelting! But, ye gods,<br>Give us to hate the lands which bear the guilt;<br>Let not all earth be cursed, though not all<br>Be blameless found.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="/comments.php?id=451912" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">'Twas thus that Munda's fight<br>And blood of Mutina, and Leucas' cape,<br>And sad Pachynus, made Philippi pure.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br/></a><a href="https://poems.citatepedia.com/">poem</a> by <strong><a rel="author" href="https://authors.citatepedia.com/by.php?a=Marcus+Annaeus+Lucanus">Marcus Annaeus Lucanus</a></strong></div>

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