Lepanto

The Call to Arms

¹White founts falling in the Courts of the sun,

²And the Soldan of Dolorosa, when the sun

³And the Soldan of Dolorosa smiles,

⁴And the Lord upon the Golden Horn is laughing in the sun.

⁵Dim drums throbbing, in the hills half heard,

⁶Where only on a nameless throne a crownless prince has stirred,

⁷Where, risen from a doubtful seat and half-attainted stall,

⁸The last knight of Europe takes weapons from the wall,

⁹The last and lingering troubadour to whom the bird has sung,

¹⁰That once went singing southward when all the world was young.

¹¹In that enormous silence, tiny and unafraid,

¹²Comes up along a winding road the noise of the Crusade.

¹³Strong gongs groaning as the guns boom far,

¹⁴Don John of Austria is going to the war,

Don John of Austria

¹⁵Stiff flags straining in the night-blasts cold

¹⁶In the gloom black-purple, in the glint old-gold,

¹⁷Torchlight crimson on the copper kettle-drums,

¹⁸Then the tuckets, then the trumpets, then the cannon, and he comes.

¹⁹Don John laughing in the brave beard curled,

²⁰Spurning of his stirrups like the thrones of all the world,

²¹Holding his head up for a flag of all the free.

²²Love-light of Spain — Loss upon the plain!

²³Don John of Austria rides home from the Dolorosa.

²⁴St. Michael's on his Mountain in the sea-roads of the north

²⁵(Don John of Austria is girt and going forth.)

²⁶Where the grey seas glitter and the sharp tides shift

²⁷And the sea-folk labour and the red sails lift.

²⁸He shakes his lance of iron and he claps his wings of stone;

The Charge

²⁹The noise is gone through Dolorosa, on the dying of the day!

³⁰Will no one set the banner? Will no one lead the way!

³¹Don John of Austria is shouting to the ships.

³²Don John calling through the blast and the eclipse

³³Crying with the trumpet, with the trumpet of his lips,

³⁴Trumpet that sayeth ha!

³⁵Dolorosa, Dolorosa, Dolorosa!

³⁶Dolorosa, the night is full of pain!

³⁷Dolorosa, the pain is full of night!

³⁸Don John of Austria is going to the war,

³⁹Dolorosa! Dolorosa!

⁴⁰Don John of Austria has set his people free!