Part II, Madoc in Aztlan: V

This is the day, when, in a foreign grave,
King Owen's relics shall be laid to rest.
No bright emblazonries bedecked his bier,
No tapers blazed, no prelate sung the mass,
No choristers the funeral dirge intoned,
No mitred abbots, and no tonsured train,
Lengthened the pomp of ceremonious woe.
His decent bier was with white linen spread
And canopied ; two elks and bisons, yoked,
Drew on the car ; foremost Cadwallon bore
The Crucifix ; with single voice, distinct,
The good Priest Llorien chaunted, loud and deep,
The solemn service ; Madoc, next the bier,
Followed his father's corpse ; bareheaded then
Came all the people, silently and slow.
The burial-place was in a grassy plat,
A little level field of sunny green,
Between the river and a rocky bank,
Which, like a buttress, from the precipice
Of naked rock sloped out. On either side
T'was skirted by the woodlands. A stone cross
Stood on Cynetha's grave, sole monument,
Beneath a single cocoa, whose straight trunk
Rose like an obelisk, and waved on high
Its palmy plumage, green and never sere.
Here by Cynetha's side, with Christian prayers,
All wrongs forgotten now, was Owen laid.
Rest, King of Gwyneth, in a foreign grave,
From foul indignity of Romish pride
And bigot priesthood, from a falling land
Thus timely snatched, and from the impending yoke!
Rest in the kingdom of thy noble son !

Ambassadors from Aztlan in the vale
Awaited their return, . . Yuhidthiton,
Chief of the Chiefs, and Helhua the Priest.
With these came Malinal. They met the Prince,
And with a sullen stateliness returned
His salutation, then the Chief began ;
Lord of the Strangers, hear me! by my voice
The People and the Pabas and the King
Of Aztlan speak. Our injured Gods have claimed
Their wonted worship, and made manifest
Their wrath ; we dare not impiously provoke
The Dreadful. Worship ye in your own way ;
But we must keep the path our fathers kept.

We parted, O Yuhidthiton ! as friends
And brethren, said the Christian Prince ; alas,
That this should be our meeting ! When we pledged,
In the broad day-light, and the eye of Heaven,.
Our hands in peace, ye heard and understood
The will of God, and felt that it was good,
In reason and in heart. This calm assent
Ye would by, by midnight miracles
Scared, and such signs of darkness, as beseem
The demons whom ye dread ; or likelier
Duped by the craft of those accursed men,
Whose trade is blood. Ask thou of thine own heart,
Yuhidthiton, a
But Helhua broke his speech, . .
Our bidding is to tell thee, quoth the Priest,
That Aztlan hath restored, and will maintain,
Her ancient faith. If it offendeth thee,
Move thou thy dwelling place. .

Madoc replied,
This day have I deposited in earth
My father's bones, and where his bones are laid,
There mine shall moulder.

Malinal at that
Advanced; . . Prince Madoc, said the youth, I come,
True to thy faith and thee, and to the weal
Of Aztlan true, and bearing, for that truth,
Reproach and shame and scorn and obloquy.
In sorrow come I here, a banished man ;
Here take, in sorrow, my abiding place,
Cut off from all my kin, from all old ties
Divorced ; all dear familiar countenances
No longer to be present to my sight ;
The very mother-language which I learnt,
A lisping baby on my mother's knees,
No more with its sweet sounds to comfort me.
So be it! ... To his brother then he turned ;
Yuhidthiton, said he, when thou shalt find, . .
As find thou wilt, . . that those accursed men
Have played the juggler with thee, and deceived
Thine honest heart, .. when Aztlan groans in blood, ..
Bid her remember then, that Malinal
Is in the dwellings of her enemy,
Where all his hope in banishment hath been
To intercede for her, and heal her wounds,
And mitigate her righteous punishment.

Sternly and sullenly his brother heard ;
Yet hearkened he as one whose heart perforce
Supprest its instinct, and there might be seen
A sorrow in his silent stubbornness.
And now his ministers on either hand.
A water vessel fill, and heap dry sedge
And straw before his face, and fire the pile.
He, looking upward, spread his arms, and cried,
Hear me, ye Gods of Aztlan, as we were,
And are, and will be yours! behold your foes !
He stoopt, and lifted up one ample urn, . .
Thus let their blood be shed! . . and far away
He whirled the scattering water. Then again
Raised the full vase, .. Thus let their lives be quenched!
And out he poured it on the flaming pile.
The steam-cloud, hissing from the extinguished heap,
Spread like a mist, and, ere it melted off,
Homeward the heralds of the war had turned.