Britain ... - Blue-Lite

Scene IV.] THE ENGLISH SLAVE. >
Are silent as the grave.
What a dread moment,
Big with the fearful fate of unborn years,
England,
Thy warrior sons but, like the crouching lion
Ere on his prey he springs with savage roar,
is this ! There is not one of all
Eagerly listens, burning for revenge,
To hear the fatal knell.
[The vesper-bell of St. Brice rings.
It sounds ! it sounds
Through the deep stillness ! Onward, onward peals
The voice of death, and mountain unto mountain
Through
Ethelred's dominions echoes Death !
[A noise, with cries and shrieks, without*
Enter Roderick.
RODERICK.
Ay, this would be a scene befitting well
My arm and temper,
were I but at leisure.
GONDABERT.
Roderick ! What brings thee hither ? Hear'st thou not
The rushing forth of armed multitudes,
Like wintry torrents o'er the storm-beat moor ?
The struggle and the groan of dying men.
With shrieks of murdered infants and their mothers ?
RODERICK.
I've weightier matters on my hands than listening
To children's screams, or wail of fearful women.
GONDABERT.
Sleeps in her gory tomb that maid of shame ?
RODERICK.
Her heart is colder than the clods that rest
Dark on her forest grave. But I have news
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