- Anne of Green Gables, Chapter V
Lancelot and Elaine
by Lord Tennyson
Upon memorizing this text in school, Anne, Diana, Jane Andrews, and Ruby Gillis decide to act out this scene. It is determined that Anne, despite her red hair, should play Elaine, and the girls cast her out into the river in a flat. However, a tear in the boat leaves it leaking, and Anne must jump from it unto the pillars of the bridge. She is rescued by none other than Gilbert Blythe, but even then she is unable to make amends with him. In this poem, Elaine has died from love of Lancelot, and this is her funeral.
But when the
next sun brake from underground,
Then, those two brethren slowly with bent brows
Accompanying, the sad chariot-bier
Past like a shadow through the field, that shone
Full-summer, to that stream whereon the barge,
Palled all its length in blackest samite, lay.
Loyal, the dumb old servitor, on deck,
Winking his eyes, and twisted all his face.
So those two brethren from the chariot took
And on the black decks laid her in her bed,
Set in her hand a lily, o'er her hung
The silken case with braided blazonings,
And kissed her quiet brows, and saying to her
"Sister, farewell for ever," and again
"Farewell, sweet sister," parted in all tears.
Then rose the dumb old servitor, and the dead,
Oared by the dumb, went upward with the flood -
In her right hand a lily, in her left
The letter - all her bright hair streaming down -
And all the coverlid was cloth of gold
Drawn to her waist, and she herself in white
All but her face, and that clear-featured face
Was lovely, for she did not seem dead,
But fast asleep, and lay as though she smiled.
from The Pleasures of Hope
by Thomas Campbell
Oh, sacred Truth! thy triumph ceased awhile,
And Hope, thy sister, ceased with thee to smile,
When leagued oppresion poured to Northern
wars
Her whiskered pandoors and her fierce hussars;
Waved her dread stranded to the breeze of morn;
Pealed her loud drum, and twanged her trumpet-
horn;
Tumultuous Horror brooded o'er her van;
Presaging wrath to Poland - and to man!
Warsaw's last champion from her height surveyed
Wide o'er the fields a waste of ruin laid:
"O Heaven!" he cried, "my bleeding country
save!
Is there no hand on high to shield the brave?
Yet, though Destruction sweep those lovely plains,
Rise, fellow-men! Our country yet remains!
By that dread name we wave the sword on high!
And swear for her to live! -- with her to die!"
He said; and on the rampart-heights arrayed
His trusty warriors, -- few, but undismayed;
Firm-paced and slow, a horrid front they form,
Still as the breeze, but dreadful as the storm;
Low, murmuring sounds along their banners fly,
"Revenge of death!" -- the watchword and reply;
Then pealed the notes, omnipotent to charm,
And the loud tocsin tolled their last alarm!
In vain, alas! -- in vain, ye gallant few!
From rank to rank your volleyed thunder flew: --
Oh, bloodiest picture in the book of Time!
Poor Poland fell, unwept, without a crime!
Found not a generous friend, a pitying foe,
Strength in her arms, nor mercy in her woe!
Dropped from her nerveless grasp the shattered
spear,
Closed her bright age, and curbed her high
career:
Hope, for a season, bade the world farewell,
And Freedom shrieked -- as Kosciusko fell!
The sun went down, nor ceased the carnage
there, --
Tumultuous Murder shook the midnight air;
On Prague's proud arch the fires of Ruin glow,
His blood-dyed waters murmuring below;
The storm prevails -- the rampart yields a way --
Bursts the wild cry of horror and dismay!
Hark! As the smouldering piles with thunder fall,
A thousand shrieks for hopeless mercy call! --
Earth shook! red meteors flashed along the sky!
And conscious Nature shuddered at the cry!
Departed spirits of the mighty dead!
Ye that at Marathon and Leuctra bled!
Friends of the world! restore your swords to man,
Fight in his sacred cause, and lead the van!
Yet for poor Poland's tears of blood atone,
And make her arm puissant as your own!
Oh, once again to Freedom's cause return
The partriot Tell -- the Bruce of Bannockburn!
Bach's Fantasia