Page:Ballads, Stevenson, 1890.djvu/57

 III. THE FEAST

Dawn as yellow as sulphur leaped on the naked peak,

And all the village was stirring, for now was the priest to speak.

Forth on his terrace he came, and sat with the chief in talk;

His lips were blackened with fever, his cheeks were whiter than chalk;

Fever clutched at his hands, fever nodded his head,

But, quiet and steady and cruel, his eyes shone ruby-red.

In the earliest rays of the sun the chief rose up content;

Braves were summoned, and drummers; messengers came and went;

Braves ran to their lodges, weapons were snatched from the wall;

The commons herded together, and fear was over them all.

Festival dresses they wore, but the tongue was dry in their mouth,

And the blinking eyes in their faces skirted from north to south.

Now to the sacred enclosure gathered the greatest and least,

And from under the shade of the Banyan arose the voice of the feast,

The frenzied roll of the drum, and a swift, monotonous song.

Higher the sun swam up; the trade wind level and strong

Awoke in the tops of the palms and rattled the fans aloud,

And over the garlanded heads and shining robes of the crowd

Tossed the spiders of shadow, scattered the jewels of sun.

Forty the tale of the drums, and the forty throbbed like one;

A thousand hearts in the crowd, and the even chorus of song,

Swift as the feet of a runner, trampled a thousand strong.

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