Page:Poems that every child should know (ed. Burt, 1904).djvu/166

128 Marco Bozzaris.

midnight, in his guarded tent,

The Turk was dreaming of the hour

When Greece, her knee in suppliance bent,

Should tremble at his power:

In dreams, through camp and court, he bore

The trophies of a conqueror;

In dreams his song of triumph heard;

Then wore his monarch's signet ring:

Then pressed that monarch's throne—a king;

As wild his thoughts, and gay of wing,

As Eden's garden bird.

At midnight, in the forest shades,

Bozzaris ranged his Suliote band,

True as the steel of their tried blades,

Heroes in heart and hand.

There had the Persian's thousands stood,

There had the glad earth drunk their blood

On old Platæa's day;

And now there breathed that haunted air

The sons of sires who conquered there,

With arm to strike and soul to dare,

As quick, as far as they.

An hour passed on—the Turk awoke;

That bright dream was his last;

He woke—to hear his sentries shriek,

"To arms! they come! the Greek! the Greek!"