Page:The Works of Lord Byron (ed. Coleridge, Prothero) - Volume 4.djvu/289

CANTO I.] The man who fought, toiled, travelled, and each part

Of a true citizen fulfilled, and saw

For his reward the Guelfs ascendant art

Pass his destruction even into a law.

These things are not made for forgetfulness,

Florence shall be forgotten first; too raw

The wound, too deep the wrong, and the distress

Of such endurance too prolonged to make

My pardon greater, her injustice less,

Though late repented; yet—yet for her sake

I feel some fonder yearnings, and for thine,

My own Beatricē, I would hardly take

Vengeance upon the land which once was mine,

And still is hallowed by thy dust's return,

Which would protect the murderess like a shrine,

And save ten thousand foes by thy sole urn.

Though, like old Marius from Minturnæ's marsh

And Carthage ruins, my lone breast may burn

At times with evil feelings hot and harsh,

And sometimes the last pangs of a vile foe

Writhe in a dream before me, and o'erarch

My brow with hopes of triumph,—let them go!

Such are the last infirmities of those

Who long have suffered more than mortal woe,

And yet being mortal still, have no repose

But on the pillow of Revenge—Revenge,

Who sleeps to dream of blood, and waking glows

With the oft-baffled, slakeless thirst of change,

When we shall mount again, and they that trod

Be trampled on, while Death and Até range