Page:Undivine Comedy - Zygmunt Krasiński, tr. Martha Walker Cook.djvu/67

 Rh it is so, but beyond doubt it is the only practical — alas! the only possible—course; and it alone explains the strange sovereignty exercised by poetic genius in that country.

Such sovereignty, like all others, has its cares, nay, even its agonies and remorse; and Mickiewicz has admirably symbolized the glory and the misery of the poetic mission in Poland in the famous Banquet Scene in "Wallenrod." Our readers will doubtless recollect the subject of this celebrated tale. Wallenrod, while still an infant, had been torn from his own country, and brought up in the midst of its enemies; he had held the highest positions, and would perhaps have forgotten his origin, had he not been accompanied by an old blind man, a poor Bard, a "Waïdelote," to remind him always of his birth, and reanimate his hate. This Bard enters in the midst of a banquet, and in the very presence of the conquerors, in a language which they cannot understand, pours into the ears of the young Wallenrod his sonorous chant, the memories of his childhood, his plighted faith, his oaths, and the duties still to be accomplished. And such has indeed been the glorious role of the Polish Poet in recent times; but how cruel and terrible this role often is, is also indicated at the close of this pathetic scene, when Wallenrod, subdued and fascinated by the words of the poet, renews his oaths, but at the same time makes him responsible for the calamities certain to ensue. He says to the Bard:

"You desire struggle? You urge me on to combat? Amen! But let the blood which must flow be upon your own head! Oh! I know, I know you! Every hymn of the Bard is a presage of misfortune, like the howling of hounds at midnight! Death and devastation are your favorite chants; to us you leave the glory and the punishment! From the very cradle your perfidious songs twine their serpent rings round the bosom of the infant, breathing into his soul deadly and subtle poison,—a stupid passion for glory, and a wild love of country! and these songs forever haunt a young man like the ghost of a dead enemy, appearing in the midst of every festival to mingle blood with the full cups of wine! Aye, I have heard them, these songs; I have hearkened too much to them! The die is cast, and you have won the throw! It will be the death of the disciple, the triumph of the poet!"

This will serve to give us a conception of the sombre and appalling nature of the power exercised in that