THE TWO FOSCARI.[16]

Ho! gentlemen of Venice! Ho! soldiers of St. Mark! Pile high your blazing beacon-fire, The night is wild and dark, Behoves us all be wary, Behoves us have a care No traitor spy of Austria Our watch is prowling near. Time was, would princely Venice No foreign tyrant brook; Time was, before her stately wrath The proudest Kaiser shook; When o'er the Adriatic The Wingéd Lion hurled Destruction on his enemies— Defiance to the world. 'Twas when the Turkish crescent Contended with the cross, And many a Christian kingdom rued Discomfiture and loss; We taught the turban'd Paynim— We taught his boastful fleet, Venetian freemen scorned alike Submission or retreat. Alas, for fair Venezia, When wealth and pomp and pride —The pride of her patrician lords— Her freedom thrust aside: When o'er the trembling commons The haughty nobles rode, And red with patriotic blood The Adrian waters flowed. 'Twas in the year of mercy Just fourteen fifty two —When Francis Foscari was Doge, A valiant prince and true— He won for the Republic Ravenna—Brescia bright— And Crema—aye, and Bergamo Submitted to his might: Young Giacopo, his darling, —His last and fairest child— A gallant soldier in the wars, In peace serene and mild— Woo'd gentle Mariana, Old Contarini's pride, And glad was Venice on that day He claimed her for his bride. The Bucentaur showed bravely In silks and cloth of gold, And thousands of swift gondolas Were gay with young and old; Where spann'd the Canalazo A boat-bridge wide and strong, Amid three hundred cavaliers The bridegroom rode along. Three days were joust and tourney, Three days the Plaza bore Such gallant shock of knight and steed Was never dealt before, And thrice ten thousand voices With warm and honest zeal, Loud shouted for the Foscari Who loved the Commonweal. For this the Secret Council— The dark and subtle Ten— Pray God and good San Marco None like may rule again! Because the people honoured Pursued with bitter hate, And foully charged young Giacopo With treason to the state. The good old prince, his father— Was ever grief like his!— They forced, as judge, to gaze upon His own child's agonies! No outward mark of sorrow Disturb'd his awful mien— No bursting sigh escaped to tell The anguish'd heart within. Twice tortured and twice banish'd, The hapless victim sighed To see his old ancestral home, His children and his bride: Life seem'd a weary burthen Too heavy to be borne, From all might cheer his waning hours A hopeless exile torn. In vain—no fond entreaty Could pierce the ear of hate— He knew the Senate pitiless, Yet rashly sought his fate; A letter to the Sforza Invoking Milan's aid, He wrote, and placed where spies might see— 'Twas seen, and was betrayed. Again the rack—the torture— Oh! cruelty accurst!— The wretched victim meekly bore— They could but wreak their worst; So he but lay in Venice, Contented, if they gave What little space his bones might fill— The measure of a grave. The white-haired sire, heart-broken, Survived his happier son, To learn a Senate's gratitude For faithful service done; What never Doge of Venice Before had lived to tell, He heard for a successor peal San Marco's solemn bell. When, years before, his honours Twice would he fain lay down, They bound him by his princely oath To wear for life the crown; But now, his brow o'ershadow'd By fourscore winters' snows, Their eager malice would not wait A spent life's mournful close. He doff'd his ducal ensigns In proud obedient haste, And through the sculptured corridors With staff-propt footsteps paced; Till on the giant's staircase, Which first in princely pride He mounted as Venezia's Doge, The old man paused—and died. Thus govern'd the Patricians When Venice owned their sway, And thus Venetian liberties Became a helpless prey: They sold us to the Teuton, They sold us to the Gaul— Thank God and good San Marco, We've triumph'd over all! Ho! gentlemen of Venice! Ho! soldiers of St. Mark! You've driven from your palaces The Austrian, cold and dark! But better for Venezia The stranger ruled again, Than the old patrician tyranny, The Senate and the Ten!