Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry. 1904.

VI. Animate Nature

Beth Gêlert

William Robert Spencer (1770–1834)

THE SPEARMEN heard the bugle sound,

And cheerily smiled the morn;

And many a brach, and many a hound,

Obeyed Llewellyn’s horn.

And still he blew a louder blast,

And gave a lustier cheer,

“Come, Gêlert, come, wert never last

Llewellyn’s horn to hear.

“O, where does faithful Gêlert roam,

The flower of all his race;

So true, so brave,—a lamb at home,

A lion in the chase?”

In sooth, he was a peerless hound,

The gift of royal John;

But now no Gêlert could be found,

And all the chase rode on.

That day Llewellyn little loved

The chase of hart and hare;

And scant and small the booty proved,

For Gêlert was not there.

Unpleased, Llewellyn homeward hied,

When, near the portal seat,

His truant Gêlert he espied,

Bounding his lord to greet.

But, when he gained his castle-door,

Aghast the chieftain stood;

The hound all o’er was smeared with gore;

His lips, his fangs, ran blood.

Llewellyn gazed with fierce surprise;

Unused such looks to meet,

His favorite checked his joyful guise,

And crouched, and licked his feet.

Onward, in haste, Llewellyn passed,

And on went Gêlert too;

And still, where’er his eyes he cast,

Fresh blood-gouts shocked his view.

O’erturned his infant’s bed he found,

With blood-stained covert rent;

And all around the walls and ground

With recent blood besprent.

He called his child,—no voice replied,—

He searched with terror wild;

Blood, blood he found on every side,

But nowhere found his child.

“Hell-hound! my child ’s by thee devoured,”

The frantic father cried;

And to the hilt his vengeful sword

He plunged in Gêlert’s side.

Aroused by Gêlert’s dying yell,

Some slumberer wakened nigh:

What words the parent’s joy could tell

To hear his infant’s cry!

Concealed beneath a tumbled heap

His hurried search had missed,

All glowing from his rosy sleep,

The cherub boy he kissed.

Nor scathe had he, nor harm, nor dread,

But, the same couch beneath,

Lay a gaunt wolf, all torn and dead,

Tremendous still in death.

Ah, what was then Llewellyn’s pain!

For now the truth was clear;

His gallant hound the wolf had slain

To save Llewellyn’s heir.