  Who dared to pluck the sleeve of Hannibal, And hale him from the shades? Who bade the man, Indomitable of brain, return to plan A vast revenge and vowed? Wild clarions call; Dusk faces flame; the turreted brute-wall Moves, tramples, overwhelms; van clashes van; Roman, Numidian, Carthaginian; And griefs are here, unbowed, imperial. Who caught the world’s fierce tides? An English girl. Shy dreamer ’neath fledged elm and apple-bloom, With Livy or Polybius on her knee, Whose dreams were light as dew and pure as pearl,— Yet poignant-witted; thew’d for thought; girl-groom Sped to her Lord across the Midland Sea. |
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