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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=407949" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>Peruvian Tales: Zilia, Tale III</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">PIZARRO takes possession of Cuzco--The fanaticism of VALVERDA , a<br>Spanish priest--Its dreadful effects--A Peruvian priest put to the tor-<br>ture--His Daughter's distress--He is rescued by LAS CASAS , a Spa-<br>nish ecclesiastic--And led to a place of safety, where he dies--His<br>Daughter's narration of her sufferings--Her death. </div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Now stern PIZARRO seeks the distant plains,<br>Where beauteous Cuzco lifts her golden fanes.<br>The meek Peruvians gaz'd in wild dismay,<br>Nor barr'd the dark Oppressor's sanguine way;<br>And soon on Cuzco, where the dawning light<br>Of glory shone, foretelling day more bright,<br>Where the young arts had shed unfolding flowers,<br>A scene of spreading desolation lowers!</div><div style="margin:10px 0">While buried deep in everlasting shade,<br>That lustre sickens, and those blossoms fade.<br>And yet, devoted land, not gold alone,<br>Or dire ambition wak'd thy rising groan;<br>For lo! a fiercer fiend, with joy elate,<br>Feasts on thy suff'rings, and impels thy fate:<br>Fanatic Fury rears her sullen shrine,<br>Where vultures prey, where venom'd adders twine;<br>Her savage arm with purple torrents stains<br>Thy rocking temples, and thy falling fanes;<br>Her blazing torches flash the mounting fire,<br>She grasps the sabre, and she lights the pyre;<br>Her voice is thunder rending the still air,<br>Her glance the baleful lightning's lurid glare;<br>Her lips unhallow'd breathe their impious strain,<br>And pure Religion's sacred voice profane;<br>Whose precepts pity's mildest deeds approve,<br>Whose law is mercy, and whose soul is love.<br>And see, fanatic Fury wakes the storm--<br>She wears the stern VALVERDA'S hideous form;<br>His bosom never felt another's woes,<br>No shriek of anguish breaks its dark repose.<br>The temple nods--an aged form appears--<br>He beats his breast, he rends his silver hairs--<br>VALVERDA drags him from the blest abode,<br>Where his meek spirit humbly sought its God;<br>See, to his aid his child, soft ZILIA , springs,<br>And steeps in tears the robe to which she clings!<br>Now bursting from PERUVIA'S frighted throng,<br>Two warlike youths impetuous rush'd along;<br>One grasp'd his twanging bow with furious air,<br>While in his troubled eye sat fierce despair;<br>But all in vain his erring weapon flies,<br>Pierc'd by a thousand wounds, on earth he lies.<br>His drooping head the trembling ZILIA rais'd,<br>And on the youth in speechless anguish gaz'd;<br>While he who fondly shared his danger flew,<br>And from his bleeding breast a poignard drew.<br>"Deep in my faithful bosom let me hide<br>The fatal steel that would our souls divide,"--<br>He quick exclaims--the dying warrior cries<br>"Ah yet forbear!--by all the sacred ties<br>That bind our hearts, forbear!"--in vain he spoke,<br>Friendship with frantic zeal impels the stroke!<br>"Thyself for ever lost, thou hop'st in vain,"<br>The youth replied, "my spirit to detain;<br>From thee my soul, in childhood's earliest year,<br>Caught the light pleasure and the passing tear;<br>Thy friendship then my young affections blest<br>The first pure passion of my infant breast;<br>And still in death I feel its strong controul,<br>Its sacred impulse wings my fleeting soul,<br>That only lingers here till thou depart,<br>Whose image lives upon my fainting heart!"--<br>In vain the gen'rous youth, with panting breath,<br>Pour'd these last murmurs in the ear of death;<br>He reads the fatal truth in ZILIA'S eye,<br>And gives to friendship his expiring sigh.--<br>But now with rage VALVERDA'S glances roll,<br>And mark the vengeance rankling in his soul;<br>He bends his gloomy brow --his lips impart<br>The brooding purpose of his venom'd heart;<br>He bids the hoary priest in mutter'd strains<br>Abjure his faith, forsake his native fanes,<br>While yet the ling'ring pangs of torture wait,<br>While yet VALVERDA'S power suspends his fate.<br>"Vain man," the victim cried, "to hoary years<br>Know death is mild, and virtue feels no fears;<br>Cruel of spirit, come! let tortures prove<br>The power I serv'd in life in death I love."<br>He ceas'd--with rugged cords his limbs they bound,<br>And drag the aged suff'rer on the ground;<br>They grasp his feeble frame, his tresses tear;<br>His robe they rend, his shrivell'd bosom bare.<br>Ah, see his uncomplaining soul sustain<br>The sting of insult and the dart of pain!<br>His stedfast spirit feels one pang alone,<br>A child's despair awakes one bitter groan--<br>The mourner kneels to catch his parting breath,<br>To soothe the agony of ling'ring death:<br>No moan she breath'd, no tear had power to flow,<br>Still on her lip expir'd th' unutter'd woe;<br>Yet ah, her livid cheek, her stedfast look,<br>The desolated soul's deep anguish spoke--<br>Mild victim! close not yet thy languid eyes;<br>Pure spirit! claim not yet thy kindred skies;<br>A pitying angel comes to stay thy flight,<br>LAS CASAS * bids thee view returning light;<br>Ah, let that sacred drop, to virtue dear,<br>Efface thy wrongs--receive his precious tear;<br>See his flush'd cheek with indignation glow,<br>While from his lips the tones of pity flow.--<br>"Oh, suff'ring Lord!" he cried, "whose streaming blood,<br>Was pour'd for man--earth drank the sacred flood,<br>Whose mercy in the mortal pang forgave<br>The murd'rous band, Thy love alone could save;<br>Forgive--thy goodness bursts each narrow bound<br>Which feeble thought, and human hope surround;<br>Forgive the guilty wretch, whose impious hand<br>From thy pure altar flings the flaming brand;<br>In human blood that hallow'd altar steeps,<br>Libation dire! while groaning nature weeps;<br>The limits of thy mercy dares to scan,<br>The object of thy love, his victim,--man.<br>While yet I linger, lo, the suff'rer dies,<br>I see his frame convuls'd,--I hear his sighs!<br>Whoe'er controuls the purpose of my heart,<br>First in this breast shall plunge his guilty dart."<br>With hurried step he flew, with eager hands<br>He broke the fetters, burst the cruel bands.<br>As the fall'n angel heard with awful fear,<br>The cherub's grave rebuke, in grace severe,<br>And fled, while horror plum'd his impious crest,* <br>The form of virtue as she stood confest;<br>So fierce VALVERDA sullen mov'd along,<br>Abash'd, and follow'd by the hostile throng.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">At length the hoary victim, freed from chains,<br>LAS CASAS gently leads to safer plains;<br>His searching eye explores a secret cave,<br>Whose shaggy sides the languid billows lave;<br>"There rest secure," he cried, "the Christian's God<br>Will hover near, will guard the lone abode."<br>Oft to the gloomy cell his steps repair,<br>While night's chill breezes wave his silver'd hair;<br>Oft in the tones of love, the words of peace,<br>He bids the bitter tears of anguish cease;<br>Bids drooping hope uplift her languid eyes,<br>And points to bliss that dwells beyond the skies.<br>Yet ah! in vain his pious cares would save<br>The aged suff'rer from the op'ning grave;<br>For deep the pangs of torture pierc'd his frame,<br>And sunk his wasted life's expiring flame;<br>To his cold lip LAS CASAS ' hand he prest,<br>He faintly clasp'd his ZILIA to his breast;<br>Then cried, "the God, whom now my vows adore,<br>My heart through life obey'd, unknowing more;<br>His mild forgiveness then my soul shall prove,<br>His mercy share, LAS CASAS ' God is love."<br>He spoke no more, his ZILIA'S hopeless moan<br>Was heard responsive to his dying groan.<br>"Victim of impious zeal," LAS CASAS cries,<br>"Accept, departed shade, a Christian's sighs;<br>And thou, soft mourner, tender, drooping form,<br>What power shall guard thee from the fearful storm?"<br>"Weep not for me," she cried, "for ZILIA'S breast<br>Soon in the shelt'ring earth shall find its rest;<br>Seek not the victim of despair to save,<br>I ask but death--I only wish a grave.<br>Witness, thou mangled form, that earth retains,<br>Witness a murder'd lover's cold remains;<br>I liv'd my father's pangs to soothe, to share,<br>I bore to live, though life was all despair.<br>Ah! still my lover's dying moan I hear,<br>In every pulse I feel his parting tear--<br>I faint--an icy coldness chills each vein,<br>No more these feeble limbs their load sustain;<br>Spirit of pity! catch my fleeting breath,<br>A moment stay--and close my eyes in death.<br>LAS CASAS , thee thy God in mercy gave,<br>To soothe my pangs, to find the wretch a grave."<br>She ceas'd, her spirit fled to purer spheres,<br>LAS CASAS bathes the pallid corse with tears;<br>Fly, minister of good! nor ling'ring shed<br>Those fruitless sorrows o'er th' unconscious dead;<br>I view the sanguine flood, the wasting flame,<br>I hear a suff'ring world LAS CASAS claim.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Helen+Maria+Williams">Helen Maria Williams</a><div class=q> <img src="https://www.citatepedia.ro/g/32share.png" style="float:left" alt="Share"> <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=407949" data-title="Peruvian Tales: Zilia, Tale III de Helen Maria Williams" data-description="PIZARRO takes possession of Cuzco--The fanaticism of VALVERDA , a Spanish priest--Its dreadful effects--A Peruvian priest put to the tor- ture--His Daughter's distress--He is rescued by LAS CASAS , a Spa- nish ecclesiastic--And led to a place of s..."></div> </div> </div>
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