[Richard and I attended a bluegrass music festival yesterday, and one of the songs had to have been taken from this original poem (hanky-alert!).]
The spearmen heard the bugle sound,
And cheerily smiled the morn,
And many a brach and many a hound
Obey’d Llewelyn’s horn.
And still he blew a louder blast,
And gave a lustier cheer:
“Come, Gelert, come, wert never last
Llewelyn’s horn to hear.”
“Oh! where does faithful Gelert roam,
The flow’r of all his race?
So true, so brave; a lamb at home,
A lion in the chase!”
‘Twas only at Llewelyn’s board
The faithful Gelert fed;
He watch’d, he serv’d, he cheer’d his lord,
And sentinell’d his bed.
In sooth he was a peerless hound,
The gift of royal John;
But now no Gelert could be found,
And all the chose rode on.
And now, as o’er the rocks and dells
The gallant chidings rise,
All Snowdon’s craggy chaos yells
The many-mingled cries!
That day Llewelyn little loved
The chase of Hart or Hare,
And scant and small the booty proved,
For Gelert was not there.
Unpleased, Llewelyn homeward hied:
When, near the portal seat,
His truant Gelert He espied
Bounding his lord to greet.
But, when he gained his castle door,
Aghast the chieftain stood:
The hound all o’er was smear’d with gore,
His lips, his fangs, ran blood.
Llewelyn gazed with fierce surprise:
Unused such looks to meet,
His fav’rite check’d his joyful guise,
And crouch’d and lick’d his feet.
Onward in haste Llewelyn pass’d,
And on went Gelert too,
And still, where’er his eyes he cast,
Fresh blood-gouts shock’d his view.
O’erturn’ed his infant’s bed he found,
With blood-stain’d covert rent;
And all around, the walls and ground
With recent blood besprent.
He call’d his child, no voice replied;
He search’d with terror wild;
Blood, blood he found on ev’ry side;
But nowhere found his child.
“Hell-hound! my child by thee’s devour’d!”
The frantic father cried;
And to the hilt his vengeful sword
He plunged in Gelert’s side.
His suppliant looks as prone he fell,
No pity could impart:
But still his Gelert’s dying yell
Pass’d heavy o’er his heart.
Aroused by Gelert’s dying yell
Some slumb’rer waken’d nigh:
What words the parent’s joy could tell
To hear his infant’s cry!
Conceal’d beneath a tumbled heap
his hurried search had miss’d,
All glowing from his rosy sleep,
The cherub boy he kiss’d.
Not scath 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 Llewelyn’s pain!
For now the truth was clear;
His gallant hound the wolf had slain,
To save Llewelyn’s heir.
Vain, vain was all Llewelyn’s woe:
“Best of thy kind, adieu!
The frantic blow, which laid thee low,
This heart shall ever rue.”
And now a gallant tomb they raise,
With costly sculpture deckt;
And marbles, storied with his praise,
Poor Gelert’s bones protect.
There never could the spearman pass,
Or forester, unmoved;
There oft the tear-besprinkled grass
Llewelyn’ sorrow proved.
And there he hung his sword and spear,
And there as evening fell,
In Fancy’s ear he oft would hear
Poor Gelert’s dying yell.
And till great Snowden’s rocks grow old,
And cease the storm to brave,
The consecrated spot shall hold
The name of “Gelert’s Grave.”
—William Robert Spencer (1769-1834)
