'Eardulf, that raged against me, told you, Lords, That Rome was still the hater of your race, And warred thereon. She warred much more on mine, Roman but Christian likewise! Ye were foes; Warring on you she warred on hostile tribes: In us she tore her proper flesh and blood: Mailed men were you that gave her blow for blow; We were her tender children; on her hearths We dwelt, or delved her fields and dressed her vines. What moved her hatred? that we loved a God All love to man. With every God beside Rome made her traffic: fellowship with such Unclean we deemed: thenceforth Rome saw in us Her destined foe. Three centuries, Earls and Thanes, Her hand was red against us. Vengeance came: Who wrought it? Who avenged our martyred Saints That, resting 'neath God's altar, cried, "How long?" Alaric, and his, the Goths! And who were they? Your blood, your bone, your spirit, and your soul! They with your fathers roamed four hundred years The Teuton waste; they swam the Teuton floods, They pointed with the self-same hand of scorn At Rome, their common foe! In Odin's loins Together came ye from the shining East:-- True man was he: ye changed him to false god! That Odin, when the destined hour had pealed, Beckoned to Alaric, marched by Alaric's side Invisibly to Rome! Ye know the tale: Her senate-kings their portals barred; they deemed That awe of Rome would drive him back amazed; And sat secure at feast. But he that slew Remus, his brother, on the unfinished wall, A bitter expiation paid that night! The wail went up: the Goths were lords of Rome!-- Alaric alone in that dread hour was just, And with his mercy tempered justice. Why? Alaric that day was Christian: of his host The best and bravest Christian. Senators In purple nursed lived on, 'tis true, in rags; To Asian galleys and Egyptian marts The rich were driven; the mighty. Gold in streams Ran molten from the Capitolian roofs: The idol statues choked old Tyber's wave: But life and household honour Alaric spared; And round the fanes of Peter and of Paul His soldiers stood on guard. Upon the grave Of that bad Empire sentenced, nay of all The Empires of this world absorbed in one, In one condemned, they throned the Church of Christ; His Kingdom's seat established. Since that hour That Kingdom spreads o'er earth. In Eastern Gaul Long since your brave Burgundians kneel to Christ; Pannonia gave Him to the Ostro-Goths, Barbaric named; and to the Suevi Spain: The Vandals o'er the Mauritanian shores Exalt His Cross with joy. Your pardon, sirs: These lands to you are names; but Odin knew them; A living man he trod them in his youth; Hated their vices; bound his race to spurn