Recall in me such thoughts of bitterness. The time has been when happy was their lot Who had their birthright here; but happy now Are they who to thy bosom are gone home, Because they feel not in their graves the feet That trample upon Spain. ’Tis well that age Hath made me like a child, that I can weep: My heart would else have broken, overcharged, And I, false servant, should lie down to rest Before my work is done. Hard by their path, A little way without the walls, there stood An edifice, whereto, as by a spell, Siverian’s heart was drawn. Brother, quoth he, ’Tis like the urgency of our return Will brook of no retardment; and this spot It were a sin if I should pass, and leave Unvisited. Beseech you turn with me, The while I offer up one duteous prayer. Roderick made no reply. He had not dared To turn his face toward those walls; but now He follow’d where the old man led the way. Lord! in his heart the silent sufferer said, Forgive my feeble soul, which would have shrunk From this, ... for what am I that I should put The bitter cup aside! O let my shame And anguish be accepted in thy sight! VI. RODERICK IN TIMES PAST. The mansion whitherward they went, was one Which in his youth Theodofred had built: Thither had he brought home in happy hour His blooming bride; there fondled on his knee The lovely boy she bore him. Close beside, A temple to that Saint he rear’d, who first, As old tradition tells, proclaim’d to Spain The gospel-tidings; and in health and youth, There mindful of mortality, he saw His sepulchre prepared. Witiza took For his adulterous leman and himself The stately pile: but to that sepulchre, When from captivity and darkness death Enlarged him, was Theodofred consign’d; For that unhappy woman, wasting then Beneath a mortal malady, at heart Was smitten, and the Tyrant at her prayer This poor and tardy restitution made. Soon the repentant sinner follow’d him; And calling on Pelayo ere she died, For his own wrongs, and for his father’s death, Implored forgiveness of her absent child, ... If it were possible he could forgive Crimes black as her’s, she said. And by the pangs Of her remorse, ... by her last agonies, ... The unutterable horrors of her death, ... And by the blood of Jesus on the cross For sinners given, did she beseech his prayers In aid of her most miserable soul. Thus mingling sudden shrieks with hopeless vows, And uttering franticly Pelayo’s name, And crying out for mercy in despair, Here had she made her dreadful end, and here Her wretched body was deposited. That presence seem’d to desecrate the place: Thenceforth the usurper shunn’d it with the heart Of conscious guilt; nor could Rusilla bear These groves and bowers, which, like funereal shades, Opprest her with their monumental forms: One day of bitter and severe delight,