Heroes and Chiefs of old! and ye who bore Firm to the last your part in that dread strife, When Julian and Witiza’s viler race Betray’d their country, hear ye from yon Heaven The joyful acclamation which proclaims That Spain is born again! O ye who died In that disastrous field, and ye who fell Embracing with a martyr’s love your death Amid the flames of Auria; and all ye Victims innumerable, whose cries unheard On earth, but heard in Heaven, from all the land Went up for vengeance; not in vain ye cry Before the eternal throne!... Rest innocent blood! Vengeance is due, and vengeance will be given, Rest innocent blood! The appointed age is come! The star that harbingers a glorious day Hath risen! Lo there the Avenger stands! Lo there He brandishes the avenging sword! Lo there The avenging banner spreads its argent field Refulgent with auspicious light!... Rejoice, O Leon, for thy banner is displayed, Rejoice with all thy mountains, and thy vales And streams! And thou, O Spain, through all thy realms, For thy deliverance cometh! Even now, As from all sides the miscreant hosts move on ... From southern Betis; from the western lands, Where through redundant vales smooth Minho flows, And Douro pours through vine-clad hills the wealth Of Leon’s gathered waters; from the plains Burgensian, in old time Vardulia call’d, But in their castellated strength ere long To be design’d Castille, a deathless name; From midland regions where Toledo reigns Proud city on her royal eminence, And Tagus bends his sickle round the scene Of Roderick’s fall; from rich Rioja’s fields; Dark Ebro’s shores; the walls of Salduba, Seat of the Sedetanians old, by Rome Cæsarian and August denominate, Now Zaragoza, in this later time Above all cities of the earth renown’d For duty perfectly perform’d; ... East, West And South, where’er their gather’d multitudes Urged by the speed of vigorous tyranny, With more than with commeasurable strength Haste to prevent the danger, crush the hopes Of rising Spain, and rivet round her neck The eternal yoke, ... the ravenous fowls of heaven Flock there presentient of their food obscene, Following the accursed armies, whom too well They know their purveyors long. Pursue their march, Ominous attendants! Ere the moon hath fill’d Her horns, these purveyors shall become the prey, And ye on Moorish not on Christian flesh Wearying your beaks, shall clog your scaly feet With foreign gore. Soon will ye learn to know, Followers and harbingers of blood, the flag Of Leon where it bids you to your feast! Terror and flight shall with that flag go forth, And Havoc and the Dogs of War and Death. Thou Covadonga with the tainted stream Of Deva, and this now rejoicing vale, Soon its primitial triumphs wilt behold! Nor shall the glories of the noon be less Than such miraculous promise of the dawn: