But now the rising sun relumes the plain, And calls to arms the well-accustom'd train. High in the front imperial Capac strode, In fair effulgence like the beaming God; A golden girdle bound his snowy vest, A mimic sun hung sparkling on his breast; The lautu's horned wreath his temples twined, The bow, the quiver shade his waist behind; Raised high in air his golden sceptre burn'd, And hosts surrounding trembled as he turn'd. O'er eastern hills he cast his watchful eye, Thro the broad breaks that lengthen down the sky; In whose blue clefts the sloping pathways bend, Where annual floods from melting snows descend. Now dry and deep, they lead from every height The savage files that headlong rush to fight; They throng and thicken thro the smoky air, And every breach pours down the dusky war. So when a hundred streams explore their way, Down the same slopes, convolving to the sea, They boil, they bend, they force their floods amain, Swell o'er obstructing crags, and sweep the plain. Capac beholds and waits the coming shock, As for the billows waits the storm-beat rock; And while for fight his ardent troops prepare, Thus thro the ranks he breathes the soul of war: Ye tribes that flourish in the Sun's mild reign, Long have your flocks adorn'd the peaceful plain, As o'er the realm his smiles persuasive flow'd, And conquer'd all without the stain of blood; But lo, at last that wild infuriate band With savage war demands your happy land. Beneath the dark immeasurable host, Descending, swarming, how the crags are lost! Already now their ravening eyes behold Your star-bright temples and your gates of gold; And to their gods in fancied goblets pour The warm libation of your children's gore. Move then to vengeance, meet the sons of blood, Led by this arm and lighted by that God; The strife is fierce, your fanes and fields the prize, The warrior conquers or the infant dies. Fill'd with his fire, the troops in squared array Wait the wild hordes loose huddling to the fray; Their pointed arrows, rising on the bow, Look up the sky and chide the lagging foe.