10. 'For we were slaying still without remorse, And now that dreadful chief beneath my hand _3875 Defenceless lay, when on a hell-black horse, An Angel bright as day, waving a brand Which flashed among the stars, passed.'--'Dost thou stand Parleying with me, thou wretch?' the king replied; 'Slaves, bind him to the wheel; and of this band, _3880 Whoso will drag that woman to his side That scared him thus, may burn his dearest foe beside; 11. 'And gold and glory shall be his.--Go forth!' They rushed into the plain.--Loud was the roar Of their career: the horsemen shook the earth; _3885 The wheeled artillery's speed the pavement tore; The infantry, file after file, did pour Their clouds on the utmost hills. Five days they slew Among the wasted fields; the sixth saw gore Stream through the city; on the seventh, the dew _3890 Of slaughter became stiff, and there was peace anew: 12. Peace in the desert fields and villages, Between the glutted beasts and mangled dead! Peace in the silent streets! save when the cries Of victims to their fiery judgement led, _3895 Made pale their voiceless lips who seemed to dread Even in their dearest kindred, lest some tongue Be faithless to the fear yet unbetrayed; Peace in the Tyrant's palace, where the throng Waste the triumphal hours in festival and song! _3900 13. Day after day the burning sun rolled on Over the death-polluted land--it came Out of the east like fire, and fiercely shone A lamp of Autumn, ripening with its flame The few lone ears of corn;--the sky became _3905 Stagnate with heat, so that each cloud and blast Languished and died,--the thirsting air did claim All moisture, and a rotting vapour passed From the unburied dead, invisible and fast. 14. First Want, then Plague came on the beasts; their food _3910 Failed, and they drew the breath of its decay. Millions on millions, whom the scent of blood Had lured, or who, from regions far away, Had tracked the hosts in festival array, From their dark deserts; gaunt and wasting now, _3915 Stalked like fell shades among their perished prey; In their green eyes a strange disease did glow, They sank in hideous spasm, or pains severe and slow. 15. The fish were poisoned in the streams; the birds In the green woods perished; the insect race _3920 Was withered up; the scattered flocks and herds Who had survived the wild beasts' hungry chase Died moaning, each upon the other's face In helpless agony gazing; round the City All night, the lean hyaenas their sad case _3925 Like starving infants wailed; a woeful ditty! And many a mother wept, pierced with unnatural pity.