Strike, strike the iron, children o’ Mulciber, Hot from the charcoal cheerily glimmering! Swing, swing, my boys, high swing the sledges! Heave at it, heave at it, all! Together! Great Mars, the war God, watches ye laboring Joyously. Joyous watches the gleam o’ the Bright sparkles, upsoaring the faster, Faster as our merry blows revive them. Well knoweth He that clang. It arouses him, Heard far aloof! He laughs on us hammering The sword, the clear harness of iron, Armipotent paramour o’ Venus.—— Red glows the charcoal. Bend to the task, my boys, Time flies apace, and speedily night cometh, When we no more may ply the anvil; Fate cometh eke, i’ the murky midnight. Mark ye the pines, which rooted i’ rocky ground,(17) Brave Euroclydon’s onset at evening. Day dawns. The tree, which stood the tallest, Preeminent i’ the leafy greenwood, Now lies the lowest. Safely the arbutus, Which bent before him, flourishes, and the sun Wakens the thrush, which slept securely Nestled in its emerald asylum. So, when the war-shout peals i’ the noon o’ night, Rousing the sleepers fearful, in ecstacy When slaves avenge their wrongs, arising Strong i’ the name o’ liberty new born, When fury spares not beauty nor innocence, First flame the grandest domes. I’ the massacre, First fall the noblest. Lowly virtue Haply the shade o’ poverty defends. Forge then the broad sword. Quickly the night cometh, When red the streets with gore o’ the mightiest Shall fiercely flow, like Tiber in flood. Rise then, avenger, the time it hath come! Wake bloody tyrants from merry banquetting, From downy couches, snowy-bosomed women And ruby wine-cups, wake—The avenger Springs to his arms, for the time it hath come! The wild strain ceased, and with it the clang of the hammers, the bars of steel being already beaten into the form of those short massive two-edged blades, which were the Roman’s national and all victorious weapon. But, as it ceased, a deep stern hum of approbation followed, elicited probably by some real or fancied similitude between the imagery of the song, and the circumstances of the auditors, who were to a man of the lowest order of plebeians, taught from their cradles to regard the nobles, and perhaps with too much cause, as their natural enemies and oppressors. When the brief applause was at an end, one of the elder bystanders addressed the principal workman, at the forge, in a low voice. "You are incautious, Caius Crispus, to sing such songs as this, and at such a time, too."