It was long of yore

That the Gothic rout,

Forth from Scythia's eastern shore,
Led their shieldmen out;

Thronged with swarms of war
The lands of many a clan,

And in the South set firm and far
Two tribes to trouble man.

Yearly waxed and grew

Those Gothic kingdoms twain,
And Alaric and Rædgast too
Right royally did reign.

Then down the Alps the Goth

Made haste to force his way,
In haughty pride all fiercely wroth,
And lusting for the fray:

Their banner fluttered bright,
While all Italia through

Shot ruthless in their linden might
The shielded warrior crew,

Forth from the Alpine drifts

To great Sicilia's coast,
Where in the seastream it uplifts
Its lofty island boast.

Then Rome's old rule was crush'd,
Her costliness despoil'd,

And by that host, with battle flush'd,

The city's beauty soil'd.

Alaric and Raedgast

The fastness first they seek,

While Cæsar with his chiefs fled fast

For safety to the Greek.

Essays

Then could the wretched band,

Left mournfully behind,

No more the warring Goth withstand,
Nor much of mercy find.

Unwillingly their trust

The warders then gave up,

None to his oath was true and just;
And full was sorrow's cup.

Yet to the Greek outyearn'd

The people, as at first,

And for some daring leader burn'd,
To follow whom they durst.

The people wore their woes
Many a wintry year,

. Till weird-ordain'd Theodric rose,

Whom thane and earl should hear.

To Christ the chief was born,

And water wash'd the king,

While all Rome's children blest the morn, peace with it should bring.

That

To Rome he vowed full fast

Her old-time rights to yield,

While God should grant his life to last,
The Gothic power to wield.

He did forswear all that:

The Atheling he lied,

To please Arius God forgat,
And falsely slipp'd aside.

He broke his plighted oath,

And, without right or ruth,
Good John the pope against all troth
Beheaded for the truth.

A shameful deed was there;

And heaps of other ill

Against the good this Goth did dare
In wickedness of will.

22

A man there was just set
For heretoch in Rome,

Loved by the lord whose bread he ate,

And dear to all at home:

Dear also to the Greek,

When he the town did save;

A righteous man, whom all would seek, For many gifts he gave.

Long since was he full wise,

In worldly wit and lore,

Eager in worth and wealth to rise,
And skill'd on books to pore.

Boethius was he hight;

He ate shame's bitter bread, And ever kept the, scorn in sight Outlandish kings had said.

He to the Greek was true,

And oft the old-rights told, Which he and his forefathers too From those had won of old.

Carefully then he plann'd

To bring the Greek to Rome, That Cæsar in his rightful land Again might reign at home.

In hidden haste he plied

With letters all the lords, And prayed them by the Lord who died To heed his earnest words.

Greece should give laws to Rome,

And Rome should Greece obey; The people longed to let them come To drive the Goth away.

But lo! the Amuling

Theodric found out all,

And bade his fellows seize and bring

This highborn chief in thrall.

He feared that good earl well,
And straightly bade them bind
Boethius in the prison-cell,

Sore troubled in his mind.

Ah! he had basked so long
Beneath a summer sky,

Ill could he bear such load of wrong,
So heavy did it lie.

Then was he full of woe,

Nor heeded honour more;
Reckless he flung himself below
Upon the dungeon floor;

Much mourning, there he lay,

Nor thought to break his chains,
But to the Lord by night and day
Sang thus in sighing strains.

This poem also is Alfred's own: and has not in any way been suggested by Boethius. It serves, in an able and effective manner, to introduce the Metres that follow, giving a slight historic sketch of Rome and its fortunes at the time of Boethius's imprisonment. In Gibbon's 'Decline and Fall' all the matters here hinted at are detailed at length: as it is not our wish to encumber this version with needless notes, the reader can if he pleases there refer to the history of Theodoric's invasion and government. Meanwhile, a few words in this version require explanation: e. g. 'sceldas læddon' 'led their shields,'-as we would now say of a general, he sent so many hundred 'bayonets' to the flank &c. : 'lind wigende' lime or linden-fighters, so called from their bucklers or spear shafts having been made of lime-wood: 'hlaf' is a 'loaf'; 'ord' a 'beginning or cause': hence hlaford' is a 'patron' or a 'lord whose bread he ate:'heretoga' is a 'general or chieftain'; Boethius was in fact consul,' but, as in the case of atheling' for 'prince,' it is thought best to keep to the word of Alfred. So also of 'Amuling;' which signifies the descendant of Amul. Boethius (prænamed Anicius Manlius Torquatus Severinus, and allied to those noble families) flourished as a Roman citizen and a Christian writer toward the close of the fifth and the beginning of the

sixth century of our era. He was educated in Greece, where he spent the first years of his life, and married a Sicilian lady of Greek extraction, by name Elpis: these serve to explain the fact of his Philhellenism referred to in the text. After having filled the highest office of state himself and having lived to see his sons Patricius and Hypatius Consuls also, he was sent to a prison in Pavia, for having stood up against the usurpations of Theodoric. He appears to have lived only six months in the prison, and then to have been cruelly executed: but the greater part of those six months he must have spent both wisely and well in the elegant prose and ingenious verse of "The consolations of Philosophy." In the second volume of this edition, King Alfred's prose Boethius will be given in full to the reader: the present work concerns the poetry. John Bunyan, we may remember, as well as the holy Paul, severally have put a prison to the like good uses: but Boethius has been censured, and with some reason, for not adding (what Alfred every where supplies) the consolations of religion to those of philosophy. His metres, 26 in number, are varied and ingenious: they have been systematized by Theodore Pulman; but it would here be out of place to descant upon them: our text is Alfred, not Boethius.

II. A SORROWFUL FYTTE.

CARMINA qui quondam studio florente peregi,- -Flebilis, heu, mæstos cogor inire modos.