Three-and-thirty wrinkled dames,
Wearing on their heads their Basque
Scarlet hoods of ancient style,
Stood beside the village gate.
One of them, like Deborah,
Beat the tambourine and danced
While she sang a hymn in praise
Of the slayer of the bear.
Four strong men in triumph bore
Slaughtered Atta, who erect
In his wicker litter sat
Like some patient at a spa.
To the rear, like relatives
Of the dead, Lascaro came
With Uraka, who abashed,
Nodded to the right and left.
Then the town-clerk at the hall
Spoke as the procession came
To a halt. Of many things
Spoke that dapper little man.
As, for instance, of the rise
Of the navy, of the Press,
Of the sugar-beet debates,
And that hydra, party strife.
All the feats of Louis Philippe
Vaunted he unto the skies,--
Of Lascaro then he spoke
And his great heroic deed.
"Thou Lascaro!" cried the clerk,
As he mopped his streaming brow
With his bright tri-coloured sash--
"Thou Lascaro! thou that hast
"Freed Hispania and France
From that monster Atta Troll,
By both lands shalt be acclaimed the
Pyreneean Lafayette!"
When Lascaro in official
Wise thus heard himself announced
As a hero, then he smiled
In his beard and blushed for joy.
And in stammering syllables
And in broken phrases he
Stuttered forth his gratitude
For the honour shown to him.
Wonder-smitten then stood all
At the unexpected sight,
And in low and timid tones
Thus the ancient women spoke:
"Did you hear Lascaro laugh?
Did you see Lascaro blush?
Did you hear Lascaro speak?
He the witch's perished son!"
On that very day they flayed
Atta Troll. At auction they
Sold his hide. A furrier bid
Just an even hundred francs.
And the furrier decked the skin
Handsomely, and mounted it
All on scarlet. For this work
He demanded twice the cost.
From a third hand Juliet
Then received it. Now it lies
As a rug before her bed
In the city by the Seine.
Oh, how many nights I've stood
Barefoot on the earthly husk
Of my hero great and true,
On the hide of Atta Troll!
Then by sorrow deeply touched
Would I think of Schiller's words:
"That which song would make eternal
First must perish from the Earth."
[Illustration]