You think my spirit rose to flights,
Aspiring past all present sights,
Invoking from the grave of time
The heroes of that city’s prime,—
The great Gonsalvo[6] marching on,
Or Ferdinand[7] of Aragon?—
You think I saw, by camp-fires bright,
The turban bow beneath the sight
Of chieftains marshall’d, far and near,
With drifting plume and flashing spear,
Like cloud and lightning sent to sweep
Abdillah’s[7] Moors across the deep?—
You think I trod these lanes in days
When Califs vied to sound their praise,
And term’d the town that seem’d so blest
“The grander Bagdad of the west”[8];
Or trod them, when it gave the Goth
His “Home of holiness and troth”[8];
Or, long ere through its children’s veins
Flow’d Roman[9] blood to richen Spain’s,
Beheld it named by every mouth,
“The matchless gem of all the south”?[8]—
Nay, nay, I dreamt with joy intense,
But did not heed a hint from thence.