Hail, Zaragoza! If With Unwet Eye

Composed 1809.--Published 1815

Hail, Zaragoza! If with unwet eye We can approach, thy sorrow to behold, Yet is the heart not pitiless nor cold; Such spectacle demands not tear or sigh. These desolate remains are trophies high Of more than martial courage in the breast Of peaceful civic virtue:[A] they attest Thy matchless worth to all posterity. Blood flowed before thy sight without remorse; Disease consumed thy vitals; War upheaved The ground beneath thee with volcanic force: Dread trials! yet encountered and sustained Till not a wreck of help or hope remained, And law was from necessity received.[B]

See note to the sonnet beginning "And is it among rude untutored Dales" (p. 222). "Saragossa surrendered February 20, 1809, after a heroic defence, which may recall the sieges of Numantiaor Saguntum. Every street, almost every house, had been hotly contested; the monks, and even the women, had taken a conspicuous share in the defence; more than 40,000 bodies of both sexes and every age testified to the obstinate courage of the besieged." (See Dyer's History of Modern Europe, vol. iv. p. 496.)--ED.

VARIANTS:

The word "necessity" was italicised in the editions of 1815 to 1843.