XXXI. HELL'S GATE

Onward led the road again

Through the sad uncoloured plain

Under twilight brooding dim,

And along the utmost rim

Wall and rampart risen to sight

Cast a shadow not of night,

And beyond them seemed to glow

Bonfires lighted long ago.

And my dark conductor broke

Silence at my side and spoke,

Saying, “You conjecture well:

Yonder is the gate of hell.”

Ill as yet the eye could see

The eternal masonry,

But beneath it on the dark

To and fro there stirred a spark.

And again the sombre guide

Knew my question, and replied:

“At hell gate the damned in turn

Pace for sentinel and burn.”

Dully at the leaden sky

Staring, and with idle eye

Measuring the listless plain,

I began to think again.

Many things I thought of then,

Battle, and the loves of men,

Cities entered, oceans crossed,

Knowledge gained and virtue lost,

Cureless folly done and said,

And the lovely way that led

To the slimepit and the mire

And the everlasting fire.

And against a smoulder dun

And a dawn without a sun

Did the nearing bastion loom,

And across the gate of gloom

Still one saw the sentry go,

Trim and burning, to and fro,

One for women to admire

In his finery of fire.

Something, as I watched him pace,

Minded me of time and place,

Soldiers of another corps

And a sentry known before.

Ever darker hell on high

Reared its strength upon the sky,

And our footfall on the track

Fetched the daunting echo back.

But the soldier pacing still

The insuperable sill,

Nursing his tormented pride,

Turned his head to neither side,

Sunk into himself apart

And the hell-fire of his heart.

But against our entering in

From the drawbridge Death and Sin

Rose to render key and sword

To their father and their lord.

And the portress foul to see

Lifted up her eyes on me

Smiling, and I made reply:

“Met again, my lass,” said I.

Then the sentry turned his head,

Looked, and knew me, and was Ned.

Once he looked, and halted straight,

Set his back against the gate,

Caught his musket to his chin,

While the hive of hell within

Sent abroad a seething hum

As of towns whose king is come

Leading conquest home from far

And the captives of his war,

And the car of triumph waits,

And they open wide the gates.

But across the entry barred

Straddled the revolted guard,

Weaponed and accoutred well

From the arsenals of hell;

And beside him, sick and white,

Sin to left and Death to right

Turned a countenance of fear

On the flaming mutineer.

Over us the darkness bowed,

And the anger in the cloud

Clenched the lightning for the stroke;

But the traitor musket spoke.

And the hollowness of hell

Sounded as its master fell,

And the mourning echo rolled

Ruin through his kingdom old.

Tyranny and terror flown

Left a pair of friends alone,

And beneath the nether sky

All that stirred was he and I.

Silent, nothing found to say,

We began the backward way;

And the ebbing luster died

From the soldier at my side,

As in all his spruce attire

Failed the everlasting fire.

Midmost of the homeward track

Once we listened and looked back;

But the city, dusk and mute,

Slept, and there was no pursuit.