Childe Roland To The Dark Tower Came
I.
My
first
thought
was,
he
lied
in
every
word,
That
hoary
cripple,
with
malicious
eye
Askance
to
watch
the
working
of
his
lie
On
mine,
and
mouth
scarce
able
to
afford
Suppression
of
the
glee,
that
pursed
and
scored
Its
edge,
at
one
more
victim
gained
thereby.
II.
What
else
should
he
be
set
for,
with
his
staff?
What,
save
to
waylay
with
his
lies,
ensnare
All
travellers
who
might
find
him
posted
there,
And
ask
the
road?
I
guessed
what
skull-like
laugh
Would
break,
what
crutch
'gin
write
my
epitaph
For
pastime
in
the
dusty
thoroughfare,
III.
If
at
his
counsel
I
should
turn
aside
Into
that
ominous
tract
which,
all
agree,
Hides
the
Dark
Tower.
Yet
acquiescingly
I
did
turn
as
he
pointed:
neither
pride
Nor
hope
rekindling
at
the
end
descried,
So
much
as
gladness
that
some
end
might
be.
IV.
For,
what
with
my
whole
world-wide
wandering,
What
with
my
search
drawn
out
thro'
years,
my
hope
Dwindled
into
a
ghost
not
fit
to
cope
With
that
obstreperous
joy
success
would
bring,
I
hardly
tried
now
to
rebuke
the
spring
My
heart
made,
finding
failure
in
its
scope.
V.
As
when
a
sick
man
very
near
to
death
Seems
dead
indeed,
and
feels
begin
and
end
The
tears
and
takes
the
farewell
of
each
friend,
And
hears
one
bid
the
other
go,
draw
breath
Freelier
outside,
(``since
all
is
o'er,''
he
saith,
``And
the
blow
falIen
no
grieving
can
amend;'')
VI.
While
some
discuss
if
near
the
other
graves
Be
room
enough
for
this,
and
when
a
day
Suits
best
for
carrying
the
corpse
away,
With
care
about
the
banners,
scarves
and
staves:
And
still
the
man
hears
all,
and
only
craves
He
may
not
shame
such
tender
love
and
stay.
VII.
Thus,
I
had
so
long
suffered
in
this
quest,
Heard
failure
prophesied
so
oft,
been
writ
So
many
times
among
``The
Band''—-to
wit,
The
knights
who
to
the
Dark
Tower's
search
addressed
Their
steps—-that
just
to
fail
as
they,
seemed
best,
And
all
the
doubt
was
now—-should
I
be
fit?
VIII.
So,
quiet
as
despair,
I
turned
from
him,
That
hateful
cripple,
out
of
his
highway
Into
the
path
he
pointed.
All
the
day
Had
been
a
dreary
one
at
best,
and
dim
Was
settling
to
its
close,
yet
shot
one
grim
Red
leer
to
see
the
plain
catch
its
estray.
IX.
For
mark!
no
sooner
was
I
fairly
found
Pledged
to
the
plain,
after
a
pace
or
two,
Than,
pausing
to
throw
backward
a
last
view
O'er
the
safe
road,
'twas
gone;
grey
plain
all
round:
Nothing
but
plain
to
the
horizon's
bound.
I
might
go
on;
nought
else
remained
to
do.
X.
So,
on
I
went.
I
think
I
never
saw
Such
starved
ignoble
nature;
nothing
throve:
For
flowers—-as
well
expect
a
cedar
grove!
But
cockle,
spurge,
according
to
their
law
Might
propagate
their
kind,
with
none
to
awe,
You'd
think;
a
burr
had
been
a
treasure-trove.
XI.
No!
penury,
inertness
and
grimace,
In
some
strange
sort,
were
the
land's
portion.
``See
``Or
shut
your
eyes,''
said
nature
peevishly,
``It
nothing
skills:
I
cannot
help
my
case:
``'Tis
the
Last
judgment's
fire
must
cure
this
place,
``Calcine
its
clods
and
set
my
prisoners
free.''
XII.
If
there
pushed
any
ragged
thistle-stalk
Above
its
mates,
the
head
was
chopped;
the
bents
Were
jealous
else.
What
made
those
holes
and
rents
In
the
dock's
harsh
swarth
leaves,
bruised
as
to
baulk
All
hope
of
greenness?'tis
a
brute
must
walk
Pashing
their
life
out,
with
a
brute's
intents.
XIII.
As
for
the
grass,
it
grew
as
scant
as
hair
In
leprosy;
thin
dry
blades
pricked
the
mud
Which
underneath
looked
kneaded
up
with
blood.
One
stiff
blind
horse,
his
every
bone
a-stare,
Stood
stupefied,
however
he
came
there:
Thrust
out
past
service
from
the
devil's
stud!
XIV.
Alive?
he
might
be
dead
for
aught
I
know,
With
that
red
gaunt
and
colloped
neck
a-strain,
And
shut
eyes
underneath
the
rusty
mane;
Seldom
went
such
grotesqueness
with
such
woe;
I
never
saw
a
brute
I
hated
so;
He
must
be
wicked
to
deserve
such
pain.
XV.
I
shut
my
eyes
and
turned
them
on
my
heart.
As
a
man
calls
for
wine
before
he
fights,
I
asked
one
draught
of
earlier,
happier
sights,
Ere
fitly
I
could
hope
to
play
my
part.
Think
first,
fight
afterwards—-the
soldier's
art:
One
taste
of
the
old
time
sets
all
to
rights.
XVI.
Not
it!
I
fancied
Cuthbert's
reddening
face
Beneath
its
garniture
of
curly
gold,
Dear
fellow,
till
I
almost
felt
him
fold
An
arm
in
mine
to
fix
me
to
the
place,
That
way
he
used.
Alas,
one
night's
disgrace!
Out
went
my
heart's
new
fire
and
left
it
cold.
XVII.
Giles
then,
the
soul
of
honour—-there
he
stands
Frank
as
ten
years
ago
when
knighted
first.
What
honest
man
should
dare
(he
said)
he
durst.
Good—-but
the
scene
shifts—-faugh!
what
hangman
hands
Pin
to
his
breast
a
parchment?
His
own
bands
Read
it.
Poor
traitor,
spit
upon
and
curst!
XVIII.
Better
this
present
than
a
past
like
that;
Back
therefore
to
my
darkening
path
again!
No
sound,
no
sight
as
far
as
eye
could
strain.
Will
the
night
send
a
howlet
or
a
bat?
I
asked:
when
something
on
the
dismal
flat
Came
to
arrest
my
thoughts
and
change
their
train.
XIX.
A
sudden
little
river
crossed
my
path
As
unexpected
as
a
serpent
comes.
No
sluggish
tide
congenial
to
the
glooms;
This,
as
it
frothed
by,
might
have
been
a
bath
For
the
fiend's
glowing
hoof—-to
see
the
wrath
Of
its
black
eddy
bespate
with
flakes
and
spumes.
XX.
So
petty
yet
so
spiteful!
All
along,
Low
scrubby
alders
kneeled
down
over
it;
Drenched
willows
flung
them
headlong
in
a
fit
Of
route
despair,
a
suicidal
throng:
The
river
which
had
done
them
all
the
wrong,
Whate'er
that
was,
rolled
by,
deterred
no
whit.
XXI.
Which,
while
I
forded,—-good
saints,
how
I
feared
To
set
my
foot
upon
a
dead
man's
cheek,
Each
step,
or
feel
the
spear
I
thrust
to
seek
For
hollows,
tangled
in
his
hair
or
beard!
—-It
may
have
been
a
water-rat
I
speared,
But,
ugh!
it
sounded
like
a
baby's
shriek.
XXII.
Glad
was
I
when
I
reached
the
other
bank.
Now
for
a
better
country.
Vain
presage!
Who
were
the
strugglers,
what
war
did
they
wage,
Whose
savage
trample
thus
could
pad
the
dank
Soil
to
a
plash?
Toads
in
a
poisoned
tank,
Or
wild
cats
in
a
red-hot
iron
cage—-
XXIII.
The
fight
must
so
have
seemed
in
that
fell
cirque.
What
penned
them
there,
with
all
the
plain
to
choose?
No
foot-print
leading
to
that
horrid
mews,
None
out
of
it.
Mad
brewage
set
to
work
Their
brains,
no
doubt,
like
galley-slaves
the
Turk
Pits
for
his
pastime,
Christians
against
Jews.
XXIV.
And
more
than
that—-a
furlong
on—-why,
there!
What
bad
use
was
that
engine
for,
that
wheel,
Or
brake,
not
wheel—-that
harrow
fit
to
reel
Men's
bodies
out
like
silk?
with
all
the
air
Of
Tophet's
tool,
on
earth
left
unaware,
Or
brought
to
sharpen
its
rusty
teeth
of
steel.
XXV.
Then
came
a
bit
of
stubbed
ground,
once
a
wood,
Next
a
marsh,
it
would
seem,
and
now
mere
earth
Desperate
and
done
with;
(so
a
fool
finds
mirth,
Makes
a
thing
and
then
mars
it,
till
his
mood
Changes
and
off
he
goes!)
within
a
rood—-
Bog,
clay
and
rubble,
sand
and
stark
black
dearth.
XXVI.
Now
blotches
rankling,
coloured
gay
and
grim,
Now
patches
where
some
leanness
of
the
soil's
Broke
into
moss
or
substances
like
boils;
Then
came
some
palsied
oak,
a
cleft
in
him
Like
a
distorted
mouth
that
splits
its
rim
Gaping
at
death,
and
dies
while
it
recoils.
XXVII.
And
just
as
far
as
ever
from
the
end!
Nought
in
the
distance
but
the
evening,
nought
To
point
my
footstep
further!
At
the
thought,
great
black
bird,
Apollyon's
bosom-friend,
Sailed
past,
nor
beat
his
wide
wing
dragon-penned
That
brushed
my
cap—-perchance
the
guide
I
sought.
XXVIII.
For,
looking
up,
aware
I
somehow
grew,
'Spite
of
the
dusk,
the
plain
had
given
place
All
round
to
mountains—-with
such
name
to
grace
Mere
ugly
heights
and
heaps
now
stolen
in
view.
How
thus
they
had
surprised
me,—-solve
it,
you!
How
to
get
from
them
was
no
clearer
case.
XXIX.
Yet
half
I
seemed
to
recognize
some
trick
Of
mischief
happened
to
me,
God
knows
when—-
In
a
bad
dream
perhaps.
Here
ended,
then,
Progress
this
way.
When,
in
the
very
nick
Of
giving
up,
one
time
more,
came
a
click
As
when
a
trap
shuts—-you're
inside
the
den!
XXX.
Burningly
it
came
on
me
all
at
once,
This
was
the
place!
those
two
hills
on
the
right,
Crouched
like
two
bulls
locked
horn
in
horn
in
fight;
While
to
the
left,
a
tall
scalped
mountain…
Dunce,
Dotard,
a-dozing
at
the
very
nonce,
After
a
life
spent
training
for
the
sight!
XXXI.
What
in
the
midst
lay
but
the
Tower
itself?
The
round
squat
turret,
blind
as
the
fool's
heart,
Built
of
brown
stone,
without
a
counter-part
In
the
whole
world.
The
tempest's
mocking
elf
Points
to
the
shipman
thus
the
unseen
shelf
He
strikes
on,
only
when
the
timbers
start.
XXXII.
Not
see?
because
of
night
perhaps?—-why,
day
Came
back
again
for
that!
before
it
left,
The
dying
sunset
kindled
through
a
cleft:
The
hills,
like
giants
at
a
hunting,
lay,
Chin
upon
hand,
to
see
the
game
at
bay,—-
``Now
stab
and
end
the
creature—-to
the
heft!''
XXXIII.
Not
hear?
when
noise
was
everywhere!
it
tolled
Increasing
like
a
bell.
Names
in
my
ears
Of
all
the
lost
adventurers
my
peers,—-
How
such
a
one
was
strong,
and
such
was
bold,
And
such
was
fortunate,
yet,
each
of
old
Lost,
lost!
one
moment
knelled
the
woe
of
years.
XXXIV.
There
they
stood,
ranged
along
the
hill-sides,
met
To
view
the
last
of
me,
a
living
frame
For
one
more
picture!
in
a
sheet
of
flame
I
saw
them
and
I
knew
them
all.
And
yet
Dauntless
the
slug-horn
to
my
lips
I
set,
And
blew.
``Childe
Roland
to
the
Dark
Tower
came.''
Robert Browning
Robert Browning (born May 7, 1812, London—died Dec. 12, 1889, Venice) major English poet of the Victorian age, noted for his mastery of dramatic monologue and psychological portraiture. His most noted work was The Ring and the Book (1868–69), the story of a Roman murder trial in 12 books. Through all the vicissitudes of critical reputation, however, Browning’s major contribution to the canon of children’s literature, “The Pied Piper of Hamelin,” has retained its popular audience. At the time of his death in 1889, he was one of the most popular poets in England.