Predestinate to ruin! all lands else
Have stable peace: here war's rage first begins;
We bide the first brunt. Safer might we dwell
Under the frosty bear, or parching east,
Waggons or tents, than in this frontier town.
We first sustain'd the uproars of the Gauls
And furious Cimbrians, and of Carthage Moors:
As oft as Rome was sack'd, here gan the spoil."
Thus sighing whisper'd they, and none durst speak,
And show their fear or grief; but as the fields260