“Rome had arrayed thee in white marble newly,
As an imperial princess decked thee duly.
Thy brow a crown of stately columns wore;
The gates of thy arena were sixscore;
Thou hadst thy theatre and hippodrome,
So to make mirth in thy resplendent home!
“We pass within the gates. A crowd advances
Toward the theatre, with songs and dances.
We join them; and the eager thousands press
Through the cool colonnades of palaces;
As thou, mayhap, a mighty flood hast seen
Rush through a maple-shaded, deep ravine.
“Arrived,—oh, shame and sorrow!—we saw there
On the proscenium, with bosoms bare,
Young maidens waltzing to a languid lyre,
And high refrain sung by a shrill-voiced choir.
They in the mazes of their dance surrounded
A marble shape, whose name like ‘Venus’ sounded.
“The frenzied populace its clamour adds
Unto the cries of lasses and of lads,
Who shout their idol’s praises o’er and o’er,—
‘Hail to the Venus, of joy the bestower!
Hail to thee, Venus, goddess of all grace!
Mother of earth and of the Arlesian race!’
“The statue, myrtle-crowned, with nostrils wide
And head high-borne, appears to swell with pride
Amid the incense-clouds; when suddenly,
In horror of so great audacity,
Leaps Trophimus amid the maddened wretches,
And o’er the bewildered throng his arms outstretches.
“‘People of Arles!’ in mighty tones he cried,
‘Hear me, even for the sake of Christ who died
No more.’ But, smitten by his shaggy frown,
The idol groaned and staggered, and fell down,
Headlong, from off its marble pedestal.
Fell, too, the awe-struck dancers, one and all.
“Therewith went up, as ’twere, a single howl
Choked were the gateways with a rabble foul,
Who filled all Arles with terror and dismay,
So that patricians tore their crowns away;
And all the enragèd youth closed round us there,
While flashed a thousand poniards in the air.
“Yet they recoiled;—whether it were the sight
Of us, in our salt-crusted robes bedight;
Or Trophimus’ calm brow which beamed on them,
As wreathed with a celestial diadem;
Or tear-veiled Magdalene, who stood between us,—
How tenfold fairer than their sculptured Venus!
“And the old saint resumed: ‘Arlesian men,
Hear ye my message first; and slay me then,
If need be. Ye have seen your goddess famed
Shiver like glass when my God was but named:
Deem not, Arlesians, that the thing was wrought
By my poor, feeble voice; for we are naught.
“‘The God who thus your idol smote, but now
No lofty temple hath on the hill’s brow;
But Day and Night see him alone up there!
And stern to sin, but generous to prayer,
Is he; and he hath made, with his own hand,
The sky, the sea, the mountains, and the land.