And not the ruins old of pomp long past;
’Twill move their minds to rath, and frame afresh
New hopes and fears, and vows, and many a wish,
And Arthur’s cause shall still be favour’d most.
He was the joy and hope, and hap, of all,
The realm’s defence, the sole delay of fates;
He was our wall and fort: twice thirteen years
His shoulders did the Briton state support.
Whiles yet he reign’d, no foreign foes prevail’d,
Nor once could hope to bind the Briton bounds;