MAZEPPA.
29
“And perish—if it must be so—
“At bay, destroying many a foe.
“When first my courser’s race begun,
“I wish’d the goal already won;
“But now I doubted strength and speed.
“Vain doubt! his swift and savage breed510
“Had nerved him like the mountain-roe;
“Nor faster falls the blinding snow
“Which whelms the peasant near the door
“Whose threshold he shall cross no more,
“Bewilder’d with the dazzling blast,
“Than through the forest-paths he past—
“Untired, untamed, and worse than wild;
“All furious as a favour’d child
“Balk’d of its wish; or fiercer still—
“A woman piqued—who has her will.520
XIII.
“The wood was past; ’twas more than noon,
“But chill the air, although in June;
“Or it might be my veins ran cold—
