From conquest Jephtha came, with faltering step
And troubled eye: His home appears in view;
He trembles at the sight. Sad he forbodes, -
His vow will meet a victim in his child;
For well he knows, that, from her earliest years,
She still was first to meet his homeward steps;
Well he remembers, how, with tottering gain,
She ran, and clasp'd his knees, and lisp'd, and look'd
Her joy: and how, when garlanding with flowers
His helm, fearful, her infant hand would shrink
Back from the lion couch'd beneath the crest.
What sound is that, which, from the palm-tree grove,
Floats now with choral swell, now fainter falls
Upon the ear? It is, it is the song
He loved to hear, - a song of thanks and praise,
Sung by the patriarch for his ransom'd son.
Hope from the omen springs: O blessed hope!
It may not be her voice! - Fain would he think
'Twas not his daughter's voice that still approach'd,
Blent with the timbrel's note. Forth from the grove
She foremost glides of all minstrel band:
Moveless he stands; then grasps his hilt, still red
With hostile gore, but, shuddering, quits the hold
And clasps in agony his hands, and cries,
'Alas, my daughter! thou hast brought me low.' -
The timbrel at her rooted feet resounds.