Explore "Death of Archbishop Turpin" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
From the Chanson de Roland
The Archbishop, whom God loved in high degree, / Beheld his wounds all bleeding fresh and free; / And then his cheek more ghastly grew and wan, / And a faint shudder through his members ran. / Upon the battle-field his knee was bent; / Brave Roland saw, and to his succor went, / Straightway his helmet from his brow unlaced, / And tore the shining hauberk from his breast. / Then raising in his arms the man of God, / Gently he laid him on the verdant sod. / "Rest, Sire," he cried, -- "for rest thy suffering needs. " / The priest replied, "Think but of warlike deeds! / The field is ours; well may we boast this strife! / But death steals on, -- there is no hope of life; / In paradise, where Almoners live again, / There are our couches spread, there shall we rest from pain."