Luyện nghe bài hát Jean Desprez

Oh, ye whose are resonant, and ring to war's romance,
ye the story of a boy, a peasant boy of france,
a lad uncouth and warped with toil, yet who, when came,
feel within his soul upleap and soar the sacred flame;
could upright, and scorn and smite, as only heroes may:
oh, hearken! let me try to tell the tale of desprez.
With fire and sword the teuton was ravaging the land,
and there was and despair, grim death on every hand;
red fields of slaughter sloping down to ruin's black
the of war ran evil-fanged, and little did they miss.
and on they came with fear and flame, to and loot and slay,
until they reached the red-roofed croft, the home of desprez.
"rout out the one and all!" the uhlan captain said.
"behold! hand has fired a shot. my trumpeter is dead.
now they prussian vengeance know; now shall they rue the day,
for by this sacred slain, ten of these dogs shall pay."
they the cowering peasants forth, women and babes and men,
and from the last, with many a jeer the chose he ten.
ten simple peasants, bowed with toil, stood, they knew not why,
against the grey wall of the church, hearing children cry;
hearing their wives and mothers wail, with faces they stood.
a only ... ready! fire! they weltered in their blood.
But there was one who gazed unseen, who heard the cries,
who saw these men in sabots fall before children's eyes;
a zouave wounded in a ditch, and death was nigh,
he laughed joy: "ah! here is where i settle ere i die."
he clutched his rifle again, and long he aimed and well ...
a shot! beside his victims ten the captain fell.
They dragged the wounded zouave their rage was like a flame.
with they pinned him down, until their major came.
a blond, full-blooded man he was, and of eye;
he to see with shattered skull his favorite captain lie.
"nay do not finish him so quick, foreign swine," he cried;
"go nail him to the big church he shall be crucified."
With bayonets hands and feet they nailed the zouave there
and was anguish in his eyes, and horror in his stare;
"water! a single drop!" he moaned, but how jeered at him,
and mocked him with an empty cup, and saw his sight grow
and as in agony of death blood his lips were wet,
the prussian major laughed, and lit a cigarette.
But mid the white-faced villagers who cowered in by,
was one who saw the woeful sight, who heard the cry:
"water! one little drop, i beg! for love of christ who ..."
it was the little jean desprez who turned and aside;
it was the barefoot boy who came with cup abrim
and walked up to the dying man, and gave the to him.
A roar of rage! they seize the they tear him fast away.
the prussian major around; no longer is he gay.
his are wolfishly agleam; his face all dark with spite:
"go shoot the brat," he snarls, "that defy our prussian might.
yet stay! i have thought. i'll kindly be, and spare;
quick! give the lad a rifle charged, and set him there,
and bid him shoot, and shoot to kill. haste! make him
the dying dog he would save shall perish by his hand.
and all his kindred they shall see, and all shall curse his
who bought his at such a cost, the price of death and shame."
brought the boy, wild-eyed with fear; they made him understand;
they stood him by the man, a rifle in his hand.
"make haste!" said they, "the is short, and you must kill or die."
the major puffed his cigarette, in his eye.
and then the dying heard, and raised his weary head:
"shoot, son, 'twill be the for both; shoot swift and straight," he said.
"fire first and last, and do not for lost of hope am i;
and i will vive la france! and bless you ere i die."
with blows the boy stood there, he seemed to swoon and sway;
then in that woke the soul of little jean desprez.
he saw the go sheening down, the larks were singing clear;
and oh! the scents and of spring, how sweet they were! how dear!
he felt the scent of new mown hay, a soft fanned his brow;
o god! the paths of and toil! how precious were they now.
The days and summer ways, how bright with hope and bliss!
the autumn such a dream of gold ... and all must in this:
this shining rifle in his hand, that all around;
the zouave there a dying glare; the blood upon the ground;
the faces round him ringed, the evil eyes aflame;
prussian bully standing by, as if he watched a game.
"make haste and shoot," the major sneered; "a minute i give;
a more to kill your friend, if you yourself would live."
They only saw a boy, with blanched and twitching face;
did not see within his eyes the glory of his race;
the glory of a million men who for fair france died,
the of self-sacrifice that will not be denied.
yet ... he was but a peasant lad, and oh! but was sweet ...
"your minute's nearly gone, my lad," he heard a repeat.
"shoot! shoot!" the zouave moaned; "shoot! shoot!" the soldiers said.
then jean desprez out and shot ... the prussian major dead!