The Poetry Corner

The Lovers Tale

By Alfred Lord Tennyson

I. Here far away, seen from the topmost cliff, Filling with purple gloom the vacancies Between the tufted hills, the sloping seas Hung in mid-heaven, and half-way down rare sails, White as white clouds, floated from sky to sky. Oh! pleasant breast of waters, quiet bay, Like to a quiet mind in the loud world, Where the chafed breakers of the outer sea Sank powerless, as anger falls aside And withers on the breast of peaceful love; Thou didst receive the growth of pines that fledged The hills that watchd thee, as Love watcheth Love, In thine own essence, and delight thyself To make it wholly thine on sunny days. Keep thou thy name of Lovers Bay. See, sirs, Even now the Goddess of the Past, that takes The heart, and sometimes touches but one string That quivers, and is silent, and sometimes Sweeps suddenly all its half-moulderd chords To some old melody, begins to play That air which pleased her first. I feel thy breath; I come, great Mistress of the ear and eye: Thy breath is of the pinewood; and tho years Have hollowd out a deep and stormy strait Betwixt the native land of Love and me, Breathe but a little on me, and the sail Will draw me to the rising of the sun, The lucid chambers of the morning star, And East of Life. Permit me, friend, I prythee, To pass my hand across my brows, and muse On those dear hills, that never more will meet The sight that throbs and aches beneath my touch, As tho there beat a heart in either eye; For when the outer lights are darkend thus, The memorys vision hath a keener edge. It grows upon me nowthe semicircle Of dark-blue waters and the narrow fringe Of curving beachits wreaths of dripping green Its pale pink shellsthe summerhouse aloft That opend on the pines with doors of glass, A mountain nestthe pleasure-boat that rockd, Light-green with its own shadow, keel to keel, Upon the dappled dimplings of the wave, That blanchd upon its side. O Love, O Hope! They come, they crowd upon me all at once Moved from the cloud of unforgotten things, That sometimes on the horizon of the mind Lies folded, often sweeps athwart in storm Flash upon flash they lighten thro medays Of dewy dawning and the amber eves When thou and I, Camilla, thou and I Were borne about the bay or safely moord Beneath a low-browd cavern, where the tide Plashd, sapping its worn ribs; and all without The slowly-ridging rollers on the cliffs Clashd, calling to each other, and thro the arch Down those loud waters, like a setting star, Mixt with the gorgeous west the lighthouse shone, And silver-smiling Venus ere she fell Would often loiter in her balmy blue, To crown it with herself. Here, too, my love Waverd at anchor with me, when day hung From his mid-dome in Heavens airy halls; Gleams of the water-circles as they broke, Flickerd like doubtful smiles about her lips, Quiverd a flying glory on her hair, Leapt like a passing thought across her eyes; And mine with one that will not pass, till earth And heaven pass too, dwelt on my heaven, a face Most starry-fair, but kindled from within As twere with dawn. She was dark-haird, dark-eyed: Oh, such dark eyes! a single glance of them Will govern a whole life from birth to death, Careless of all things else, led on with light In trances and in visions: look at them, You lose yourself in utter ignorance; You cannot find their depth; for they go back, And farther back, and still withdraw themselves Quite into the deep soul, that evermore Fresh springing from her fountains in the brain, Still pouring thro, floods with redundant life Her narrow portals. Trust me, long ago I should have died, if it were possible To die in gazing on that perfectness Which I do bear within me: I had died, But from my farthest lapse, my latest ebb, Thine image, like a chants of light and strength Upon the waters, pushd me back again On these deserted sands of barren life. Tho from the deep vault where the heart of Hope Fell into dust, and crumbled in the dark Forgetting how to render beautiful Her countenance with quick and healthful blood Thou didst not sway me upward; could I perish While thou, a meteor of the sepulchre, Didst swathe thyself all round Hopes quiet urn For ever? He, that saith it, hath oer-stept The slippery footing of his narrow wit, And falln away from judgment. Thou art light, To which my spirit leaneth all her flowers, And length of days, and immortality Of thought, and freshness ever self-renewd. For Time and Grief abode too long with Life, And, like all other friends i the world, at last They grew aweary of her fellowship: So Time and Grief did beckon unto Death, And Death drew nigh and beat the doors of Life; But thou didst sit alone in the inner house, A wakeful portress, and didst parle with Death, This is a charmed dwelling which I hold; So Death gave back, and would no further come. Yet is my life nor in the present time, Nor in the present place. To me alone, Pushd from his chair of regal heritage, The Present is the vassal of the Past: So that, in that I have lived, do I live, And cannot die, and am, in having been A portion of the pleasant yesterday, Thrust forward on to-day and out of place; A body journeying onward, sick with toil. The weight as if of age upon my limbs, The grasp of hopeless grief about my heart, And all the senses weakend, save in that, Which long ago they had gleand and garnerd up Into the granaries of memory The clear brow, bulwark of the precious brain, Chinkd as you see, and seamdand all the while The light soul twines and mingles with the growths Of vigorous early days, attracted, won, Married, made one with, molten into all The beautiful in Past of act or place, And like the all-enduring camel, driven Far from the diamond fountain by the palms, Who toils across the middle moonlit nights, Or when the white heats of the blinding noons Beat from the concave sand; yet in him keeps A draught of that sweet fountain that he loves, To stay his feet from falling, and his spirit From bitterness of death. Ye ask me, friends, When I began to love. How should I tell you? Or from the after-fulness of my heart, Flow back again unto my slender spring And first of love, tho every turn and depth Between is clearer in my life than all Its present flow. Ye know not what ye ask. How should the broad and open flower tell What sort of bud it was, when, prest together In its green sheath, close-lapt in silken folds, It seemd to keep its sweetness to itself, Yet was not the less sweet for that it seemd? For young Life knows not when young Life was born, But takes it all for granted: neither Love, Warm in the heart, his cradle, can remember Love in the womb, but resteth satisfied, Looking on her that brought him to the light: Or as men know not when they fall asleep Into delicious dreams, our other life, So know I not when I began to love. This is my sum of knowledgethat my love Grew with myselfsay rather, was my growth, My inward sap, the hold I have on earth, My outward circling air wherewith I breathe, Which yet upholds my life, and evermore Is to me daily life and daily death: For how should I have lived and not have loved? Can ye take off the sweetness front the flower, The colour and the sweetness from the rose, And place them by themselves; or set apart Their motions and their brightness from the stars, And then point out the flower or the star? Or build a wall betwixt my life and love, And tell me where I am? Tis even thus: In that I live I love; because I love I live: whateer is fountain to the one Is fountain to the other; and wheneer Our God unknits the riddle of the one, There is no shade or fold of mystery Swathing the other. Many, many years, (For they seem many and my most of life, And well I could have lingerd in that porch, So unproportiond to the dwelling-place,) In the Maydews of childhood, opposite The flush and dawn of youth, we lived together, Apart, alone together on those hills. Before he saw my day my father died, And he was happy that he saw it not; But I and the first daisy on his grave From the same day came into light at once. As Love and I do number equal years, So she, my love, is of an age with me. How like each other was the birth of each! On the same morning, almost the same hour, Under the selfsame aspect of the stars, (Oh falsehood of all starcraft!) we were born. How like each other was the birth of each! The sister of my mothershe that bore Camilla close beneath her beating heart, Which to the imprisond spirit of the child, With its true-touched pulses in the flow And hourly visitation of the blood, Sent notes of preparation manifold, And mellowd echoes of the outer world My mothers sister, mother of my love, Who had a twofold claim upon my heart, One twofold mightier than the other was, In giving so much beauty to the world, And so much wealth as God had charged her with Loathing to put it from herself for ever, Left her own life with it; and dying thus, Crownd with her highest act the placid face And breathless body of her good deeds past. So were we born, so orphand. She was motherless And I without a father. So from each Of those two pillars which from earth uphold Our childhood, one had fallen away, and all The careful burthen of our tender years Trembled upon the other. He that gave Her life, to me delightedly fulfilld All loving kindnesses, all offices Of watchful care and trembling tenderness. He waked for both: he prayd for both: he slept Dreaming of both: nor was his love the less Because it was divided, and shot forth Boughs on each side, laden with wholesome shade, Wherein we nested sleeping or awake, And sang aloud the matin-song of life. She was my foster-sister: on one arm The flaxen ringlets of our infancies Wanderd, the while we rested: one soft lap Pillowd us both: a common light of eyes Was on us as we lay: our baby lips, Kissing one bosom, ever drew from thence The stream of life, one stream, one life, one blood, One sustenance, which, still as thought grew large, Still larger moulding all the house of thought, Made all our tastes and fancies like, perhaps Allall but one; and strange to me, and sweet, Sweet thro strange years to know that whatsoeer Our general mother meant for me alone, Our mutual mother dealt to both of us: So what was earliest mine in earliest life, I shared with her in whom myself remains. As was our childhood, so our infancy, They tell me, was a very miracle Of fellow-feeling and communion. They tell me that we would not be alone, We cried when we were parted; when I wept, Her smile lit up the rainbow on my tears, Stayd on the cloud of sorrow; that we loved The sound of one-anothers voices more Than the gray cuckoo loves his name, and learnd To lisp in tune together; that we slept In the same cradle always, face to face. Heart beating time to heart, lip pressing lip, Folding each other, breathing on each other, Dreaming together (dreaming of each other They should have added), till the morning light Sloped thro the pines, upon the dewy pane Falling, unseald our eyelids, and we woke To gaze upon each other. If this be true, At thought of which my whole soul languishes And faints, and hath no pulse, no breathas tho A man in some still garden should infuse Rich atar in the bosom of the rose, Till, drunk with its own wine, and overfull Of sweetness, and in smelling of itself, It fall on its own thornsif this be true And that way my wish leads me evermore Still to believe ittis so sweet a thought, Why in the utter stillness of the soul Doth questiond memory answer not, nor tell Of this our earliest, our closest-drawn, Most loveliest, earthly-heavenliest harmony? O blossomd portal of the lonely house, Green prelude, April promise, glad new-year Of Being, which with earliest violets And lavish carol of clear-throated larks Filled all the March of life!I will not speak of thee, These have not seen thee, these can never know thee, They cannot understand me. Pass we then A term of eighteen years. Ye would but laugh, If I should tell you how I hoard in thought The faded rhymes and scraps of ancient crones, Gray relics of the nurseries of the world, Which are as gems set in my memory, Because she learnt them with me; or what use To know her father left us just before The daffodil was blown? or how we found The dead man cast upon the shore? All this Seems to the quiet daylight of your minds But cloud and smoke, and in the dark of mine Is traced with flame. Move with me to the event. There came a glorious morning, such a one As dawns but once a season. Mercury On such a morning would have flung himself From cloud to cloud, and swum with balanced wings To some tall mountain: when I said to her, A day for Gods to stoop, she answered, Ay., And men to soar: for as that other gazed, Shading his eyes till all the fiery cloud, The prophet and the chariot and the steeds, Suckd into oneness like a little star Were drunk into the inmost blue, we stood, When first we came from out the pines at noon, With hands for eaves, uplooking and almost Waiting to see some blessed shape in heaven, So bathed we were in brilliance. Never yet Before or after have I known the spring Pour with such sudden deluges of light Into the middle summer; for that day Love, rising, shook his wings, and charged the winds With spiced May-sweets from bound to bound, and blew Fresh fire into the sun, and from within Burst thro the heated buds, and sent his soul Into the songs of birds, and touchd far-off His mountain-altars, his high hills, with flame Milder and purer. Thro the rocks we wound: The great pine shook with lonely sounds of joy That came on the sea-wind. As mountain streams Our bloods ran free: the sunshine seemd to brood More warmly on the heart than on the brow. We often paused, and, looking back, we saw The clefts and openings in the mountains filld With the blue valley and the glistening brooks, And all the low dark groves, a land of love! A land of promise, a land of memory, A land of promise flowing with the milk And honey of delicious memories! And down to sea, and far as eye could ken, Each way from verge to verge a Holy Land, Still growing holier as you neard the bay, For there the Temple stood. When we had reachd The grassy platform on some hill, I stoopd, I gatherd the wild herbs, and for her brows And mine made garlands of the selfsame flower, Which she took smiling, and with my work thus Crownd her clear forehead. Once or twice she told me (For I remember all things) to let grow The flowers that run poison in their veins, She said, The evil flourish in the world. Then playfully she gave herself the lie Nothing in nature is unbeautiful; So, brother, pluck and spare not. So I wove Evn the dull-blooded poppy-stem, whose flower, Hued with the scarlet of a fierce sunrise, Like to the wild youth of an evil prince, Is without sweetness, but who crowns himself Above the naked poisons of his heart In his old age. A graceful thought of hers Gravn on my fancy! And oh, how like a nymph, A stately mountain nymph she lookd! how native Unto the hills she trod on! While I gazed My coronal slowly disentwined itself And fell between us both; tho while I gazed My spirit leapd as with those thrills of bliss That strike across the soul in prayer, and show us That we are surely heard. Methought a light Burst from the garland I had wovn, and stood A solid glory on her bright black hair; A light methought broke from her dark, dark eyes, And shot itself into the singing winds; A mystic light flashd evn from her white robe As from a glass in the sun, and fell about My footsteps on the mountains. Last we came To what our people call The Hill of Woe. A bridge is there, that, lookd at from beneath Seems but a cobweb filament to link The yawning of an earthquake-cloven chasm. And thence one night, when all the winds ere loud, A woful man (for so the story went) Had thrust his wife and child and dashd himself Into the dizzy depth below. Below, Fierce in the strength of far descent, a stream Flies with a shatterd foam along the chasm. The path was perilous, loosely strown with crags: We mounted slowly; yet to both there came The joy of life in steepness overcome, And victories of ascent, and looking down On all that had lookd down on us; and joy In breathing nearer heaven; and joy to me, High over all the azure-circled earth, To breathe with her as if in heaven itself; And more than joy that I to her became Her guardian and her angel, raising her Still higher, past all peril, until she saw Beneath her feet the region far away, Beyond the nearest mountains bosky brows, Arise in open prospectheath and hill, And hollow lined and wooded to the lips, And steep-down walls of battlemented rock Gilded with broom, or shatterd into spires, And glory of broad waters interfused, Whence rose as it were breath and steam of gold, And over all the great wood rioting And climbing, streakd or starrd at intervals With falling brook or blossomd bushand last, Framing the mighty landscape to the west, A purple range of mountain-cones, between Whose interspaces gushd in blinding bursts The incorporate blaze of sun and sea. At length Descending from the point and standing both, There on the tremulous bridge, that from beneath Had seemd a gossamer filament up in air, We paused amid the splendour. All the west And evn unto the middle south was ribbd And barrd with bloom on bloom. The sun below, Held for a space twixt cloud and wave, showerd down Rays of a mighty circle, weaving over That various wilderness a tissue of light Unparalleld. On the other side, the moon, Half-melted into thin blue air, stood still, And pale and fibrous as a witherd leaf, Nor yet endured in presence of His eyes To indue his lustre; most unloverlike, Since in his absence full of light and joy, And giving light to others. But this most, Next to her presence whom I loved so well, Spoke loudly even into my inmost heart As to my outward hearing: the loud stream, Forth issuing from his portals in the crag (A visible link unto the home of my heart), Ran amber toward the west, and nigh the sea Parting my own loved mountains was received, Shorn of its strength, into the sympathy Of that small bay, which out to open main Glowd intermingling close beneath the sun. Spirit of Love! that little hour was bound Shut in from Time, and dedicate to thee: Thy fires from heaven had touchd it, and the earth They fell on became hallowd evermore. We turnd: our eyes met: hers were bright, and mine Were dim with floating tears, that shot the sunset In lightnings round me; and my name was borne Upon her breath. henceforth my name has been A hallowd memory like the names of old, A centerd, glory-circled memory, And a peculiar treasure, brooking not Exchange or currency: and in that hour A hope flowd round me, like a golden mist Charmd amid eddies of melodious airs, A moment, ere the onward whirlwind shatter it, Waverd and floatedwhich was less than Hope, Because it lackd the power of perfect Hope; But which was more and higher than all Hope, Because all other Hope had lower aim; Even that this name to which her gracious lips Did lend such gentle utterance, this one name, In some obscure hereafter, might in-wreathe (How lovelier, nobler then!) her life, her love, With my life, love, soul, spirit, and heart and strength. Brother, she said, let this be calld henceforth The Hill of Hope;and I replied, O sister, My will is one with thine; the Hill of Hope. Nevertheless, we did not change the name. I did not speak: I could not speak my love. Love lieth deep: Love dwells not in lip-depths. Love wraps his wings on either side the heart, Constraining it with kisses close and warm, Absorbing all the incense of sweet thoughts So that they pass not to the shrine of sound. Else had the life of that delighted hour Drunk in the largeness of the utterance Of Love; but how should Earthly measure mete The Heavenly-unmeasured or unlimited Love, Who scarce can tune his high majestic sense Unto the thundersong that wheels the spheres, Scarce living in the olian harmony, And flowing odour of the spacious air, Scarce housed within the circle of this Earth, Be cabind up in words and syllables, Which pass with that which breathes them? Sooner Earth Might go round Heaven, and the strait girth of Time Inswathe the fulness of Eternity, Than language grasp the infinite of Love. O day which did enwomb that happy hour, Thou art blessed in the years, divinest day O Genius of that hour which dost uphold Thy coronal of glory like a God, Amid thy melancholy mates far-seen, Who walk before thee, ever turning round To gaze upon thee till their eyes are dim With dwelling on the light and depth of thine, Thy name is ever worshippd among hours! Had I died then, I had not seemd to die, For bliss stood round me like the light of Heaven, Had I died then, I had not known the death; Yea had the Power from whose right hand the light Of Life issueth, and from whose left hand floweth The Shadow of Death, perennial eflluences, Whereof to all that draw the wholesome air, Somewhile the one must overflow the other; Then had he stemmd my day with night, and driven My current to the fountain whence it sprang, Even his own abiding excellence On me, methinks, that shock of gloom had falln Unfelt, and in this glory I had merged The other, like the sun I gazed upon, Which seeming for the moment due to death, And dipping his head low beneath the verge, Yet bearing round about him his own day, In confidence of unabated strength, Steppeth from Heaven to Heaven, from light to light, And holdeth his undimmed forehead far Into a clearer zenith, pure of cloud. We trod the shadow of the downward hill; We past from light to dark. On the other side Is scoopd a cavern and a mountain hall, Which none have fathomd. If you go far in (The country people rumour) you may hear The moaning of the woman and the child, Shut in the secret chambers of the rock. I too have heard a soundperchance of streams Running far on within its inmost halls, The home of darkness; but the cavern-mouth, Half overtrailed with a wanton weed, Gives birth to a brawling brook, that passing lightly Adown a natural stair of tangled roots, Is presently received in a sweet grave Of eglantines, a place of burial Far lovelier than its cradle; for unseen, But taken with the sweetness of the place, It makes a constant bubbling melody That drowns the nearer echoes. Lower down Spreads out a little lake, that, flooding, leaves Low banks of yellow sand; and from the woods That belt it rise three dark, tall cypresses, Three cypresses, symbols of mortal woe, That men plant over graves. Hither we came, And sitting down upon the golden moss, Held converse sweet and lowlow converse sweet, In which our voices bore least part. The wind Told a lovetale beside us, how he wood The waters, and the waters answering lispd To kisses of the wind, that, sick with love, Fainted at intervals, and grew again To utterance of passion. Ye cannot shape Fancy so fair as is this memory. Methought all excellence that ever was Had drawn herself from many thousand years, And all the separate Edens of this earth, To centre in this place and time. I listend, And her words stole with most prevailing sweetness Into my heart, as thronging fancies come To boys and girls when summer days are new, And soul and heart and body are all at ease: What marvel my Camilla told me all? It was so happy an hour, so sweet a place, And I was as the brother of her blood, And by that name I moved upon her breath; Dear name, which had too much of nearness in it And heralded the distance of this time! At first her voice was very sweet and low, As if she were afraid of utterance; But in the onward current of her speech, (As echoes of the hollow-banked brooks Are fashiond by the channel which they keep), Her words did of their meaning borrow sound, Her cheek did catch the colour of her words. I heard and trembled, yet I could but hear; My heart pausedmy raised eyelids would not fall, But still I kept my eyes upon the sky. I seemd the only part of Time stood still, And saw the motion of all other things; While her words, syllable by syllable, Like water, drop by drop, upon my ear Fell; and I wishd, yet wishd her not to speak; But she spake on, for I did name no wish, What marvel my Camilla told me all Her maiden dignities of Hope and Love Perchance, she said, returnd. Even then the stars Did tremble in their stations as I gazed; But she spake on, for I did name no wish, No wishno hope. Hope was not wholly dead, But breathing hard at the approach of Death, Camilla, my Camilla, who was mine No longer in the dearest sense of mine For all the secret of her inmost heart, And all the maiden empire of her mind, Lay like a map before me, and I saw There, where I hoped myself to reign as king, There, where that day I crownd myself as king, There in my realm and even on my throne, Another! then it seemd as tho a link Of some tight chain within my inmost frame Was riven in twain: that life I heeded not Flowd from me, and the darkness of the grave, The darkness of the grave and utter night, Did swallow up my vision; at her feet, Even the feet of her I loved, I fell, Smit with exceeding sorrow unto Death. Then had the earth beneath me yawning cloven With such a sound as when an iceberg splits From cope to basehad Heaven from all her doors, With all her golden thresholds clashing, rolld Her heaviest thunderI had lain as dead, Mute, blind and motionless as then I lay; Dead, for henceforth there was no life for me! Mute, for henceforth what use were words to me! Blind, for the day was as the night to me! The night to me was kinder than the day; The night in pity took away my day, Because my grief as yet was newly born Of eyes too weak to look upon the light; And thro the hasty notice of the ear Frail Life was startled from the tender love Of him she brooded over. Would I had lain Until the plaited ivy-tress had wound Round my worn limbs, and the wild brier had driven Its knotted thorns thro my unpaining brows, Leaning its roses on my faded eyes. The wind had blown above me, and the rain Had falln upon me, and the gilded snake Had nestled in this bosom-throne of Love, But I had been at rest for evermore. Longtime entrancement held me. All too soon Life (like a wanton too-officious friend, Who will not hear denial, vain and rude With proffer of unwished-for services) Entering all the avenues of sense Past thro into his citadel, the brain, With hated warmth of apprehensiveness. And first the chillness of the sprinkled brook Smote on my brows, and then I seemd to hear Its murmur, as the drowning seaman hears, Who with his head below the surface dropt Listens the muffled booming indistinct Of the confused floods, and dimly knows His head shall rise no more: and then came in The white light of the weary moon above, Diffused and molten into flaky cloud. Was my sight drunk that it did shape to me Him who should own that name? Were it not well If so be that the echo of that name Ringing within the fancy had updrawn A fashion and a phantasm of the form It should attach to? Phantom!had the ghastliest That ever lusted for a body, sucking The foul steam of the grave to thicken by it, There in the shuddering moonlight brought its face And what it has for eyes as close to mine As he didbetter that than his, than he The friend, the neighbour, Lionel, the beloved, The loved, the lover, the happy Lionel, The low-voiced, tender-spirited Lionel, All joy, to whom my agony was a joy. O how her choice did leap forth from his eyes! O how her love did clothe itself in smiles About his lips! andnot one moments grace Then when the effect weighd seas upon my head To come my way! to twit me with the cause! Was not the land as free thro all her ways To him as me? Was not his wont to walk Between the going light and growing night? Had I not learnt my loss before he came? Could that be more because he came my way? Why should he not come my way if he would? And yet to-night, to-nightwhen all my wealth Flashd from me in a moment and I fell Beggard for everwhy should he come my way Robed in those robes of light I must not wear, With that great crown of beams about his brows Come like an angel to a damned soul, To tell him of the bliss he had with God Come like a careless and a greedy heir That scarce can wait the reading of the will Before he takes possession? Was mine a mood To be invaded rudely, and not rather A sacred, secret, unapproached woe, Unspeakable? I was shut up with Grief; She took the body of my past delight, Narded and swathed and balmd it for herself, And laid it in a sepulchre of rock Never to rise again. I was led mute Into her temple like a sacrifice; I was the High Priest in her holiest place, Not to be loudly broken in upon. Oh friend, thoughts deep and heavy as these well-nigh Oerbore the limits of my brain: but he Bent oer me, and my neck his arm up-stayd I thought it was an adders fold, and once I strove to disengage myself, but faild, Being so feeble: she bent above me, too; Wan was her cheek; for whatsoeer of blight Lives in the dewy touch of pity had made The red rose there a pale oneand her eyes I saw the moonlight glitter on their tears And some few drops of that distressful rain Fell on my face, and her long ringlets moved, Drooping and beaten by the breeze, and brushd My fallen forehead in their to and fro, For in the sudden anguish of her heart Loosed from their simple thrall they had flowd abroad, And floated on and parted round her neck, Mantling her form halfway. She, when I woke, Something she askd, I know not what, and askd, Unanswerd, since I spoke not; for the sound Of that dear voice so musically low, And now first heard with any sense of pain, As it had taken life away before, Choked all the syllables, that strove to rise From my full heart. The blissful lover, too, From his great hoard of happiness distilld Some drops of solace; like a vain rich man, That, having always prosperd in the world, Folding his hands, deals comfortable words To hearts wounded for ever; yet, in truth, Fair speech was his and delicate of phrase, Falling in whispers on the sense, addressd More to the inward than the outward ear, As rain of the midsummer midnight soft, Scarce-heard, recalling fragrance and the green Of the dead spring: but mine was wholly dead, No bud, no leaf, no flower, no fruit for me. Yet who had done, or who had sufferd wrong? And why was I to darken their pure love, If, as I found, they two did love each other, Because my own was darkend? Why was I To cross between their happy star and them? To stand a shadow by their shining doors, And vex them with my darkness? Did I love her? Ye know that I did love her; to this present My full-orbd love has waned not. Did I love her, And could I look upon her tearful eyes What had she done to weep? Why should she weep? O innocent of spiritlet my heart Break ratherwhom the gentlest airs of Heaven Should kiss with an unwonted gentleness. Her love did murder mine? What then? She deemd I wore a brothers mind: she calld me brother: She told me all her love: she shall not weep. The brightness of a burning thought, awhile In battle with the glooms of my dark will, Moonlike emerged, and to itself lit up There on the depth of an unfathomd woe Reflex of action. Starting up at once, As from a dismal dream of my own death, I, for I loved her, lost my love in Love; I, for I loved her, graspt the hand she lovd, And laid it in her own, and sent my cry Thro the blank night to Him who loving made The happy and the unhappy love, that He Would hold the hand of blessing over them, Lionel, the happy, and her, and her, his bride! Let them so love that men and boys may say, Lo! how they love each other! till their love Shall ripen to a proverb, unto all Known, when their faces are forgot in the land One golden dream of love, from which may death Awake them with heavens music in a life More living to some happier happiness, Swallowing its precedent in victory. And as for me, Camilla, as for me, The dew of tears is an unwholesome dew, They will but sicken the sick plant the more. Deem that I love thee but as brothers do, So shalt thou love me still as sisters do; Or if thou dream aught farther, dream but how I could have loved thee, had there been none else To love as lovers, loved again by thee. Or this, or somewhat like to this, I spake, When I beheld her weep so ruefully; For sure my love should neer indue the front And mask of Hate, who lives on others moans. Shall Love pledge Hatred in her bitter draughts, And batten on her poisons? Love forbid Love passeth not the threshold of cold Hate, And hate is strange beneath the roof of Love. O Love, if thou best Love, dry up these tears Shed for the love of Love; for tho mine image, The subject of thy power, be cold in her, Yet, like cold snow, it melteth in the source Of these sad tears, and feeds their downward flow. So Love, arraignd to judgment and to death, Received unto himself a part of blame, Being guiltless, as an innocent prisoner, Who, when the woful sentence hath been past, And all the clearness of his fame hath gone Beneath the shadow of the curse of man, First falls asleep in swoon, wherefrom awaked, And looking round upon his tearful friends, Forthwith and in his agony conceives A shameful sense as of a cleaving crime For whence without some guilt should such grief be? So died that hour, and fell into the abysm Of forms outworn, but not to me outworn, Who never haild anotherwas there one? There might be oneone other, worth the life That made it sensible. So that hour died Like odour rapt into the winged wind Borne into alien lands and far away. There be some hearts so airily built, that they, Theywhen their love is wreckdif Love can wreck On that sharp ridge of utmost doom ride highly Above the perilous seas of Change and Chance; Nay, more, hold out the lights of cheerfulness; As the tall ship, that many a dreary year Knit to some dismal sandbank far at sea, All thro the livelong hours of utter dark, Showers slanting light upon the dolorous wave. For mewhat light, what gleam on those black ways Where Love could walk with banishd Hope no more? It was ill-done to part you, Sisters fair; Loves arms were wreathd about the neck of Hope, And Hope kissd Love, and Love drew in her breath In that close kiss, and drank her whisperd tales. They said that Love would die when Hope was gone, And Love mournd long, and sorrowd after Hope; At last she sought out Memory, and they trod The same old paths where Love had walkd with Hope, And Memory fed the soul of Love with tears. II. From that time forth I would not see her more; But many weary moons I lived alone Alone, and in the heart of the great forest. Sometimes upon the hills beside the sea All day I watchd the floating isles of shade, And sometimes on the shore, upon the sands Insensibly I drew her name, until The meaning of the letters shot into My brain; anon the wanton billow washd Them over, till they faded like my love. The hollow caverns heard methe black brooks Of the midforest heard methe soft winds, Laden with thistledown and seeds of flowers, Paused in their course to hear me, for my voice Was all of thee: the merry linnet knew me, The squirrel knew me. and the dragonfly Shot by me like a flash of purple fire. The rough brier tore my bleeding palms; the hemlock, Brow-high, did strike my forehead as I past; Yet trod I not the wildflower in my path, Nor bruised the wildbirds egg. Was this the end? Why grew we then together in one plot? Why fed we from one fountain? drew one sun? Why were our mothers branches of one stem? Why were we one in all things, save in that Where to have been one had been the cope and crown Of all I hoped and feard?if that same nearness Were father to this distance, and that one Vauntcourier to this double? if Affection Living slew Love, and Sympathy hewd out The bosom-sepulchre of Sympathy? Chiefly I sought the cavern and the hill Where last we roamd together, for the sound Of the loud stream was pleasant, and the wind Came wooingly with woodbine smells. Sometimes All day I sat within the cavern-mouth, Fixing my eyes on those three cypress-cones That spired above the wood; and with mad hand Tearing the bright leaves of the ivy-screen, I cast them in the noisy brook beneath, And watchd them till they vanishd from my sight Beneath the bower of wreathed eglantines: And all the fragments of the living rock (Huge blocks, which some old trembling of the world I lad loosend from the mountain, till they fell Half-digging their own graves) these in my agony Did I make bare of all the golden moss, Wherewith the dashing runnel in the spring Had liveried them all over. In my brain The spirit seemd to flag from thought to thought, As moonlight wandering thro a mist: my blood Crept like marsh drains thro all my languid limbs; The motions of my heart seemd far within me, Unfrequent, low, as tho it told its pulses; And yet it shook me, that my frame would shudder, As if twere drawn asunder by the rack. But over the deep graves of Hope and Fear, And all the broken palaces of the Past, Brooded one master-passion evermore, Like to a low-hung and a fiery sky Above some fair metropolis, earth-shockd, Hung round with ragged rims and burning folds, Embathing all with wild and woful hues, Great hills of ruins, and collapsed masses Of thundershaken columns indistinct, And fused together in the tyrannous light Ruins, the ruin of all my life and me! Sometimes I thought Camilla was no more, Some one had told me she was dead, and askd If I would see her burial: then I seemd To rise, and through the forest-shadow borne With more than mortal swiftness, I ran down The steepy sea-bank, till I came upon The rear of a procession, curving round The silver-sheeted bay: in front of which Six stately virgins, all in white, upbare A broad earth-sweeping pall of whitest lawn, Wreathed round the bier with garlands: in the distance, From out the yellow woods upon the hill Lookd forth the summit and the pinnacles Of a gray steeplethence at intervals A low bell tolling. All the pageantry, Save those six virgins which upheld the bier, Were stoled from head to foot in flowing black; One walkd abreast with me, and veild his brow, And he was loud in weeping and in praise Of her, we followd: a strong sympathy Shook all my soul: I flung myself upon him In tears and cries: I told him all my love, How I had loved her from the first; whereat He shrank and howld, and from his brow drew back His hand to push me from him; and the face, The very face and form of Lionel Flashd thro my eyes into my innermost brain, And at his feet I seemd to faint and fall, To fall and die away. I could not rise Albeit I strove to follow. They past on, The lordly Phantasms! in their floating folds They past and were no more: but I had fallen Prone by the dashing runnel on the grass. Alway the inaudible invisible thought, Artificer and subject, lord and slave, Shaped by the audible and visible, Moulded the audible and visible; All crisped sounds of wave and leaf and wind, Flatterd the fancy of my fading brain; The cloud-paviliond element, the wood, The mountain, the three cypresses, the cave, Storm, sunset, glows and glories of the moon Below black firs, when silent-creeping winds Laid the long night in silver streaks and bars, Were wrought into the tissue of my dream: The moanings in the forest, the loud brook, Cries of the partridge like a rusty key Turnd in a lock, owl-whoop and dor-hawk-whirr Awoke me not, but were a part of sleep, And voices in the distance calling to me And in my vision bidding me dream on, Like sounds without the twilight realm of dreams, Which wander round the bases of the hills, And murmur at the low-dropt eaves of sleep, Half-entering the portals. Oftentimes The vision had fair prelude, in the end Opening on darkness, stately vestibules To caves and shows of Death: whether the mind, With some revengeeven to itself unknown, Made strange division of its suffering With her, whom to have suffering viewd had been Extremest pain; or that the clear-eyed Spirit, Being blunted in the Present, grew at length Prophetical and prescient of whateer The Future had in store: or that which most Enchains belief, the sorrow of my spirit Was of so wide a compass it took in All I had loved, and my dull agony, Ideally to her transferrd, became Anguish intolerable. The day waned; Alone I sat with her: about my brow Her warm breath floated in the utterance Of silver-chorded tones: her lips were sunderd With smiles of tranquil bliss, which broke in light Like morning from her eyesher eloquent eyes, (As I have seen them many a hundred times) Filld all with pure clear fire, thro mine down raind Their spirit-searching splendours. As a vision Unto a haggard prisoner, iron-stayd In damp and dismal dungeons underground, Confined on points of faith, when strength is shockd With torment, and expectancy of worse Upon the morrow, thro the ragged walls, All unawares before his half-shut eyes, Comes in upon him in the dead of night, And with the excess of sweetness and of awe, Makes the heart tremble, and the sight run over Upon his steely gyves; so those fair eyes Shone on my darkness, forms which ever stood Within the magic cirque of memory, Invisible but deathless, waiting still The edict of the will to reassume The semblance of those rare realities Of which they were the mirrors. Now the light Which was their life, burst through the cloud of thought Keen, irrepressible. It was a room Within the summer-house of which I spake, Hung round with paintings of the sea, and one A vessel in mid-ocean, her heaved prow Clambering, the mast bent and the ravin wind In her sail roaring. From the outer day, Betwixt the close-set ivies came a broad And solid beam of isolated light, Crowded with driving atomies, and fell Slanting upon that picture, from prime youth Well-known well-loved. She drew it long ago Forthgazing on the waste and open sea, One morning when the upblown billow ran Shoreward beneath red clouds, and I had pourd Into the shadowing pencils naked forms Colour and life: it was a bond and seal Of friendship, spoken of with tearful smiles; A monument of childhood and of love; The poesy of childhood; my lost love Symbold in storm. We gazed on it together In mute and glad remembrance, and each heart Grew closer to the other, and the eye Was riveted and charm-bound, gazing like The Indian on a still-eyed snake, low-couchd A beauty which is death; when all at once That painted vessel, as with inner life, Began to heave upon that painted sea; An earthquake, my loud heart-beats, made the ground Reel under us, and all at once, soul, life And breath and motion, past and flowd away To those unreal billows: round and round A whirlwind caught and bore us; mighty gyres Rapid and vast, of hissing spray wind-driven Far thro the dizzy dark. Aloud she shriekd; My heart was cloven with pain; I wound my arms About her: we whirld giddily; the wind Sung; but I claspd her without fear: her weight Shrank in my grasp, and over my dim eyes, And parted lips which drank her breath, down-hung The jaws of Death: I, groaning, from me flung Her to empty phantom: all the sway and whirl Of the storm dropt to windless calm, and I Down welterd thro the dark ever and ever. III. I came one day and sat among the stones Strewn in the entry of the moaning cave; A morning air, sweet after rain, ran over The rippling levels of the lake, and blew Coolness and moisture and all smells of bud And foliage from the dark and dripping woods Upon my feverd brows that shook and throbbd From temple unto temple. To what height The day had grown I know not. Then came on me The hollow tolling of the bell, and all The vision of the bier. As heretofore I walkd behind with one who veild his brow. Methought by slow degrees the sullen bell Tolld quicker, and the breakers on the shore Sloped into louder surf: those that went with me, And those that held the bier before my face, Moved with one spirit round about the bay, Trod swifter steps; and while I walkd with these In marvel at that gradual change, I thought Four bells instead of one began to ring, Four merry bells, four merry marriage-bells, In clanging cadence jangling peal on peal A long loud clash of rapid marriage-bells. Then those who led the van, and those in rear, Rushd into dance, and like wild Bacchanals Fled onward to the steeple in the woods: I, too, was borne along and felt the blast Beat on my heated eyelids: all at once The front rank made a sudden halt; the bells Lapsed into frightful stillness; the surge fell From thunder into whispers; those six maids With shrieks and ringing laughter on the sand Threw down the bier; the woods upon the hill Waved with a sudden gust that sweeping down Took the edges of the pall, and blew it far Until it hung, a little silver cloud Over the sounding seas: I turnd: my heart Shrunk in me, like a snowflake in the hand, Waiting to see the settled countenance Of her I loved, adornd with fading flowers. But she from out her death-like chrysalis, She from her bier, as into fresher life, My sister, and my cousin, and my love, Leapt lightly clad in bridal whiteher hair Studded with one rich Provence rosea light Of smiling welcome round her lipsher eyes And cheeks as bright as when she climbd the hill. One hand she reachd to those that came behind, And while I mused nor yet endured to take So rich a prize, the man who stood with me Stept gaily forward, throwing down his robes, And claspt her hand in his: again the bells Jangled and clangd: again the stormy surf Crashd in the shingle: and the whirling rout Led by those two rushd into dance, and fled Wind-footed to the steeple in the woods, Till they were swallowd in the leafy bowers, And I stood sole beside the vacant bier. There, there, my latest visionthen the event! IV. THE GOLDEN SUPPER.1 (Another speaks.) He flies the event: he leaves the event to me: Poor Julianhow he rushd away; the bells, Those marriage-bells, echoing in ear and heart But cast a parting glance at me, you saw, As who should say Continue. Well he had One golden hourof triumph shall I say! Solace at leastbefore he left his home. Would you had seen him in that hour of his! He moved thro all of it majestically Restraind himself quite to the closebut now Whether they were his ladys marriage-bells, Or prophets of them in his fantasy, I never askd: but Lionel and the girl Were wedded, and our Julian came again Back to his mothers house among the pines. But these, their gloom, the mountains and the Bay, The whole land weighd him down as tna does The Giant of Mythology: he would go, Would leave the land for ever, and had gone Surely, but for a whisper, Go not yet, Some warningsent divinelyas it seemd By that which followdbut of this I deem As of the visions that he toldthe event Glanced back upon them in his after life, And partly made themtho he knew it not. And thus he stayd and would not look at her No not for months: but, when the eleventh moon After their marriage lit the lovers Bay, Heard yet once more the tolling bell, and said, Would you could toll me out of life, but found All softly as his mother broke it to him A crueller reason than a crazy ear, For that low knell tolling his lady dead Deadand had lain three days without a pulse: All that lookd on her had pronounced her dead. And so they bore her (for in Julians land They never nail a dumb head up in elm), Bore her free-faced to the free airs of heaven, And laid her in the vault of her own kin. What did he then? not die: he is here and hale Not plunge headforemost from the mountain there, And leave the name of Lovers Leap not he: He knew the meaning of the whisper now, Thought that he knew it. This, I stayd for this; O love, I have not seen you for so long. Now, now, will I go down into the grave, I will be all alone with all I love, And kiss her on the lips. She is his no more: The dead returns to me, and I go down To kiss the dead. The fancy stirrd him so He rose and went, and entering the dim vault, And, making there a sudden light, beheld All round about him that which all will be. The light was but a flash, and went again. Then at the far end of the vault he saw His lady with the moonlight on her face; Her breast as in a shadow-prison, bars Of black and bands of silver, which the moon Struck from an open grating overhead High in the wall, and all the rest of her Drownd in the gloom and horror of the vault. It was my wish, he said, to pass, to sleep, To rest, to be with hertill the great day Peald on us with that music which rights all, And raised us hand in hand. And kneeling there Down in the dreadful dust that once was man, Dust, as he said, that once was loving hearts, Hearts that had beat with such a love as mine Not such as mine, no, nor for such as her He softly put his arm about her neck And kissd her more than once, till helpless death And silence made him boldnay, but I wrong him, He reverenced his dear lady even in death; But, placing his true hand upon her heart, O, you warm heart, he moand, not even death Can chill you all at once: then starting, thought His dreams had come again. Do I wake or sleep? Or am I made immortal, or my love Mortal once more? It beatthe heartit beat: Faintbut it beat: at which his own began To pulse with such a vehemence that it drownd The feebler motion underneath his hand. But when at last his doubts were satisfied, He raised her softly from the sepulchre, And, wrapping her all over with the cloak He came in, and now striding fast, and now Sitting awhile to rest, but evermore Holding his golden burthen in his arms, So bore her thro the solitary land Back to the mothers house where she was born. There the good mothers kindly ministering, With half a nights appliances, recalld Her fluttering life: she raisd an eye that askd Where? till the things familiar to her youth Had made a silent answer: then she spoke Here! and how came I here? and learning it (They told her somewhat rashly as I think) At once began to wander and to wail, Ay, but you know that you must give me back: Send! bid him come; but Lionel was away Stung by his loss had vanishd, none knew where. He casts me out, she wept, and goesa wail That seeming something, yet was nothing, born Not from believing mind, but shatterd nerve, Yet haunting Julian, as her own reproof At some precipitance in her burial. Then, when her own true spirit had returnd, Oh yes, and you, she said, and none but you? For you have given me life and love again, And none but you yourself shall tell him of it, And you shall give me back when he returns. Stay then a little, answerd Julian, here, And keep yourself, none knowing, to yourself; And I will do your will. I may not stay, No, not an hour; but send me notice of him When he returns, and then will I return, And I will make a solemn offering of you To him you love. And faintly she replied, And I will do your will, and none shall know. Not know? with such a secret to be known. But all their house was old and loved them both, And all the house had known the loves of both; Had died almost to serve them any way, And all the land was waste and solitary: And then he rode away; but after this, An hour or two, Camillas travail came Upon her, and that day a boy was born, Heir of his face and land, to Lionel. And thus our lonely lover rode away, And pausing at a hostel in a marsh, There fever seized upon him: myself was then Travelling that land, and meant to rest an hour; And sitting down to such a base repast, It makes me angry yet to speak of it I heard a groaning overhead, and climbd The moulderd stairs (for everything was vile) And in a loft, with none to wait on him, Found, as it seemd, a skeleton alone, Raving of dead mens dust and beating hearts. A dismal hostel in a dismal land, A flat malarian world of reed and rush But there from fever and my care of him Sprang up a friendship that may help us yet. For while we roamd along the dreary coast, And waited for her message, piece by piece I learnt the drearier story of his life; And, tho he loved and honourd Lionel, Found that the sudden wail his lady made Dwelt in his fancy: did he know her worth, Her beauty even? should he not be taught, Evn by the price that others set upon it, The value of that jewel he had to guard? Suddenly came her notice and we past, I with our lover to his native Bay. This love is of the brain, the mind, the soul: That makes the sequel pure; tho some of us Beginning at the sequel know no more. Not such am I: and yet I say the bird That will not hear my call, however sweet, But if my neighbour whistle answers him What matter? there are others in the wood. Yet when I saw her (and I thought him crazed, Tho not with such a craziness as needs A cell and keeper), those dark eyes of hers Oh! such dark eyes! and not her eyes alone, But all from these to where she touchd on earth, For such a craziness as Julians lookd No less than one divine apology. So sweetly and so modestly she came To greet us, her young hero in her arms! Kiss him, she said. You gave me life again. He, but for you, had never seen it once. His other father you! Kiss him, and then Forgive him, if his name be Julian too. Talk of lost hopes and broken heart! his own Sent such a flame into his face, I knew Some sudden vivid pleasure hit him there But he was all the more resolved to go, And sent at once to Lionel, praying him By that great love they both had borne the dead, To come and revel for one hour with him Before he left the land for evermore; And then to friendsthey were not manywho lived Scatteringly about that lonely land of his, And bad them to a banquet of farewells. And Julian made a solemn feast: I never Sat at a costlier; for all round his hall From column on to column, as in a wood, Not such as herean equatorial one, Great garlands swung and blossomd; and beneath, Heirlooms, and ancient miracles of Art, Chalice and salver, wines that, Heaven knows when, Had suckd the fire of some forgotten sun, And kept it thro a hundred years of gloom, Yet glowing in a heart of rubycups Where nymph and god ran ever round in gold Others of glass as costlysome with gems Moveable and resettable at will, And trebling all the rest in valueAh heavens! Why need I tell you all?suffice to say That whatsoever such a house as his, And his was old, has in it rare or fair Was brought before the guest: and they, the guests, Wonderd at some strange light in Julians eyes (I told you that he had his golden hour), And such a feast, ill-suited as it seemd To such a time, to Lionels loss and his And that resolved self-exile from a land He never would revisit, such a feast So rich, so strange, and stranger evn than rich, But rich as for the nuptials of a king. And stranger yet, at one end of the hall Two great funereal curtains, looping down, Parted a little ere they met the floor, About a picture of his lady, taken Some years before, and falling hid the frame. And just above the parting was a lamp: So the sweet figure folded round with night Seemd stepping out of darkness with a smile. Well thenour solemn feastwe ate and drank, And mightthe wines being of such nobleness Have jested also, but for Julians eyes, And something weird and wild about it all: What was it? for our lover seldom spoke, Scarce touchd the meats; but ever and anon A priceless goblet with a priceless wine Arising, showd he drank beyond his use; And when the feast was near an end, he said: There is a custom in the Orient, friends I read of it in Persiawhen a man Will honour those who feast with him, he brings And shows them whatsoever he accounts Of all his treasures the most beautiful, Gold, jewels, arms, whatever it may be. This custom Pausing here a moment, all The guests broke in upon him with meeting hands And cries about the banquetBeautiful! Who could desire more beauty at a feast? The lover answerd, There is more than one Here sitting who desires it. Laud me not Before my time, but hear me to the close. This custom steps yet further when the guest Is loved and honourd to the uttermost. For after he hath shown him gems or gold, He brings and sets before him in rich guise That which is thrice as beautiful as these, The beauty that is dearest to his heart O my hearts lord, would I could show you, he says, Evn my heart too. And I propose to-night To show you what is clearest to my heart, And my heart too. But solve me first a doubt. I knew a man, nor many years ago; He had a faithful servant, one who loved His master more than all on earth beside. He falling sick, and seeming close on death, His master would not wait until he died, But bad his menials bear him from the door, And leave him in the public way to die. I knew another, not so long ago, Who found the dying servant, took him home, And fed, and cherishd him, and saved his life. I ask you now, should this first master claim His service, whom does it belong to? him Who thrust him out, or him who saved his life? This question, so flung clown before the guests, And balanced either way by each, at length When some were doubtful how the law would hold, Was handed over by consent of all To one who had not spoken, Lionel. Fair speech was his, and delicate of phrase. And he beginning languidlyhis loss Weighd on him yetbut warming as he went, Glanced at the point of law, to pass it by, Affirming that as long as either lived, By all the laws of love and gratefulness, The service of the one so saved was due All to the saveradding, with a smile, The first for many weeksa semi-smile As at a strong conclusionbody and soul And life and limbs, all his to work his will. Then Julian made a secret sign to me To bring Camilla down before them all. And crossing her own picture as she came, And looking as much lovelier as herself Is lovelier than all otherson her head A diamond circlet, and from under this A veil, that seemed no more than gilded air, Flying by each fine ear, an Eastern gauze With seeds of goldso, with that grace of hers, Slow-moving as a wave against the wind, That flings a mist behind it in the sun And hearing high in arms the mighty babe, The younger Julian, who himself was crownd With roses, none so rosy as himself And over all her babe and her the jewels Of many generations of his house Sparkled and flashd, for he had decked them out As for a solemn sacrifice of love So she came in:I am long in telling it, I never yet beheld a thing so strange, Sad, sweet, and strange togetherfloated in While all the guests in mute amazement rose And slowly pacing to the middle hall, Before the board, there paused and stood, her breast Hard-heaving, and her eyes upon her feet, Not daring yet to glance at Lionel. But him she carried, him nor lights nor feast Dazed or amazed, nor eyes of men; who cared Only to use his own, and staring wide And hungering for the gilt and jewelld world About him, lookd, as he is like to prove, When Julian goes, the lord of all he saw. My guests, said Julian: you are honourd now Evn to the uttermost: in her behold Of all my treasures the most beautiful, Of all things upon earth the dearest to me. Then waving us a sign to seat ourselves, Led his dear lady to a chair of state. And I, by Lionel sitting, saw his face Fire, and dead ashes and all fire again Thrice in a second, felt him tremble too, And heard him muttering, So like, so like; She never had a sister. I knew none. Some cousin of his and hersO God, so like! And then he suddenly askd her if she were. She shook, and cast her eyes down, and was dmnb. And then some other questiond if she came From foreign lands, and still she did not speak. Another, if the boy were hers: but she To all their queries answerd not a word, Which made the amazement more, till one of them Said, shuddering, Her spectre! But his friend Replied, in half a whisper, Not at least The spectre that will speak if spoken to. Terrible pity, if one so beautiful Prove, as I almost dread to find her, dumb! But Julian, sitting by her, answerd all: She is but dumb, because in her you see That faithful servant whom we spoke about, Obedient to her second master now; Which will not last. I have here to-night a guest So bound to me by common love and loss What I shall I bind him more? in his behalf, Shall I exceed the Persian, giving him That which of all things is the dearest to me, Not only showing? and he himself pronounced That my rich gift is wholly mine to give. Now all be dumb, and promise all of you Not to break in on what I say by word Or whisper, while I show you all my heart. And then began the story of his love As here to-day, but not so wordily The passionate moment would not suffer that Past thro his visions to the burial; thence Down to this last strange hour in his own hall; And then rose up, and with him all his guests Once more as by enchantment; all but he, Lionel, who fain had risen, but fell again, And sat as if in chainsto whom he said: Take my free gift, my cousin, for your wife; And were it only for the givers sake, And tho she seem so like the one you lost, Yet cast her not away so suddenly, Lest there be none left here to bring her back: I leave this land for ever. Here he ceased. Then taking his dear lady by one hand, And bearing on one arm the noble babe, He slowly brought them both to Lionel. And there the widower husband and dead wife Rushd each at each with a cry, that rather seemd For some new death than for a life renewd; Whereat the very babe began to wail; At once they turnd, and caught and brought him in To their charmd circle, and, half killing him With kisses, round him closed and claspt again. But Lionel, when at last he freed himself From wife and child, and lifted up a face All over glowing with the sun of life, And love, and boundless thanksthe sight of this So frighted our good friend, that turning to me And saying, It is over: let us go There were our horses ready at the doors We bad them no farewell, but mounting these He past for ever from his native land; And I with him, my Julian, back to mine.