Part 8

She took a gift into her hand, As one that had a boon to crave; She stole across the ruined land Where lay the dead without a grave, And to Achilles’ hand she gave Her gift, the secret postern’s key. “To-morrow let me be thy slave!” Moaned to her love Pisidicê.

Ere dawn the Argives’ clarion call Rang down Methymna’s burning street; They slew the sleeping warriors all, They drove the women to the fleet, Save one, that to Achilles’ feet Clung, but, in sudden wrath, cried he: “For her no doom but death is meet,” And there men stoned Pisidicê.

In havens of that haunted coast, Amid the myrtles of the shore, The moon sees many a maiden ghost Love’s outcast now and evermore. The silence hears the shades deplore Their hour of dear-bought love; but thee The waves lull, ’neath thine olives hoar, To dreamless rest, Pisidicê!

FROM THE EAST TO THE WEST.

RETURNING from what other seas Dost thou renew thy murmuring, Weak Tide, and hast thou aught of these To tell, the shores where float and cling My love, my hope, my memories?

Say does my lady wake to note The gold light into silver die? Or do thy waves make lullaby, While dreams of hers, like angels, float Through star-sown spaces of the sky?

Ah, would such angels came to me That dreams of mine might speak with hers, Nor wake the slumber of the sea With words as low as winds that be Awake among the gossamers!

LOVE THE VAMPIRE.

Ο ΕΡΩΤΑΣ ’Σ ΤΟΝ ΤΑΦΟ.

THE level sands and grey, Stretch leagues and leagues away, Down to the border line of sky and foam, A spark of sunset burns, The grey tide-water turns, Back, like a ghost from her forbidden home!

Here, without pyre or bier, Light Love was buried here, Alas, his grave was wide and deep enough, Thrice, with averted head, We cast dust on the dead, And left him to his rest. An end of Love.

“No stone to roll away, No seal of snow or clay, Only soft dust above his wearied eyes, But though the sudden sound Of Doom should shake the ground, And graves give up their ghosts, he will not rise!”

So each to each we said! Ah, but to either bed Set far apart in lands of North and South, Love as a Vampire came With haggard eyes aflame, And kissed us with the kisses of his mouth!

Thenceforth in dreams must we Each other’s shadow see Wand’ring unsatisfied in empty lands, Still the desirèd face Fleets from the vain embrace, And still the shape evades the longing hands.

BALLADE OF THE BOOK-MAN’S PARADISE.

THERE is a Heaven, or here, or there,— A Heaven there is, for me and you, Where bargains meet for purses spare, Like ours, are not so far and few. Thuanus’ bees go humming through The learned groves, ’neath rainless skies, O’er volumes old and volumes new, Within that Book-man’s Paradise!

There treasures bound for Longepierre Keep brilliant their morocco blue, There Hookes’ Amanda is not rare, Nor early tracts upon Peru! Racine is common as Rotrou, No Shakespeare Quarto search defies, And Caxtons grow as blossoms grew, Within that Book-man’s Paradise!

There’s Eve,—not our first mother fair,— But Clovis Eve, a binder true; Thither does Bauzonnet repair, Derome, Le Gascon, Padeloup! But never come the cropping crew That dock a volume’s honest size, Nor they that “letter” backs askew, Within that Book-man’s Paradise!

ENVOY.

Friend, do not Heber and De Thou, And Scott, and Southey, kind and wise, La chasse au bouquin still pursue Within that Book-man’s Paradise?

BALLADE OF A FRIAR.

(Clement Marot’s Frère Lubin, though translated by Longfellow and others, has not hitherto been rendered into the original measure, of ballade à double refrain.)

SOME ten or twenty times a day, To bustle to the town with speed, To dabble in what dirt he may,— Le Frère Lubin’s the man you need! But any sober life to lead Upon an exemplary plan, Requires a Christian indeed,— Le Frère Lubin is not the man!

Another’s wealth on his to lay, With all the craft of guile and greed, To leave you bare of pence or pay,— Le Frère Lubin’s the man you need! But watch him with the closest heed, And dun him with what force you can,— He’ll not refund, howe’er you plead,— Le Frère Lubin is not the man!

An honest girl to lead astray, With subtle saw and promised meed, Requires no cunning crone and grey,— Le Frère Lubin’s the man you need! He preaches an ascetic creed, But,—try him with the water can— A dog will drink, whate’er his breed,— Le Frère Lubin is not the man!

ENVOY.

In good to fail, in ill succeed, Le Frère Lubin’s the man you need! In honest works to lead the van, Le Frère Lubin is not the man!

BALLADE OF NEGLECTED MERIT. {78}