In Tyntagel's palace proud.

But then they deck'd a restless ghost
With hot-flush'd cheeks and brilliant eyes,
And quivering lips on which the tide
Of courtly speech abruptly died,
And a glance that over the crowded floor,
The dancers, and the festive host,
Flew ever to the door.

That the knights eyed her in surprise,
And the dames whisper'd scoffingly-
'Her moods, good lack, they pass like
showers!

But yesternight and she would be
As pale and still as wither'd flowers,
And now to-night she laughs and speaks
And has a colour in her cheeks.

Christ keep us from such fantasy!' The air of the December night Steals coldly around the chamber bright, Where those lifeless lovers be. Swinging with it, in the light Shines the ghostlike tapestry. And on the arras wrought you see A stately Huntsman, clad in green, And round him a fresh forest scene. On that clear forest knoll he stays With his pack round him, and delays. He stares and stares, with troubled face, At this huge gleam-lit fireplace, At the bright iron-figur'd door, And those blown rushes on the floor. He gazes down into the room With heated cheeks and flurried air, And to himself he seems to say'What place is this, and who are they? Who is that kneeling Lady fair? And on his pillows that pale Knight Who seems of marble on a tomb? How comes it here, this chamber bright, Through whose mullion'd windows clear The castle court all wet with rain, The drawbridge, and the moat appear, And then the beach, and mark'd with spray The sunken reefs, and far away The unquiet bright Atlantic plain?·

What, has some glamour made me sleep, And sent me with my dogs to sweep, By night, with boisterous bugle peal, Through some old, sea-side, knightly hall, Not in the free greenwood at all? That Knight's asleep, and at her prayer That Lady by the bed doth kneel: Then hush, thou boisterous bugle peal!'The wild boar rustles in his lairThe fierce hounds snuff the tainted air But lord and hounds keep rooted there.

Cheer, cheer thy dogs into the brake, O Hunter! and without a fear Thy golden-tassell'd bugle blow, And through the glades thy pastime take!

For thou wilt rouse no sleepers here. For these thou seest are unmov'd; Cold, cold as those who liv'd and lov'd A thousand. years ago.

III

ISEULT OF BRITTANY

A YEAR had flown, and o'er the sea away, In Cornwall, Tristram and Queen Iseult lay;

In King Marc's chapel, in Tyntagel old: There in a ship they bore those lovers cold. The young surviving Iseult, one bright day, Had wander'd forth: her children were at play

In a green circular hollow in the heath Which borders the sea-shore; a country path

Creeps over it from the till'd fields behind. The hollow's grassy banks are soft inclin'd, And to one standing on them, far and near The lone unbroken view spreads bright and clear

Over the waste:- - This cirque of open ground

Is light and green; the heather, which all round

Creeps thickly, grows not here; but the pale grass

Is strewn with rocks, and many a shiver'd

mass

Of vein'd white-gleaming quartz, and here and there

Dotted with holly trees and juniper.

In the smooth centre of the opening stood Three hollies side by side, and made a

screen

Warm with the winter sun, of burnish'd green,

With scarlet berries gemm'd, the fell-fare's food.

Under the glittering hollies Iseult stands Watching her children play their little hands

Are busy gathering spars of quartz, and

streams

Of stagshorn for their hats anon, with

screams

Of mad delight they drop their spoils, and bound

Among the holly clumps and broken ground,

Racing full speed, and startling in their rush

The fell-fares and the speckled misselthrush

Out of their glossy coverts: but when now Their cheeks were flush'd, and over each

hot brow

Under the feather'd hats of the sweet pair In blinding masses shower'd the golden hair

Bore up from where the bright Atlantic gleams,

Swooping to landward; nor to where, quite clear,

The fell-fares settled on the thickets near. And they would still have listen'd, till dark night

Came keen and chill down on the heather bright;

But, when the red glow on the sea grew cold,

And the grey turrets of the castle old Look'd sternly through the frosty evening air,

Then Iseult took by the hand those children fair,

And brought her tale to an end, and found the path

And led them home over the darkening heath.

And is she happy? Does she see unmov'd

The days in which she might have liv'd and lov'd

Slip without bringing bliss slowly away, One after one, to-morrow like to-day? Joy has not found her yet, nor ever will:Is it this thought that makes her mien so still,

Her features so fatigued, her eyes, though

sweet,

So sunk, so rarely lifted save to meet

Along this iron coast, know like a star, And take her broidery frame, and there she'll sit

Hour after hour, her gold curls sweeping it,
Lifting her soft-bent head only to mind
Her children, or to listen to the wind.
And when the clock peals midnight, she
will move

Her work away, and let her fingers rove Across the shaggy brows of Tristram's hound

Who lies, guarding her feet, along the ground:

Or else she will fall musing, her blue eyes Fix'd, her slight hands clasp'd on her lap; then rise,

And at her prie-dieu kneel, until she have told

Her rosary beads of ebony tipp'd with gold, Then to her soft sleep: and to-morrow'll be

To-day's exact repeated effigy.

Yes, it is lonely for her in her hall. The children, and the grey-hair'd seneschal, Her women, and Sir Tristram's aged hound, Are there the sole companions to be found. But these she loves; and noisier life than this

She would find ill to bear, weak as she is: She has her children too, and night and

day

Is with them; and the wide heaths where they play,

The hollies, and the cliff, and the seashore,

The sand, the sea birds, and the distant sails,

These are to her dear as to them: the tales With which this day the children she beguil'd

She glean'd from Breton grandames when a child

In every hut along this sea-coast wild. She herself loves them still, and, when they are told,

Can forget all to hear them, as of old.

Dear saints, it is not sorrow, as I hear, Not suffering, that shuts up eye and ear

To all which has delighted them before, And lets us be what we were once no

more.

No: we may suffer deeply, yet retain Power to be mov'd and sooth'd, for all our pain,

By what of old pleas'd us, and will again. No: 'tis the gradual furnace of the world, In whose hot air our spirits are upcurl'd Until they crumble, or else grow like steel

Which kills in us the bloom, the youth, the spring

Which leaves the fierce necessity to feel, But takes away the power this can avail, By drying up our joy in everything,

To make our former pleasures all seem stale. This, or some tyrannous single thought, some fit

Of passion, which subdues our souls to it, Till for its sake alone we live and moveCall it ambition, or remorse, or loveThis too can change us wholly, and make

seem

All that we did before, shadow and dream.

And yet, I swear, it angers me to see How this fool passion gulls men potently; Being in truth but a diseas'd unrest And an unnatural overheat at best. How they are full of languor and distress Not having it; which when they do pos

sess

They straightway are burnt up with fume and care,

And spend their lives in posting here and there

Where this plague drives them; and have little ease,

Are fretful with themselves, and hard to please,

Like that bold Caesar, the fam'd Roman wight,

Who wept at reading of a Grecian knight Who made a name at younger years than he:

Or that renown'd mirror of chivalry, Prince Alexander, Philip's peerless son, Who carried the great war from Macedon Into the Soudan's realm, and thunder'd on To die at thirty-five in Babylon.

What tale did Iseult to the children say,

Under the hollies, that bright winter's day?

She told them of the fairy-haunted land Away the other side of Brittany,

Beyond the heaths, edg'd by the lonely sea; Of the deep forest-glades of Broce-liande, Through whose green boughs the golden

sunshine creeps,

Where Merlin by the enchanted thorn-tree sleeps.

For here he came with the fay Vivian, One April, when the warm days first began;

He was on foot, and that false fay, his friend,

On her white palfrey: here he met his end,

In these lone sylvan glades, that April day.

This tale of Merlin and the lovely fay Was the one Iseult chose, and she brought clear

Before the children's fancy him and her.

Blowing between the stems the forest air Had loosen'd the brown curls of Vivian's hair,

Which play'd on her flush'd cheek, and her blue eyes

Sparkled with mocking glee and exercise. Her palfrey's flanks were mired and bath'd in sweat,

For they had travell'd far and not stopp'd yet.

A brier in that tangled wilderness

Had scor'd her white right hand, which she allows

To rest unglov'd on her green ridingdress;

The other warded off the drooping boughs. But still she chatted on, with her blue

eyes

Fix'd full on Merlin's face, her stately prize:

Her 'haviour had the morning's fresh clear grace,

The spirit of the woods was in her face; She look'd so witching fair, that learned wight

Forgot his craft, and his best wits took flight,

And he grew fond, and eager to obey
His mistress, use her empire as she may.

They came to where the brushwood ceas'd, and day

Peer'd 'twixt the stems; and the ground broke away

In a slop'd sward down to a brawling brook,

And up as high as where they stood to look

On the brook's further side was clear; but then

The underwood and trees began again. This open glen was studded thick with thorns

Then white with blossom; and you saw the horns,

Through the green fern, of the shy fallowdecr

Which come at noon down to the water here

You saw the bright-eyed squirrels dart along

Under the thorns on the green sward; and strong

The blackbird whistled from the dingles

near,

And the light chipping of the woodpecker Rang lonelily and sharp: the sky was fair, And a fresh breath of spring stirr'd everywhere.

Merlin and Vivian stopp'd on the slope's brow

To gaze on the green sea of leaf and bough

Which glistering lay all round them, lone and mild,

As if to itself the quiet forest smil'd. Upon the brow-top grew a thorn; and here

The grass was dry and moss'd, and you saw clear

Across the hollow: white anemones Starr'd the cool turf, and clumps of prim

With shivering heart the strife we saw
Of Passion with Eternal Law.
And yet with reverential awe
We watch'd the fount of fiery life
Which serv'd for that Titanic strife.

When Goethe's death was told, we said
Sunk, then, is Europe's sagest head.
Physician of the Iron Age
Goethe has done his pilgrimage.
He took the suffering human race,
He read each wound, each weakness clear-
And struck his finger on the place
And said Thou ailest here, and here.
He look'd on Europe's dying hour
Of fitful dream and feverish power;
His eye plung'd down the weltering strife,
The turmoil of expiring life;

He said The end is everywhere:
Art still has truth, take refuge there. -
And he was happy, if to know
Causes of things, and far below
His feet to see the lurid flow
Of terror, and insane distress,
And headlong fate, be happiness.
And Wordsworth! Ah, pale ghosts! re-
joice!

For never has such soothing voice
Been to your shadowy world convey'd,
Since erst, at morn, some wandering shade
Heard the clear song of Orpheus come
Through Hades, and the mournful gloom.
Wordsworth is gone from us — and ye,,
Ah, may ye feel his voice as we.
He too upon a wintry clime

Had fallen on this iron time
Of doubts, disputes, distractions, fears.
He found us when the age had bound
Our souls in its benumbing round:
He spoke, and loos'd our heart in tears.
He laid us as we lay at birth

On the cool flowery lap of earth;
Smiles broke from us and we had ease.
The hills were round us, and the breeze
Went o'er the sun-lit fields again:
Our foreheads felt the wind and rain.
Our youth return'd: for there was shed
On spirits that had long been dead,
Spirits dried up and closely-furl'd,
The freshness of the early world.

Ah, since dark days still bring to light
Man's prudence and man's fiery might,
Time may restore us in his course
Goethe's sage mind and Byron's force:
But where will Europe's latter hour
Again find Wordsworth's healing power?
Others will teach us how to dare,
And against fear our breast to steel;
Others will strengthen us to bear
But who, ah who, will make us feel?
The cloud of mortal destiny,
Others will front it fearlessly-

But who, like him, will put it by?
Keep fresh the grass upon his grave,
O Rotha! with thy living wave.
Sing him thy best! for few or none
Hears thy voice right, now he is gone.

SELF-DEPENDENCE

[1852.]

WEARY of myself, and sick of asking
What I am, and what I ought to be,
At the vessel's prow I stand, which bears

me

Forwards, forwards, o'er the starlit sea.

And a look of passionate desire O'er the sea and to the stars I send: 'Ye who from my childhood up have calm'd me,

Calm me, ah, compose me to the end.

'Ah, once more,' I cried, 'Ye Stars, ye Waters,

On my heart your mighty charm renew:
Still, still, let me, as I gaze upon you,
Feel my soul becoming vast like you.'

From the intense, clear, star-sown vault of heaven,

Over the lit sea's unquiet way,

In the rustling night-air came the answer 'Wouldst thou be as these are? Live as they.

'Unaffrighted by the silence round them, Undistracted by the sights they see, These demand not that the things without them

Yield them love, amusement, sympathy.

And with joy the stars perform their 9 shining

And the sea its long moon-silver'd roll.
For alone they live, nor pine with noting
All the fever of some differing soul.
'Bounded by themselves, and unobservant
In what state God's other works may be,
In their own tasks all their powers pouring,
These attain the mighty life you see.'

O air-born Voice! long since, severely clear,

Repellent as the world: - but see!
A break between the housetops shows
The moon, and, lost behind her, fading

A cry like thine in my own heart I hear. Resolve to be thyself: and know, that he Who finds himself, loses his misery.

A SUMMER NIGHT [1852.]

dim

Into the dewy dark obscurity

Down at the far horizon's rim,

Doth a whole tract of heaven disclose.

IN the deserted moon-blanch'd street
How lonely rings the echo of my feet!
Those windows, which I gaze at, frown,
Silent and white, unopening down,

That night was far more fair;

But the same restless pacings to and fro And the same vainly throbbing heart was there,

And the same bright calm moon.

And the calm moonlight seems to say
Hast thou then still the old unquiet breast
That neither deadens into rest
Nor ever feels the fiery glow

That whirls the spirit from itself away,
But fluctuates to and fro

Never by passion quite possess'd,

And never quite benumb'd by the world's sway?

And I, I know not if to pray

Still to be what I am, or yield, and be
Like all the other men I see.

For most men in a brazen prison live,
Where in the sun's hot eye,

elindustride

rotest a

With heads bent o'er their toil, they languidly

Their lives to some unmeaning taskwork give,

Dreaming of nought beyond their prison wall.

And as, year after year,

Fresh products of their barren labour fall
From their tired hands, and rest
Never yet comes more near,

Gloom settles slowly down over their breast.

And while they try to stem

The waves of mournful thought by which they are prest,

Death in their prison reaches them Unfreed, having seen nothing, still unblest.

And the rest, a few,

Escape their prison, and depart

On the wide Ocean of Life anew.

There the freed prisoner, where'er his heart

oppress