"Who ever saw such wild barbarians?

"Girls?-more like men!" and at these words the snake,
My secret, seem'd to stir within my breast;
And oh, Sirs, could I help it, but my cheek
Began to burn and burn, and her lynx eye
To fix and make me hotter, till she laugh'd:

"O marvellously modest maiden, you!

Men! girls, like men! why, if they had been men
You need not set your thoughts in rubric thus
For wholesale comment." Pardon, I am asham'd
That I must needs repeat for my excuse
What looks so little graceful: "men" (for still
My mother went revolving on the word)
"And so they are,-very like men indeed—
And with that woman closeted for hours!"
Then came these dreadful words out one by one,
"Why-these-are-men:" I shudder'd: "and you
know it."

"O ask me nothing," I said: "And she knows too,
And she conceals it." So my mother clutch'd
The truth at once, but with no word from me;
And now thus early risen she goes to inform
The Princess: Lady Psyche will be crush'd;
But you may yet be saved, and therefore fly:
But heal me with your pardon ere you go.'

30

35

40

45

"What pardon, sweet Melissa, for a blush?" Said Cyril: "Pale one, blush again: than wear Those lilies, better blush our lives away.

50

Yet let us breathe for one hour more in Heaven"
He added, "lest some classic Angel speak

In scorn of us, "They mounted, Ganymedes,
To tumble, Vulcans, on the second morn.”
But I will melt this marble into wax

To yield us farther furlough :" and he went.

Melissa shook her doubtful curls, and thought He scarce would prosper.

55

"Tell us," Florian ask'd, 60

34. 1847-48. And in their fulsome fashion woo'd you, child,
You need not take so deep a rouge: like men-

And so they are,-very like men indeed-
And closeted with her for hours.

Then came, etc.

Aha!"

"How grew this feud betwixt the right and left.”
"O long ago," she said, "betwixt these two
Division smoulders hidden; 'tis my mother,
Too jealous, often fretful as the wind

Pent in a crevice: much I bear with her:

65

I never knew my father, but she says

(God help her) she was wedded to a fool;

And still she rail'd against the state of things.

She had the care of Lady Ida's youth,

And from the Queen's decease she brought her up.

70

But when your sister came she won the heart
Of Ida: they were still together, grew
(For so they said themselves) inosculated;
Consonant chords that shiver to one note;
One mind in all things: yet my mother still
Affirms your Psyche thieved her theories,
And angled with them for her pupil's love:
She calls her plagiarist; I know not what:
But I must go: I dare not tarry," and light,
As flies the shadow of a bird, she fled.

Then murmur'd Florian gazing after her,
"An open-hearted maiden, true and pure.
If I could love, why this were she: how pretty
Her blushing was, and how she blush'd again,
As if to close with Cyril's random wish :

67. 1847-48. (God pardon her).

71. 1847-48. love.

72. 1847-48. Of the Princess.

75

80

85

74. Cf. Walton's Life of Donne: "It is most certain that two lutes, being both strung and tuned to an equal pitch, and then one being played upon, the other that is not touched being laid upon a table at a fit distance, will, like an echo to a trumpet, warble a faint audible harmony in answer to the same tune. This is frequently referred to in our old writers. Long before Walton, Lyly had noticed it (Sappho and Phaon, IV. iii.): "Such is the lying of two in Wedlock as is the tuning of two lutes in one key, for striking the strings of the one, straws will stir upon the strings of the other." Cf., too, Marvell's Flecknoe, and Owen Feltham's Lusoria, "The Sympathy

Two lutes are strung

And on a table, tun'd alike for song;

Strike one, and that which none did touch
Shall sympathizing sound as much.

75. 1847-48. only Lady Blanche.

77. 1847-48. for the Royal heart.

Not like your Princess cramm'd with erring pride,
Nor like poor Psyche whom she drags in tow."

"The crane," I said, "may chatter of the crane, The dove may murmur of the dove, but I

An eagle clang an eagle to the sphere.
My princess, O my princess! true she errs,
But in her own grand way: being herself

90

Three times more noble than threescore of men,
She sees herself in every woman else,
And so she wears her error like a crown

95

To blind the truth and me: for her, and her,

Hebes are they to hand ambrosia, mix

The nectar; but-ah she-whene'er she moves

The Samian Herè rises and she speaks

A Memnon smitten with the morning Sun."

100

So saying from the court we paced, and gain'd
The terrace ranged along the Northern front,
And leaning there on those balusters, high
Above the empurpled champaign, drank the gale
That blown about the foliage underneath,
And sated with the innumerable rose,
Beat balm upon our eyelids. Hither came
Cyril, and yawning "O hard task," he cried ;
"No fighting shadows here! I forced a way
Thro' solid opposition crabb'd and gnarl'd.
Better to clear prime forests, heave and thump
A league of street in summer solstice down,
Than hammer at this reverend gentle

105

110

man.

I knock'd and, bidden, enter'd; found her there

At point to move, and settled in her eyes
The green malignant light of coming storm.
Sir, I was courteous, every phrase well-oil'd,

115

92. 1847-48. For being, and wise in knowing that she is.

97. 1847-48. They are Hebes meet to hand ambrosia, mix.

100. The allusion is to Pausanias, lib. i. 42, ad med. Cf. Palace of Art, 171, 172, and for further illustrations the note to that passage.

IOI. 1847-48. from out the court.

109, 110. Added in 1851.

114, 115. 1847-48. I knock'd and bidden went in: I found her there

At point to sally, etc.

As man's could be; yet maiden-meek I pray'd
Concealment: she demanded who we were,
And why we came ? I fabled nothing fair,
But, your example pilot, told her all.

Up went the hush'd amaze of hand and eye.
But when I dwelt upon your old affiance,
She answer'd sharply that I talk'd astray.

120

I urged the fierce inscription on the gate,

125

And our three lives. True-we had limed ourselves
With open eyes, and we must take the chance.
But such extremes, I told her, well might harm

The woman's cause. "Not more than now," she said, "So puddled as it is with favouritism.”

130

I tried the mother's heart. Shame might befal
Melissa, knowing, saying not she knew:

Her answer was "Leave me to deal with that.”

I spoke of war to come and many deaths,
And she replied, her duty was to speak,
And duty duty, clear of consequences.
I grew discouraged, Sir; but since I knew
No rock so hard but that a little wave
May beat admission in a thousand years,
I recommenced; "Decide not ere you pause.

135

140

I find you here but in the second place,

Some say the third-the authentic foundress you.

I offer boldly: we will seat you highest :

Wink at our advent: help my prince to gain
His rightful bride, and here I promise you
Some palace in our land, where you shall reign
The head and heart of all our fair she-world,
And your great name flow on with broadening time
For ever.
Well, she balanced this a little,
And told me she would answer us to-day,
Meantime be mute: thus much, nor more I gain'd."

He ceasing, came a message from the Head. "That afternoon the Princess rode to take

118. 1847-48-50. man.

120. 1847-48. I minted nothing false.

126. 1847-48.

she said we had limed ourselves.

146. 1847-48. A palace in our own land.
153. 1847-48. In the afternoon.

145

150

The dip of certain strata to the North.

Would we go with her? we should find the land
Worth seeing; and the river made a fall
Out yonder:" then she pointed on to where
A double hill ran up his furrowy forks
Beyond the thick-leaved platans of the vale.

She stood

Agreed to, this, the day fled on thro' all
Its range of duties to the appointed hour.
Then summon'd to the porch we went.
Among her maidens, higher by the head,
Her back against a pillar, her foot on one
Of those tame leopards. Kittenlike he roll'd
And paw'd about her sandal. I drew near;
I gazed. On a sudden my strange seizure came
Upon me, the weird vision of our house:
The Princess Ida seem'd a hollow show,
Her gay-furr'd cats a painted fantasy,
Her college and her maidens, empty masks,
And I myself the shadow of a dream,
For all things were and were not.

Yet I felt

155

160

165

170

My heart beat thick with passion and with awe;
Then from my breast the involuntary sigh

175

Brake, as she smote me with the light of eyes

That lent my knee desire to kneel, and shook

My pulses, till to horse we got, and so

Went forth in long retinue following up
The river as it narrow'd to the hills.

180

I rode beside her and to me she said:
"O friend, we trust that you esteem'd us not
Too harsh to your companion yestermorn;
Unwillingly we spake.' "No-not to her,"

I answer'd, "but to one of whom we spake

Your Highness might have seem'd the thing you say."

66

Again?" she cried " are you ambassadresses

158. 1847-48-50. "dark-blue" for "furrowy."

185

159. 1847-48-50. full-leaved. Cf. Moschus, Idyll, v.: úxò xλatávw ßabuçúlλw (under the thick-leaved plane).

167-73. Not added till 1851.

175. 1847-48-50. "And" for "Then."

178. 1847-48-50. clomb.