Go find the bottom ! Would you stay me ?

There ! Now pluck a great blade of that ribbon

grass To plait in where the foolish jewel was, I flung away : since you have prais'd my

hair, 'T is proper to be choice in what I wear.

you ?

you !

He speaks, musing Lie back : could thought of mine improve From this shoulder let there spring A wing ; from this, another wing ; Wings, not legs and feet, shall move Snow-white must they spring, to blend With your flesh, but I intend They shall deepen to the end, Broader, into burning gold, Till both wings crescent-wise enfold Your perfect self, from ’neath your feet To o'er your head, where, lo, they meet As if a million sword-blades hurid Defiance from you to the world ! Rescue me thou, the only real ! And scare away this mad ideal That came, nor motions to depart ! Thanks! Now, stay ever as thou art !

He speaks Row home? must we row home? Too surely Know I where its front's demurely Over the Guidecca pil'd ; Window just with window mating, Door on door exactly waiting, All's the set face of a child : But behind it, where 's a trace Of the staidness and reserve, And formal lines without a curve, In the same child's playing-face ? No two windows look one way O'er the small sea-water thread Below them. Ah, the autumn day I, passing, saw you overhead ! First, out a cloud of curtain blew, Then a sweet cry, and last came you To catch your lory that must needs Escape just then, of all times then, To peck a tall plant's fleecy seeds And make me happiest of men. I scarce could breathe to see you reach So far back o'er the balcony, To catch him ere he climb'd too high Above you in the Smyrna peach, That quick the round smooth cord of gold, This coil'd hair on your head, unroll’d, Fell down you like a gorgeous snake The Roman girls were wont, of old, When Rome there was, for coolness' sake

That overfloods my room with sweets, Contrive your

Zorzi somehow meets My Zanze! If the ribbon 's black, The Three are watching : keep away!

we.

Your gondola — let Zorzi wreathe
A mesh of water-weeds about
Its prow, as if he unaware
Had struck some

quay or bridge-foot
stair !
That I may throw a paper out
As you and he go underneath.
There's Zanze's vigilant taper ; safe are
Only one minute more to-night with me?
Resume your past self of a month ago !
Be you the bashful gallant, I will be
The lady with the colder breast than snow.
Now bow you, as becomes, nor touch my

hand More than I touch yours when I step to

land.
“ All thanks, Siora !”

Heart to heart And lips to lips! Yet once more, ere we

part, Clasp me and make me thine, as mine thou

art !

To let lie curling o'er their bosoms.
Dear lory, may his beak retain
Ever its delicate rose stain,
As if the wounded lotus-blossoms
Had mark'd their thief to know again.
Stay longer yet, for others' sake
Than mine! What should your chamber

do ?
With all its rarities that ache
In silence while day lasts, but wake
At night-time and their life renew,
Suspended just to pleasure you
Who brought against their will together
These objects, and, while day lasts, weave
Around them such a magic tether
That dumb they look : your harp, believe,
With all the sensitive tight strings
Which dare not speak, now to itself
Breathes slumberously, as if some elf
Went in and out the chords, — his wings
Make murmur, wheresoe'er they graze,
As an angel may, between the maze
Of midnight palace-pillars, on
And on, to sow God's plagues, have gone
Through guilty glorious Babylon.
And while such murmurs flow, the nymph
Bends o'er the harp-top from her shell
As the dry limpet for the lymph
Come with a tune he knows so well.
And how your statues' hearts must swell!
And how your pictures must descend
To see each other, friend with friend !
Oh, could you take them by surprise,
You 'd find Schidone's eager Duke
Doing the quaintest courtesies
To that prim saint by Haste-thee-Luke !
And, deeper into her rock den,
Bold Castelfranco's Magdalen
You'd find retreated from the ken
Of that rob’d counsel-keeping Ser —
As if the Tizian thinks of her,
And is not, rather, gravely bent
On seeing for himself what toys
Are these his progeny invent,
What litter now the board employs
Whereon he sign'd a document
That got him murder'd! Each enjoys
Its night so well, you cannot break
The sport up : so, indeed must make
More stay with me, for others' sake.

Just say,

She speaks To-morrow, if a harp-string, say, Is used to tie the jasmine back

The year's at the spring,
And day 's at the morn ;
Morning 's at seven ;
The hill-side's dew-pearl'd ;
The lark's on the wing ;
The snail's on the thorn ;
God's in His heaven -
All's right with the world.

“ HOW THEY BROUGHT THE

GOOD NEWS FROM GHENT TO AIX"

[16-] I SPRANG to the stirrap, and Joris, and he ; I gallop'd, Dirck gallop'd, we gallop'd all

three “Good speed !” cried the watch, as the

gate-bolts undrew; "Speed !” echoed the wall to us galloping

through ; Behind shut the postern, the lights sank to

rest, And into the midnight we gallop'd abreast. Not a word to each other ; we kept the

great pace Neck by neck, stride by stride, never

changing our place ; I turn’d in my saddle and made its girths

tight, Then shorten'd each stirrup, and set the

pique right, Rebuckled the cheek-strap, chain'd slacker

the bit, Nor gallop'd less steadily Roland a whit. ’T was moonset at starting ; but while we Lokeren, the cocks crew and twilight

dawn'd clear ; At Boom, a great yellow star came out to

see ; At Düffeld, 't was morning as plain as could And from Mechelm church-steeple we heard

the half chime, So, Joris broke silence with, “ Yet there is

time !"

By Hasselt, Dirck groan'd ; and cried

Joris “ Stay spur! Your Roos gallop'd bravely, the fault's

not in her, We'll remember at Aix" for one heard

the quick wheeze Of her chest, saw the stretch'd neck and

staggering knees, And sunk tail, and horrible heave of the

flank, As down on her haunches she shudder'd

and sank.

So, we were left galloping, Joris and I, Past Looz and past Tongres, no cloud in

the sky; The broad sun above laugh'd a pitiless

laugh, ’Neath our feet broke the brittle bright

stubble like chaff ; Till over by Dalhem a dome-spire sprang

white, And “Gallop,” gasped Joris, “for Aix is in

sight!

drew near

be ;

“How they 'll greet us !” — and all in a

moment his roan Roll'd neck and croup over, lay dead as a

stone ; And there was my Roland bear the

whole weight Of the news which alone could save Aix

from her fate, With his nostrils like pits full of blood to

the brim, And with circles of red for his eye-sockets'

rim.

At Aershot, up leap'd of a sudden the sun, And against him the cattle stood black

every one, To stare thro' the mist at us galloping past, And I saw my stout galloper Roland at

last, With resolute shoulders, each butting away The haze, as some bluff river headland it's

spray : And his low head and crest, just one sharp

ear bent back For my voice, and the other prick'd out

on his track ;

And I — soon managed to find

Weak points in the flower-fence facing, Was forced to put up a blind

And be safe in my corset-lacing.

HOME THOUGHTS FROM

ABROAD

I

No barm! It was not my fault

If you never turn'd your eye's tail up As I shook upon E in alt, Or ran the chromatic scale

up :

For spring bade the sparrows pair,

And the boys and girls gave guesses, And stalls in our street look'd rare

With bulrush and watercresses.

Why did not you pinch a flower

In a pellet of clay and fling it? Why did not I put a power

Of thanks in a look, or sing it? I did look, sharp as a lynx,

(And yet the memory rankles) When models arriv'd, some minx

Tripp'd up stairs, she and her ankles. But I think I gave you as good !

" That foreign fellow, who can know How she pays, in a playful mood,

For his tuning her that piano ?” Could

you say so, and never say, Suppose we join hands and fortunes, And I fetch her from over the way, Her, piano, and long tunes and short

tunes ?”

And after April, when May follows
And the white-throat builds, and all the

swallows ! Hark, where my blossom’d pear-tree in

the hedge Leans to the field and scatters on the clover Blossoms and dewdrops — at the bent

spray's edge That's the wise thrush : he sings each song

twice over Lest you should think he never could re

capture The first fine careless rapture ! And, though the fields look rough with

hoary dew, All will be gay when noontide wakes anew The buttercups, the little children's dower, Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!

A FACE

No, no : you would not be rash,

Nor I rasher and something over ; You ’ve to settle yet Gibson's hash,

And Grisi yet lives in clover. But you

meet the Prince at the Board, I'm queen myself at bals-parés, I've married a rich old lord,

And you 're dubb'd knight and an R. A. Each life's unfulfill’d, you see ;

It hangs still, patchy and scrappy : We have not sigh'd deep, laugh'd free,

Starv'd, feasted, despair’d, — been happy; And nobody calls you a dunce,

And people suppose me clever ; This could but have happen'd once,

And we miss'd it, lost it forever.

IF one could have that little head of

hers ! Painted upon a background of pale gold, Such as the Tuscan's early art prefers ! No shade encroaching on the matchless

mould Of those two lips, which should be opening

soft In the pure profile ; not as when she

laughs, For that spoils all : but rather as if aloft Yon hyacinth, she loves so, lean'd its

staff's Burthen of honey-color'd buds to kiss And capture 'twixt the lips apart for this.