snare

Delay'd it may be for more lives yet, What else should he be set for, with his Through worlds I shall traverse, not a

staff ? few :

What, save to waylay with his lies, enMuch is to learn, much to forget Ere the time be come for taking you. All travellers who might find him posted

there, But the time will come, at last it will, And ask the road ? I guess'd what skullWhen, Evelyn Hope, what meant (I

like laugh shall say)

Would break, what crutch 'gin write my In the lower earth, in the years long still,

epitaph That body and soul so pure and gay? For pastime in the dusty thoroughfare, Why your hair was amber, I shall divine, And your mouth of your own geranium's | If at his counsel I should turn aside red

Into that ominous tract which, all agree, And what you would do with me, in fine, Hides the Dark Tower. Yet acquiescingly In the new life come in the old one's I did turn as he pointed : neither pride stead.

Nor hope rekindling at the end descried,

So much as gladness that some end I have liv'd (I shall say) so much since

might be. then, Given up myself so many times,

For, what with my whole world-wide Gain'd me the gains of various men,

wandering, Ransack'd the ages, spoil'd the climes ; What with my search drawn out thro' Yet one thing, one, in my soul's full scope, years, my hope Either I miss'd or itself miss'd me :

Dwindled into a ghost not fit to cope And I want and find you, Evelyn Hope ! With that obstreperous joy success would What is the issue ? let us see !

bring,

I hardly tried now to rebuke the spring I lov'd you, Evelyn, all the while !

My heart made, finding failure in its My heart seem'd full as it could hold;

scope. There was place and to spare for the frank young smile,

As when a sick man very near to death And the red young mouth, and the hair's Seems dead indeed, and feels begin and young gold.

end So hush, -1 will give you this leaf to The tears and takes the farewell of each keep :

friend, See, I shut it inside the sweet cold And hears one bid the other go, draw breath hand !

Freelier outside, (" since all is o’er,” he There, that is our secret : go to sleep!

saith, You will wake, and remember, and “ And the blow fallen no grieving can understand.

amend ;”)

While some discuss if near the other graves “ CHILDE ROLAND TO THE DARK Be room enough for this, and when a day TOWER CAME"1

Suits best for carrying the corpse away,

With care about the banners, scarves and My first thought was, he lied in every staves, word,

And still the man hears all, and only craves That hoary cripple, with malicious eye He may not shame such tender love and Askance to watch the working of his lie

stay. On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford Suppression of the glee, that purs’d and Thus, I had so long suffer'd, in this quest, scor'd

Heard failure prophesied so oft, been writ Its edge, at one more victim gain'd So many times among “The Band” – to thereby

a

The knights who to the Dark Tower's As for the grass, it grew as scant as hair search address'd

In leprosy; thin dry blades prick'd the Their steps — that just to fail as they,

mud seem'd best.

Which underneath look'd kneaded up And all the doubt was now - should I

with blood.
be fit ?
One stiff blind horse, his every

bone

a-stare, So, quiet as despair, I turn'd from him, Stood stupefied, however he came there :

That hateful cripple, out of his bighway Thrust out past service from the devil's Into the path he pointed. All the day

stud! Had been a dreary one at best, and dim Was settling to its close, yet shot one grim Alive? he might be dead for aught I Red leer to see the plain catch its estray.

know,

With that red, gaunt and collop'd neck For mark ! no sooner was I fairly found I

a-strain, Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two, And shut eyes underneath the rusty Than, pausing to throw backward a last

mane ; view

Seldom went such grotesqueness with such O'er the safe road, 't was gone ; gray plain

woe ; all round :

I never saw a brute I hated so; Nothing but plain to the horizon's bound. He must be wicked to deserve such pain. I might go on; nought else remain’d to do.

I shut my eyes and turn’d them on my So, on I went. I think I never saw

heart. Such starv'd ignoble nature ; nothing As a man calls for wine before he fights, throve :

I ask'd one draught of earlier, happier For flowers as well expect a cedar

sights, grove!

Ere fitly I could hope to play my part. But cockle, spurge, according to their law Think first, fight afterwards the soldier's Might propagate their kind, with none to

art :

One taste of the old time sets all to You'd think ; a burr had been a treasure rights. trove.

Not it! I fancied Cuthbert's reddening No! penury, inertness and grimace,

face In some strange sort, were the land's Beneath its garniture of curly gold, portion. «See

Dear fellow, till I almost felt him fold Or shut your eyes," said Nature peevishly, An arm in mine to fix me to the place, “ It nothing skills : I cannot help my case : That way he us’d. Alas, one night's dis'T is the Last Judgment’s fire must cure this place,

Out went my heart's new fire and left it Calcine its clods and set my prisoners

cold. free."

Giles then, the soul of honor — there he If there push'd any ragged thistle-stalk

stands Above its mates, the head was chopp'd ; Frank as ten years ago when knighted the bents

first. Were jealous else. What made those What honest man should dare (he said) holes and rents

he durst. In the dock's harsh swarth leaves, bruis'd Good — but the scene shifts faugh! as to baulk

what hangman hands All hope of greenness? 'T is a brute must Pin to his breast a parchment ? His own walk

bands Pashing their life out, with a brute's in- Read it. Poor traitor, spit upon and tents.

awe,

grace!

a

a

case.

Mere ugly heights and heaps now stolen in There they stood, ranged along the hillview.

sides, met How thus they had surpris'd me, — solve To view the last of me, a living frame it, you !

For one more picture ! in a sheet of flame How to get from them was no clearer I saw them and I knew them all. And yet

Dauntless the slug-horn to my lips I set,

And blew “ Childe Roland to the Dark Yet half I seem'd to recognize some trick

Tower came." Of mischief happen'd to me, God knows when

RESPECTABILITY In a bad dream perhaps. Here ended, then,

DEAR, had the world in its caprice Progress this way. When, in the very nick Deign’d to proclaim “I know you both, Of giving up, one time more, came a click Have recogniz'd your plighted troth, As when a trap shuts — you 're inside the Am sponsor for

you :

: live in peace!” den.

How many precious months and years

Of youth had pass’d, that speed so fast, Burningly it came on me all at once,

Before we found it out at last, This was the place ! those two hills on The world, and what it fears ?

the right, Couch'd like two bulls lock'd horn in How much of priceless life were spent horn in fight,

With men that every virtue decks, While, to the left, a tall scalp'd mountain And women models of their sex, Dunce,

Society's true ornament, Dotard, a-dozing at the very nonce,

Ere we dar'd wander, nights like this,
After a life spent training for the sight ! Thro’ wind and rain, and watch the Seine,

And feel the Boulevart break again
What in the midst lay but the Tower itself ? To warmth and light and bliss ?
The round squat turret, blind as the
fool's heart,

I know! the world proscribes not love ; Built of brown stone, without a counter- Allows my fingers to caress part

Your lips' contour and downiness, In the whole world. The tempest's mock- Provided it supply a glove.

The world's good word ! — the Institute ! Points to the shipman thus the unseen shelf Guizot receives Montalembert ! He strikes on, only when the timbers start. Eh? Down the court three lampions

flare : Not see? because of night perhaps ? - Put forward your best foot !

why, day Came back again for that! before it left,

MEMORABILIA The dying sunset kindled through a cleft: The hills, like giants at a hunting, lay, Ah, did you once see Shelley plain, Chin upon hand, to see the game at bay, And did he stop and speak to you, “ Now stab and end the creature - to And did you speak to him again? the heft!"

How strange it seems, and new!

ing elf