This were a medley! we should have him back Who told the 'Winter's tale' to do it for us. No matter: we will say whatever comes. And let the ladies sing us, if they will, From time to time, some ballad or a song To give us breathing-space.' So I began, And the rest follow'd: and the women sang I. A PRINCE I was, blue-eyed, and fair in face, There lived an ancient legend in our house. Some sorcerer, whom a far-off grandsire burnt Because he cast no shadow, had foretold, Dying, that none of all our blood should know The shadow from the substance, and that one Should come to fight with shadows and to fall. For so, my mother said, the story ran. And, truly, waking dreams were, more or less, An old and strange affection of the house. Myself too had weird seizures, Heaven knows what: On a sudden in the midst of men and day, And while I walk'd and talk'd as heretofore, I seem'd to move among a world of ghosts, Our great court-Galen poised his gilt-head cane, Now it chanced that I had been, While life was yet in bud and blade, betroth'd At eight years old; and still from time to time Came murmurs of her beauty from the South, And of her brethren, youths of puissance; And still I wore her picture by my heart, And one dark tress; and all around them both Sweet thoughts would swarm as bees about their queen. But when the days drew nigh that I should wed, And jewels, gifts, to fetch her: these brought back That morning in the presence room I stood With Cyril and with Florian, my two friends: A MEDLEY. The first, a gentleman of broken means (His father's fault) but given to starts and bursts Of revel; and the last, my other heart, And almost my half-self, for still we moved Now, while they spake, I saw my father's face Grow long and troubled like a rising moon, Inflamed with wrath: he started on his feet, Tore the king's letter, snow'd it down, and rent The wonder of the loom thro' warp and woof From skirt to skirt; and at the last he sware That he would send a hundred thousand men, And bring her in a whirlwind: then he chew'd The thrice-turn'd cud of wrath, and cook'd his spleen, Communing with his captains of the war. At last I spoke. 'My father, let me go. |