O, I see the crescent promise of my spirit hath not set. Ancient founts of inspiration well thro' all my fancy yet. Howsoever these things be, a long farewell to Locksley Hall! Now for me the woods may wither, now for me the roof-tree fall. Comes a vapour from the margin, blackening over heath and holt, Cramming all the blast before it, in its breast a thunderbolt. Let it fall on Locksley Hall, with rain or hail, or fire or snow; For the mighty wind arises, roaring seaward, and I go. GODIVA. I waited for the train at Coventry ; I hung with grooms and porters on the bridge, Not only we, the latest seed of Time, Cry down the past, not only we, that prate Of rights and wrongs, have loved the people well, Upon his town, and all the mothers brought Their children, clamouring," If we pay, we starve ; She sought her lord, and found him, where he strode About the hall, among his dogs, alone, His beard a foot before him, and his hair A yard behind. She told him of their tears, And pray'd him, "If they pay this tax, they starve." Whereat he stared, replying, half-amazed, "You would not let your little finger ache For such as these?". -"But I would die," said she. He laugh'd, and swore by Peter and by Paul : Then fillip'd at the diamond in her ear, 66 "O ay, ay, ay, you talk!". "Alas!" she said, "But prove me what it is I would not do." And from a heart, as rough as Esau's hand, Till pity won. She sent a herald forth, The hard condition; but that she would loose Then fled she to her inmost bower, and there Stole on; and, like a creeping sunbeam, slid The gateway; there she found her palfrey trapt Then she rode forth, clothed on with chastity: The deep air listen'd round her as she rode, And all the low wind hardly breathed for fear. The little wide-mouth'd heads upon the spout Had cunning eyes to see: the barking cur Made her cheek flame: her palfrey's footfall shot Light horrors thro' her pulses: the blind walls Then she rode back, clothed on with chastity : Peep'd - but his eyes, before they had their will, And dropt before him. So the Powers, who wait Her bower; whence reissuing, robed and crown'd, |