And stately, needs must have their share But ill he lived, much evil saw Those wild men's vices he received. His genius and his moral frame A man who without self-control And yet he with no feigned delight What could he less than love a maid But now the pleasant dream was gone; New objects did new pleasure give, As lawless as before. Meanwhile, as thus with him it fared, They for the voyage were prepared, And went to the sea-shore ; But, when they thither came, the youth "God help thee, Ruth !"-Such pains she had That she in half a year was mad And in a prison housed; And there exulting in her wrongs, Among the music of her songs, She fearfully caroused. Yet sometimes milder hours she knew, Nor wanted sun, nor rain, nor dew, Nor pastimes of the May, -They all were with her in her cell; And a wild brook with cheerful knell Did o'er the pebbles play. When Ruth three seasons thus had lain But of the vagrant none took thought; Among the fields she breathed again: And, coming to the banks of Tone*, The engines of her pain, the tools That shaped her sorrow, rocks and pools, The vernal leaves, she loved them still, Which had been done to her. A barn her Winter bed supplies; But, till the warmth of Summer skies (And all do in this tale agree) She sleeps beneath the greenwood tree, An innocent life, yet far astray! And Ruth will, long before her day, Be broken down and old. Sore aches she needs must have! but less Of mind, than body's wretchedness, From damp, and rain, and cold. If she is pressed by want of food, And there she begs at one steep place, That oaten pipe of hers is mute, I, too, have passed her on the hills By spouts and fountains wild- Ere she had wept, ere she had mourned, Farewell. And when thy days are told, Thy corpse shall buried be; For thee a funeral bell shall ring, And all the congregation sing A Christian psalm for thee. The Tone is a river of Somersetshire at no great distance from the Quantocs Hills. These hills, which are alluded to a few stanzas below, are extremely beauti ful and in most places richly covered with coppice woods. LAODAMIA. WITH sacrifice, before the rising morn Restore him to my sight-great Jove, restore !" So speaking, and by fervent love endowed With faith, the suppliant heavenward lifts her hands; Her countenance brightens-and her eye expands, And she expects the issue in repose. O terror! what hath she perceived?-O joy! What doth she look on ?-whom doth she behold? Her hero slain upon the beach of Troy? And a god leads him-winged Mercury! Mild Hermes spake-and touched her with his wand Thy husband walks the paths of upper air: He comes to tarry with thee three hours' space; Forth sprang the impassioned queen her lord to clasp, But in reward of thy fidelity. And something also did my worth obtain; "Thou know'st, the Delphic oracle foretold That the first Greek who touched the Trojan strand |