"From thee in all their vigour came "My arm of strength, my soul of flame"Thou didst not give me life alone, "But all that made me more thine own. 290 "See what thy guilty love hath done! "Repaid thee with too like a son! 295 "I am no bastard in my soul, "For that, like thine, abhorred controul: "And for my breath, that hasty boon "Thou gav'st and wilt resume so soon, "I valued it no more than thou, 300 "When rose thy casque above thy brow, "And we, all side by side, have striven, "And o'er the dead our coursers driven: "The past is nothing—and at last "The future can but be the past ; "Yet would I that I then had died: "For though thou work'dst my mother's ill, "And made thy own my destined bride, "I feel thou art my father still; 305 "And, harsh as sounds thy hard decree, 310 ""Tis not unjust, although from thee. "As erred the sire, so erred the son- XIV. He ceased—and stood with folded arms, 315 On which the circling fetters sounded; 320 And there with glassy gaze she stood 335 But every now and then a tear So large and slowly gathered slid From the long dark fringe of that fair lid, And those who saw, it did surprise, 340 Such drops could fall from human eyes. 345 More like a thing that ne'er had life,— 350 But scarce to reason-every sense Had been o'erstrung by pangs intense; And each frail fibre of her brain 360 (As bow-strings, when relaxed by rain, That some one was to die-but who? She had forgotten:-did she breathe? Or were they fiends who now so frowned 375 eye Till then had smiled in sympathy? All was confused and undefined, To her all-jarred and wandering mind; A chaos of wild hopes and fears: And now in laughter, now in tears, But madly still in each extreme, She strove with that convulsive dream; 380 Hark! the hymn is singing— The song for the dead below, Or the living who shortly shall be so ! For a departing being's soul The death-hymn peals and the hollow bells knoll: He is near his mortal goal; Kneeling at the Friar's knee; Sad to hear and piteous to see Kneeling on the bare cold ground, 396 With the block before and the guards around 400 And the headsman with his bare arm ready, That the blow may be both swift and steady, Feels if the axe be sharp and true— Since he set its edge anew: While the crowd in a speechless circle gather 405 To see the Son fall by the doom of the Father. G |