And much I might have said, but that my zone
Unmanned me: then the Doctors! O to hear
The Doctors! O to watch the thirsty plants
Imbibing! once or twice I thought to roar,

To break my chain, to shake my mane: but thou,
Modulate me, Soul of mincing mimicry!

Make liquid treble of that bassoon, my throat;
Abase those eyes that ever loved to meet
Star-sisters answering under crescent brows;
Abate the stride, which speaks of man, and loose
A flying charm of blushes o'er this cheek,
Where they like swallows coming out of time
Will wonder why they came: but hark the bell
For dinner, let us go!"

And in we streamed

Among the columns, pacing staid and still
By twos and threes, till all from end to end
With beauties every shade of brown and fair,
In colors gayer than the morning mist,
The long hall glittered like a bed of flowers.
How might a man not wander from his wits,
Pierced through with eyes, but that I kept mine own
Intent on her, who rapt in glorious dreams
The second-sight of some Astræan age,

Sat compassed with professors: they, the while,
Discussed a doubt, and tossed it to and fro:
A clamor thickened, mixed with inmost terms
Of art and science; Lady Blanche alone,
Of faded form and haughtiest lineaments,
With all her Autumn tresses falsely brown,
Shot sidelong daggers at us, a tiger-cat
In act to spring.

At last a solemn grace

Concluded, and we sought the gardens: there
One walked reciting by herself, and one

In this hand held a volume as to read,

And smoothed a petted peacock down with that:

Some to a low song oared a shallop by,

Or under arches of the marble bridge

Hung, shadowed from the heat: some hid and sought In the orange thickets: others tost a ball

Above the fountain-jets, and back again

With laughter: others lay about the lawns,

Of the older sort, and murmured that their May
Was passing: what was learning unto them?
They wished to marry; they could rule a house;
Men hated learned women: but we three

Sat muffled like the Fates; and often came

Melissa, hitting all we saw with shafts

Of gentle satire, kin to charity,

That harmed not: then day droopt; the chapel bells Called us we left the walks; we mixt with those Six hundred maidens, clad in purest white,

Before two streams of light from wall to wall, While the great organ almost burst his pipes, Groaning for power, and rolling through the court A long melodious thunder to the sound

Of solemn psalms and silver litanies,

The work of Ida, to call down from Heaven
A blessing on her labors for the world.

Sweet and low, sweet and low,
Wind of the western sea,
Low, low, breathe and blow,

Wind of the western sea!

Over the rolling waters go,

Come from the dying moon, and blow,

Blow him again to me;

While my little one, while my pretty one, sleeps.

Sleep and rest, sleep and rest,

Father will come to thee soon;

Rest, rest, on mother's breast,

Father will come to thee soon;

Father will come to his babe in the nest,

Silver sails all out of the west

Under the silver moon ;

Sleep, my little one, sleep, my pretty one, sleep.

TII.

MORN in the white wake of the morning star
Came furrowing all the orient into gold.
We rose, and each by other drest with care
Descended to the court that lay three parts
In shadow, but the Muses' heads were touched
Above the darkness from their native East.

There while we stood beside the fount, and watched Or seemed to watch the dancing bubble, approached

Melissa, tinged with wan from lack of sleep,

Or grief, and glowing round her dewy eyes

The circled Iris of a night of tears;

And fly," she cried, "O fly, while yet you may!

My mother knows:" and when I asked her "how,"

"My fault," she wept, "my fault! and yet not mine:

Yet mine in part. O hear me, pardon me!
My mother, 't is her wont from night to night

To rail at Lady Psyche and her side.,

She says the Princess should have been the Head,
Herself and Lady Psyche the two arms;

And so it was agreed when first they came;