She played about with slight and sprightly talk,
And vivid smiles, and faintly-venomed points.
Of slander, glancing here and grazing there;
And yielding to his kindlier moods, the Scer
Would watch her at her petulance, and play,
Ev'n when they seemed unlovable, and laugh
As those that watch a kitten; thus he grew
Tolerant of what he half disdained, and she,
Perceiving that she was but half disdained,
Began to break her sports with graver fits,
Turn red or pale, would often when they met
Sigh fully, or all-silent gaze upon him
With such a fixed devotion, that the old man,
Though doubtful, felt the flattery, and at times
Would flatter his own wish in age for love,
And half believe her true: for thus at times
He wavered; but that other clung to him,
Fixed in her will, and so the seasons went.
Then fell upon him a great melancholy;
And leaving Arthur's court he gained the beach;
'There found a little boat, and stepped into it;
And Vivien followed, but he marked her not.
She took the helm and he the sail; the boat
Drave with a sudden wind across the deeps,
And touching Breton sands, they disembarked.
And then she followed Merlin all the way,
Ev'n to the wild woods of Broceliande.
For Merlin once had told her of a charm,
The which if any wrought on any one
With woven paces and with waving arms,
The man so wrought on ever seemed to lie
Closed in the four walls of a hollow tower,

From which was no escape for evermore;

And none could find that man for evermore,
Nor could he see but him who wrought the charm
Coming and going, and he lay as dead

And lost to life and use and name and fame.
And Vivien ever sought to work the charm
Upon the great Enchanter of the Time,
As fancying that her glory would be great
According to his greatness whom she quenched.

She mused a little, and then clapped her hands

Together with a wailing shriek, and said:

"Stabbed through the heart's affections to the heart! Seethed like the kid in its own mother's milk! Killed with a word worse than a life of blows!

I thought that he was gentle, being great :

O God, that I had loved a smaller man!
I should have found in him a greater heart.

Oh, I, that flattering my true passion, saw
The knights, the court, the king, dark in your light,
Who loved to make men darker than they are,

Because of that high pleasure which I had
To scat you sole upon my pedestal

Of worship-I am answered, and henceforth.
The course of life that seemed so flowery to me
With you for guide and master, only you,
Becomes the sea-cliff pathway broken short,
And ending in a ruin-nothing left,

But into some low cave to crawl, and there,
If the wolf spare me, weep my life away,

Killed with unutterable unkindliness."

She paused, she turned away, she hung her head, The snake of gold slid from her hair, the braid Slipped and uncoiled itself, she wept afresh, And the dark wood grew darker toward the storm In silence, while his anger slowly died

Within him, till he let his wisdom go

For ease of heart, and half believed her true :
Called her to shelter in the hollow oak,
"Come from the storm," and having no reply,
Gazed at the heaving shoulder, and the face
Hand-hidden, as for utmost grief or shame;
Then thrice essayed, by tenderest-touching terms
To sleek her ruffled peace of mind, in vain.
At last she let herself be conquered by him,
And as the cageling newly flown returns,
The seeming-injured simple-hearted thing
Came to her old perch back, and settled there.
There while she sat, half falling from his knees,
Half nestled at his heart, and since he saw
The slow tear creep from her closed eyelid yet,
About her, more in kindness than in love,
The gentle wizard cast a shielding arm.
But she dislinked herself at once and rose,
Her arms upon her breast across, and stood
A virtuous gentlewoman deeply wronged,
Upright and flushed before him: then she said:

"There must be now no passages of love Betwixt us twain henceforward evermore.

Since, if I be what I am grossly called,

What should be granted which your own gross heart Would reckon worth the taking? I will go.

In truth, but one thing now

-better have died

Thrice than have asked it once-could make me stay-
That proof of trust-so often asked in vain!
How justly, after that vile term of yours,

I find with grief! I might believe you then,
Who knows? once more. Oh, what was once to me
Mere matter of the fancy, now has grown
The vast necessity of heart and life.
Farewell: think kindly of me, for I fear
My fate or fault, omitting gayer youth
For one so old, must be to love you still.
But ere I leave you let me swear once more
That if I schemed against your peace in this,
May yon just Heaven that darkens o'er me, send
One flash, that, missing all things else, may. make
My scheming brain a cinder, if I lie.”

Scarce had she ceased, when out of heaven a bolt (For now the storm was close above them) struck, Furrowing a giant oak, and javelining

With darted spikes and splinters of the wood
The dark earth round.

He raised his eyes and saw

The tree that shone white-listed through the gloom.
But Vivien, fearing Heaven had heard her oath,
And dazzled by the livid-flickering fork,

And deafened with the stammering cracks and claps
That followed, flying back and crying out,

"O Merlin, though you do not love me, save,
Yet save me!" clung to him and hugged him close;
And called him dear protector in her fright,
Nor yet forgot her practice in her fright,

But wrought upon his mood and hugged him close.

The pale blood of the wizard at her touch
Took gayer colours, like an opal warmed.
She blamed herself for telling hearsay tales:
She shook from fear, and for her fault she wept
Of petulancy; she called him lord and liege,
Her seer, her bard, her silver star of eve,
Her God, her Merlin, the one passionate love
Of her whole life; and ever overhead
Bellowed the tempest, and the rotten branch
Snapped in the rushing of the river-rain
Above them; and in change of glare and gloom
Her eyes and neck glittering went and came;
Till now the storm, its burst of passion spent,
Moaning and calling out of other lands,

Had left the ravaged woodland yet once more

Το peace; and what should not have been had beenFor Merlin, overtalked and overworn,

Had yielded, told her all the charm, and slept.

Then, in one moment, she put forth the charm

Of woven paces and of waving hands,
And in the hollow oak he lay as dead,

And lost to life and use and name and fame.

Then crying, "I have made his glory mine," And shrieking out, "O fool!" the harlot leaped Adown the forest, and the thicket closed

Behind her, and the forest echoed, "Fool!"