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 | The Poetical Works of Aubrey De Vere |  |
399
XIII. THE FOUNTAIN OF EGERIA.
For this cold fount the Sabine Saint and SageWooed by high thought forsook both camp and throne:
Here on his country's weal he mused alone
Calm-visaged as the planetary page:
That murmuring spring had power his cares to assuage:
Here—dim elsewhere as noontide moon fleece-strewn—
In this religious gloom distinctly shewn,
Egeria shared his kingly hermitage.
O pure as Arethusa, and more high!
Cleaving rough seas she spurned the irreverent love;
Thine, Roman Nymph, a tenderer sanctity,
Bending like air that strong white head above
To breathe just counsel in a monarch's ear—
Those kings alone are blest to whom thy voice is dear!
| The Poetical Works of Aubrey De Vere | |