 | Eclogues and monodramas |  |
But westward of the heath by some hours' ride,
James Bolton lived, half farmer and half squire,
Florid, fair-built, some twenty-four years old:
Who rode his hunters: kept his park of deer,
A small one: owned some land and rented more.
He, from the hunt thrown out one winter eve,
Pushed meditative homewards with loosed rein;
And chanced on Mary leaning near a well
To lift her pitcher: in whose gentle eyes
He read a power that seemed to clothe in light
The gray lane with its bare and soughing twigs
Of leafless hazel: and his horse drew up
Guessing the rider's mind. But James's blood
Came at a leap in crimson to his face,
Deep as the red leaves showering from the eaves
Of cottage trailers: somewhat less she blushed;
As the warm west answers the eastern glow
At sunrise matching with a fainter rose.
And so they dwelt confusedly: but he
Grasping suggestion, with a quickened brain,
From the mid flutter of his heart, devised
To feign a thirsty pretext for delay,
So perhaps to speak a word or change a glance.
And she, how could she else? with some faint smile
Willingly gave the bright wave of the well
Caught from its source and trickling now no more
In prison walls, and reached it, near as fair
As she, whose story in the Church is read,
The mother of the favoured Israel.
James Bolton lived, half farmer and half squire,
Florid, fair-built, some twenty-four years old:
Who rode his hunters: kept his park of deer,
A small one: owned some land and rented more.
He, from the hunt thrown out one winter eve,
Pushed meditative homewards with loosed rein;
81
To lift her pitcher: in whose gentle eyes
He read a power that seemed to clothe in light
The gray lane with its bare and soughing twigs
Of leafless hazel: and his horse drew up
Guessing the rider's mind. But James's blood
Came at a leap in crimson to his face,
Deep as the red leaves showering from the eaves
Of cottage trailers: somewhat less she blushed;
As the warm west answers the eastern glow
At sunrise matching with a fainter rose.
And so they dwelt confusedly: but he
Grasping suggestion, with a quickened brain,
From the mid flutter of his heart, devised
To feign a thirsty pretext for delay,
So perhaps to speak a word or change a glance.
And she, how could she else? with some faint smile
Willingly gave the bright wave of the well
Caught from its source and trickling now no more
In prison walls, and reached it, near as fair
82
The mother of the favoured Israel.
| Eclogues and monodramas | |