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But when he heard how many a time the flowers
Had bloomed and faded since his Love was seen;
And found no tongue to syllable a word;

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No trace or sign whereby her lonely fate
Might be pursued, he wandered wearily;
While gloom came over him like darkening clouds
When gathered into storm they blot the day.
“None breathed,” he mused, “whose cruelty would harm
A nymph so tuned responsive to delight!
And had she been by bear or wolf devoured,
Some ravelled scrap of raiment had been left,
Caught in a thorn or blown against the sedge;
Something had told a tale or pointed clue!”
Conjecture, weary, faltered in the trail;
And could not picture Syrinx sunk and drowned
In water native to her limbs as heaven's
Translucent azure to the flight of birds.