University of Virginia Library

With hasty rein from off the bloody field
Prince Edwin with a score of followers fled
Toward King Redwald's border—thither drawn
By hope, which was twin-brother to despair—
The grey King Redwald, though to him unknown,
Long time his father's friend, who ruled a land
In peace beyond the vapour-burdened hills.
But Ethelbert upon the fliers swooped
Like peregrine on pigeons, striking down
And scattering. Edwin 'scaped, but 'scaped as one
Wet-fetlocked from the Morecambe tide, that brings
Sea-silence in an hour to wide-spread sands
Loud with pack-horses, and the crack of whips.
And on the way the steed of steeds beloved
Burst noble heart and fell; and with a pang
Keener than that which oftentimes is felt
By human death-beds, Edwin left the corse
To draw the unseen raven from the sky;
Then fearful lest the villages of men
Might babble of his steps to Ethelbert,
Certain to sweep that way with clouds of horse,
He sought rude wastes and heathy wildernesses
Through which the stagnant streams crept black and sour.
Once, coming on a string of traffickers,
With laden mules bound for a town, he hid
Within the hollow of a ruined oak
Till the blue evening steaming from the ground
Made the star wink; then, signalled by the owl,
He from his hiding stole. When earth was red
With set of sun he passed into the land
Of reed and fen, by many a wing be-clanged,
And all the night he journeyed, while o'erhead
The windy heaven streamed from east to west,
And dim in vapour, keen in azure gulfs,
The feverish stars pressed forward to their bournes.
Midnighted thrice in wilderness he saw
The far-meandering lake beneath the moon,
Flicker in silver round a woody isle—
The lake he oft had heard of. And he knew
Another day would bring him to the Court
Of the grey King who for his father's sake
Would shelter him in this his sore distress.

Next morning, from the sandy hills he saw
The bare blue desert of the sea flow out
In glittering wrinkles 'neath a cloudy dawn;
And when the sun burned through the mists, and grew
A mass of blinding splendour that out-rayed,
He dipped into the valleys. On through woods,
And roadless meads he passed, till at the hour
When fiercest is the light, he weary came
To a ravine that broke down from the hill
With many a tumbled crag: a streamlet leapt
From stony shelf to shelf: the rocks were touched
By purple foxgloves, plumed by many a fern;
And all the soft green bottom of the gorge
Was strewn with hermit stones that sideways leaned,
Smooth-cheek'd with emerald moss. Here Edwin paused
To quench his thirst, and rising, was aware
Of a gay youth that slid from off a rock
With cordial greeting and toward him came:
Slender as any girl: the golden hair,
That plenteously unto his shoulders hung,
Divided, gave to view a happy face
Pure red and white as apple bloom on bough.
He was a page, he said, at Redwald's Court,
And going thither. “Thither go I, too,”
Quoth Edwin; “and have travelled since the morn.
If it mislikes thee not, companionship,
Poor as mine own, may kill a weary mile.”
So without farther parley on they went—
One blithe in spirit, and as gaily dight
As goldfinch swinging on a thistle top;
The other sad of brow, and in attire
As homely as the sparrow that has chirped
Its whole life long upon a smoky thatch.
And as they walked, the stranger full of life,
Grew garrulous on Redwald and his sons.
To him the Prince gave eager ear, though oft
The kingliness behind the cloud put out
A ray that dazzled, to be swift withdrawn.
“Redwald,” he said, “was grey and sad of blood.
A man that, rooted in a bitter past,
Drew sap enough to keep the trunk alive,
But not enough to make the foliage green.
His seven sons, hound-footed, falcon-eyed,
The maddest men for hunting, who could rest
No more than could the winds.” And then his speech
Brightened like water round a sunbeam. “Ah,
The Court is richest in a maid that comes
Like silence after hoof and bugle-blare;
Who owns the whitest hand, the sweetest cheek
Air touches, sunlight sees. And Time, like one
Who in the task delights, with every grace
And glow is dressing her, so that to-day
Shames yesterday, to-morrow shames to day.”
From this height soon he fell and 'gan rehearse
The petty spites and scandals of the Court:
How the King's frown had dimmed the warrior's arms,
How the proud lady scorned the faithful knight,
How all that day the forests would be loud
With hound and horn, how 'twas the King's intent
That night to give a feast to all his lords,
Himself upon the dais. As Edwin winced,
The page turned smiling. “See, my tongue runs on
Of court and courtier, princess, prince, and king,
Unmindful of thy business! Let me know.
Perchance in me resides some little power
To gain thee audience of a mighty lord,
Though in the stirrup were his hasty foot—
Glad should I be.” In strange sort Edwin smiled.
“What trade have such as I with mighty lords?
'Tis with King Redwald that my business lies.
A king is like the unexcepting sun
That shines on all alike.” Discoursing thus
They entered on a broad and public way
Whereon were travellers and lively stir,
And now a maid, and now a knight went past
With light upon his armour; and at length,
The while the press was growing more and more,
They came upon the palace, vast in shade
Against the sunset. Noisy was the place
With train and retinue, and the cumbrous pomps
The feasters left without. The steeds were staked
Upon the sward, and from the gates the folk,
Busy as bees at entrance of a hive,
Swarmed in and out. Men lay upon the grass,
Men leaned with folded arms against the walls,
Men diced with eager hands and covetous eyes;
Men sat on grass with hauberk, greave and helm
And great bright sword, and as they sat they sang
The prowess of their masters deep in feast,—
How foremost in the chase he speared the boar,
How through the terrible battle press he rode,
Death following like a squire. Prince Edwin paused:
On his companion's shoulder laid his hand
With something like affection. “Here we part;
Thanks for thy courtesy. If I regain
That which my father on his death-bed left,
This day thou wilt remember. Fare thee well.”
Thereat the page into the palace went:
But Edwin sat without till darkness came,
And dicers all had vanished; then he rose
And, entering, claimed an audience of the King,
For his was instant business, life and death.
The seneschals swift bustled to and fro
Regardless; but at last it reached the King
That the waste dark had given up a man
That sought his face and would not be denied:
Then at his wish, the haggard Prince was led
To the great hall wherein was set the feast;
And at his step, from out the smoky glare
And gloom of guttering torches, weeping pitch,
A hundred bearded faces were upraised,
Flaming with mead: and from their master's stools
Great dogs upstarting snarled; and from the dais,
The King, while wonder raised the eyebrow, asked
What man he was? what business brought him there?

When Edwin thus, the target of all eyes:

“One who has brothered with the ghostly bats,
That skim the twilight on their leathern wings,
And with the rooks that caw in airy towns;
One intimate with misery: who has known
The fiend that in the hind's pinched entrail sits
Devising treason, and the death of kings—
Famine the evil-visaged—that once faced,
There is no terror left to scare a man.
Though my associates are the horrible shapes
That press on dying eyes in wildernesses
Where they must stare unclosed, this hand I stretch
Is native to the sceptre, knows its touch
Familiarly as thine. Though hunted like
Some noisome beast, that when it steals abroad
The cry spreads, and the village rises up
With sticks and stones to kill it, I have seen,
When I but oped my mouth, men look as if
It thundered in the air.”

As from a crag
That rises sheer from out the fresh-blown surge,
Upsprings a smoke of sea-fowl, puff on puff,
Until the air is dark with countless wings
And deaf with plumy clangour, from the feast
Broke laughter. When it ceased, the smiling King
With the intruder played. “Whence comest thou?
What king art thou? where doth thy kingdom lie?
In earth or air? and if indeed a king,
Though ne'er stood king in such unkingly plight,
Why hast thou been so strangely companied
By midnight and the owls?”

Then Edwin cried—
“O list fell hunger and the mountain wind
To the loud bruit of fed prosperity,
That never can be neighboured with distress!
No height so high, but you can fall from it.
Earth counts ten graves for every living man;
A single scroll contains our victories,
But 'tis a dreary volume, that the names
Of our defeats o'erflow. I was a king,
Have been destroyed in battle, lost my home,
Have fed on berries like the moorland birds;
Have drunk the stream that tameless creatures drink,—
Slept where I could. Thou ask'st me who I am?
From whence I come? From Deira do I come.
I am that Egbert's son who loved thee well.
Oft thou and he were tenants of one crib—
Two growing apples reddening cheek to cheek
Upon the self-same bough—two pebbles glazed
By the same wavelet's hand. In Egbert's name—
Egbert these twenty years in earth—his son
Claims shelter from thee.”

When he ceased, and when
A murmur grew among the guests, wherein
Doubt with assurance clashed, the King arose,
A sudden flash of colour on his face,
Of which, if half was pleasure, half was shame,
And in the seeing of the spacious hall
Stepped down, took Edwin in his arms, while speech
Came like a hurrying brook that overlays
Eddy with eddy, watery swirl with swirl.
“Something of this I heard, as one immersed
In boundless woods, the falling of a tree:
Who hears a sound, but cannot tell from whence,
Nor whether nibbling centuries of time
Or woodman's axe hath sapped it. 'Twas thy fall!
'Twas thy name rumour babbled indistinct!
And thou art come unto thy father's friend
For shelter! Thou shalt have it. Would that thou
Hadst asked for something costlier. So disguised!
So covered up!—but never murky cloud
Let slip so fair a sun! 'Tis Fortune's trick
To muffle up her gifts in dusky hulls,
That, when they throw their mantles off, surprise
May richness over-double. Egbert's child!
Nay, his own self returned again to run
A large career of noble deeds, and reap
An aftermath of fame. It is a sight
To make me young again! While I peruse
The lips, the nose, the colour of the curls,
The build of brow, the contour of the cheek,
The wild-hawk eye, and when, as now, thou smil'st,
The face's sunbeam—all this melts away,
And through the cloudiness of forty years
I see thy father and myself, when we,
Like twin lambs, raced across the meads of youth,
Happy as lambs, and innocent as they—
While our young lives were bright as silks uncreased,
Or daggers newly gilt; the careless days
When life was May and full of singing birds;
Before that we had seen or kissed our wives;
Ere thou, young sir, wert thought of. Welcome here!
Although it were the son of my own loins
Long absent from these eyes, I could not grace
His coming with a single smile beyond
These now I give thee. Welcome, yet again!
But now have meats and drinks: the moorland fruits
And streams I thank, for hunger will enrich
This my poor table more than cups of gold.
Sit here beside me, 'twixt me and my sons—
Nay, as thou art. At bed-time, doff these weeds.
Thou art a new found jewel, and to-morrow
We'll have thee richly set.”

Then Edwin stepped
Across the dogs that lay upon the floor,
With drowsy muzzles on their outstretched paws—
Oft starting into voice as if they chased
And bayed the boar in dream, and took his seat
On the right hand of Redwald, 'mong his sons,
A kingdom's strength upon a battle day.
The lordliest game of forest and of hill
Made that board paradise, within whose smell
The phœnix appetite divinely died
Into a rarer life. Sheep, steer, and boar,
And stags that on the mountain took the dawn
High o'er the rising splendours of the mists,
Were plenteously there. All fowls that pierce
In wedge or caravan the lonely sky,
At winter's sleety whistle, heaped the feast;
With herons kept for kings, and swans that float
Like water-lilies on the glassy mere.
Nor these alone. All fish of glorious scale,
The fruits of English woods, and honey pure
Slow oozing from its labyrinthine cells,
And spacious horns of mead—the blessed mead
That can unpack the laden heart of care—
That climbs a heated reveller to the brain,
And sits there singing songs. And seated high,
'Mid torches' glare and glimmer, minstrels sang
Mailed gods of war, grim giants, kings who walked
In the grey dawn and morning light of time
Statured like towers; kings whose huge bulks of bone
Unmouldered, yet are seen in twilight caves,
Like some old galley with its sea-worn ribs
Half-sunk in ancient sands. And, while they sang
Of blazoned banners streaming on the wind,
Of arrows splintering on the brazen breast,
Swords red from point to hilt; of trumpets blown,
Shred armour, floundering horses, cries of men,
The light of battle burned in every eye,
Shouts burst from bearded lips be-drenched with mead,
Swords and cuirasses rusting on the wall
Clattered as life were in them. So the feast,
Led by the minstrels' scaling voice, and hand
In fury 'mong the harpstrings, roared, till dawn,
Let through a loophole, fell on torches burned,
The upset goblets of the deep debauch,
Lords tumbled on the rushes.

But long ere that
The King, with Edwin and his seven sons,
Left the fierce feasters maddening with the song.
A spacious chamber facing to the east
Was Edwin's, who threw down his weary length,
And, like a fallen column, slept till morn.
Then touched by earliest beam, he waking, stared
With a blank eyeball, troubled as a man
Who dies in sleep and wakes in another world.
The chamber broke upon him weird and strange—
He knew not what had been, or where he was—
Till, like the lightning come and gone at once,
Swift memory supplied the missing link
And knit him with himself. He rose at last,
Unbreathed on by the cold ungracious air
That lives in waste and wilderness, and saw
A pile of raiment in the chamber, heaped
In fold and golden crease. Enclothed, he shone
Like some gay kingfisher whose flight illumes
A river's sandy bank. His rich cap lay
Upon the rushes when the King came in,
With a “good morrow” in his face and eye.
Well pleased, he laughed, “So, so, the grub has cracked
To a rare butterfly! Did'st rest as well
When thou wert ligging 'neath the round-eyed owl,
And heard him scold his brethren of the waste?
Come with me to the lads, for they at noon
Will fly their falcons, and the sport will be
The gayer for thy presence.” Then he led,
Through a long passage, toward a noise of dogs
That ever nearer grew, and entered straight
A mighty chamber hung with horn and head;
Its floor bestrewn with arrows, as if War
Grown weary of his trade, had there disrobed
And thrown his quiver down. And in the midst
The brothers stood in hunting gear, and stroked
Great brindled dogs, that leapt about their knees,
And talked of them the while, and called to mind
How this one charged the lowering mountain bull,
What time he stood affronted in the glade
And the spurned earth flew round him in his rage;
How the boar's tusk made that one yelp and limp
The day he came upon him in the brake.
“Lads,” quoth the King, still holding Edwin's hand,
“I've brought a fair companion for your sport.
Strive which can bend the stiffest bow, which train
The swiftest hound, the highest towering hawk.”
While welcome danced within their cordial eyes,
While one by one they grasped the Prince's hand,
And while the dogs, suspicious, sniffed his heel,
And while an eager babble broke of hawk
And steed and hound, and arrow-head and spear,
In at the door a moment peeped a girl,
Fair as a rose-tree growing thwart a gap
Of ruin, seen against the blue when one
Is dipped in dungeon gloom; and Redwald called,
And at the call she through the chamber came,
And laid a golden head and blushing cheek
Against his breast. He clasped his withered hands
Fondly upon her head, and bent it back,
As one might bend a downward-looking flower
To make its perfect beauty visible,
Then kissed her mouth and cheek. “My little one,
A morsel to these lion whelps of mine,
Yet pearl to pebble, precious gold to iron,
There came last night a stranger to our Court,
Who brought with him a face from out the grave,
And with an ancient friendship warmed my heart.
He stands in centre of thy brethren there
Worthy thy dearest greeting.” As she turned
(Half-breaking from the arms that softly held)
A happy blushing face, with yellow hair
And sweet eyes azure as the flaxen flower,
The dim air brightened round her, and her voice
Brake into silvery welcome, then so stopped
That its surcease was to the ear what light
Withdrawn is to the eye. The Prince, through all
The hurry of his pulse, returned her grace
In ceremonious phrases—stately set,
Cold in themselves, yet tinged as by a dawn
Of coming passion—when the King broke in,
Words that a kiss foreran, “Now go, my girl;
Thou shouldst be very fair; thy coming stole
Thy mother from me. After last night's bout,
Day will be grateful to our heated brows.
Our guests have gone, a fiery throat with each
That will no more let stream go by unlapped
Than thirsty dogs in July. Whilst we go,
Thou canst the story of thy wrongs relate,
And then rejoin the lads.” So, with these words,
Redwald led Edwin forth.

And while they walked
Toward the rookery, the Prince rehearsed
How Ethelbert, tolled on by plunder's bell,
Wasted his borders for these many years;
How when, a month ago, the routing boar
Pierced to his kingdom's heart, in haste he hid
His mother, with the women and their broods,
Within the secret places of the hills,
And raised a host; and how, one summer's day,
His squadrons dashed upon the iron foe
Effectless as the rainy flaws that smoke
On precipices that o'er-frown the vale;
And how, at a most dismal set of sun,
He saw his files lie on the bloody field
Like swathes of grass, and knew that all was lost;
And how, when the pursuit grew fierce and fell,
A hut he entered, blazoned like a king,
And issued thence a peasant; how he fled
For days and nights toward his father's friend,
Till, as he knew, last night, a famished man
He burst upon the feast. At this he dashed
Fierce tears aside, that broke upon a cheek
Stormily crimson, as the light that burns
Upon the bellied wry-necked thunder-cloud,
Rearing itself from out the inky east
Against the spokes of sunset, and he cried,

“Though earth and heaven both had knit their hands
To grant my wishes, I would only ask
To be once more before him host to host!
Ye iron destinies that rule the world
From injury preserve him till that day!
From knife, disease, and heaven's snaky fire
That licks up life like water, keep him free!
For every limb of that same Ethelbert
Is dearer unto me than to his Queen;
She never pined for him in all her love,
Or cursed the hours that kept them separate,
As I do in my hate. O, I could kill him
Fondly as e'er she kissed him! King, my realm
Is sorrow and the memory of wrong;
My courtiers are the ghosts of happiness.
Yet unmixed evil lives not. Fallen low,
I see a new proportion in the world,
And hear another murmur of events.
Although the wafture of its muffled vans
Be noiseless as the downy owlet's flight,
I hear thy coming ruin climb the wind.
In me as in a mirror see thyself.
Fear this, wild Ethelbert. 'Tis not my cause
Alone I plead, but every prince's cause.
This man would break down all our diadems,
And with the gold and jewels build his own.
He has a stomach for us all. Nor think
In him ambition is a phantasy
Of idleness engendered, and as frail
As stream of summer vapour, which the crag
Tears with its horns, the sunlight can drink up.
For years within his dark and constant mind
The monstrous thing has grown. No hand but Death's
Can root it out. 'Tis like a poisonous tree
For ages anchored in a castle wall,
Whose gnarled and fingery roots so clutch the stones,
That, plucked up, all is ruin. Well, what then?
Better the arrow stayed upon the string
Than shivered on the breastplate.”

Edwin's words
Came like a mountain torrent swollen with rain
Adown a long ravine of cataracts,
Ending one chafe of foam. The King replied,
In measured words devolving smooth as oil:

“I need not say, in earnest of my love,
Were I assured it would thee reinstate,
In the red hand of War I'd strike my own,
And clasp it as a friend's. Were I assured—
Alas! my heart is like a troubled seer,
And speaks a cloudy language. Ethelbert
Is strong in towns and men—most subtle-brained,
Most proud of heart—yet roughly generous
To those that with submission flatter him.
Before the forthright motion of the wind
Bend like the sapling; when 't has overblown,
Erect thyself at pleasure. For myself,
Thou hast a boding eye that can discern
A tempest brewing in the sunny noon.
If a portentous cloud should climb the sky,
(Though I protest I see no present sign),
Some shelter will be found ere o'er my head
It splits in rain and fire. Why search for ills
That wander o'er the wilds of phantasy,
Which, if we seek not, we may never see?
Be not downcast, although the heavens frown;
The gods oft use us as we use our babes,
And snatch our plaything from us for a time;
Be patient, 'tis returned. Perversely fight,
The frail thing oft is broken. Do not fear;
Prosperity, like the swallow, comes and goes:
To-day there is the ruinous clay and straw;
To-morrow, sweetest twitterings fill the eaves.
The wretch plunged knee-deep in the whirling drift
Cannot believe in summer, yet it comes
With all its singing birds. Remember, Time
Works often to some fair accomplishment,
Which we impatient, purblind, cannot see,
And in our eagerness stretch forth a hand,
And that one act mars all.”

Then Edwin cried,
“There is scant comfort in thy words. No more
The births of time we can prognosticate
Than the next phantom of a madman's brain;
Or than the shape that yonder travelling cloud—
Now to my fancy headed like a wolf—
Will crumble into next. Most wretched he,
Unreasoning Chance's pensioner, who lives,
Like the blind beggar at the high-way side,
On alms of passers-by. I have been taught
The world is nothing but a mass of means,—
We have but what we make; that every good
Is locked by nature in a granite hand,
Sheer labour must unclench. The forest trees—
Do they fall round us into builded homes
Without an axe or arm? The blowing winds
Are but our servants when we hoist a sail.
O Redwald, Redwald! be not like the owl
That dozes with a wise and solemn face
In its own midnight, in the blaze of day.
Not for myself I speak, but all for thee.
The ravening wolf hath burst into the fold
Of peaceful kingdoms; 'tis the untouched herd,
Not the torn carcase, that hath cause to fear.
Thou yet art standing in thy pride of place,
I've known misfortune's worst; and, like a soul
Refuged by death from all calamity,
Nothing can hurt me more.”

Then Redwald's face
Grew troubled, for his spirit, peering out
Into the future, blenched at something there.
Uneasily he spake. “Draw once the sword,
In a strange world 'tis sheathed. When war-winds blow,
Kingdoms break up like clouds. I would thee serve,
But dare not set my dwelling in a blaze
To warm thy hands. But let this end to-day:
In private council I will take the thing,
And do not doubt that, through the voluble throng
Of diverse reasons, love for thee will plead—
An advocate silver-tongued. Come now, the lads
Will fly their hawks at noon.”

Then, like a man
That brings a painful interview to end,
Turned on his heel the King, and instant went
Toward the Palace. Edwin at his side
Walked, with ignited heart that fumed within,
Slow climbing to a clear bright flame of rage.
Both silent. When they reached the Palace front,
The brothers stood about the gate with grooms
And steeds, and falconers with hooded hawks,
Eager to ride. And Redwald, with pleased eyes,
Gazed on that carcanet of noble youth,
The poorest of whose seven precious stones
Would have enriched a realm, till Edwin sprang
Into the saddle, and away they rode
Toward the mass of woodland in the west;
And when the last gay rider disappeared,
Within his countenance pleasure's fire went out,
And left it dark. He entered full of thought.
With muffled sound, fair glimmered man and horse
Down forest aisles, bedipt from plume to hoof
In dancing light and shade; and issuing thence
As from a roof, the riders burst in day
On an uneven waste of hillocked sand,
Shagged with rude grass, and patched with withered furze,
With the great dazzle of the sea in front.
And as along they rode, though Edwin flashed
The general gladness back, as sea the sun,
Kept up the game while each derided each,
Paying gay jest with jest—'twas like a man
High-capering to no music—for the wit
Ached at the heart, and loud his laughter rose
To hide its want of joy. Some three leagues on,
Taking the wind upon a purple moor,
The happy Princes, riding hitherto
Close as a clump of primroses, broke up
And curvetted in twos; and as they broke,
Regner, the rose of all the wreath of sons,
Spurred his horse up to Edwin's, drew the talk
Slowly from this and that, to last night's feast,
Thence to the overthrow, and by what means
The pit-maker should fall into the pit,
The ruiner be ruined. Riding thus—
Prince Edwin lightening with his wrongs, the while,
By the true virtue of an open ear
Blonde Regner drew the grief that stagnated
In bitterness about the heart away—they dipped
Down on a shining water-course, that led
To mountains closely drawn, and came at length
On a great boulder, black with pine, flung down
In the gorge's throat; and, rounding it, they split
A second time. Like pearls upon a string,
Each after each, they thrid a ruinous glen,
All silence, toppling crag, and falling stream,
Where nothing moved except the vapoury smoke
From the abyss, or slowly crawling cloud
That hardly can sustain its weight of rain,
Eating the sunshine up and blackening all—
Since earthquake passed that way. At last, they reached
The gloomy tenant of that gloomy place,
A lake of sadness, seldom sunned, that stretched
In sullen silver from a marge of reeds
To far-flung gloom of precipice and peak,
That on the northern side kept back the day.
As on the ruined shore the eight drew rein,
Uprose the startled heron with a scream,
Waking the echoes of that region dern;
And Edwin, with a stranger's privilege,
First threw his hawk. Then Regner, riding near,
Watching his countenance, caught his eye, and cried,
“When 'gainst the heron Ethelbert thou fliest,
I follow in thy track, come weal, come woe!”
And, rising fiercely in his stirrup, flung
His falcon into air. A glorious sight
To see them scale the heaven in lessening rings
Till they as motes became: while here and there
About the strand the eager brethren rode,
With shaded faces upturned to the blue,
Now crying, “This one has it!” and now “That!”
When suddenly, from out the dizzy sky,
Dropped screaming hawks and heron locked in fight,
Leaving a track of plumes upon the air.
Down came they struggling, wing and beak and claw,
And splashed beyond the rushes in the mere.
Amid the widening circles to the waist,
A falconer dashed and drew to shore the birds,
All dead save Edwin's falcon, that, with claws
Struck through the heron's neck, yet pecked and tore,
Unsated in its fierceness. Regner laughed
At the weird omen, though his colour rose.
“I cannot guess,” quoth he, “how this will come
Unless I with thee to the battle ride,
So that is fixed. Brave falcon, with thy heart
Burst on thy foeman's bill!” He gave his steed
The spur to hide his face. His brethren stood
Dashed for the moment; and no more that day
Was falcon thrown from fist into the sky,
Or from its airy poisings to the lure
Brought with a whistle. Soon the dreary lake
Lost princely voice and clang of iron hoof,
And as the six rode on the omen died,
And was entombed in laughter; farther on,
Heading the riders down the ruinous vale,
Regner and Edwin moved abreast, while love
Grew up between them purely—all untouched
By haughtiness, or thought of selfish end;
The noble love that lives in noble men;
That is ashamed of its own nakedness,
And hides itself in deeds,—would not be seen,
And tongueless lives and dies. And riding thus
Toward the palace, Regner talked of days
When all would be at peace within the land,
And each man have his own inheritance,
Be it cot or citied realm: and how they twain,
When crownèd kings, would through the country ride,
Teaching civility and raising man,
Till on the highway there should not be heard
A rude word, and till gold might lie untouched.

So talking, Edwin knew that they approached
The palace: neither mount, nor stream, nor tree,
Nor landmark, noted as they rode at morn,
Foretold its nearness, but a heart that swam
In new delight, like summer setting suns
In colour. As they rode, between the twain
Speech died; and, when the billowy woods drew off,
And gave the palace clear in afternoon,
Its turrets rose in a delicious clime,
And sacred as her garment's hem had grown,
Its utmost pale and limit. As they came,
The noise of hoofs brought Redwald to the door,
A shallow ray of welcome in his face
That faded soon. Like one preoccupied
With his own thoughts, he asked What sport? whose hawk
Had highest towered? which struck the quarry down?
And heeded not the answer when it came.
All the dismounted princes then he led
To a great board set forth with meats and drinks,
And, as he sat and carved before them all,
And as the talk rose high among the sons,
His face to Edwin—who with anxious eye
Sought there the future—seemed a doubtful day
Beyond the skill of prophet to predict
Whether 'twould darken into thunder shower
Or clear to azure and a golden set,
With promise of fair morrows. Moody-browed
He sat at feast and moody-browed he rose
And went out, leaving Edwin and his sons.
Then, after interval of sportive talk,
Regner brought all the table to the hall
Where in the morning he had stood with dogs;
But changed its grisly furniture, for now
Twilight had settled down upon the world,
And in the red and winking faggot light
Now flashed a spear-head, and now gleamed a brand.
The seven soon were busy here and there—
Some diced, one played with spearhead, one with hound.
But Edwin, feathering arrows sat apart,
For all the piled-up anguish—visible
As some high hanging tempest, which the sun
Holds back at noon, but which, when that same sun
Goes out like a red ember in the west,
Settles down bodily, a double night,
And pours through all the hollows of the hills
With voices in the blackness and the blast—
Covered him up, and in his soul he cursed
The purblind King, incapable to pierce
The curtain of a sunset, and descry
The angry-featured morn that lowered behind.
And, as they sat, and redder grew the hall,
The Princess came and sang as was her wont,
And as it chanced that night a tale of love—
Of love new-born and trembling like an Eve
Within a paradise all wide and strange
At the most perilous sweetness of herself
But one short moment known. And while her voice
Went wandering through a maze of melody,
The hand lay where it fell, and ceased the breath,
And finer grew the listening face. And when
Like a leaf's wavering course through autumn air,
The wildered melancholy music ceased,
And silence from a rack of keen delight
Unstretched their spirits to their grosser moods
And common occupations, she arose
With music lingering in her face, and eyes
That seemed to look through surfaces of things,
And would have thence withdrawn from out the hall;
But Regner caught her twixt his mighty knees,
Proud of her innocence and gentle ways,
Impatient half that she was not a glede
Fire-eyed to peck his fingers. “Tush!” he cried,
Breaking in laughter like a wave in foam,
“Thy music trembles like a yearling fawn
At its own shadow. Evermore of love
Thou singest, as if love made up the world
And men were pigeons cooing on a thatch.
Was hand and arm like this of mine but made
To circle waists and finger maiden hair?
Although this love be all thou sing'st, methinks
'Tis something to be first to spear the boar,
'Tis something to have heart enough to keep
A friend, and strength enough to kill a foe.
Happy thy husband, Bertha, in his hall
Sitting unscolded, while each enterprise
That might have made him great unheeded streams
Like wild swans overhead. A gentle wife
With yellow-headed children round thy knees—
Aha, our lily leaps into a rose!
What! struggling like a very sheep in pen
Beneath the shears!” While gazed the throneless Prince
With idle fingers on the feathered shaft,
While she, flushed rosy-red, broke loose and fled,
And while great Regner's loving laugh pursued,
Sudden, all heaven, immeasurably sweet,
Sank downward on his heart, and filled it full
As crimson fills a rose.

Then, while they slept,
The feverish heart within his body lay
Awake, and slave to giddy fear and hope,
'Twas blown from life to death, from heaven to hell,
A hundred times ere morn. But when the dawn
Flowed from the eastern cloud, and chamber wall,
And window white, and passion's fiery self
Wavered and lost their forms, and swam away,
Like watery circles into nothing, she
Came floating in upon a stream of sleep,
And smiling, breathed the sacredest delight
Through all his soul. Ah, dawn among thy stars,
Yet linger, scare not with thy broadening ray
The paradise our father Adam knew!
Sudden above the shoulder of the world
The broad sun bounced and flung his shafts abroad—
One quivered redly on the dewy lawns,
One broke in rose along a mountain range,
One fired the cloud, and lark beneath the cloud.
And in the wide effulgence Edwin woke,
With heart sweet thrilling, like a string from which
The hand has vanished, though the tone is yet
By silence undevoured. And, when the sun
Had in succincter splendour turned his face
Noonwards, the Prince arose, and sought the hall;
And, after frank “Good morrow” from the sons,
And graver greeting from the King, and touch
Of Bertha's hand—the while from eye and lip
Broke sunlight for a moment, and was gone—
He put aside a plan by Regner urged,
To kill the noon, on score of weariness.
And when the King had gone, and when the sons,
With six or seven great dogs at their heels,
He, with a mighty thirst to be alone,
To weed his heart of perilous delight—
For this new passion seemed unnatural
As winter breeding roses—stole unseen
From gate, and hid himself within the woods,
That billowed on and on toward the west;
And after roaming many a shadowy way,
He found a green recess, a sheltered nook,
Where many a family of violets dim
Sweetened the forest twilight with their breaths
Through mossy centuries unsmelt by man.
Covered with secrecy and silence there,
While Time sailed on, and never beat a wing,
All Nature fed his madness. Solitude
Spake with her voice, and Memory wore her face,
And in the thick-leaved murmur overhead
“Bertha” was shaped for ever. Starting up,
For his delight he feared as 'twere a fiend
In angel's shape, with cruel-lovely eyes
That fascinate a man against his will,
Drawing him onward to some horrible brink,
He left the massy coverture of leaves,
That whispered like a tempter, and sought peace
And some deliverance from his heart on wold,
Brown waste, and sea-shore. But the world was full
Of Bertha as a trembling string with sound:
The shallow stream upon its pebble stones
Was babbling “Bertha, Bertha!” all the air,
Like his own brain, was singing with her voice;
And every cliff and mount her beauty knew,
And looked on him in passion. Worn at length
He reached the palace, black against a west
Yet crimson with the memory of the sun,
And, passing through the hall, he heard, amid
A crowd of youths that lay about the fire,
Relaxed from chase, one talk about a stag
That day seen in the woods, the noblest brute
That ever antlers wore, and Regner's vow
That, though the chase should stretch o'er half the land,
The head would hang upon his trophied walls
Ere set another sun. Like bows unbent
The tired youths lay. But Regner looking up,
Saw Edwin passing, and toward him came,
With a most gay reproachfulness of tone,
But not the less reproachful that it wore
A sprightly colour. “All the day,” quoth he,
“I have been looking for thee, and each sport
Renounced for want of heart in it. Come, now,
By all the friendship as we rode last night,
And by the better day we look for still,
Do not forsake me so. I'd rather walk
With thee through shower, than with another man
Through all the summer sunshine. We are men,
Not women, and our hearts should never dwell
Upon our tongues—yet as the thing is said,
Let it remain. What can I do to kill
The tedium of the time? A mighty stag,
(A forester has brought the welcome news,)
Lairs in our woods to-night. Then in the morn,
As early as thy sluggardy will let,
Wilt thou with Bertha and the rest of us
Ride, for his antlers I have vowed to win?”
To him Prince Edwin, with a kindly face:
“I'll stir, so please thee, ere the youngling birds;
And may to-morrow prove the goodliest day
Of a whole wreath of hunting days. Thy love
Is to me, Regner, justly dear; and, though
I did account it less, I am too poor
To put it lightly by.” He then adduced
For his retirement, weariness and weight
Of anxious thought, and to his chamber went.
When, after preparation for the morn
The circle broke to bed, and while the horn
Was blowing shrilly through the hunter's dreams—
(For, passion is a substance vaporous
That cannot hold its shape a single hour),
Prince Edwin sat upon his couch, with hands
Lax hanging on his knees, while all his love
Seemed hopeless as the feasts a famished man
Beholds in dream; as brilliant and as frail
As wondrous imagery of fruit and flower
Wrought by the frost upon the window pane
At night, while wolds are steaming white and chill,
That in the morning runs a blur of tears.