University of Virginia Library

I.DESIRE.

THERE dwelt a squire in Poitou of old times,
Under the fragrant limes
That fringed a city very fair and wide,
Set on a green hill-side;
And all about the city with its slow
Interminable flow,
Faint mem'ries murm'ring of a bygone day,
A river went, that lay
Upon the woven greensward of the fields,
In pools like silver shields
Of fallen giants flung upon the grass,
And round the walls did pass
And kiss'd the grey old ramparts of the place
With the enchanted grace
Of its fair crystal shallows, in the morn
Flush'd silver as the thorn
Of a May-dawning and when day was done,
Rose-ruddy with the sun,
That fill'd the arteries of the land with gold.
Fair was the place and old
Beyond the memory of man, with roofs
Tall-peak'd and hung with woofs
Of dainty stone-work, jewell'd with the grace
Of casements, in the face
Of the white gables inlaid, in all hues
Of lovely reds and blues.
At every corner of the winding ways
A carven saint did gaze,
With mild sweet eyes, upon the quiet town,
From niche and shrine of brown;
And many an angel, graven for a charm
To save the folk from harm
Of evil sprites, stood sentinel above
High pinnacle and roof.
The place seem'd sanctified by quietude,
With some quaint peace imbued;
And down its streets the sloping sunlight leant
On roof and battlement,
Like a God's blessing, loath to pass away,
Lingering beyond the day.
But seldom came the pomp and blazonry
Of clamorous war anigh
The calm sweet stead; but there folk came to spend
The days of their life's end
In strifeless quiet, in the tender haze
Of the old knightly days,
That bathed the place in legend and romance.
Haply, bytimes, a lance
Would glitter in the sun, as down the street
The mailed knights rode to meet
The armies of the king of all the land,
And with loud-clanging brand
And noise of many a clarion and a horn,
The bannerets were borne
Before them by their men-at-arms: but yet
The walls were unbeset
By very war and men look'd lazily
Across the plains, to see
The far-off dust-clouds, speck'd with points of light,
That told of coming fight
In the dim distance, where the fighting-men
Trail'd, through some distant glen
Or round the crown of some high-crested hill,
Halberd and spear and bill,
And to the walls the echoed sound would come
Of some great army's hum
And clank of harness, mix'd with trumpet-clang.
And now and then there rang
At the shut gates a silver clarion's call,
And the raised bridge would fall
To give some knight night's harbourage, who went
To a great tournament
Or act of arms in some far distant town
Beyond the purpled brown
Of the great hills. But else the quiet place
Slept in a lazy grace
Of old romance and felt the stress and need
Little in very deed
Of the great world, that compass'd it about
With many a woe and doubt
Unknown to it. Yea, for the quietness
And peace that did possess
The town, had many a learned clerk, that sought
Deep in the mines of thought,
Made to himself a home within the walls;
Among the ancient halls
Wrought many a limner, famous in the land,
And many an one with hand
Well skill'd to sweep the lute-strings to delight,
And crafty men that write
Fair books and fill the marge with painted things,
Gold shapes of queens and kings,
Fair virgins sitting in bird-haunted bowers,
And every weed that flowers
From spring through summer to the waning year,—
Here without let or fear
These all did dwell and wrought at arts of peace.
And there, too, dwelt at ease
This squire of Poitou. Ebhart was his name;
One not unknown to fame
In the old days, when he was wont to rear
Banner and banner'd spear
Before great knights and rend the thickest press
Of foemen with the stress
Of his hot youth. Of old, in very deed,
There once had been much rede
Of his fair prowess and the deeds of arms
He wrought with his stout arms
Upon the enemies of land and king;
And of a truth, no thing
Was wanting to the squire but yet one field
Of fight, ere on his shield
The glorious blazon of a knight should shine,
Before the golden sign
Of chivalry should glance at either heel
And the ennobling steel
Fall softly on his shoulder. But that day
Was long since past away
Out of his thought, and all the old desire
Had faded from the squire
Of golden spurs and every knightly thing.
For, as the years did bring
The winterward of life and age began
To creep upon the man,
Came weariness of strife and wish for rest
And thought that peace was best
For those whose youth had left them and the first
Fresh heat of blood, that burst
All bounds and barriers of rugged Fate.
Wherefore he did abate
His warlike toil, and after many a day
He had himself away
From the grim strife and clangour of the time
Wholly withdrawn, in prime
Of later manhood, and in arts of peace
Thenceforward without cease
His mind had vantaged. And in chief, such quests,
As the old alchymists
And nigromancers sought, himself he set
To follow and forget
The ills of living, seeking in old tomes,
Heap'd up within the glooms
Of scholars' shelves for many a dusty year,
To find the words that clear
The secret of the mysteries of life
And all the problems rife
In changeful being, that for aye anew
Unto the sage do sue
For due solution. Many a year he wrought
At these dim quests, and sought—
Chiefest of all the hidden things that lie
And mock men's fantasy
In the recesses of forbidden arts—
The mystic lore that parts
The soul of man from grinding cares of earth
And with a new bright birth
More blessèd than the angels maketh him;
And had upon the brim
Of the strange knowledge trembled many a time,
Yet back into the slime
Of the old state fell ever, missing aye
The thing he did essay
By some hair's-breadth of crystal pitiless,
That against all his stress
Avail'd to stop his passing heavenward.
So, many a year he pour'd
His strength into the sieve of that strange task,
As in a Danaïd's cask,
And failing ever, ever hoped anew,
And ever did ensue
Upon the well-worn path he loved so well;
Until, one day, it fell
That, studying in an ancient book—fair writ
With chymic inks that bit
Into the pictured vellum of the page
So deeply that with age
The words fail'd scarcely, bound with many a hasp
And quaintly-graven clasp
Of gold and tarnish'd silver,—by some chance
Of favouring Fate, his glance,
That had been wandering dull and listlessly
Amid a prosy sea
Of ancient saws and schoolmen's verbiage,
Lit on a close-writ page,
Whose very aspect made his heart to leap
With some strange stirring. Deep
And long he search'd the scroll, till on a space
Left wide betwixt the grace
Of woven flowers and goldwork, that the rim
Of the fair script did limn
With such bright broidery of lovely hues
As ancient folk did use
To beautify their pleasant books withal,
He read a rescript, all
In twisted Greek, contracted to such maze
Of crabbèd Proclus-ways,
That with much labour hardly could he win
To find the sense within
The gnarl'd, rude characters. But well repaid
For all the toil he laid
To the deciphering, in truth, he was;
For so it came to pass
That as the meaning, veil'd at first and dim,
Grew visible to him
More and more certainly, the squire was ware
That in the scroll a rare
And precious secret of the craft lay hid,
Cunningly set amid
A maze of devious words, that, save to one
Long-learn'd and grey-hair'd grown
In all the occult arts, must lead the wit
Wandering astray from it
Among void fancies. But the squire had spent
Long years in study, bent
Over such books, and so was skill'd in all
Devices wherewithal
The ancient masters sought their pearls to hide
From such profane as tried
To fathom their strange mysteries, and keep
Their wisdom dim and deep
For those alone that of the craftship were;
And so, with toil and care,
After much labour from the scroll he learn'd
The thing for which he yearn'd
So many fruitless years; the charm that frees
The soul from miseries
And joys of life: for it therein was told
That, if with virgin gold
Won with his sweat and beaten into shoon,
Beneath the waxing moon,
With his own hands, a man should shoe his horse
And braced for a great course,
Should fearless ride into the setting sun,—
Before seven days were done,
He of a truth should come unto a place,
Where, with unearthly grace
And ravishment, the dreams of his dead youth,
In all their lovely sooth
Beyond imagining, should be upbuilt
Before his eyes, and gilt
With all the gold and pearls and flówers that be
Within man's fantasy;
And there it should be given him to dwell
For ever, 'neath the spell
Of that unchanging magic of his thought,
Wherein no thing unsought
For lack of his imagining should fail,
Nor any note of wail
Nor hum of weary toil should enter there,
But in the restful air
Life should be painless under dream-blue skies,
Lit with the radiant eyes
Of that fair queen, whom all in dreams do love,
Set in the realms above
Our reach, as Dante loved his Beatrice.—
And lovelier things than this,
Ay, and more wondrous, were recounted there
Of how that place was fair
And bright beyond man's thought of earthly bliss.
So, little strange it is
If Ebhart, reading of the things set down
Upon the vellum, brown
With age, of that old book, grew wonder-glad
And for a little had
Scarce senses to receive the words he read
And all the goodlihead
Of promise, that the faithful scroll had held
So many a year enspell'd
From all but him the master and adept.
Hot tears of joy he wept
To think there was to him, of all his kind,
Alone such bliss assign'd;
And presently began his thoughts to set
Awork how he should get
This thing he yearn'd for: for the man was poor
And hardly could procure
Fit sustenance. In study had he spent
His substance, being bent
On his strange hopes past thought of worldly gain.
But, as he rack'd his brain,
Awhile all fruitlessly, for means whereby
He should make shift to buy
The needed metal, that came nigh to be
The price of a squire's fee,
He suddenly bethought him that there yet,
Uncharged by any debt,
Remain'd to him one little piece of land,
Fruitful enough and spann'd
By the swift Loire; a little vine-set field
Whose fertile soil did yield
A dole of daily substance, scant enough
For all save those that plough
The fields of knowledge; earnt as the reward
Of his young blood outpour'd
On many a foughten field of sunny France;
Which, being sold, perchance
Might, with some curious arms he once had gain'd,
Whilom when Fortune deign'd
To favour him against his foe in fight,
Fulfil the sum aright
He needed to possess the thing he sought.
But if (O woful thought!)
His substance being wasted in this wise,
His glorious enterprise
Should fail, for all his hopes and efforts? Why,
What could he do but die?
And to a fighter, death was terrorless.
While, if the Fates should bless
His long desire with the fulfill'd delight,
Would not his soul be quite
Absolved from life and its ignoble need,
Seeing that he should feed
On the fair food of an unearthly bliss
And with his love's best kiss
And in her sight from all the weary dearth
And stressfulness of earth
Be purified? So either hap might chance,
Ill or deliverance,
And in no wise should he have need again
Of that unlovely bane
Of our dull lives, that is our curse and stay,
Without which is no way
To live nor with it to live happily.
Wherefore his land sold he
And all his arms, except one suit of mail,
Wrought out with many a scale
And ring of steel, and his good sword and spear
And all the warlike gear
He had erst ridden to the battle in,
With age and use full thin
And rusty grown, but still of temper keen
And faithful, having been
A right good armourer's work of middle Spain;
And with the double gain
He bought a lump of virgin gold as large
As a Moor's battle-targe,
Wherewith to work the magic that he learnt
Within the scroll. There burnt
Within his breast so uncontroll'd a fire
And urgence of desire
To fill the measure of his high intent,
That scarce the day was spent,
Whereon he bought the gold, and in the sky
The moon was white and high,
Ere to the roof-top of his house he crept,
And there, whilst all folk slept,
In the full ripple of the flooding light,
Did work the livelong night,
To fashion out the ore with his own hands
Into smooth beaten bands
Of wroughten gold, moulding them circle-wise
Into such shape and guise
As for the seven days' journey should be meet
To guard his horse's feet
Against the highway's stones. The work did grow
Beneath his hands full slow
And tediously; for many a year was past
Since he had labour'd last
At such smith's craft; but yet the earnest will
Redeem'd the want of skill,
And with much toil at last the squire did make
The stubborn gold to take
Shoe-shape. All night he wrought beneath the moon,
And with the dawn the shoon
Fourfold were finish'd, round beyond impeach,
Pierced with four holes in each;
Nor, for the fitting, unto each did fail
The needful golden nail,
To clasp the circlet through the holes fourfold.
And so it chanced the gold
Was wholly spent, to the last glittering grain,
Nor did a speck remain
Of the thick ore, when the last nail was wrought;
Wherefore Squire Ebhart thought
The omen fair and braced his heart with it.
Then, as the night did flit
Across the hilltops in the van of morn
And the pale lights were born,
That in the dawn do herald the young day,
Streaking the cheerless grey
Of heaven with their rose and opal woof,—
Descending from the roof,
Before the daybreak, hastily he clad
The harness, that he had
Yet left to him, upon his sturdy breast
And in his morion's crest
Set the strait plume he had been wont to wear
In the old days, once fair
And flaunting scarlet, but now faded sore.
Then did he strike the four
Worn shoes of iron from his horse's feet,
And in their stead the meet
Gold circlets set and beat them firmly on.
And now the steed must don
His harness and caparisons of war,
Such as of old he bore,
Chanfrein and poitrail with its rusty spike,
Rerebrace and all the like.
And so,—the twain addrest in everything
For knightly venturing
Needful and meet,—the man bestrode his horse;
And on the appointed course
The old squire sallied forth with his old steed,
As over hill and mead
The young day came with slow and timorous feet,
And the chill air grew sweet
With the clear dews and the pure early scent
Of the waked flow'rets, blent
For incense to the daybreak from the earth;
And in the tender birth
Of morning all things joy'd, and tunes were strong
Of larks' and linnets' song.
So, riding through the dim white streets, as yet
Unstirr'd by all the fret
And hum of daily labour, waking all
The echoes with the fall
Of his steed's hoofs upon the hilly way,
He came to where there lay
Before the gate the guardians of the town,
Upon the grass thrown down
To watch the portal, cross'd with many a bar
And bolt of steel. Ajar
The wide leaves stood, whilst sleep possess'd the folk
So wholly, that the stroke
Of the squire's horse-hoofs stirr'd their slumbering
But as an echoing
Of sound in dreams, nor all his calling roused
Them anywise, so drowsed
With sleep they were.—And so he thought to make
His outward way, nor break
The warders' wide-mouth'd rest; but as he strove
The ancient gate to move
On its dull flanges, clogg'd with all the rust
Of many a year, and thrust
The half-closed, ponderous leaves apart enough
To give him way, the gruff
Harsh creaking of the hinge that swung for him,—
Breaking upon the dim
Sleep-troubled senses of the folk that lay
Adream beside the way,—
With some faint mimic sound of buckler-clang
And foemen's trumpets, rang
Within the dull dazed channels of their brain,
Snapping the slumberous chain
Wherewith the dream-god held their heavy sense
In leaden-limb'd suspense;
So that they started up from sleep and saw
The squire, that in the raw
Chill morning dimness pass'd athwart the gate;
And wondering thereat,
Caught up bright arms and cried to him to stay.
But he, upon his way
Slackening not, faced round upon his seat,
That so their eyes might meet
A visage that they knew; and they, for friend
Recalling him, did wend
Back to their ward, with many a mutter'd oath,
Born of their thwarted sloth,
'Gainst him that so untimely broke their sleep.
But Ebhart down the steep
Of the fair hill rode, all unheeding them,
Whilst on the pearlèd hem
Of the far sky the dim day brighten'd up
Into the azure cup
Of the sweet heaven, that lay on field and hill,
All rippleless, until
Its blue deeps broke upon the purple verge
Into a snowy surge
Of swan-breast cloudlets, laced with palest gold;
And then the shadows roll'd
Their mantles round them, and the lingering night
Fled from the coming light.
And so uprose the golden-armour'd sun
And smote the ridges dun
Of the deep-bosom'd hills and kindled all
Their furrows tenebral
Into a wonderwork of luminous spires,
Hung with the fretted fires
Of dawning, and each crest in the pure light
Grew to a chrysolite
Of aspiration. On each upland lawn
Down fell the dewy dawn
And waked the flowers from their green-folded sleep,
And o'er each verdant steep
Of sloping greensward swept the sun-chased mist,
Ruby and amethyst
With pitiless sweet splendour. Every wood
With the sweet minstrel brood
Grew carolful, with, here and there, at first
A note, and then a burst
Of single song, soon swelling to a sea
Of choral ecstasy
And thanks for the young day and the delight
Of victory o'er the might
Of darkness; and each living thing that dwells
Within the cool wood-dells
Or in the meadows, to the awakening
Of that sweet day of Spring
Did homage. So rode Ebhart onward, through
The cool sweet tender blue
Of the fresh springtide dawning, glad at heart,
Following the rays that part
The morning sky to westward. By the edge,
Purple with flower'd sedge,
Of the clear stream, whose tinkling currents went
Toward the occident,
The stout squire fared, through many a thymy field
With the fresh heaven ceil'd,—
Crush'd with his horsehoofs many a tender flower,
That in the sweet dawn hour
Open'd its gold and azure eyes from dreams
Of the near June's sunbeams,
And saw the kine regardant on the grass,
That aye, as he did pass
Across the greensward on his destrere true,
Wet to the hocks with dew,
Turn'd their slow heads to gaze upon the twain
Awhile, then back again
Bent down their muzzles with a lazy grace
To the rich pasture-place,
Thickset with flowers and juicy herbs. And then,—
About the hour when men
Are wont to go to labour and the light
Across the fields grows white
And large with full mid-morn,—the clear stream pass'd
The green sweet fields and fast
Among the emerald cloisters of a wood
Its farther course pursued,
Streaking the moss with brown and silver threads
And sprinkling the pale beds
Of primroses and windflowers, white and blue,
With its life-giving dew.
And in the ways the light grew dim again;
But through the leaves, like rain
Of gold, the sunshine broke and fell in showers
Upon the upturn'd flowers,
Whilst all the birds made carol to the May,
Answering the brooklet's lay
With choral thanks for all the cool sweet rills
It brought them from the hills.
And Ebhart, following the river's way,
Rode onward through the day
Along the fair green lapses of the wood,
With many a network strew'd
Of frolic sunbeams; and as he did fare,
Full often was he ware
Of peeping hares and velvet-coated deer
That fled as he drew near,
And couchant fawns, upon the bracken set
For morning sleep, as yet
Unknowing fright, that with great fearless eyes
Did gaze on him, childwise,
Questioning in themselves what this might be,
Clanking in panoply
Of rust-red mail along the ferny maze
Of the cool woodland ways.
The rabbits scamper'd from his horse's feet,
As o'er some wood-lawn, sweet
With hyacinths, he pass'd, or down some glen,
Purple with cyclamen;
And now and then, as through the wood he went,
On his strange hopes intent,
There met him some tann'd woodman, stout and bluff,
That with a word of gruff
Early day-greeting did accost the squire.
But else of his desire
No foreign harshness broke the pleasant spell,
Nor on his senses fell
A human sight or sound; but all was sweet
And silent, as is meet
For him that dreams in the fair midmost Spring,
Amid the birds that sing
And the fresh flowers that gladden the old world
With their pure eyes, impearl'd
In many a whorl of virginal faint green.
Slow wound the way between
The columns of the trees; and now and then
Some slope of shallowing glen
Ceased suddenly upon an open space,
Where many a fern did lace
The greensward and the heather put forth buds
And the red sad-eyed studs
Of pimpernels did diaper the grass.
Anon the squire did pass
Betwixt lush hedge-rows, riding on again
Along some country lane,
Tangled with briers and the early rose
And the white weed that blows
With fragrant flower-flakes in the flush of May,—
Whereon the shadows lay
Of the new-leaféd trees, that over it
A sun-fleck'd roof did knit
To ward it from the heat. Now, as he went
Adown some steep descent
Or toil'd along some bridle-path, high hung
Betwixt thin woods that clung
Close to the brow of some tall cliff-spur's steep,
His downward glance would sweep
Across gold plains and cities thick with men
And many a hollow glen,
Sweet with the blossom'd vines in many a row,
Toss'd seas of apple-snow
And dropping gold of fire-flowers. Then again,
As on the open plain
The pair paced on and felt the sun once more,
The fragrant breezes bore
To him the distant hum of men and life,
And the clear sounds were rife
In the far distance of the village bells;
And on the mossy fells,
In the blue sky-marge, lay within his sight
Some little town of white,
With roofs rose-gilded by the flooding sun;
For the noon had begun
To hover over hills and charm the air
Into the peace most fair
And stirless of the midday. On the wold
Slumber'd with wings of gold
The hours, and all things rested. Not a breath
Told of the late-left death
Of the sad winter; but the world was glad,
As if for aye it had
The fair possession of the lovely May.
And then again the way
Wound down into the wood, and from the dells
Gush'd up the perfumed swells
Of breath from violets bedded in the moss,
And many a hare would cross
The sunn'd green pathway with a sunbeam's speed;
And still the valiant steed
Paced on, unslackening. So went horse and man,
Until the sun began
To draw toward the setting and the West
Grew glorious on the crest
Of the dumb hills. And now the day did fold
Its mantle of deep gold
And purple for its death upon the hills,
And all the pomp, that fills
The tragedy of sunset with the glow
Of a king's death, did strow
The radiant heaven. So down sank the sun,
And so the day was done;
And in the occident the silver horn
Of the pale moon was borne
Up in the gold-tinct watchet of the skies,
And one by one, the eyes
Of the unsleeping stars were visible
In the clear purple bell
Of that great blossom that we mortals name
God's heaven, and there came
The hush of sleep upon the lovely land.
The Dream-god went and fann'd
The air with flower-breathed breezes, and one knew,
In the clear sweep of dew,
The backward wind, that had been wandering o'er
The pleasant fresh-flower'd shore,
And now upon the breast of the dead day
Came back to die away
Into the stillness. Still the west was flush'd,
Until the day-birds, hush'd
By the prone night, gave place to those that hold
The even with the gold
Of their clear grieving song. The nightingale
Began to tell the tale
Of her great poet's sorrow, that is aye
New-born and may not die,
Being too lovely and too sad withal,—
For sorrow may not fall
Into the deeps of comfortable death,
As may the Summer's breath
And the fierce gladness of the July-tide,—
And to his plighted bride
The night-thrush piped, amid the plaited leaves,
And every thing that grieves
Melodiously for the dead day was fain
To fill the air again
With silver sadness. So the night fell down,
And in her mantle brown
All weary things addrest themselves to sleep,
And over all, the deep
Sweet silence brooded. Then the man was tired,
And eke his steed required
Some natural ministrance of rest and food.
So in the middle wood
The squire dismounted and with ears attent,
Sought for some stream that went
Between the trees; and speedily the plash
Of ripples, that did dash
And gurgle over pebbles, with a note
Of welcome nearness smote
Upon his hearing; and without delay
He came where o'er the grey
Of the moon-coloured mosses, trickled through
The grass-roots and the rue
A crystal rill, that to the wavering moon
Sang up its changeless tune
In the pale night. Thither the squire did bring
His horse; then, by the spring
Kneeling, drank deep and long, and looking round,
Spied fallen on the ground
Great store of berries from a neighbouring tree.
So from the boughs did he
Gather the fruit, and finding it was meet
For human food, did eat
A handful of sweet berries, red and brown,—
And satisfied, lay down
By his tired horse, that had already laid
Himself beneath the shade
Of a great elm, upon the cushion'd moss,
Crushing the flowers across
The twisted grass-stalks in the mossy sward,
For many a fragrant yard,
Beneath his weight; for all the earth was strewn
So thick, beneath the moon,
With all the Spring-tide heritage and dower
Of lovely weed and flower,
One might not tread there but the feet must crush
Many a sweet flower-flush
And broidery on the green earth's bridal gown.
So fell the midnight down;
And still Squire Ebhart, by his sleeping horse,
Mused of the next day's course,
And for the changeless thought of coming bliss,
Forgot to woo the kiss
Of the fair sleep that is all tired men's due.
But, at the last, the dew
Of slumber fell upon his heavy lids,
And the fair God, that bids
The dreamer to the far enchanted land,
Laid on his brows a hand
Of woven moonbeams; till the thoughts took flight
Into the brooding night,
And with a smiling face, the sleeper lay
And dreamt of many a day
Long lost behind the glimmering veils of time,
And in a golden clime
Went wandering through the dreamlands of his youth,
Under the sweet skies' ruth,
Link'd to his lady. So Squire Ebhart slept,
What time the slow night swept
Along the silver woodways and the hours
Folded their wings on flowers,
For peace of moonlight, till the moon 'gan fade
For break of day, that laid
Its cold grey hands upon the purple dusk
And from the hodden husk
Of the small hours drew forth the rosy bud
Of morning, all a-flood
With glittering dews: the golden dawn 'gan wake,
With many a rosy flake
And pearl of sungleams flung across the eaves;
And through the screen of leaves,
That overlay the place where Ebhart slept,
The frolic sunlight crept,
By help of some stray chinks within the woof
Of the green luminous roof,
And kissing all his face, as there supine
He lay, in frolic vine
And grass embow'red, warn'd him that day was come;
And then the awakening hum
Of the fresh wood and the bright tuneful clang
Of quiring birds, that sang
The reveillade of morning, with the gold
Of the broad sun-glow, told
His drowsy sense that it was morn again
And he too long had lain
In faineant slumber. Then did he arise
And from his heavy eyes
Brushing with drowsy hands the dust of sleep,
Awhile watch'd the light creep
Along the crests; then suddenly bethought
Him of the thing he sought
And how, if he would come to his desire,
Before the sun rose higher,
At once upon his forward way he must
Be fain. And so he thrust
His sleep from off him and with gladsome heart
Addrest him to depart
Upon his second day of journeying.
So, stooping to the spring
That well'd up through the thyme-roots clear and cool,
He wash'd away the dull
Gross heaviness of night that lay on him
And standing on the brim
Of the brown rippled pool, he call'd his steed,
That in the neighbouring weed
Did graze; and at his call the faithful beast
Was fain to leave his feast
And to his side came splashing through the fount,
In haste. Then did he mount
Into the saddle without more delay,
And to find out the way
He should travérse, a second he did pause
Half doubtfully, because
The man with sleep was somewhat dazed nor knew
At first what path led due
Toward the setting and the golden west;
Then to the realms of rest,
That lie beyond the day, his face he set,
And spurr'd his horse. Not yet
The dew was sun-dried from the pearlèd grass,
As steed and man did pass
Along the windings of the forest ways,
Nor the faint scented haze,
That hovers in the vanward of the morn,
Over the flowers, had worn
Its shimmering webs away, for the sun-glare,
Into the thin blue air
That waves unseen between the noontide rays;—
For, seven long Spring days,
From earliest morning to the couchant sun,
Must Ebhart ride, nor shun
The long day's labour,—turning not aside
For aught that he espied
Of fair or tempting,—if he would possess
The yearn'd-for loveliness
Of his high dreams. So seven long days he rode
Along green pass and road,
From morning-glitter to the even-gloam,
Under the blue sky-dome,
Following his dream through many changing lands;
Now o'er the white sea-sands,
With horsehoofs splashing through the foamy spray
That broke across the way,—
Now passing through the till'd fair fields of men,
Hearkening to lark and wren
And all the fowls whose kindly use it is
Folk with the promised bliss
Of their sweet song, to hearten at their toil,—
Now riding where the soil
Blew thick and sweet with roses red and white,
And with the fair delight
Of minstrelsy the scented air was weft;
And whiles within the cleft
Of many a bare rock and savage hill,
Whose rifts rich gems did fill
To overflowing and along whose veins
The red gold blazed, like stains
Of sunlight fix'd by some magician's skill.
Through many a mountain rill,
Swollen to torrents by the young year's rains,
And over blossom'd plains
Of heathy moorland, undefiled by feet
Of toiling men and sweet
With blowing breezes from the distant sea,—
Through deeps of greenery
And dim dumb churches of the giant pines,
Ranged in sad stately lines,
Waiting the coming of the Gods to be
To hail with hymns,—rode he
Unwearying alway; whilst the golden shoes
Each day some part did lose
Of their soft metal on the pointed stones;
For all along the cones
Of many a mountain range he toil'd, whereo'er
No foot had pass'd before,
Save that of goat or deer,—through many a reach
Of grey and shingly beach
And many a flinty pass; nor might aside
Turn from the highway's wide
Rough band of white, that wound out far away
Into the dying day,
To seek the tender greensward of the meads
That lay beside him. Needs
Must he endure the utmost of the toil,
The bitterest of the coil
Of struggles and of hardships, that abode
Upon his wishward road.