II.
Part II.
I.
Nurse Agnes stood in Langdale gate:
She heard young Bracy go:
For young Bracy's sake and Sir Leoline's,
A prayer she whispers low.
II.
Sir Leoline lay at the gates of death,
Nor pray'd, nor spoke nor stirr'd:
Nor save by Agnes' trembling ear,
His breathing could be heard.
III.
She hears his breathing faint and slow,
She says ‘God's will be done:
But I have lost a son to-day,
And he has lost a son.
IV.
‘For I too pray'd to Mary Queen,
And I beheld a sign:
And on the midnight of mine eyes
Came Lady Geraldine.
V.
‘She cursed thee, O Sir Leoline,
She cursed thy daughter sweet:
She cursed the gallant and the bold:
She bade him seek the maiden meek
Lies buried in the mould.
VI.
‘She bade him go to Charliot,
She laugh'd that he should go:
For he should die with foul fiends by,
And by the wall lie low:
Chill and bare to midnight air,
For she would work him woe;
And she would go to Charliot
And laugh to meet him there.’
VII.
She thought of vanish'd Christabel,
She cursed the jealous angry spell,
(And cross'd herself with holy sign);
That wrought so on the aged knight,
When, to work out her fiendish spite
He gave his own true daughter bright
A prey to Lady Geraldine.
VIII.
Nurse Agnes turned to Sir Leoline;
She said: he slumbers calm and deep:
On the carven bench she sate her low,
And dreams were with her in her sleep.
IX.
A weary way, a weary way,
She saw the gallant Bracy go:
She saw him stand on Thames' fair strand,
She saw him touch the southern land,
And on to Breton Charliot.
X.
A weary way, a dreary road:
A dun-wove cloud of driving snow:
By forest hoar, by rivers frore,
O'er ice that hung from shore to shore,
While deep beneath the currents pour,
And still o'erhead where'er he sped,
Two drifting seams of azure go.
XI.
By dark Rouen, by Lisieux,
By Caen-sur-Orne and gray Bayeux;
Avranches, and where the holy Mount
Frowns on Saint Malo strand:
And where o'er Merlin's wizard fount,
Enwreathed along the valley stand
The giant glades of Brocelyande.
XII.
Now, stain'd upon an amber sky,
The blackening turrets he can spy,
Tall warders of the waste afar;
Grim giant terrors of the foe,
As o'er Roannez' plain they go,
And pride of wild Armorica.
