Thus her heart rejoices greatly, And beneath the gate she turns; Than all those she saw before; Not a lord in all the county All at once the color flushes Her sweet face from brow to chin: As it were with shame she blushes, And her spirit changed within. Then her countenance all over Pale again as death did prove: But he clasped her like a lover, And he cheered her soul with love. So she strove against her weakness, Though at times her spirit sank: Shaped her heart with woman's meekness To all duties of her rank: And a gentle consort made he, And her gentle mind was such That she grew a noble lady, And the people loved her much. But a trouble weighed upon her, And perplexed her, night and morn, With the burthen of an honor Unto which she was not born. Faint she grew, and ever fainter, Three fair children first she bore him, Weeping, weeping late and early, Deeply mourned the Lord of Burleigh, And he came to look upon her, And he looked at her and said, Bring the dress, and put it on her, That she wore when she was wed." Then her people, softly treading, Bore to earth her body, drest In the dress that she was wed in, That her spirit might have rest. SIR LAUNCELOT AND QUEEN GUINEVERE. A FRAGMENT. LIKE souls that balance joy and pain, Came in a sun-lit fall of rain. In crystal vapor everywhere Blue isles of heaven laughed between, And, far in forest-deeps unseen, The topmost linden gathered green Sometimes the linnet piped his song: SIR LAUNCELOT AND QUEEN GUINEVERE. 127 In curves the yellowing river ran, Then, in the boyhood of the year, She seemed a part of joyous Spring: Buckled with golden clasps before; Now on some twisted ivy-net, On mosses thick with violet, Her cream-white mule his pastern set: And now more fleet she skimmed the plains Than she whose elfin prancer springs By night to eery warblings, When all the glimmering moorland rings With jingling bridle-reins. |