'Thou read the book, my pretty Vivien ! O, ay, it is but twenty pages long, But every page having an ample marge, And every marge enclosing in the midst A square of text that looks a little blot, 669 The text no larger than the limbs of fleas; And every square of text an awful charm, Writ in a language that has long gone by,

So long that mountains have arisen since With cities on their flanks - thou read the book!

And every margin scribbled, crost, and cramm'd

With comment, densest condensation, hard To mind and eye; but the long sleepless

Then answer'd Merlin: Nay, I know

the tale.

Sir Valence wedded with an outland dame; Some cause had kept him sunder'd from

his wife.

One child they had; it lived with her; she

died.

His kinsman travelling on his own affair Was charged by Valence to bring home the child.

He brought, not found it therefore; take the truth.'

'O, ay,' said Vivien, 'over-true a tale ! What say ye then to sweet Sir Sagra.

more,

She answer'd with a low and chuckling laugh:

'Man! is he man at all, who knows and winks ?

Sees what his fair bride is and does, and winks?

780 By which the good King means to blind himself,

And blinds himself and all the Table Round

To all the foulness that they work. Myself Could call him- were it not for womanhood

The pretty, popular name such manhood earns,

Could call him the main cause of all their crime,

Yea, were he not crown'd king, coward and

fool.'

Her words had issue other than she will'd.

He dragg'd his eyebrow bushes down, and made

A snowy pent-house for his hollow eyes, And mutter'd in himself: Tell her the charm!

So, if she had it, would she rail on me
To snare the next, and if she have it not
So will she rail. What did the wanton
say?

810

"Not mount as high!" we scarce can sink as low;

For men at most differ as heaven and earth, But women, worst and best, as heaven and hell.

I know the Table Round, my friends of old;

All brave, and many generous, and some chaste.

She cloaks the scar of some repulse with lies.

I well believe she tempted them and fail'd, Being so bitter; for fine plots may fail, Tho' harlots paint their talk as well as face

With colors of the heart that are not theirs.

820

times

Face-flatterer and backbiter are the same. And they, sweet soul, that most impute a crime

Are pronest to it, and impute themselves, Wanting the mental range, or low desire Not to feel lowest makes them level all; Yea, they would pare the mountain to the plain,

To leave an equal baseness; and in this Are harlots like the crowd that if they find Some stain or blemish in a name of note, Not grieving that their greatest are so small, 831

Inflate themselves with some insane delight,

And judge all nature from her feet of clay,

Without the will to lift their eyes, and see Her godlike head crown'd with spiritual fire, And touching other worlds. I am weary

of her.'

For ease of heart, and half believed her true;

Call'd her to shelter in the hollow oak, 'Come from the storm,' and having no reply,

Gazed at the heaving shoulder and the face

Hand-hidden, as for utmost grief or shame; Then thrice essay'd, by tenderest-touching terms,

To sleek her ruffled peace of mind, in vain. At last she let herself be conquer'd by him, And as the cageling newly flown returns, The seeming-injured simple-hearted thing Came to her old perch back, and settled there.

901