For by the day he lay in languid mood,

And night was scarcely more filled up with solitude.

Certes, it was right sorrowful to see

So very gentle and inspired a child, Wearing away, as so it seemed to be,

And going to his grave serene and mild: The warrior's heart, that is so fiery wild, Breaks—and a flood of glory streams around ;— But where youth in its quiet is beguiled To the chill tomb, it doth the gazer wound; For there no beauty is-no breath-no sight-no sound!

At night he felt a longing to be thrown

Into some forest dun, where trees were thick,

And water very cool: to make a throne

Of some quaint bank, and in a pleasant trick
Of idleness, a coronal to pick

Of lilies of the water for his head,

And ever while his pulse was beating quick With pain, he sweet things of the summer said, And framed this little song upon his midnight bed.

O, melon-scented lily!

O, water queen of flowers!

When shall I see the silver waves,

Dancing around thee, like sweet slaves

To beauty in its bowers;
When shall I take an earthly part
In honouring thy golden heart?

O, pretty rose autumnal!

O, fairy queen of trees!

When may I trace thy gentle buds,
Adorned with their emerald studs,

1

In their green palaces :

When see thy vernal velvet fall,

Under thy ruby coronal?

The sound of forest music,

The water song of streams,
Are become dim and strange to me,
As musings of old witchery;

But in my fitful dreams,

And in my waking weary hours,
Spirits come to me, as from flowers.

GENEVIEVE.

ALL thoughts, all passions, all delights,

Whatever stirs this mortal frame,

Are all but ministers of Love,

And feed his sacred flame.

Oft in my waking dreams do I

Live o'er again that happy hour,
When midway on the mount I lay,
Beside the ruined tower.

The moonshine, stealing o'er the scene,
Had blended with the lights of eve;
And she was there, my hope, my joy,
My own dear Genevieve !

Coleridge.

She leant against the armed man,
The statue of the armed knight;
She stood and listened to my lay,
Amid the lingering light.

Few sorrows hath she of her own,
My hope! my joy! my Genevieve!
She loves me best, whene'er I sing

The songs that make her grieve.

I play'd a soft and doleful air,
I sang an old and moving story-
An old rude song, that suited well
That ruin wild and hoary.

She listen'd with a flitting blush,
With downcast eyes and modest grace,
For well she knew I could not chuse
But gaze upon her face.

I told her of the knight that wore
Upon his shield a burning brand;
And that for ten long years he wooed
The Lady of the Land.

I told her how he pined; and ah!
The deep, the low, the pleading tone
With which I sang another's love,
Interpreted my own.

She listened with a flitting blush,
With downcast eyes and modest grace,

And she forgave me, that I gazed

Too fondly on her face!

But when I told the cruel scorn

That crazed that bold and lovely Knight, And that he crossed the mountain-woods, Nor rested day nor night;

That sometimes from the savage den,
And sometimes from the darksome shade,
And sometimes starting up at once

There came and looked him in the face
An angel, beautiful and bright;
And that he knew it was a fiend,
This miserable Knight!

And that unknowing what he did,
He leap'd amid a murderous band,
And saved from outrage worse than death
The Lady of the Land!

And how she wept, and claspt his knees; And how she tended him in vain

And ever strove to expiate

The score that crazed his brain,

And that she nursed him in a cave;.
And how his madness went away,
When on the yellow forest leaves,
A dying man he lay.

His dying words-but when I reached That tenderest strain of all the ditty, My faultering voice and pausing harp Disturbed her soul with pity ▸

All impulses of soul and sense

Had thrill'd my guileless Genevieve;

The music, and the doleful tale,
The rich and balmy eve;

And hopes, and fears that kindle hope,
An undistinguishable throng,

And gentle wishes long subdued,

Subdued and cherished long;

She wept with pity and delight,
She blushed with love and virgin shame :
And like the murmur of a dream,

I heard her breathe my name.

Her bosom heav'd-she stept aside,
As conscious of my look she stept-
Then suddenly, with timorous eye,
She fled to me and wept.

She half enclosed me with her arms, She pressed me with a meek, embrace; And bending back her head, look'd up, And gazed upon my face.

"Twas partly love and partly fear,
And partly 'twas a bashful art,
That I might rather feel than see,
The swelling of her heart.

I calm'd her fears, and she was calm,
And told her love with virgin pride,
And so I won my Genevieve,

My bright and beauteous bride.