the last gain and greatest.

I know not—all counsel and wit is departed, I wait for thy will; I will do it, my master.

Through the boughs of the garden I followed the singing To a smooth space of sward: there the unknown desire Of my soul I beheld,—wrought in shape of a woman.

O ye warders of Troy-walls, join hands through the darkness, Tell us tales of the Downfall, for we too are with you!

As my twin sister, young of years was she and slender, Yellow blossoms of spring-tide her hands had been gathering, But the gown-lap that held them had fallen adown And had lain round her feet with the first of the singing; Now her singing had ceased, though yet heaved her bosom As with lips lightly parted and eyes of one seeking She stood face to face with the Love that she knew not, The love that she longed for and waited unwitting; She moved not, I breathed not—till lo, a horn winded, And she started, and o'er her came trouble and wonder, Came pallor and trembling; came a strain at my heartstrings As bodiless there I stretched hands toward her beauty, And voiceless cried out, as the cold mist swept o'er me. Then again clash of arms, and the morning watch calling, And the long leaves and great twisted trunks of the chesnuts, As I sprang to my feet and turned round to the trumpets And gathering of spears and unfolding of banners That first morn of my reign and my glory's beginning.

O well were we that tide though the world was against us.

Hearken yet!—through that whirlwind of danger and battle, Beaten back, struggling forward, we fought without blemish On my banner spear-rent in the days of my father, On my love of the land and the longing I cherished For a tale to be told when I, laid in the minster, Might hear it no more; was it easy of winning, Our bread of those days? Yet as wild as the work was, Unforgotten and sweet in my heart was that vision, And her eyes and her lips and her fair body's fashion Blest all times of rest, rent the battle asunder, Turned ruin to laughter and death unto dreaming; And again and thrice over again did I go there Ere spring was grown winter: in the meadows I met her, By the sheaves of the corn, by the down-falling apples, Kind and calm, yea and glad, yet with eyes of one seeking.     —Ah the mouth of one waiting, ere all shall be over!—     But at last in the winter-tide mid the dark forest     

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