the king To-day will surely visit her when vespers ring.”

p. 31

p. 32

p. 33

Joyful, Minuccio bore the joyous word, And told at full, while none but Lisa heard, How each thing had befallen, sang the song, And, like a patient nurse who would prolong All means of soothing, dwelt upon each tone, Each look, with which the mighty Aragon Marked the high worth his royal heart assigned To that dear place he held in Lisa’s mind. She listened till the draughts of pure content Through all her limbs like some new being went— Life, not recovered, but untried before, From out the growing world’s unmeasured store p. 34Of fuller, better, more divinely mixed. ’Twas glad reverse: she had so firmly fixed To die, already seemed to fall a veil Shrouding the inner glow from light of senses pale.

p. 34

 

Her parents, wondering, see her half arise; Wondering, rejoicing, see her long dark eyes Brimful with clearness, not of ’scaping tears, But of some light ethereal that enspheres Their orbs with calm, some vision newly learnt Where strangest fires erewhile had blindly burnt. She asked to have her soft white robe and band And coral ornaments; and with her hand She gave her long dark locks a backward fall, Then looked intently in a mirror small, And feared her face might, perhaps, displease the king: p. 35“In truth,” she said, “I am a tiny thing: I was too bold to tell what could such visit bring.”

p. 35

Meanwhile the king, revolving in his thought That innocent passion, was more deeply wrought To chivalrous pity; and at vesper-bell, With careless mien which hid his purpose well, Went forth on horseback, and, as if by chance Passing Bernardo’s house, he paused to glance At the fine garden of this wealthy man, This Tuscan trader turned Palermitan; But, presently dismounting, chose to walk Amid the trellises, in gracious talk With this same trader, deigning even to ask If he had yet fulfilled the father’s task Of marrying that daughter, whose young charms Himself, betwixt the passages of arms, p. 36Noted admiringly. “Monsignor, no, She is not married: that were little woe, Since she has counted barely fifteen years; But all such hopes of late have turned to fears; She droops and fades, though, for a space quite brief,— Scarce three hours past,—she finds some strange relief.” The king avised: “’Twere dole to all of us, The world should lose a maid 

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