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X.

Long in its dim recesses pines the spirit,
Wildered and dark, despairingly alone;
Though many a shape of beauty wander near it,
And many a wild and half-remembered tone
Tremble from the divine abyss to cheer it,
Yet still it knows that there is only one
Before whom it can kneel and tribute bring,
Yet be far less a vassal than a king.

XI.

To feel a want, yet scarce know what it is,
To seek one nature that is always new,

Whose glance is warmer than another's kiss,
Whom we can bare our inmost beauty to

Nor feel deserted afterwards, for this

But with our destined comate we can do,Such longing instinct fills the mighty scope Of the young soul with one mysterious hope.

XII.

Naught as a maiden's soul is bountiful,

For beauty's law is bounty: it must be That, when the heart with blessedness is full, It droops into a sated apathy,

Unless the choice blooms of that bliss it cull

To crown another with, and make it free Of beauty's harvest, which unfruitful lies, Wanting the ripening light of loving eyes.

XIII.

So Margaret's heart grew brimming with the lore
Of love's enticing secrets; and although
She had found none to cast it down before,

Το

Yet oft to Fancy's chapel she would go

pay her vows, and count the rosary o'er

Of her love's promised graces: - haply so Miranda's hope had pictured Ferdinand

Long ere the gaunt wave tossed him on the strand.

'XIV.

A new-made star that swims the lonely gloom,
Unwedded yet and longing for the sun,

Whose beams, the bride-gifts of the lavish groom,
Blithely to crown the virgin planet run,

Her being was, watching to see the bloom

Of love's fresh sunrise roofing one by one Its clouds with gold, a triumph-arch to be For him who came to hold her heart in fee.

XV.

Her sun arose to redden.in eclipse,

Alas! too soon, ere yet 't was risen wholly, — But let us not unseal the morrow's lips;

Swiftly enough thou comest, Melancholy,

And what we win of earth's contentment slips
From our forlorn embraces not too slowly :
Let the bright mist of morning cover now
From our pleased eyes the future's sullen brow.

XVI.

Not far from Margaret's cottage dwelt a knight
Of the proud Templars, a sworn celibate,
Whose heart in secret fed upon the light

And dew of her ripe beauty, through the grate

Of his close vow catching what gleams he might

Of the free heaven, and cursing- all too late The cruel faith whose black walls hemmed him in And turned life's crowning bliss to deadly sin.

XVII.

For he had met her in the wood by chance,
And, having drunk her beauty's wildering spell,

His heart shook like the pennon of a lance
That quivers in a breeze's sudden swell,
And thenceforth, in a close enfolded trance,
From mistily golden deep to deep he fell;
The earth did waver and fade far away
Beneath the hope in whose warm arms he lay.

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XVIII.

A dark, proud man he was, whose half-blown youth

Had shed its blossoms even in opening,

Leaving a few that with more winning ruth

Trembling around grave manhood's stem might cling,

More sad than cheery, making, in good sooth,

Like the fringed gentian, a late autumn spring : — A twilight nature, braided light and gloom,

A youth half-smiling by an open tomb.

XIX.

Fair as an angel, who yet inly wore

A wrinkled heart foreboding his near fall;
Who saw him alway wished to know him more,
As if he were some fate's defiant thrall
And nursed a dreaded secret at his core ;
Little he loved, but power most of all,

And that he seemed to scorn, as one who knew
By what foul paths men choose to crawl thereto.

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