No More Learning

"

XIV.

Here she paused; she had been paler at the first word of her speaking,
But, because a silence followed it, blushed somewhat, as for shame:
Then, as scorning her own feeling, resumed calmly--"I am seeking
More distinction than these gentlemen think worthy of my claim.

XV.

"Ne'ertheless, you see, I seek it--not because I am a woman,"
(Here her smile sprang like a fountain and, so, overflowed her mouth)
"But because my woods in Sussex have some purple shades at gloaming
Which are worthy of a king in state, or poet in his youth.

XVI.

"I invite you, Mister Bertram, to no scene for worldly speeches--
Sir, I scarce should dare--but only where God asked the thrushes first:
And if _you_ will sing beside them, in the covert of my beeches,
I will thank you for the woodlands,--for the human world, at worst. "

XVII.

Then she smiled around right childly, then she gazed around right
queenly,
And I bowed--I could not answer; alternated light and gloom--
While as one who quells the lions, with a steady eye serenely,
She, with level fronting eyelids, passed out stately from the room.

XVIII.

Oh, the blessed woods of Sussex, I can hear them still around me,
With their leafy tide of greenery still rippling up the wind!
Oh, the cursed woods of Sussex! where the hunter's arrow found me,
When a fair face and a tender voice had made me mad and blind!

XIX.

In that ancient hall of Wycombe thronged the numerous guests invited,
And the lovely London ladies trod the floors with gliding feet;
And their voices low with fashion, not with feeling, softly freighted
All the air about the windows with elastic laughters sweet.

XX.
For at eve the open windows flung their light out on the terrace
Which the floating orbs of curtains did with gradual shadow sweep,
While the swans upon the river, fed at morning by the heiress,
Trembled downward through their snowy wings at music in their sleep.

XXI.

And there evermore was music, both of instrument and singing,
Till the finches of the shrubberies grew restless in the dark;
But the cedars stood up motionless, each in a moonlight's ringing,
And the deer, half in the glimmer, strewed the hollows of the park.

XXII.

And though sometimes she would bind me with her silver-corded speeches
To commix my words and laughter with the converse and the jest,
Oft I sat apart and, gazing on the river through the beeches,
Heard, as pure the swans swam down it, her pure voice o'erfloat the
rest.

XXIII.

In the morning, horn of huntsman, hoof of steed and laugh of rider,
Spread out cheery from the courtyard till we lost them in the hills,
While herself and other ladies, and her suitors left beside her,
Went a-wandering up the gardens through the laurels and abeles.

XXIV.

Thus, her foot upon the new-mown grass, bareheaded, with the flowing
Of the virginal white vesture gathered closely to her throat,
And the golden ringlets in her neck just quickened by her going,
And appearing to breathe sun for air, and doubting if to float,--

XXV.

With a bunch of dewy maple, which her right hand held above her,
And which trembled a green shadow in betwixt her and the skies,
As she turned her face in going, thus, she drew me on to love her,
And to worship the divineness of the smile hid in her eyes.

XXVI.

For her eyes alone smile constantly; her lips have serious sweetness,
And her front is calm, the dimple rarely ripples on the cheek;
But her deep blue eyes smile constantly, as if they in discreetness
Kept the secret of a happy dream she did not care to speak.

XXVII.

Thus she drew me the first morning, out across into the garden,
And I walked among her noble friends and could not keep behind.
Spake she unto all and unto me--"Behold, I am the warden
Of the song-birds in these lindens, which are cages to their mind.

XXVIII.