Summers twice eight had passed away, Since in his nurse's arms he lay, A rosy roaring child, While all around was noisy mirth, And vassals drank the brown bowl dry, Summers twice eight had passed away; And when he muttered-" Becket-beast, Bring me the posset-and a priest," Becket looked grave, and said "good lack !" And went to ask the price of black. Masses and medicines both were bought, Masses and medicines both were naught; Sir Hubert's race was run; As best beseemed a warrior tall, "Twere long to tell the motley gear, And then, beneath the chapel-stones, The mob departed: cold and cloud And night came dark and dreary; And Vidal very weary. Low moaned the bell; the torch-light fell In fitful and faint flashes; And he lay on the stones, where his father's bones As his father had been before him. It was an ancient thing; a song His heart had sung in other years, When boyhood had its idle throng Of guiltless smiles, and guileless tears; But never had its music seemed So sweet to him, as when to-night All lorn and lone, he kneeled and dreamed, Of many and mysterious things, "My mother's grave, my mother's grave! Oh! dreamless in her slumber there, And drowsily the banners wave O'er her that was so chaste and fair; Yea! love is dead, and memory faded! But when the dew is on the brake, And silence sleeps on earth and sea, And mourners weep, and ghosts awake, Oh! then she cometh back to me, In her cold beauty darkly shaded! "I cannot guess her face or form; But what to me is form or face? I do not ask the weary worm To give me back each buried grace Of glistening eyes, or trailing tresses! And that we meet, and that we part; And that I clasp around my heart, Her sweet still voice, and soft caresses! "Not in the waking thought by day, Not in the sightless dream by night, Do the mild tones and glances play, Of her who was my cradle's light! But in some twilight of calm weather, She glides, by fancy dimly wrought, A glittering cloud, a darkling beam, With all the quiet of a thought, And all the passion of a dream, Linked in a golden spell together!" Oh! Vidal's soul did weep very Whene'er that music, like a charm, Brought back from their unlistening sleep The kissing lip and clasping arm. But quiet tears are worth, to some, The richest smiles in Christendom; And Vidal, though in folly's ring He seemed so weak and wild a thing, Had yet an hour, when none were by, For reason's thought, and passion's sigh. And knew and felt, in heart and brain, The Paradise of buried pain! |