Never was form of such fine mould

But the hands and the face were as white and cold

As they of the Parian stone were made,

To which, in great Minerva's shade,

The Athenian sculptor's toilsome knife
Gave all of loveliness but life.

On her fair neck there seemed no stain,

Where the pure blood coursed thro' the delicate vein; And her breath, if breath indeed it were,

Flowed in a current so soft and rare,

It would scarcely have stirred the young moth's wing On the path of his noonday wandering;

Never on earth a creature trod,

Half so lovely, or half so odd.

Count Otto stares till his eyelids ache,
And wonders when she 'll please to wake;
While Fancy whispers strange suggestions,
And Wonder prompts a score of questions.
Is she a nymph of another sphere?

Whence came she hither ?what doth she here?

Or if the morning of her birth

Be registered on this our earth,

Why hath she fled from her father's halls?

And where hath she left her cloaks and shawls ?

There was no time for Reason's lectures,
There was no time for Wit's conjectures;

He threw his arm, with timid haste,
Around the maiden's slender waist,

And raised her up, in a modest way,

From the cold, bare rock on which she lay.

He was but a mile from his castle gate,

And the lady was scarcely five stone weight;

He stopped, in less than half an hour,

With his beauteous burthen, at Belmont Tower.

Gay, I ween, was the chamber dressed,
As the Count gave order, for his guest;
But scarcely on the couch 't is said,

That gentle guest was fairly laid,

When she opened at once her great blue eyes,

And, after a glance of brief surprise,

Ere she had spoken, and ere she had heard

Of wisdom or wit a single word,

She laughed so long, and laughed so loud,

That Dame Ulrica often vowed

A dirge is a merrier thing by half

Than such a senseless, soulless laugh.

Around the tower the elfin crew

Seemed shouting in mirthful concert too;
And echoed roof, and trembled rafter,
With that unsentimental laughter.

As soon as that droll tumult passed,
The maiden's tongue, unchained at last,
Asserted all its female right,

And talked and talked with all its might.

Oh, how her low and liquid voice

Made the rapt hearer's soul rejoice!

"T was full of those clear tones that start From innocent childhood's happy heart, Ere passion and sin disturb the well

In which their mirth and music dwell.

But man nor master could make out

What the eloquent maiden talked about;

The things she uttered like did seem

To the babbling waves of a limpid stream;

For the words of her speech, if words they might be,

Were the words of a speech of a far countrie;

And when she had said them o'er and o'er,

Count Otto understood no more

Than you or I of the slang that falls

From dukes and dupes at Tattersall's,

Of Hebrew from a bearded Jew,
Or metaphysics from a Blue.

Count Otto swore, (Count Otto's reading Might well have taught him better breeding,) That whether the maiden should fume or fret,

The maiden should not leave him yet;

And so he took prodigious pains

To make her happy in her chains :

From Paris came a pair of cooks,

From Gottingen a load of books;
From Venice stores of gorgeous suits,
From Florence minstrels and their lutes;

The youth himself had special pride

In breaking horses for his bride;

And his old tutor, Doctor Hermann,

Was brought from Bonn to teach her German.

And there in her beauty and her grace

The wayward maiden grew;

And every day, of her form or face

Some charm seemed fresh and new :

Over her cold and colourless cheek

The blush of the rose was shed,
And her quickened pulse began to speak
Of human hope and dread!
And soon she grasped the learned lore
The old gray pedant taught,

And turned from the volume to explore
The hidden mine of thought.

Alas! her bliss was not the same

As it was in other years,

For with new knowledge sorrow came,
And with new passion tears.

Oft, till the Count came up from wine,
She would sit by the lattice high,
And watch the windings of the Rhine
With a very wistful eye;

And oft on some rude cliff she stood,

Her light harp in her hand,

And still as she looked on the gurgling flood,

She sang of her native land.

And when Count Otto pleaded well

For priest, and ring, and vow,