V.

1.

A VOICE by the cedar tree,

In the meadow under the Hall!

She is singing an air that is known to me, A passionate ballad gallant and gay,

A martial song like a trumpet's call !

Singing alone in the morning of life,
In the happy morning of life and of May,
Singing of men that in battle array,

Ready in heart and ready in hand,
March with banner and bugle and fife

To the death, for their native land.

2.

Maud with her exquisite face,

And wild voice pealing up to the sunny sky,

And feet like sunny gems on an English green,
Maud in the light of her youth and her grace,

Singing of Death, and of Honour that cannot die,
Till I well could weep for a time so sordid and mean,

And myself so languid and base.

Silence, beautiful voice!

3.

Be still, for you only trouble the mind

With a joy in which I cannot rejoice,

A glory I shall not find.

Still! I will hear you no more,

For your

sweetness hardly leaves me a choice

But to move to the meadow and fall before
Her feet on the meadow grass, and adore,
Not her, who is neither courtly nor kind,

Not her, not her, but a voice.

VI.

1.

MORNING arises stormy and pale,

No sun, but a wannish glare

In fold upon fold of hueless cloud,

And the budded peaks of the wood are bow'd

Caught and cuff'd by the gale:

I had fancied it would be fair.

2.

Whom but Maud should I meet

Last night, when the sunset burn'd

On the blossom'd gable-ends

At the head of the village street,

Whom but Maud should I meet?

And she touch'd my hand with a smile so sweet

She made me divine amends

For a courtesy not return'd.

3.

And thus a delicate spark

Of glowing and growing light

Thro' the livelong hours of the dark

Kept itself warm in the heart of

my

Ready to burst in a colour'd flame;

Till at last when the morning came

In a cloud, it faded, and seems

But an ashen-gray delight.

dreams,

4.

What if with her sunny hair,

And smile as sunny as cold,

She meant to weave me a snare

Of some coquettish deceit,

Cleopatra-like as of old

To entangle me when we met,

To have her lion roll in a silken net

And fawn at a victor's feet.

5.

Ah, what shall I be at fifty
Should Nature keep me alive,

If I find the world so bitter
When I am but twenty-five?

Yet, if she were not a cheat,

If Maud were all that she seem'd,

And her smile were all that I dream'd,

Then the world were not so bitter

But a smile could make it sweet.

6.

What if tho' her eye seem'd full

Of a kind intent to me,

What if that dandy-despot, he,