THE HAYSTACK IN THE FLOODS
HAD she come all the way for this,
To part at last without a kiss?
Yea, had she borne the dirt and rain
That her own eyes might see him slain
Beside the haystack in the floods?

Along the dripping leafless woods,
The stirrup touching either shoe,
She rode astride as troopers do;
With kirtle kilted to her knee,
To which the mud splash'd wretchedly;
And the wet dripp'd from every tree
Upon her head and heavy hair,
And on her eyelids broad and fair;
The tears and rain ran down her face.

By fits and starts they rode apace,
And very often was his place
Far off from her; he had to ride
Ahead, to see what might betide
When the roads cross'd; and sometimes,
when

There rose a murmuring from his men,
Had to turn back with promises.
Ah me! she had but little ease;
And often for pure doubt and dread
She sobb'd, made giddy in the head
By the swift riding; while, for cold,
Her slender fingers scarce could hold
The wet reins; yea, and scarcely, too,
She felt the foot within her shoe
Against the stirrup: all for this,
To part at last without a kiss
Beside the haystack in the floods.

For when they near'd that old soak'd hay,

They saw across the only way
That Judas, Godmar, and the three
Red running lions dismally
Grinn'd from his pennon, under which
In one straight line along the ditch,
They counted thirty heads.

So then
While Robert turn'd round to his men,
She saw at once the wretched end,
And, stooping down, tried hard to rend
Her coif the wrong way from her head,
And hid her eyes; while Robert said:

Nay, love, 'tis scarcely two to one;
At Poictiers where we made them run
So fast-why, sweet my love, good
cheer,

The Gascon frontier is so near,
Nought after us.'

But: "O!" she said, "My God! my God! I have to tread

The long way back without you; then
The court at Paris; those six men;
The gratings of the Chatelet ;
The swift Seine on some rainy day
Like this, and people standing by,

And laughing, while my weak hands try

To recollect how strong men swim.
All this, or else a life with him,

For which I should be damned at last, Would God that this next hour were past!"

He answer'd not, but cried his cry,

66

St. George for Marny!" cheerily; And laid his hand upon her rein. Alas! no man of all his train

Gave back that cheery cry again;

And, while for rage his thumb beat fast
Upon his sword-hilt, some one cast
About his neck a kerchief long,
And bound him.

Then they went along

To Godmar; who said: "Now, Jehane,
Your lover's life is on the wane

So fast, that, if this very hour
You yield not as my paramour,
He will not see the rain leave off:

Nay, keep your tongue from gibe and

scoff

Sir Robert, or I slay you now."

She laid her hand upon her brow,
Then gazed upon the palm, as though
She thought her forehead bled, and:
"No!"

She said, and turn'd her head away,
As there was nothing else to say,
And everything was settled: red
Grew Godmar's face from chin to head:
"Jehane, on yonder hill there stands
My castle, guarding well my lands;
What hinders me from taking you,
And doing that I list to do
To your fair wilful body, while
Your knight lies dead?

A wicked smile
Wrinkled her face, her lips grew thin,
A long way out she thrust her chin:
"You know that I should strangle you
While you were sleeping; or bite through
Your throat, by God's help: ah!" she

said,

"Lord Jesus, pity your poor maid!
For in such wise they hem me in,
I cannot choose but sin and sin,
Whatever happens: yet I think
They could not make me eat or drink,
And so should I just reach my rest."

"Nay, if you do not my behest,
O Jehane though I love you well,"
Said Godmar, would I fail to tell
All that I know? "Foul lies," she

66

said.

Eh? lies, my Jehane? by God's head,
At Paris folks would deeni them true!
Do you know, Jehane, they cry for you:
'Jehane the brown! Jehane the brown!
Give us Jehane to burn or drown!'
Eh!--gag me Robert !-sweet my friend,
This were indeed a piteous end
For those long fingers, and long feet,
And long neck, and smooth shoulders
sweet;

An end that few men would forget
That saw it. So, an hour yet:
Consider, Jehane, which to take
Of life or death!"

So, scarce awake,
Dismounting, did she leave that place,
And totter some yards: with her face
Turn'd upward to the sky she lay,
Her head on a wet heap of hay,

For Robert, both his eyes were dry,
He could not weep, but gloomily
He seem'd to watch the rain; yea, too,
His lips were firm; he tried once more
To touch her lips; she reach'd out, sore
And vain desire so tortured them,
The poor gray lips, and now the hem
Of his sleeve brush'd them.

With a start Up Godmar rose, thrust them apart; From Robert's throat he loosed the bands

Of silk and mail; with empty hands Held out, she stood and gazed, and saw, The long bright blade without a flaw Glide out from Godmar's sheath, his hand

In Robert's hair; she saw him bend Back Robert's head; she saw him send The thin steel down; the blow told well, Right backward the knight Robert fell. And moaned as dogs do, being half dead Unwitting, as I deem: so then

Godmar turn'd grinning to his men,

TWO RED ROSES ACROSS THE
MOON

THERE was a lady lived in a hall,
Large of her eyes and slim and tall;
And ever she sung from noon to noon,
Two red roses across the moon.

There was a knight came riding by
In early spring, when the roads were dry;
And he heard that lady sing at the noon,
Two red roses across the moon.

Yet none the more he stopp'd at all,
But he rode a-gallop past the hall;
And left that lady singing at noon,
Two red roses across the moon.

Because, forsooth, the battle was set,
And the scarlet and blue had got to be

I trow he stopp'd when he rode again By the hall, though draggled sore with the rain;

And his lips were pinch'd to kiss at the

noon

Two red roses across the moon.

Under the may she stoop'd to the crown, All was gold, there was nothing of brown, And the horns blew up in the hall at noon, Two red roses across the moon. 1858.

SIR GILES' WAR-SONG1 Ho! is there any will ride with me, Sir Giles, le bon des barrières ? The clink of arms is good to hear, The flap of pennons fair to see;

Ho! is there any will ride with me,

Sir Giles, le bon des barrières ?

The leopards and lilies are fair to see; St. George Guienne! right good to hear: Ho! is there any will ride with me; Sir Giles, le bon des barrières ?

I stood by the barrier,
My coat being blazon'd fair to see;
Ho! is there any will ride with me,
Sir Giles, le bon des barrières ?
Clisson put out his head to see,
And lifted his basnet up to hear;
I pull'd him through the bars to ME,
Sir Giles, le bon des barrières.
1858.

NEAR AVALON

A SHIP with shields before the sun,
Six maidens round the mast,
A red-gold crown on every one,
A green gown on the last.

The fluttering green banners there
Are wrought with ladies' heads most
fair,

And a portraiture of Guenevere
The middle of each sail doth bear.

A ship which sails before the wind,
And round the helm six knights,

1 Browning wrote to Morris, on the appearance of the Earthly Paradise: "It is a double delight to me to read such poetry, and know you, of all the world, wrote it,-you whose songs I used to sing while galloping by Fiesole in old days. 'Ho, is there any will ride with me?' "— (J. W. Mackail's Life of William Morris, Vol. I., p. 133.).

O BITTER sea, tumultuous sea, Full many an ill is wrought by thee !Unto the wasters of the land

Thou holdest out thy wrinkled hand ; And when they leave the conquered town,

Whose black smoke makes thy surges brown,

Driven betwixt thee and the sun,
As the long day of blood is done,
From many a league of glittering waves
Thou smilest on them and their slaves.

The thin bright-eyed Phoenician
Thou drawest to thy waters wan,
With ruddy eve and golden morn
Thou temptest him, until, forlorn,
Unburied, under alien skies
Cast up ashore his body lies.

Yea, whoso sees thee from his door, Must ever long for more and more; Nor will the beechen bowl suffice,

Or homespun robe of little price,
Or hood well-woven from the fleece
Undyed, or unspiced wine of Greece;
So sore his heart is set upon
Purple, and gold, and cinnamon;
For as thou cravest, so he craves,
Until he rolls beneath thy waves,
Nor in some landlocked, unknown bay;
Can satiate thee for one day.

Now, therefore, O thou bitter sea,
With no long words we pray to thee,
But ask thee, hast thou felt before
Such strokes of the long ashen oar?
And hast thou yet seen such a prow
Thy rich and niggard waters plough?

Nor yet, O sea, shalt thou be cursed, If at thy hands we gain the worst, And, wrapt in water, roll about Blind-eyed, unheeding song or shout, Within thine eddies far from shore, Warmed by no sunlight any more.

Therefore, indeed, we joy in thee, And praise thy greatness, and will we Take at thy hands both good and ill, Yea, what thou wilt, and praise thee still, Enduring not to sit at home,

And wait until the last days come,
When we no more may care to hold
White bosoms under crowns of gold,
And our dulled hearts no longer are
Stirred by the clangorous noise of war,
And hope within our souls is dead,
And no joy is remembered.

So, if thou hast a mind to slay,
Fair prize thou hast of us to-day;
And if thou hast a mind to save,
Great praise and honor shalt thou have;
But whatso thou wilt do with us,
Our end shall not be piteous,

Because our memories shall live
When folk forget the way to drive
The black keel through the heaped-up

sea,

And half dried up thy waters be. 1867.

THE NYMPH'S SONG TO HYLAS1

I know a little garden close
Set thick with lily and red rose,
Where I would wander if I might
From dewy dawn to dewy night,
And have one with me wandering.

And though within it no birds sing, And though no pillared house is there,

1 This song reappears under the title A Garden by the Sea in "Poems by the Way," 1891, with slight variations in the text, the most important of which is noted below.

And though the apple boughs are bare Of fruit and blossom, would to God, Her feet upon the green grass trod, And I beheld them as before.

There comes a murmur from the shore, And in the place two fair streams are, Drawn from the purple hills afar. Drawn down unto the restless sea; The hills whose flowers ne'er fed the bee, The shore no ship has ever seen, Still beaten by the billows green,' Whose murmur comes unceasingly Unto the place for which I cry.

For which I cry both day and night, For which I let slip all delight, That maketh me both deaf and blind, Careless to win, unskilled to find, And quick to lose what all men seek. Yet tottering as I am, and weak, Still have I left a little breath To seek within the jaws of death An entrance to that happy place,

To seek the unforgotten face

Once seen, once kissed, once reft from

Passed our to-day upon the sea,
Or in a poisonous unknown land,
With fear and death on either hand,
And listless when the day was done
Have scarcely hoped to see the sun
Dawn on the morrow of the earth,
Nor in our hearts have thought of
mirth.

And while the world lasts, scarce again
Shall any sons of men bear pain
Like we have borne, yet be alive.

So surely not in vain we strive
Like other men for our reward;
Sweet peace and deep, the checkered

sward

Beneath the ancient mulberry trees,
The smooth-paved gilded palaces,

1 In A Garden by the Sea, these three lines read:

Dark hills whose heath-bloom feeds no bee,
Dark shore no ship has ever seen,

Tormented by the billows green.

Where the shy thin-clad damsels sweet
Make music with their gold-ringed feet.
The fountain court amidst of it,
Where the short-haired slave-muidens
sit,

While on the veinèd pavement lie
The honied things and spicery

Their arms have borne from out the town.

The dancers on the thymy down
In summer twilight, when the earth
Is still of all things but their mirth,
And echoes borne upon the wind
Of others in like way entwined.

The merchant-town's fair market

place,

Where over many a changing face
The pigeons of the temple flit,
And still the outland merchants sit
Like kings above their merchandise,
Lying to foolish men and wise.

Ah! if they heard that we were come
Into the bay, and bringing home
That which all men have talked about,
Some men with rage, and some with
doubt,

Some with desire, and some with praise;
Then would the people throng the ways,
Nor heed the outland merchandise,
Nor any talk, from fools or wise,
But tales of our accomplished quest.

What soul within the house shall rest
When we come home? The wily king
Shall leave his throne to see the thing;
No man shall keep the landward gate,
The hurried traveller shall wait
Until our bulwarks graze the quay ;
Unslain the milk-white bull shall be
Beside the quivering altar-flame;
Scarce shall the maiden clasp for shame
Over her breast the raiment thin
The morn that Argo cometh in.

Then cometh happy life again That payeth well our toil and pain In that sweet hour, when all our woe But as a pensive tale we know, Nor yet remember deadly fear; For surely now if death be near, Unthought-of is it, and unseen When sweet is, that hath bitter been.

1867.

SONGS OF ORPHEUS AND THE SIRENS

Sirens

O HAPPY Seafarers are ye,
And surely all your ills are past,
And toil upon the land and sea,

Since ye are brought to us at last.