o myself;
I turned and saw her sad, imploring face,
And tears that quenched the wild fire in my heart.
I pressed her hand and passed into the hall,
While she stood sobbing in a flood of tears,
And he stood choked with anger and amazed.
But as I passed the ivied porch he came
With bated breath and muttered in my ear--
'_Beggar!_'--It stung me like a serpent's fang.
Pride-pricked and muttering like a maniac,
I almost flew the street and hurried home
To vent my anger to the silent elms.
_'Beggar!_'--an hundred times that long, mad night
I muttered with hot lips and burning breath;
I paced the walk with hurried tread, and raved;
I threw myself beneath the willow-tree,
And muttered like the muttering of a storm.
My little lamb came bleating mournfully;
Angered I struck him;--out among the trees
I wandered mumbling 'beggar' as I went,
And beating in through all my burning soul
The bitter thoughts it conjured, till my brain
Reeled and I sunk upon the dew-damp grass,
And--utterly exhausted--slept till morn.

"I dreamed a dream--all mist and mystery.
I saw a sunlit valley beautiful
With purple vineyards and with garden-plats;
And in the vineyards and the garden-plats
Were happy-hearted youths and merry girls
Toiling and singing. Grandsires too were there,
Sitting contented under their own vines
And fig-trees, while about them merrily played
Their children's children like the sportive lambs
That frolicked on the foot-hills. Low of kine,
Full-uddered, homeward-wending from the meads,
Fell on the ear as soft as Hulder's loor
Tuned on the Norse-land mountains. Like a nest
Hid in a hawthorn-hedge a cottage stood
Embowered with vines beneath broad-branching elms
Sweet-voiced with busy bees.

[Illustration: PAUL'S DREAM]

"On either hand
Rose steep and barren mountains--mighty cliffs
Cragged and chasm'd and over-grown with thorns;
And on the topmost peak a golden throne
Blazoned with burning characters that read--
'Climb'--it is yours.' Not far above the vale
I saw a youth, fair-browed and raven-haired,
Clambering among the thorns and ragged rocks;
And from his brow with torn and bleeding hand
He wiped great drops of sweat. Down through the vale
I saw a rapid river, broad and deep,
Winding in solemn silence to the sea--
The sea all mist and fog. Lo as I stood
Viewing the river and the moaning sea,
A sail--and then another--flitted down
And plunged into the mist. A moment more,
Like sh