, crown your list!_'
It seemed as though the whole world, once aroused
By the first notice of such wonder's birth,
Would break bounds to contest my prize with me
The first discoverer, should she but emerge
From that safe den of darkness where she dozed
Till I stole in, that country-parsonage
Where, country-parson's daughter, motherless,
Brotherless, sisterless, for eighteen years
She had been vegetating lily-like.
Her father was my brother's tutor, got
The living that way: him I chanced to see--
Her I saw--her the world would grow one eye
To see, I felt no sort of doubt at all!
'_Secure her!_' cried the devil: '_afterward
Arrange for the disposal of the prize!_'
The devil's doing! yet I seem to think--
Now, when all's done,--think with '_a head reposed_'
In French phrase--hope I think I meant to do
All requisite for such a rarity
When I should be at leisure, have due time
To learn requirement. But in evil day--
Bless me, at week's end, long as any year,
The father must begin '_Young Somebody,
Much recommended--for I break a rule--
Comes here to read, next Long Vacation_.' '_Young!_'
That did it. Had the epithet been '_rich_,'
'_Noble_,' '_a genius_,' even '_handsome_,'--but
--'_Young!_'"

"I say--just a word! I want to know--
You are not married?"
"I?"

"Nor ever were?"
"Never! Why?"
"Oh, then--never mind! Go on!
I had a reason for the question."

"Come,--
You could not be the young man?"
"No, indeed!
Certainly--if you never married her!"

"That I did not: and there's the curse, you'll see!
Nay, all of it's one curse, my life's mistake
Which, nourished with manure that's warranted
To make the plant bear wisdom, blew out full
In folly beyond field-flower-foolishness!
The lies I used to tell my womankind,
Knowing they disbelieved me all the time
Though they required my lies, their decent due,
This woman--not so much believed, I'll say,
As just anticipated from my mouth:
Since being true, devoted, constant--she
Found constancy, devotion, truth, the plain
And easy commonplace of character.
No mock-heroics but seemed natural
To her who underneath