heaper rate,
Or what faint hearts may fancy so:
For me, no joy in lady's bower,
Or hall, or tourney, will I sing,
Till the slow stars wheel round the hour
That crowns my hero and my king.

While all the land runs red with strife,
And wealth is won by peddler-crimes,
Let who will find content in life
And tinkle in unmanly rhymes:
I wait and seek; through dark and light,
Safe in my heart my hope I bring,
Till I once more my faith may plight
To him my whole soul owns her king.

When power is filched by drone and dolt,
And, with caught breath and flashing eye,
Her knuckles whitening round the bolt,
Vengeance leans eager from the sky,--
While this and that the people guess,
And to the skirts of praters cling,
Who court the crowd they should compress,--
I turn in scorn to seek my king.

Shut in what tower of darkling chance
Or dungeon of a narrow doom,
Dream'st thou of battle-axe and lance
That for the cross make crashing room?
Come! with strained eyes the battle waits
In the wild van thy mace's swing;
While doubters parley with their fates,
Make thou thine own and ours, my king!

Oh, strong to keep upright the old,
And wise to buttress with the new,
Prudent, as only are the bold,
Clear-eyed, as only are the true,
To foes benign, to friendship stern,
Intent to imp Law's broken wing,--
Who would not die, if death might earn
The right to kiss thy hand, my king?

SCENE II.--_An Inn near the Chateau of Chalus._

Well, the whole thing is over, and here I sit
With one arm in a sling and a milk-score of gashes,
And this flagon of Cyprus must e'en warm my wit,
Since what's left of youth's flame is a head flecked with ashes.
I remember I sat in this very same inn,--
I was young then, and one young man thought I was handsome,--
I had found out what prison King Richard was in,
And was spurring for England to push on the ransom.

How I scorned the dull souls that sat guzzling around,
And knew not my secret nor recked my derision!
Let the world sink or swim, John or Richard be crowned,
All one, so the beer-tax got lenient revision.
How little I dreamed, as I tramped up and down,
That granting our wish one of Fate's saddest jokes is!
I had mine with a vengeance