is box of state,
Looked grave; as if he had just then seen
The red flag wave from the city gate,
Where the eagles in bronze had been.

The Empress, too, had a tear in her eye;
You'd have thought that her fancy had gone back again,
For one moment, under the old blue sky,
To that old glad life in Spain.

Well! there in our front row box we sat
Together, my bride betrothed and I;
My gaze was fixed on my opera hat,
And hers on the stage hard by.

And both were silent and both were sad;
Like a queen she leaned on her full white arm,
With that regal indolent air she had;
So confident of her charm!

I have not a doubt she was thinking then
Of her former lord, good soul that he was,
Who died the richest and roundest of men,
The Marquis of Carabas.

I hope that, to get to the kingdom of heaven,
Through a needle's eye he had not to pass;
I wish him well for the jointure given
To my lady of Carabas.

Meanwhile I was thinking of my first love
As I had not been thinking of aught for years;
Till over my eyes there began to move
Something that felt like tears.

I thought of the dress that she wore last time,
When we stood neath the cypress-trees together,
In that lost land, in that soft clime,
In the crimson evening weather;

Of that muslin dress (for the eve was hot);
And her warm white neck in its golden chain;
And her full soft hair just tied in a knot,
And falling loose again.

And the Jasmine flower in her fair young breast;
(O the faint sweet smell of that Jasmine flower!)
And the one bird singing alone to its nest;
And the one star over the tower.

I thought of our little quarrels and strife,
And the letter that brought me back my ring;
And it all seemed there in the waste of life,
Such a very little thing.

For I thought of her grave below the hill,
Which the sentinel cypress-tree stands over;
And I thought, "Were she only living still,
How I could forgive her and love her!"

And I swear as I thought of her thus in that hour,
And of how, after all, old things are best,
That I smelt the smell of that Jasmine flower
Which she used to wear in her breast.

And I turned and looked; she was sitting there,
In a dim box over the stage; and drest