one! The Pelham woods
Were full of doves that cooed at ease;
The orchis filled her purple hoods
For dainty bees.

He heard not; all the delicate air
Was fresh with falling water-spray:
It mattered not--he was not there,
But far away.

Till with the hazel in his hand,
Still drowned in thought it thus befell;
He drew a letter on the sand--
The letter L.

And looking on it, straight there wrought
A ruddy flush about his brow;
His letter woke him: absent thought
Rushed homeward now.

And half-abashed, his hasty touch
Effaced it with a tell-tale care,
As if his action had been much,
And not his air.

And she? she watched his open palm
Smooth out the letter from the sand,
And rose, with aspect almost calm,
And filled her hand

With cherry-bloom, and moved away
To gather wild forget-me-not,
And let her errant footsteps stray
To one sweet spot,

As if she coveted the fair
White lining of the silver-weed,
And cuckoo-pint that shaded there
Empurpled seed.

She had not feared, as I divine,
Because she had not hoped. Alas!
The sorrow of it! for that sign
Came but to pass;

And yet it robbed her of the right
To give, who looked not to receive,
And made her blush in love's despite
That she should grieve.

A shape in white, she turned to gaze;
Her eyes were shaded with her hand,
And half-way up the winding ways
We saw her stand.

Green hollows of the fringed cliff,
Red rocks that under waters show,
Blue reaches, and a sailing skiff,
Were spread below.

She stood to gaze, perhaps to sigh,
Perhaps to think; but who can tell
How heavy on her heart must lie
The letter L!

* * * * *

She came anon with quiet grace;
And "What," she murmured, "silent yet!"
He answered, "'Tis a haunted place,
And spell-beset.

"O speak to us, and break the spell!"
"The spell is broken," she replied.
"I crossed the running brook, it fell,
It could not bide.

"And I have brought a budding world,
Of orchis spires and daisies rank,
And ferny plumes but half uncurled,
From yonder bank;

"And I shall weave of them a crown,
And at the well-head launch it free,
That so the brook may float it down,
And out to sea.

"There may it to some English hands
From fairy meadow seem to come;
The fairyest of fairy lands--