For such nice taste as thine:
Yet trust me I have cooked the food,
And I have filled the can,
Since I have lived in this old wood,
For many nobler man."--
"The savory buck and the ancient cask
To a weary man are sweet;
But ere he taste, it is fit he ask
For a blessing on bowl and meat.
Let me but pray for a minute's space,
And bid me pledge ye then;
I swear to ye, by our Lady's grace,
I shall eat and drink like ten!"

The lord of the castle in wrath arose,
He frowned like a fiery dragon;
Indignantly he blew his nose,
And overturned the flagon.
And, "Away," quoth he, "with the canting priest.
Who comes uncalled to a midnight feast,
And breathes through a helmet his holy benison,
To sour my hock, and spoil my venison!"

That moment all the lights went out;
And they dragged him forth, that rabble rout,
With oath, and threat, and foul scurrility,
And every sort of incivility.
They barred the gates: and the peal of laughter,
Sudden and shrill that followed after,
Died off into a dismal tone,
Like a parting spirit's painful moan.
"I wish," said Rudolph, as he stood
On foot in the deep and silent wood;
"I wish, good Roland, rack and stable
May be kinder to-night than their master's table!"

By this the storm had fleeted by;
And the moon with a quiet smile looked out
From the glowing arch of a cloudless sky,
Flinging her silvery beams about
On rock, tree, wave, and gladdening all
With just as miscellaneous bounty,
As Isabel's, whose sweet smiles fall
In half an hour on half the county.
Less wild Sir Rudolph's pathway seemed,
As he fumed from that discourteous tower;
Small spots of verdure gaily gleamed
On either side; and many a flower,
Lily, and violet, and heart's-ease,
Grew by the way, a fragrant border;
And the tangled boughs of the hoary trees
Were twined in picturesque disorder:
And there came from the grove, and there came from
the hill,
The loveliest sounds he had ever heard,
The cheerful voice of the dancing rill,
And the sad, sad song of the lonely bird.
And at last he stared with wondering eyes,
As well he might, on a huge pavilion:
'Twas clothed with stuffs of a hundred dyes,
Blue, purple, orange, pink, vermilion;
And there were quaint devices traced
All round in the Saracenic manner;
And the top, which gle