(I told you that he had his golden hour),

And such a feast, ill-suited as it seem'd To such a time, to Lionel's loss and his,

And that resolved self-exile from a land
He never would revisit, such a feast
So rich, so strange, and stranger ev'n
than rich

But rich as for the nuptials of a king.

And stranger yet, at one end of the hall

Two great funereal curtains, looping down,

Parted a little ere they met the floor,
About a picture of his lady, taken
Some years before, and falling hid the
frame.

And just above the parting was a lamp; So the sweet figure folded round with night

Seem'd stepping out of darkness with a smile.

Well then- our solemn feast -
ate and drank,

we

he went, Glanced at the point of law, to pass it by,

Affirming that as long as either lived, By all the laws of love and gratefulness, The service of the one so saved was due All to the saver adding, with a smile, The first for many weeks- -a semi-smile As at a strong conclusion body and

soul

And life and limbs, all his to work his will."

Then Julian made a secret sign to me To bring Camilla down before them all. And crossing her own picture as she

came,

And looking as much lovelier as herself Is lovelier than all others - -on her head

A diamond circlet, and from under this A veil, that seemed no more than gilded air,

Flying by each fine ear, an Eastern gauze With seeds of gold so, with that grace

of hers, Slow-moving as a wave against the wind, That flings a mist behind it in the sun And bearing high in arms the mighty babe,

The younger Julian, who himself was crown'd

With roses, none so rosy as himself -
And over all her babe and her the jewels
Of many generations of his house
Sparkled and flash'd, for he had decked
them out

As for a solemn sacrifice of love -
So she came in: -- I am long in telling it,
I never yet beheld a thing so strange,
Sad, sweet, and strange together-
floated in-

--

But Julian, sitting by her, answer'dall: "She is but dumb, because in her you see That faithful servant whom we spoke about,

Obedient to her second master now; Which will not last. I have here to

night a guest

So bound to me by common love and loss --What shall I bind him more? in his behalf,

Shall I exceed the Persian, giving him That which of all things is the dearest

to me,

Not only showing? and he himself pronounced

That my rich gift is wholly mine to give.

"Now all be dumb, and promise all

of you

Not to break in on what I say by word Or whisper, while I show you all my heart."

And then began the story of his love
As here to-day, but not so wordily-
The passionate moment would not suffer
that-

Past thro' his visions to the burial; thence Down to this last strange hour in his own hall;

And then rose up, and with him all his guests

Once more as by enchantment; all but he,

Lionel, who fain had risen, but fell again, And sat as if in chains to whom he

said:

Then taking his dear lady by one hand, And bearing on one arm the noble babe, He slowly brought them both to Lionel. And there the widower husband and

dead wife

Rush'd each at each with a cry, that rather seem'd

For some new death than for a life renew'd; Whereat the very babe began to wail; At once they turn'd, and caught and brought him in

To their charm'd circle, and, half killing him

With kisses, round him closed and claspt again.

But Lionel, when at last he freed himself From wife and child, and lifted up a face All over glowing with the sun of life, And love, and boundless thanks - the sight of this

So frighted our good friend, that, turning

to me

And saying, “It is over: let us go". There were our horses ready at the

doors

We bade them no farewell, but mounting these

He past forever from his native land; And I with him, my Julian, back to mine.

TWO GREETINGS.

I.

From that great deep before our world begins

Whereon the Spirit of God moves as he will

deep,

Where all that was to be in all that was Whirl'd for a million æons thro' the vast Waste dawn of multitudinous-eddying light

Out of the deep, my child, out of the deep,

Thro' all this changing world of changeless law,

And every phase of ever-heightening life, And nine long months of antenatal gloom,

With this last moon, this crescent- her dark orb

Touch'd with earth's light-thou comest, darling boy;

Our own; a babe in lineament and limb Perfect, and prophet of the perfect man; Whose face and form are her's and mine

in one,

Indissolubly married like our love;
Live and be happy in thyself, and serve
This mortal race thy kin so well that

men

deep,

From that true world within the world we see,

Whereof our world is but the bounding

shore

In

space And shatter'd phantom of that infinite finite-infinite time - our mortal veil Who made thee unconceivably thyself One, Out of His whole World-self and all in all

Live thou, and of the grain and husk, the grape

And ivyberry, choose; and still depart From death to death thro' life and life,

and find

Nearer and ever nearer Him who wrought
Not Matter, nor the finite-infinite,
But this main miracle, that thou art thou,

deep,

world.