Whole hours together he would stand
Upon the terrace in a dream,

Resting his head upon his hand,

Best pleased when he was most alone,
Like St. John Nepomuck in stone,
Looking down into a stream.

In the Round Tower, night after night,
He sat, and bleared his eyes with books;
Until one morning we found him there
Stretched on the floor, as if in a swoon
He had fallen from his chair.

We hardly recognised his sweet looks!

Poor Prince!

WALTER.

HUBERT.

I think he might have mended;

And he did mend: but very soon
The Priests came flocking in, like rooks,
With all their croziers and their crooks,

And so at last the matter ended.

How did it end?

WALTER.

HUBERT.

Why, in Saint Rochus

They made him stand, and wait his doom; And, as if he were condemned to the tomb, Began to mutter their hocus-pocus.

First, the Mass for the Dead they chaunted,

Then three times laid upon his head
A shovelful of churchyard clay,

Saying to him, as he stood undaunted,

"This is a sign that thou art dead, So in thy heart be penitent!"

And forth from the chapel door he went

Into disgrace and banishment,

Clothed in a cloak of hodden gray,

And bearing a wallet, and a bell,

Whose sound should be a perpetual knell

To keep all travellers away.

WALTER.

O, horrible fate! Outcast, rejected,
As one with pestilence infected!

HUBERT.

Then was the family tomb unsealed,
And broken helmet, sword and shield,
Buried together, in common wreck,
As is the custom, when the last
Of any princely house has passed,
And thrice, as with a trumpet-blast,

A herald shouted down the stair
The words of warning and despair,-

"O Hoheneck! O Hoheneck!"

WALTER.

Still in my soul that cry goes on,—

For ever gone! for ever gone!

Ah, what a cruel sense of loss,

Like a black shadow, would fall across

The hearts of all, if he should die!

His gracious presence upon earth

Was as a fire upon a hearth;

As pleasant songs, at morning sung,

The words that dropped from his sweet tongue Strengthened our hearts; or, heard at night, Made all our slumbers soft and light.

Where is he?

HUBERT.

In the Odenwald.

Some of his tenants, unappalled

By fear of death, or priestly word,-
A holy family, that make

Each meal a Supper of the Lord,-

Have him beneath their watch and ward,

For love of him, and Jesus' sake!

Pray you come in. For why should I

With out-door hospitality

My prince's friend thus entertain?

WALTER.

I would a moment here remain.

But you, good Hubert, go before,
Fill me a goblet of May-drink,

As aromatic as the May

From which it steals the breath away,

And which he loved so well of yore;

E

It is of him that I would think.

You shall attend me, when I call,
In the ancestral banquet-hall.
Unseen companions, guests of air,
You cannot wait on, will be there;
They taste not food, they drink not wine,

But their soft eyes look into mine,
And their lips speak to me, and all
The vast and shadowy banquet-hall
Is full of looks and words divine!

Leaning over the parapet.

The day is done; and slowly from the scene
The stooping sun upgathers his spent shafts,
And puts them back into his golden quiver!
Below me in the valley, deep and green
As goblets are, from which in thirsty draughts
We drink its wine, the swift and mantling river
Flows on triumphant through those lovely regions,
Etched with the shadows of its sombre margent,
And soft, reflected clouds of gold and argent!
Yes, there it flows, for ever, broad and still,
As when the vanguard of the Roman legions
First saw it from the top of yonder hill!

How beautiful it is! Fresh fields of wheat,

Vineyard, and town, and tower with fluttering flag,

The consecrated chapel on the crag,

And the white hamlet gathered round its base,

Like Mary sitting at her Saviour's feet,

And looking up at his beloved face!

O friend! O best of friends! Thy absence more Than the impending night darkens the landscape o'er!