Grave Alice and laughing Allegra, And Edith with golden hair.
A whisper, and then a silence; Yet I know by their merry eyes They are plotting and planning together
To take me by surprise.
A sudden rush from the stairway, A sudden raid from the hall: By three doors left unguarded They enter my castle wall.
They climb up into my turret
O'er the arms and back of my chair;
If I try to escape, they surround me: They seem to be everywhere.
They almost devour me with kisses; Their arms about me intwine, Till I think of the Bishop of Bingen In his Mouse-Tower on the Rhine.
And still with favor singled out, Marred less than man by mortal fall,
Her disposition is devout, Her countenance angelical. No faithless thought her instinct shrouds,
But fancy checkers settled sense, Like alteration of the clouds
On noonday's azure permanence. Pure courtesy, composure, ease, Declare affections nobly fixed, And impulse sprung from due degrees
Of sense and spirit sweetly mixed. Her modesty, her chiefest grace, The cestus clasping Venus' side, Is potent to deject the face
Of him who would affront its pride. Wrong dares not in her presence speak,
Nor spotted thought its taint disclose
Under the protest of a cheek
Outbragging Nature's boast, the
In mind and manners how discreet! How artless in her very art! How candid in discourse! how sweet The concord of her lips and heart!
"He that's for heaven itself unfit, Let him not hope to merit me."
And though her charms are a strong law
Compelling all men to admire, They are so clad with lovely awe,
None but the noble dares desire.
He who would seek to make her his, Will comprehend that souls of
Own sweet repulsion, and that 'tis.
The quality of their embrace
To be like the majestic reach
Of coupled suns, that, from afar, Mingle their mutual spheres, while each
Circles the twin obsequious star:
And in the warmth of hand to hand, Of heart to heart, he'll vow to note And reverently understand
How the two spirits shine remote;
And ne'er to numb fine honor's nerve, Nor let sweet awe in passion melt, Nor fail by courtesies to observe
The space which makes attraction felt;
Nor cease to guard like life the sense Which tells him that the embrace of love
Is o'er a gulf of difference Love cannot sound, nor death re-
IT happed that I came on a day Into a place, there that I say, Truly the fairest companey Of ladies that ever man with eye Had seen together in one place,· Shall I clepe it hap or grace? Among these ladies thus each one Sooth to say I saw one
That was like none of the rout, For I dare swear without doubt, That as the summer's Sunne bright Is fairer, clearer, and hath more light
Than any other planet in Heaven, The moone, or the starres seven, For all the world, so had she Surmounten them all of beauty, Of manner, and of comeliness, Of stature, and of well set gladnesse, Of goodly heed, and so well besey,— Shortly what shall I more say, By God, and by his holowes' twelve, It was my sweet, right all herselve. She had so stedfast countenance In noble port and maintenance, And Love that well harde my bone3 Had espied me thus soone, That she full soone in my thought As, help me God, so was I caught So suddenly that I ne took No manner counsel but at her look, And at my heart for why her eyen So gladly I trow mine heart, seyen That purely then mine own thought Said, Twere better to serve her for nought
Than with another to be well.
I saw her dance so comely, Carol and sing so swetely, Laugh and play so womanly, And look so debonairly,
So goodly speak, and so friendly, That certes I trow that evermore N'as seen so blissful a treasore, For every hair on her head, Sooth to say, it was not red, Nor neither yellow nor brown it n'as, Methought most like gold it was, And such eyen my lady had, Debonnaire, good, glad, and sad, Simple, of good mokel, not too wide, Thereto her look was not aside, Nor overtwhart, but beset so well It drew and took up every dell. All that on her 'gan behold Her eyen seemed anon she would Have mercy.-folly wenden so, But it was never the rather do. It was no counterfeited thing It was her own pure looking That the goddess Dame Nature Had made them open by measure And close; for, were she never so
By God my wrath is all forgive. Therewith her list so well to live, That dulness was of her adrad, She n'as too sober ne too glad; In all thinges more measure Had never I trowe creature, But many one with her look she hurt, And that sat her full little at herte: For she knew nothing of their thought,
But whether she knew, or knew it not, Alway she ne cared for them a stree;1 To get her love no near n'as he That woned at home, than he in Inde, The foremost was alway behinde; But good folk over all other She loved as man may his brother, Of which love she was wonder large, In skilful places that bear charge: But what a visage had she thereto, Alas! my heart is wonder wo That I not can describen it;- Me lacketh both English and wit For to undo it at the full. And eke my spirits be so dull So great a thing for to devise, I have not wit that can suffice To comprehend her beauté,
But thus much I dare saine, that she Was white, ruddy, fresh, and lifely hued,
And every day her beauty newed. And nigh her face was alderbest; 3 For, certes, Nature had such lest To make that fair, that truly she Was her chief patron of beauté, And chief example of all her worke And moulter: for, be it never so derke, Methinks I see her evermo, And yet, moreover, though all tho That ever lived were now alive, Not would have founde to descrive In all her face a wicked sign, For it was sad, simple, and benign. And such a goodly sweet speech Had that sweet, my life's leech, So friendly, and so well y-grounded Upon all reason, so well founded, And so treatable to all good, That I dare swear well by the rood, Of eloquence was never found So sweet a sounding faconde, Nor truer tongued nor scorned less, Nor bét could heal, that, by the Mass I durst swear, though the Pope it sung,
There was never yet through her tongue
Man or woman greatly harmèd As for her was all harm hid, No lassie flattering in her worde, That, purely, her simple record Was found as true as any bond, Or truth of any man'es hand.
Her throat, as I have now memory, Seemed as a round tower of ivory, Of good greatness, and not too great, And fair white she hete
That was my lady's name right, She was thereto fair and bright, She had not her name wrong, Right fair shoulders, and body long She had, and armes ever lith Fattish, fleshy, not great therewith, Right white hands and nailès red Round breasts, and of good brede 8 Her lippes were; a straight flat back, I knew on her none other lack, That all her limbs were pure snowing In as far as I had knowing. Thereto she could so well play What that her list, that I dare say That was like to torch bright That every man may take of light Enough, and it hath never the less Of manner and of comeliness. Right so fared my lady dear For every wight of her mannere Might catch enough if that he would If he had eyes her to behold For I dare swear well if that she Had among ten thousand be, She would have been at the best, A chief mirror of all the feast Though they had stood in a row To men's eyen that could know, For whereso men had played or waked,
So well inclined to all good That all her wit was set by the rood, Without malice, upon gladness, And thereto I saw never yet a less Harmful than she was in doing. I say not that she not had knowing What harm was, or else she Had known no good, so thinketh me: And truly, for to speak of truth But she had had, it had been ruth, Therefore she had so much her dell And I dare say, and swear it well That Truth himself over all and all Had chose his manor principal In her that was his resting place; Thereto she had the moste grace To have stedfast perseverance And easy attempre governance That ever I knew or wist yet So pure suffraunt was her wit. CHAUCER.
THREE years she grew in sun and
Then Nature said, "A lovelier flower On earth was never sown; This child I to myself will take; She shall be mine, and I will make A lady of my own.
"Myself will to my darling be Both law and impulse; and with me The girl, in rock and plain,
In earth and heaven, in glade and bower,
Shall feel an overseeing power To kindle or restrain.
"The floating clouds their state shall lend
To her; for her the willow bend: Nor shall she fail to see,
Even in the motions of the storm, Grace that shall mould the maiden's form
By silent sympathy.
"The stars of midnight shall be dear To her; and she shall lean her ear In many a secret place Where rivulets dance their wayward round;
And beauty, born of murmuring sound,
Shall pass into her face.
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