12. When a Mammonite mother kills her babe for a burial fee, And Timour-Mammon grins on a pile of children's bones, Is it peace or war? better, war! loud war by land and by sea, War with a thousand battles, and shaking a hundred thrones. 13. For I trust if an enemy's fleet came yonder round by the hill, And the rushing battle-bolt sang from the three decker out of the foam, That the smooth-faced snub-nosed rogue would leap from his counter and till, And strike, if he could, were it but with his cheating yard-wand, home. 14. There are workmen up at the Hall: they are coming back from abroad, The dark old place will be gilt by the touch of a millionnaire : I have heard, I know not whence, of the singular beauty of Maud, I play'd with the girl when a child; she promised then to be fair. 15. Maud with her venturous climbings and tumbles and childish escapes, Maud the delight of the village, the ringing joy of the Hall, Maud with her sweet purse-mouth when my father dangled the grapes, Maud the beloved of my mother, the moon-faced darling of all,― 16. What is she now? My dreams are bad. She may bring me a curse. No, there is fatter game on the moor; she will let me alone. Thanks, for the fiend best knows whether woman or man be the worse. I will bury myself in my books, and the Devil may pipe to his own. II. LONG have I sigh'd for a calm: God grant I may find it at last! It will never be broken by Maud, she has neither savor nor salt, But a cold and clear-cut face, as I found when her carriage past, Perfectly beautiful: let it be granted her: where is the fault? All that I saw (for her eyes were downcast, not to be seen) Faultily faultless, icily regular, splendidly null, Dead perfection, no more; nothing more, if it had not been |