Life of my life, wilt thou not answer this?

'The dusky strand of Death inwoven here

With dear Love's tie, makes Love himself more

dear.'

8.

Is that enchanted moan only the swell

Of the long waves that roll in yonder bay?

And hark the clock within, the silver knell
Of twelve sweet hours that past in bridal white,
And died to live, long as my pulses play;
But now by this my love has closed her sight
And given false death her hand, and stol'n away
To dreamful wastes where footless fancies dwell
Among the fragments of the golden day.

May nothing there her maiden grace affright!
Dear heart, I feel with thee the drowsy spell.
My bride to be, my evermore delight,

My own heart's heart and ownest own farewell;

It is but for a little space I go :

And ye meanwhile far over moor and fell
Beat to the noiseless music of the night!
Has our whole earth gone nearer to the glow
Of your soft splendours that you look so bright?
I have climb'd nearer out of lonely Hell.

Beat, happy stars, timing with things below,
Beat with my heart more blest than heart can tell,

Blest, but for some dark undercurrent woe

That seems to draw - but it shall not be so :

Let all be well, be well.

XIX.

1.

HER brother is coming back to-night,
Breaking up my dream of delight.

2.

My dream? do I dream of bliss?

I have walk'd awake with Truth.

O when did a morning shine

So rich in atonement as this

For my dark-dawning youth,

Darken'd watching a mother decline

And that dead man at her heart and mine:

For who was left to watch her but I?

Yet so did I let my freshness die.

3.

I trust that I did not talk

To gentle Maud in our walk

(For often in lonely wanderings

I have cursed him even to lifeless things)

But I trust that I did not talk,

Not touch on her father's sin :

I am sure I did but speak

Of my mother's faded cheek
When it slowly grew so thin,
That I felt she was slowly dying
Vext with lawyers and harass'd with debt :
For how often I caught her with eyes all wet,
Shaking her head at her son and sighing

A world of trouble within!

4.

And Maud too, Maud was moved
To speak of the mother she loved

F

As one scarce less forlorn,

Dying abroad and it seems apart

From him who had ceased to share her heart,

And ever mourning over the feud,

The household Fury sprinkled with blood

By which our houses are torn :

How strange was what she said,

When only Maud and the brother
Hung over her dying bed-

That Maud's dark father and mine

Had bound us one to the other,

Betrothed us over their wine,

On the day when Maud was born;

Seal'd her mine from her first sweet breath.

Mine, mine by a right, from birth till death, Mine, mine-our fathers have sworn.

5.

But the true blood spilt had in it a heat

To dissolve the precious seal on a bond,