That drove her foes with slaughter from her walls, Quick answer'd Lilia, 'There are thousands now O were I some great Princess, I would build And I would teach them all things: you should see.' And one said, smiling, 'Pretty were the sight I think they should not wear our rusty gowns, If there were many Lilias in the brood, ว However deep you might embower the nest, Some boy would spy it.' At this upon the sward She tapt her tiny silken-sandal'd foot: 'That's your light way; but I would make it death For any male thing but to peep at us.' Petulant she spoke, and at herself she laugh'd; A rosebud set with little wilful thorns, And sweet as English air could make her, she: They boated and they cricketed; they talk'd At wine, in clubs, of art, of politics; They lost their weeks; they vext the souls of deans; They rode; they betted; made a hundred friends, And caught the blossom of the flying terms, But miss'd the mignonette of Vivian-place, The little hearth-flower Lilia. Thus he spoke, Part banter, part affection. 'True,' she said, 'We doubt not that. O yes, you miss'd us much. I'll stake my ruby ring upon it you did.' She held it out; and as a parrot turns Up thro' gilt wires a crafty loving eye, And takes a lady's finger with all care, And wrung it. Doubt my word again!' he said. 'Come, listen! here is proof that you were miss'd: We seven stay'd at Christmas up to read ; We seven took one tutor. Never man So moulder'd in a sinecure as he : For while our cloisters echo'd frosty feet, And our long walks were stript as bare as brooms, We did but talk you over, pledge you all Sick for the hollies and the yews of home Charades and riddles as at Christmas here, And what's my thought and when and where and how, And often told a tale from mouth to mouth As here at Christmas.' 'I remember that: A pleasant game,' she said; 'I liked it more Than magic music, forfeits, all the rest. But these what kind of tales do men tell men, I wonder, by themselves?' A half-disdain, Perch'd on the pouted blossom of her lips: The rest would follow; so we tost the ball: What kind of tales? why, such as served to kill Time by the fire in winter.' 'Kill him now! Tell one,' she said: 'kill him in summer too.' 'Why not a summer's as a winter's tale? A tale for summer, as befits the time; And something it should be to suit the place, Grave, moral, solemn, like the mouldering walls About us.' Walter warp'd his mouth at this To something so mock-solemn, that I laugh'd, An echo, like an April woodpecker, Hid in the ruins; till the maiden aunt (A little sense of wrong had touch'd her face With colour) turn'd to me: 'Well as you will Just as you will,' she said; 'be, if you will, Yourself your hero.' 'Look then,' added he, 'Since Lilia would be princess, that you stoop No lower than a prince.' |