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Ranolf and Amohia

Canto the Nineteenth

page 329

Canto the Nineteenth.

I.

And what reflections took their way
Through Ranolf s mind as thus he lay
Pondering on Amo's questions, while the Maid
So lightly slumbered, lulled in noontide rest
So still, the golden spots that flecked its shade
Moved only with her moving half-hid breast?

"What must I teach her? how impress
This pliant Spirit's willingness?
On this unlettered Soul so white
What characters am I to write?
What truths in sooth have I to tell
To one whose native instincts might,
For aught I know, teach me as well?—
Where am I? let me run again
O'er facts indubitable and plain.
With nothing else have I to do
But what I know or feel is true.—

II.

"Behind this Universe—this train
Of grandest beauties, on the brain
page 330 Painted in such mysterious wise
How much is real none know—there lies
The unknown region undenied
Where (but in their effects descried)
Efficient Causes all reside.
But if all subtlest Forces—those
Perception grasps and Science knows,
That work in Nature's myriad shows,
All tend to one, and one alone—
A truth that each day clearer grows;
Must not the mystic Fountain, whence
That one proceeds, transcending Sense,
The primal Source of power, unknown
And unperceived—be One as well,
Though nought can yet its nature tell?

"Say you, there is no proof nor need
Of Cause—that 'tis a dream indeed
Begot by habit—but a vain
Conception of the human brain!—
'Tis answered—the idea of Cause
Is based on fundamental laws
Of human thought—with all that live
The notion is intuitive.

"You say—we can no more conceive
A thing that no beginning knew,
But has from all eternity
Existed—than a thing that grew
Or sprang from Nothing!—Well—'tis true,
Both inconceivable must be:
Yet I, for my part, must believe—
page 331 Most surely feel—while by the first
Our purest reason at the worst
Is merely overwhelmed—surpassed—
Tis jarred—revolted by the last.

III.

"One cause we are conscious of—must own
Can to no Matter be assigned,—
The Will, that in our human Mind
Sets Thought in motion when we please.
Be it to demonstration shown
That Thought, once set in motion, works
Through molecules no sight can seize—
Changes in brain material—still,
That motive; force, say what you will,
That primal Impulse we can lend
To subtlest matter every hour—
Deep in the Unapparent lurks,
Does our acutest sense transcend,
Yet somehow lies within our power.

"Is it so senseless then, to hold,
This Will may some faint hint unfold,
Of what in its unboundedness
Is different still beyond all guess—
The Infinite Force—unknown—untold
That still creating, still o'erseeing,
Still sets the glories we behold
For ever whirling into Being—
The Will Divine—First Cause of All,
Which God we in our ignorance call?—

page 332

IV.

"Be all that as it may—for me
I hold the mind so made, of course
It must assume the primal Force
That causes Mind, must mental be!
And does not one strange fact proclaim
The power that framed the mighty plan
Of Mind and Universe the same?
Nay, prove this bounded Mind of Man
In close accordance made, or grown,
With that all-boundless Mind unknown—
Faint spark from its omnific Flame?—
A thousand years that human Mind
Its subtle sciences designed
Of numbers—angles—ratios—lines—
Complex ingenious symbol-signs—
Pure brainwork as the wildest dream!
Then, when the long research of Time,
For Man's rapt gaze withdraws the veil
That hides the Universe sublime,
To his amazement, lo! the scheme
Of the majestic fabric stands
Before him, fitting to the Scale
So long prepared by his own hands;
In strictest keeping ranged and wrought
With fine gradations, ratios, rules,
Spun out of his unaided Thought
So many an age before, and taught
As abstract Science in his schools.
'Tis as if God himself blazed out
A moment there! beyond all doubt
Perceived—the still small voice profound
Speaking for once with trumpet-sound!

page 333

V.

"One boundless Mind first Cause of All—
That mighty fact not Physics—no,"
Nor Metaphysics can o'erthrow;
Our subtlest faculties impress
Our Reason favours it, no less.
So far seems plain. But must we call
That Cause all good—that infinite Will
Omnipotent? with Evil still
So rampant? even the babe unborn
By reckless Sires' diseases torn?
The God-made cat before your hearth
Torturing the God-made mouse for mirth?

"Well, these things outrage all our sense
Of Justice—Love—Benevolence
Or Veneration; moral powers
That most exalt this soul of ours
In Being's scale; the organs, these
High sentiments, whereby alone
Perhaps 'twas meant that we should seize,
Become impressed by—apprehend
As much as need be dimly known
Of Essences that Sense transcend;
These instincts—surely in us made
Ere birth in every varying grade—
Joined to man's structure from the first
(That brain, which they so shape and mould—
By them, not they by it, controlled)
Surely as hunger is or thirst—
These instincts, so God-made, we say—
page 334 Make what allowances you list
For Evil's uses, ends, excuses—
Are jarred, revolted every way
That any Evil should exist!

"What then! why should the Power that gave
To man that menial standard, found
As true, complete, as wish could crave
To gauge the sensuous Universe
As its majestic shows unfurled—
Be deemed to mock, as stinted, bound
By some defect, some flaw unsound,
Man's dearer need with any worse
A standard of his moral World?
Our Love, distinctly his own dower
As is that calculating power
As surely our one gauge, the best—
His spiritual Creation's test;
Why should it be less true, complete?
Why should it only prove a cheat?

VI.

"Again—the Will Divine must be
Denoted by some power at least
Of overmastering energy,
Throughout the universe we see
Or that we see not; one whose sway
Is active—in the ascendant—free—
Ever increasing and increased;
Not one that flourish how it may—
Is worsted—weaker—giving way.
In the material World, we know,
page 335 Though Action and Re-action show
Equal and needed both; although
Both motion and inertness seem
Balanced—essential to the scheme;
Yet so-called Matter, in the last
Result of that harmonious strife,
Is whirled into victorious life;
Resistance in the glorious sum
Of things, is overborne, surpassed—
If still renewed, is still o'ercome.
Well, what results is what is willed—
The intended—that which is fulfilled.
So in the moral World—the Good
Is counteracted and withstood
By Evil; yet this last, 'tis clear
(The matter of the moral sphere)
Is found, as the long centuries roll,
Still more and more subdued—outdone;
Of those two forces, on the whole
The losing and the lessening one.
Although the contest ceases never,
Though nothing may the two dissever,
Though Evil may the stuff supply
Good works on—here has being by;
Yet, as Time flies, who can deny,
For guerdon of the World's endeavour,
Good triumphs—there is Progress ever:—
No doubt, the single Will Divine
Decrees and works both powers; as, when
A rower directs a pair of sculls,
With one hand backs, the other pulls—
Both acts are caused by one design.
So Evil seconds Good; but then
page 336 The most triumphant element,
The victor principle, must best
That Universal Will suggest,
Best argue the Supreme Intent.

"So even in the World we see,
Good grows—and grows unceasingly:
This Will must therefore be confessed—
As far as our Experience shows,
Or finite faculties disclose
Its working—on the whole to tend
Triumphantly to some great end
In harmony with that high test
Itself first planted in Man's breast,
With this intent among the rest.

VII.

"But why, because that mighty Will
Cannot be said, within the bound
Of our perceptions to fulfil
All that the test, so true and sound,
Demands—insists on; why declare
Its wondrous working ceases where
Our poor perceptions do?—why fear
To say that what it breaks off here
It perfects in some other sphere?
Why carry through all Time and Space
The flaw we only know has place
Within the narrow field we trace?
Why this avowed, yet finite Wrong,
Into the Infinite prolong?—
More true to Reason 'tis, to trust
That standard of the Good and Just
page 337 And Loving—trust its dictates too.
If this world wrongs that standard true,
It wrongs God's Love, God's Right no less;
That wrong his justice must redress:
And how? but by some other state
Where compensation must await
All wrongs endured by small or great;
All Love's requirements be supplied—
The God-given standard justified?

VIII.

"Aye truly! and as when by mere appliance
Of that brain-fashioned scale of Abstract Science
To the Star-worlds on high, diviners bold
Have sometimes found a gap—declared a flaw
In our serenest dance of sister spheres;
And with a pod-like confidence foretold
The missing Planet needed by their law:
And when the optic tube, redoubling sight,
Conies in the course of long-revolving years
To test the startling prophecy aright—
Lo! there the cinders of the crumbled World,
Of proper weight, in fitting orbit hurled!
Or down in some obscure recess of Space,
Lo! there the lurking lost one they will trace,
And in some shining crowd you least suspect,
The furtive golden fugitive detect!—
Even so—when Love, that test diviner far,
Finds mightier flaws the moral fabric mar,
With full assurance may he not foretell
Some compensating cure must somewhere dwell—
Some good that shall the sense of wrong dispel?
page 338 And if immortal Life and nothing less
Be needed that deficience to redress,
Is it a splendour of too vast an orb,
Too bright for those whose gloom it should absorb—
Too grand a boon by Man to be enjoyed,
With his material kinship to the clod?—
Nay—'tis a speck to Him who left the void;
A World to us—a tiny Asteroid
To the infinite Munificence of God!

"Well then—through all that glittering mystery
Man sees that each demand brings its supply;
Responsive forces each stray force correct,
All waste restored, all aberrations checked;
Till perfect in all parts before him stands
The mighty structure from the Master's hands.
With no harsh note—no inharmonious noise,
Vast Worlds in myriads wing their flight sublime;
Their balanced whirl no chance, no change destroys;
But every pebble finds its counterpoise,
And every Star comes rounding up to time!—
So were the Spirit-World found perfect too
Could we its whole completed cycle view;
No wrong its neutralizing right would miss;
No sorrow some equivalent of bliss;
And every Soul whate'er its make or mood,
Though long or short the circuit it pursued,
Come brightening back at last to happiness and good;

—" Enough—enough! I feel, I see
The Cheerful still the True must be!
Look up, my love! nor longer keep
That sweet pretence of trustful sleep:
page 339 I know beneath each full-orbed lid,
The coiled-up living lustre hid,
Lurks ready for an innocent dart,
Not aimed at, sure to hit, the heart;
And round the placid lips the while,
Dawns the faint twilight of a smile.
Then listen, love! and let me try
To queries wide some weak reply!"

IX.

So then he told her of one Spirit for ever
Unknown; invisible—intangible
Inaudible; whose nature none can tell;
Subtler than Thought in essence; and yet never
To be disproved—discarded—disavowed;
Educing Good with infinite endeavour
From Evil for some mystic end allowed;
Whose work, Mankind, would be a cheat detected,
A palpable abortion and confusion
(Truly an inconceivable conclusion!)
If not in some serener Sphere perfected:
For He was good—all Life and Time proclaimed it,
Where good was ever in the slow ascendant;
And that blind bias—Conscience, as we named it—
Towards what seems good and better—though dependent
On other powers, for knowledge, be it granted,
Of what is good and better—was implanted
Within our brain at first, and could not be
Belied or outraged by Himself who framed it;
So must the Evil and the wrong be righted
In some great World of bliss we could not see,
Where suffering innocence would be requited,
And ties of rent affections reunited.
page 340 And this, which Reason pleaded for—the best
And brightest of that Spirit's emanations—
Souls in their very structure, revelations
Of his high nature on their own impressed,
Had felt and died for; on the facts insisting
Their souls were forced and fashioned to attest—
The certain Life immortal, to remove
And remedy all mortal woes existing—
And that supreme predominance of Love!
And therefore they who most their Souls may nourish
On Love, and hearken to his high decreeing—
Doing all right and every wrong repressing,
With pure self-sacrifice for others' blessing—
Must be the least unlike that Power supernal—
Most with that Will in their poor war agreeing;
Must be the fittest to survive and flourish
In that transcendant Sphere of Life eternal—
Of ever blest and beatific Being.

X.

Poor, vague, and disappointing merely
These reasonings to the listening Maid appeared;
Scarce lighting up that shadowy Life more clearly
Than the rude faith wherein she had been reared.
Some simple tale of pathos and pure wonder,
The founts divine of pity and awe unsealing,
With death's great mystery mystically dealing,
Her mental clouds had sooner rent asunder—
More strongly stirred her fancy and her feeling.
But all was Gospel from his lips that fell;
His tongue more gifted than with Prophet's spell;
And what he felt might well for her suffice,
Who, free from anxious fear too curious, nice,
page 341 Held this no theme to handle too austerely,
Wholly absorb, or trouble her too nearly!
Her lovelit bosom knew no listless pining
For future worlds or lives beyond divining,
With so much glory in the present shining:
And Ranolf had no taste for doubts intrusive,
Nor chafed too much at reasons inconclusive.
The mystery of the mighty Universe
He loved to play with as a subtle jest,
As children with conundrums—none the worse
Because the answer could not soon be guessed.
While its reality was a pure joy
That well might heart and life and love employ—
A bliss no doubt, no mystery could destroy.

And though he showed himself content no more
Even now than in old student-days of yore
To practise and abide by what he saw
Even then might be for Man a settled Law;
He could not, while he reasoned, quite forget
The possible truth so long before descried,
Which of itself had made him feel as yet
How slight his power to be that Maiden's guide—
That time-developed secret of the soul,
How the conviction of its glorious goal
And ultimate high destiny divine,
Is haply not designed to be the dower
Of any play of intellectual power—
No cold deduction Logic's subtlest line
Could dimly draw from shadowy postulate,
Mental or moral axiom overfine,
Admitted or disputed, as innate
Or for purblind Experience to acquire;
page 342 No theme to wrangle on with wordy strife:
But down—far down—in gulfs of Spirit profound,
Which action and keen passion only sound—
Lies, a pure gem for purified desire;
But rather, perfect gold by patience won,
Must by severer Alchemy be run
Out of each Soul plunged in the actual fire,
And smelted in the crucible of Life.

No! he could not forget that Truths like these
Way lurk secreted for the Soul to seize
Out of the chaos of her own emotions—
Heights of celestial rapture—depths like Ocean's
Of sacred sorrow; mystic yearnings speech
Divinely-darkling inmost sympathies,
Dimly discerned—awakened—half-exprest,
Haply by the blind might of Music best,
Echoing Infinitude; 'strange melodies '
That lustrous Song-Child languished to impart,
Breathing his boundless Love through boundless Art
Impassioned Seraph from his mint of gold
By our full-handed Master-Maker flung;
By him whose lays like eagles, still upwheeling
To that shy Empyrean of high feeling,
Float steadiest in the luminous fold on fold
Of wonder-cloud around its sun-depths rolled.
Whether he paint, all patience and pure snow,
Pompilia's fluttering innocence unsoiled;—
In verse, though fresh as dew one lava-flow
In fervour—with rich Titian-dyes aglow
Paint Paracelsus to grand frenzy stung.
Quixotic dreams and fiery quackeries foiled;—
page 343 Or—of Sordello's delicate Spirit unstrung
For action, in its vast Ideal's glare
Blasting the Real to its own dumb despair,—
On that Venetian water-lapped stair-flight,
In words condensed to diamond, indite
A lay dark-splendid as star-spangled Night:—
Still—though the pulses of the world-wide throng
He wields, with racy life blood beat so strong—
Subtlest Assertor of the Soul in song!—
—No! with that possible Soul-truth full in sight,
'Twas 5 little disappointment, less surprise,
To Ranolf that he read in Amo's eyes
Not all the satisfaction and delight
She looked for when the queries first she pressed
Which he with more delight and greater zest
Would doubtless, if he could, have set at rest.

But all these things apart—to them the Real
The Present seemed so rapturous an Ideal,
It seemed almost a sin to speculate
Or spend a thought upon another state;
Seemed flat ingratitude to Him who spread
A banquet so superb his guests before,
To ask, when on its dainties they had fed,
What his great bounty had provided more?
While sitting at his luxury-laden board,
To guess what fair festivities the Lord
Of the redundant feast had yet in store,
Music or dance to follow when 'twas o'er.

XI.

And so to lighter themes they gaily turn;
And "Rano! when shall I begin to learn"—
page 344 Said then the lively girl, "the white man's art
Of seeing talk—and sending, word for word,
To distant eyes unspoken speech unheard? "—
And Ranolf straightway hastened to impart
A first fond lesson in the mystery deep
Of letters—guiding that confiding hand
To trace huge characters on marbled sand,
Or clean smooth claystone of some yellow steep;
With many a toying frolicsome reproof,
And merry chiding, when the stalk of fern
And taper fingers seemed resolved to turn
Some curve from what was aimed at far aloof;
And both would join in joyous outcry wild
At each great blunder of the Woman-Child;
With childlike guerdon of a kiss no less
Rewarded at each wonderful success.
But such a keen and kindling sympathy
Between their hearts and minds electric played,
Both Taught and Teacher could delighted see
How swiftly and how sweetly, so conveyed,
The pupil would imbibe that mystery;
How soon that lovely Learner would o'ercome
The task of noting down in symbols dumb
The speech the learner with her loving smile
Was teaching to the Teacher all the while.

XII.

And now, upon a knoll beside the Lake,
Embowered with trees their resting-place they make;
The savoury light repast was over, won
By Manu's indefatigable gun,
Whose echo through the day they oft had caught
Faint from the glens or o'er the waters brought
page 345 Their young elastic spirits they resigned
To the soft hour's delicious influence,
And the full consciousness of all the bliss
Of love like theirs in such a life as this;
As sweet and free to their enamoured sense
As the pure air without a sound or sigh
They breathed in its sunlit serenity.
The solitude—the stillness so intense—
The blue ethereal lake—the liquid sky—
The silent banks and bluffs that watched around;—
The silent beams that broadly visible streamed
Through limpid veils of atmosphere, and gleamed
Along the silent hills that looked, spell-bound,
As if they felt the shadows o'er them grow,
From every fold and crevice creeping slow
And linking to exclude each slanting ray
That slumberous on their burnished shoulders lay;—
Or where those faint cliffs seemed in fading day
Refining to a vision far away—
Soft tints aerial—tender streaks of shade,
Or mottling stains their painted verdure made;—
All was so rapt and mute and motionless—
The pictured dream of lonely loveliness
Diffused o'er hearts that needed no such balm
The soft contagion of its soothing calm!
Twin hearts—mere atoms in the wide expanse—
They seemed absorbed in its voluptuous trance;
Yet 'twas the rapturous love that through them thrilled
That rather into Nature's frame instilled
Their own impassioned warmth, until it glowed
As fit for spirits in bliss some high divine abode!
page 346 Now Sunset's hushed and awful Splendour fills
The solemn scene;—transfigures heaven and earth
With luminous glory as in strange new-birth;
Clothes with vermilion woods the Eastern hills;
And where the Lake should spread its glassy length
Leaves a great hollow of one hue—blood-red
As the mysterious garments round Him rolied
Who travelling in the greatness of his strength,
In glory of apparel unalloyed,
Though stained like one who doth the winepress tread,
From Edom and from Bozrah came of old.
A single bar of light, a silver thread—
Stretched o'er the incarnadined and hollow void—
Betrays the viewless surface. On each hand
See how the headlands glow in solid gold!
See in the midst that mighty Mountain stand
One ruby!—deepening off through bluer shade
And bluer, towards the North the hills and sky
Lose more and more of that ensanguined dye—
Through all the purples of the pansy fade;
And in their darkest, most impressive gloom,
Rival the richest violet's loveliest bloom.

And Amo felt the evening;—felt
The solemn tenderness that dwelt
In all that gorgeous flood of pride
And splendour, spreading far and wide
Into her kindred spirit melt:
And nestling close to Ranolfs side
As half in sport and half in fear—
"Hush! "—whispered she, quite serious-eyed—
"Some awful Spirit must be near!—
page 347 What is it else that from the deep
Abyss o'erhead, seems so to creep
And creep—and ever nearer steal,
As though the heavens above us bending
Were closing round us—slow descending!—
Not evil though, that Spirit, I feel!
Hut like some gentle boundless arm
Encircling us—in shelter warm
Infolding us from hurt or harm;
Close to us, yet unheard, unseen:
Just as I felt you bending down
One morn above our couch of fern,
Which you had left so soon, to learn
What bird it was whose strange new cry
('Twas that blue crane with bristly crown—
You recollect?) we heard so nigh;
And I, unknowing your return
Lay half-awake nor wooing sleep;
With eyes just lightly shut to keep
Your image there with clearer glow,
And play with it in fancy so;
In dreamy bliss—such full content—
Somehow as calm and innocent,
It seemed, as when in infant days
Upon a mother's breast I leant;
So loath was I my lids to raise;
Or my fantastic joy resign
Till I should be no more alone!—
But you had stol'n towards me unknown;
And though I neither saw nor heard,
I felt your face approach my own:
Your lips were almost touching mine,
But did not—and no limb you stirred;
page 348 J neither heard nor felt your breath,
For you were silent—still as death;
And yet I knew your presence dear,
I knew that it was you so near,
Pausing before you would impress
Of fond and playful tenderness.
But that was Love—made me so wise,
To see without the use of eyes;
And know who 'twas did by me stand,
Without the aid of ear or hand:
No tongue to speak—no limb to move,
Was needed for ray heart to prove
That near approach of Love to Love! "—

"Yes—that was Love! and this, as well,
This solemn, sweet, absorbing spell,
This charm diffused o'er heaven and earth,
In Love may have its hidden birth!
For all that Reason—Science—guess,
It stands a mystery, none the less;—
A symbol why not so designed.
To do just what we find it do?
Impress upon the human Mind
A soothing sense of Love as true,
As warm and true as mine and thine,
But infinite—and all divine!—

XIII.

"But see! how through the floating, thin,
And tender purple gloom, one star
Is wildly throbbing—faint and far!
And lost in liquid twilight, look,
page 349 Where others lurk its depths within!—
Come, dearest, then! in yonder nook
See how, from its sun-smitten slopes
The snowy-crimson trees outthrow
Their sturdy stems that downward grow,
All firmly laced, securely braced
And cabled to the rocks with ropes
Of their own branches, backward bent
Along each coalescing trunk,
Half in its rugged column sunk
As up to roots again they run,
Stem, branch, and root, distinct yet one!
As if they saw and would prevent,
With conscious aim intelligent,
The great tree's risk so imminent
Of slipping down the steep descent.
But does the risk produce the aim?—
On level ground no cables sprout:
Or if in some rare case thrown out—
Perchance where casual winds create
A partial risk, but not the same—
The listless cable seems to fall
Unreaching earth; its would-be roots,
A tuft of red abortive shoots.
Adaptive Nature's powers are great;
And her organic products mate
And match each shifting change and chance
Of inorganic Circumstance;
Set each to each in ordered dance,
With a discriminating might
Of blindness keener than all sight;
And kindling here, and quenching there
At random—but with luck so rare
page 350 And mutual, ever full and fair
The cycle of Existence leave.
The trees that could their cable weave
Might stand—and those that could not—fall;
I wonder what the cause they call,
Gave this and not some other tree
That cunning first propensity
For veering cables out at all!
No matter, sweet, since there at last,
The pendent trees are anchored fast.
Suppose a fern-filled mat we sling
To one, up high, of those that fling
Their branches out most straight and stout;
So fine the night we need devise
No roof against those loving skies!
How pleasant there to lie awake
And try if any glimmering sheen
Or shimmer of the sleeping Lake
So far beneath—through all the green,
The latticed screen of boughs between.
A leafy labyrinth—could be seen!
How sweet to He up there so high,
And half asleep, so drowsily,
To all the faint night-noises hart
That make the hush more deep; and mark,
Watching the dim o'erbrooding sky,
How one by one and two by two
The moving stars come blinking through
The unmoving leaves—chink after chink—
Slow-pacing!—or if you should sleep
I might alone a vigil keep
Sometimes for mere delight; and think
What mighty Suns we use to link
page 351 Our tiny memories with; and how
Keen Sirius and red-flashing fierce
Aldebaran that deep Space may pierce.
And have no other end just now
For me, but with familiar rays
To call back far-off scenes and days:
How the faint Pleiads are less clear
Than fond regards they bring so dear!
And old Orion upside down,
Mythic Bœotian huntsman brown
Though here such different names he own,
Shines grand as his antique renown;
And flings abroad his giant limbs
In daring splendour nothing dims!
Although head foremost towards the sea
In all his glittering panoply
He plunges, eager to return
To those dear glorious lands below,
Far down below, where long ago
I first beheld his ardours burn!—
And we will settle, nestling there
Which way to-morrow we shall fare;
If back to strange Orákei's stream
Whose dark-green banks are chequered bright
With many a gaudy scar and seam
Sulphureous yellow—red and white,
Where over crusted strata grey
A hundred hot-springs steam and play
Or shall we to the Lake hard by
Of woody Oka-réka hie,
That mocks you with deceitful mien,
By loving cliffs encompassed round—
Fair captive, so resigned, serene,
page 352 Lulled in a seeming sleep profound;
Yet all the while slips off unseen
In secret diving underground;
And bursts out into open day
A beautiful Cascade, they say,
All flash and foam, a mile away!
A sudden startling change, complete
From mimic death to leaping life,
As yours, my wily, winsome cheat,
This mom when starting to your feet
At touch of that rude ready knife!"

What answer? but a laugh of fond assent
From her whose head upon his shoulder leant;
As, gaily springing up, the Maid addrest
Herself to that delightful task—to aid
In building birdlike such a pendulous nest
Mid twisted stems over the waters thrown,
As charmed with thoughts of airy rest
Lightly leaf-canopied and star-inrayed;
Toyed with by tender touches of the Moon;
Bare to each influence of the fine-flecked skies;
And yet secure as ever flung the boon
Of sweet unconsciousness o'er lovers' eyes—
Yet in secluded luxury uplaid
As ever rest enjoyed by lovers lone
In any green serenity of shade.

XIV.

So through the fervid Autumn's lingering glow
But Life and Love's young Spring-time; revelling so
page 353 In Eden-scenes as lovely-strange
As to the lover's power to change
All scenes to Edens, ever yet displayed
An Eden ready-made;
So, custom-licensed to be blest and bless
In luxury of lawful lawlessness,
Did our unbridled bridal pair
Pass their wild-honey moon no moon
Restricted—and, arriving all too soon,
Homeward to Roturua slowly strayed.