Names, deeds, grey legends, dire events, rebellions, NOUN THE EVE OF ST: AGNES. I. T. Agnes' Eve-ah, bitter chill it was! The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold; The hare limp'd trembling through the frozen grass, And silent was the flock in woolly fold : Numb were the Beadsman's fingers while he told His rosary, and while his frosted breath, Like pious incense from a censer old, Seem'd taking flight for heaven without a death, Past the sweet Virgin's picture, while his prayer he saith. II. His prayer he saith, this patient, holy man; He passeth by; and his weak spirit fails III. Northward he turneth through a little door, Rough ashes sat he for his soul's reprieve, IV. 1 That ancient Beadsman heard the prelude soft; Stared, where upon their heads the cornice rests, on their breasts. V. At length burst in the argent revelry, These let us wish away, On love, and wing'd St. Agnes' saintly care, VI. Nor look behind, nor sideways, but require VII. Full of this whim was thoughtful Madeline : The music, yearning like a God in pain, She scarcely heard: her maiden eyes divine, Fix'd on the floor, saw many a sweeping train Pass by-she heeded not at all : in vain Came many a tiptoe, amorous cavalier, And back retired; not cool'd by high disdain, But she saw not: her heart was otherwhere; She sigh'd for Agnes' dreams, the sweetest of the year.' * Keats writes to Mr. Tay. what appears to me an alterlor (June 11, 1820):—“In ation in the seventh stanza reading over the proof of St. very much for the worse. Agnes' Eve' since I left Fleet The passage I mean stands Street, I was struck with thus: her maiden eyes incline Pass by. her maiden eyes divine Pass by. My meaning is quite de- of passers by, but for skirts stroyed in the alteration. I sweeping along the floor. do not use train for concourse In the first stanza my copy reads, second line — bitter chill it was, to avoid the echo cold in the second line." VIII. She danced along with vague, regardless eyes, Anxious her lips, her breathing quick and short : The hallow'd hour was near at hand, she sighs: Amid the timbrels, and the throng'd resort Of whisperers in anger or in sport; 'Mid looks of love, defiance, hate, and scorn, Hoodwink'd with faery fancy; all amort, Save to St. Agnes and her lambs unshorn, And all the bliss to be before to-morrow morn. IX. So, purposing each moment to retire, She linger'd still. Meantime, across the moors, Had come young Porphyro, with heart on fire For Madeline. Beside the portal doors, Buttress'd from moonlight, stands he, and im plores All saints to give him sight of Madeline, But for one moment in the tedious hours, That he might gaze and worship all unseen; Perchance speak, kneel, touch, kiss-in sooth such things have been. X. He ventures in: let no buzz'd whisper tell, All eyes be muffled, or a hundred swords Will storm his heart, Love's feverous citadel : For him, those chambers held barbarian hordes, Hyena foeman, and hot-blooded lords, Whose very dogs would execration howl Against his lineage: not one breast affords Him any mercy in that mansion foul, Save one old beldame, weak in body and in soul. |