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"They come by the hill-verge from Boyne Bar, Sister Helen,

And one draws nigh, but two are afar."

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"Look, look, do you know them who they are,But he says, till you take back your ban, Sister Helen, Little brother?'' (0 Mother, Mary Mother, His soul would pass, yet never can.'' and "Nay then, shall I slay a living man,

Who should they be, between Hell

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Sister Helen,

Little brother?"

and

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And he says that he would speak with you.'' 80"Here's Keith of Westholm riding fast, "Oh tell him I fear the frozen dew,

Little brother.''

and

(0 Mother, Mary Mother, Why laughs she thus, between Hell Heaven?)

Sister Helen, For I know the white plume on the blast."' "The hour, the sweet hour I forecast,

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Little brother!'' (0 Mother, Mary Mother, Is the hour sweet, between Hell and Heaven?)

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(0 Mother, Mary Mother, 90Nay hear, nay hear, you must hear perforce,

And they and we, between Hell and Heaven!)

"Three days ago, on his marriage-morn,

Sister Helen,

What word now
Heaven?)

Little brother!'' (0 Mother, Mary Mother, heard, between Hell and

He sickened, and lies since then forlorn."
"For bridegroom's side is the bride a thorn, "Oh he says that Keith of Ewern's cry,

Sister Helen,

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Little brother?'' (0 Mother, Mary Mother, Is ever to see you ere he die." Cold bridal cheer, between Hell and Heaven!)"In all that his soul sees, there am I, Little brother!'' (0 Mother, Mary Mother, sight, between Hell and

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If he have prayed, between Hell and Heaven!) And bids you mind the banks of Boyne.'

150

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Little brother?'' (0 Mother, Mary Mother, What strain but death's, between Hell and Heaven?)

"She may not speak, she sinks in a swoon, Sister Helen,

She lifts her lips and gasps on the moon. "Oh! might I but hear her soul's blithe tune, Little brother!'' (0 Mother, Mary Mother,

"Oh he prays you, as his heart would rive, 190 Her woe's dumb cry, between Hell and

Sister Helen,

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Heaven!)

'They've caught her to Westholm's saddlebow,

Sister Helen,

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And her moonlit hair gleams white in its flow." "Let it turn whiter than winter snow, Little brother!""

(0 Mother, Mary Mother, Woe-withered gold, between Hell and Heaven!)

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Still with me lingers-' ""

(But she laughed as my kisses Glowed in her fingers With love's old blisses) "Oh! what one favour Remains to woo him, Whose whole poor savour Belongs not to him?""

THE WOODSPURGE

The wind flapped loose, the wind was still,
Shaken out dead from tree and hill:
I had walked on at the wind's will,-
I sat now,
for the wind was still.

Between my knees my forehead was,-
My lips, drawn in, said not Alas!
My hair was over in the grass,
My naked ears heard the day pass.

My eyes, wide open, had the run
Of some ten weeds to fix upon;
Among those few, out of the sun,

The woodspurge flowered, three cups in one.

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Or by what spell they have sped.

Still we say as we go,—
"Strange to think by the way,
Whatever there is to know,

That shall we know one day."

What of the heart of hate

That beats in thy breast, O Time?Red strife from the furthest prime, And anguish of fierce debate;

War that shatters her slain,

And peace that grinds them as grain,
And eyes fixed ever in vain
On the pitiless eyes of Fate.

Still we say as we go,-
"Strange to think by the way,
Whatever there is to know,

That shall we know one day."

What of the heart of love

That bleeds in thy breast, O Man? Thy kisses snatched 'neath the ban Of fangs that mock them above;

Thy bells prolonged unto knells,
Thy hope that a breath dispels,
Thy bitter forlorn farewells
And the empty echoes thereof?

Still we say as we go,-
"Strange to think by the way,
Whatever there is to know,

That shall we know one day."

The sky leans dumb on the sea,
Aweary with all its wings;
And oh! the song the sea sings

Is dark everlastingly.

Our past is clean forgot,
Our present is and is not,
Our future's a sealed seedplot,
And what betwixt them are we?-

We who say as we go,-
"Strange to think by the way,
Whatever there is to know,

That shall we know one day."

FROM THE HOUSE OF LIFE*
THE SONNET

A Sonnet is a moment's monument,-
Memorial from the Soul's eternity

Of its own arduous fulness reverent: Carve it in ivory or in ebony,

As Day or Night may rule; and let Time see
Its flowering crest impearled and orient.
A Sonnet is a coin: its face reveals
The Soul, its converse, to what Power 'tis
due:-

Whether for tribute to the august appeals
Of Life, or dower in Love's high retinue,
It serve; or 'mid the dark wharf's cavernous
breath,

In Charon's palm it pay the toll to Death.

IV. LOVESIGHT

When do I see thee most, beloved one?
When in the light the spirits of mine eyes
Before thy face, their altar, solemnize
The worship of that Love through thee made
known?

Or when in the dusk hours, (we two alone,)
Close-kissed and eloquent of still replies
Thy twilight-hidden glimmering visage lies,
And my soul only sees thy soul its own?
O love, my love! if I no more should see
Thyself, nor on the earth the shadow of thee,
Nor image of thine eyes in any spring,—
How then should sound upon Life's darkening
slope

The ground-whirl of the perished leaves of

Hope,

The wind of Death's imperishable wing?

XIX. SILENT NOON

Your hands lie open in the long fresh grass, The finger-points look through like rosy blooms; Your eyes smile peace. The pasture gleams and

glooms

'Neath billowing skies that scatter and amass. All round our nest, far as the eye can pass, Are golden kingcup-fields with silver edge Where the cow-parsley skirts the hawthornhedge.

"Tis visible silence, still as the hour-glass. Deep in the sun-searched growths the dragon-fly Hangs like a blue thread loosened from the

sky:

So this wing'd hour is dropt to us from above.
Oh! clasp we to our hearts, for deathless dower,

To one dead deathless hour. Look that it be, This close-companioned inarticulate hour

Whether for lustral rite or dire portent,

The "house of life" was the first of the twelve divisions of the heavens made by old astrologers in casting the horoscope of a man's destiny. This series of a hundred and one son

nets is a faithful record, drawn from Ros

setti's own inward experience, "of the mysterious conjunctions and oppositions wrought by Love, Change, and Fate in the House of Life."-Eng. Lit.. p. 373.

When twofold silence was the song of love.

XLIX-LII. WILLOWWOOD

I

I sat with Love upon a woodside well,
Leaning across the water, I and he;
Nor ever did he speak nor looked at me,

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