She lean'd against the armed man, Few sorrows hath she of her own, The songs that make her grieve, I played a soft and doleful air, She listened with a flitting blush, I told her of the Knight that wore Upon his shield a burning brand; And that for ten long years he wooed The Lady of the Land. I told her how he pined and ah! She listened with a flitting blush, Too fondly on her face! But when I told the cruel scorn That crazed that bold and lovely Knight, And that he crossed the mountain-woods, Nor rested day nor night; That sometimes from the savage den, And sometimes from the darksome shade, There came and looked him in the face And that, unknowing what he did, And how she wept and clasped his knees; And how she tended him in vain And ever strove to expiate The scorn that crazed his brain ; And that she nursed him in a cave; His dying words-but when I reached All impulses of soul and sense Had thrilled my guileless Genevieve; And hopes, and fears that kindle hope, And gentle wishes long subdued, She wept with pity and delight, Her bosom heaved-she stept aside, She half inclosed me with her arms, 'Twas partly love, and partly fear, I calmed her fears, and she was calm, My bright and beauteous Bride. INTRODUCTION TO THE TALE OF THE LEAVE the lily on its stem; A cypress and a myrtle-bough And now a tale of love and woe, But most, my own dear Genevieve, And now once more, a tale of woe, And trembles on the string. *Here followed the stanzas, afterwards published separately under the title " Love," (see this vol. p. 122,) and after them came the other three stanzas printed above; the whole forming the introduction to the intended Dark Ladie, of which all that exists is to be found at p. 127.Late Ed. When last I sang the cruel scorn, I promised thee a sister tale, Of man's perfidious cruelty; Come, then, and hear what cruel wrong Befell the Dark Ladie. THE BALLAD OF THE DARK LADIE. A FRAGMENT BENEATH yon birch with silver bark, And boughs so pendulous and fair, The brook falls scattered down the rock, And all is mossy there! And there upon the moss she sits, The heavy tear is in her eye, And drops and swells again. Three times she sends her little page If he might find the Knight that wears The sun was sloping down the sky, |