Roar'd) make yourself a man to fight with men.

Go: Cyril told us all.'

As boys that slink

From ferule and the trespass-chiding eye,

Away we stole, and transient in a trice

From what was left of faded woman-slough
To sheathing splendours and the golden scale
Of harness, issued in the sun that now

Leapt from the dewy shoulders of the Earth,
And hit the northern hills. Here Cyril met us
A little shy at first, but by and by

We twain, with mutual pardon ask'd and given
For stroke and song, resolder'd peace, whereon
Follow'd his tale. Amazed he fled away
Thro' the dark land, and later in the night
Had come on Psyche weeping: 'then we fell
Into your father's hand, and there she lies,

But will not speak, nor stir.'

He show'd a tent

A stone-shot off: we enter'd in, and there

Among piled arms and rough accoutrements,
Pitiful sight, wrapt in a soldier's cloak,

Like some sweet sculpture draped from head to foot,
And push'd by rude hands from its pedestal,

All her fair length upon the ground she lay :
And at her head a follower of the camp,

A charr'd and wrinkled piece of womanhood,
Sat watching like a watcher by the dead.

Then Florian knelt, and 'Come' he whisper'd to her 6 Lift up your head, sweet sister: lie not thus.

What have you done but right? you could not slay up: be comforted:

Me, nor your prince : look

Sweet is it to have done the thing one ought,

When fall'n in darker ways.' And likewise I : 'Be comforted: have I not lost her too,

In whose least act abides the nameless charm

That none has else for me.'

She heard, she moved,

She moan'd, a folded voice; and up she sat,

And raised the cloak from brows as pale and smooth

As those that mourn half-shrouded over death

In deathless marble. 'Her' she said 'my friend—

Parted from her betray'd her cause and mineWhere shall I breathe? why kept ye not your faith? O base and bad! what comfort? none for me!'

To whom remorseful Cyril 'Yet I pray

Take comfort: live, dear lady, for your child!'
At which she lifted up her voice and cried.

'Ah me, my babe, my blossom, ah my child,
My one sweet child, whom I shall see no more!
For now will cruel Ida keep her back ;
And either she will die from want of care,
Or sicken with ill usage, when they say
The child is hers-for every little fault,

The child is hers; and they will beat my girl
Remembering her mother: O my flower!

Or they will take her, they will make her hard,

And she will pass me by in after-life

With some cold reverence worse than were she dead.

Ill mother that I was to leave her there,

To lag behind, scared by the cry they made,
The horror of the shame among them all:
But I will go and sit beside the doors,
And make a wild petition night and day,
Until they hate to hear me like a wind

Wailing for ever, till they open

to me,

And lay my little blossom at my feet,
My babe, my sweet Aglaïa, my one child:
And I will take her up and go my way,

And satisfy my soul with kissing her:

Ah! what might that man not deserve of me,

Who gave me back my child?'

'Be comforted'

Said Cyril 'you shall have it :' but again

She veil'd her brows, and prone she sank, and so

Like tender things that being caught feign death, Spoke not, nor stirr❜d.

By this a murmur ran

Thro' all the camp and inward raced the scouts

With rumour of Prince Arac hard at hand.

We left her by the woman, and without

Found the gray kings at parle and 'Look you' cried

:

My father that our compact be fulfill'd:

You have spoilt this child; she laughs at you and man:

She wrongs herself, her sex, and me, and him,

But red-faced war has rods of steel and fire;

She yields, or war.'

Then Gama turn'd to me:

'We fear, indeed, you spent a stormy time

With our strange girl: and yet they say that still
You love her. Give us, then, your mind at large :
How say you, war or not ?'

Not war, if possible,

O king,' I said, 'lest from the abuse of war,

The desecrated shrine, the trampled year,

The smouldering homestead, and the household flower Torn from the lintel-all the common wrong

A smoke go up thro' which I loom to her

Three times a monster: now she lightens scorn
At him that mars her plan, but then would hate