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Then spoke the bride's father, his hand on his

sword

THE EVE OF ST. AGNES.

(For the poor craven bridegroom said never a ST. AGNES' EVE, ah, bitter chill it was!

word),

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bar,

The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold;
The hare limped 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,
Seemed taking flight for heaven without a death,
Like pious incense from a censer old,
Past the sweet virgin's picture, while his prayer
he saith.

His prayer he saith, this patient, holy man ;
Then takes his lamp, and riseth from his knees,
And back returneth, meagre, barefoot, wan,
Along the chapel aisle by slow degrees ;
The sculptured dead on each side seem to freeze,
Emprisoned in black, purgatorial rails;
Knights, ladies, praying in dumb orat'ries,
He passeth by; and his weak spirit fails
To think how they may ache in icy hoods and
mails.

"Now tread we a measure," said young Loch- Northward he turneth through a little door, And scarce three steps, ere music's golden tongue Flattered to tears this aged man and poor;

invar.

So stately his form, and so lovely her face,
That never a hall such a galliard did grace;
While her mother did fret, and her father did
fume,

But no,
The joys of all his life were said and sung:
His was harsh penance on St. Agnes' Eve:
Another way he went, and soon among

- already had his death-bell rung;

And the bridegroom stood dangling his bonnet Rough ashes sat he for his soul's reprieve,

and plume;

And the bridemaidens whispered, "'T were bet

ter by far

And all night kept awake, for sinners' sake to grieve.

To have matched our fair cousin with young That ancient beadsman heard the prelude soft :

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They told her how, upon St. Agnes' Eve,
Young virgins might have visions of delight,
And soft adorings from their loves receive
Upon the honeyed middle of the night,
If ceremonies due they did aright;
As, supperless to bed they must retire,
And couch supine their beauties, lily white;
Nor look behind, nor sideways, but require
Of heaven with upward eyes for all that they
desire.

Full of this whim was thoughtful Madeline;
The music, yearning like a god in pain,
She scarcely heard; her maiden eyes divine,
Fixed 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 cooled by high disdain.
But she saw not; her heart was otherwhere ;
She sighed for Agnes' dreams, the sweetest of the
year.

She danced along with vague, regardless eyes,
Anxious her lips, her breathing quick and short;
The hallowed hour was near at hand; she sighs
Amid the timbrels, and the thronged resort
Of whisperers in anger, or in sport;
Mid looks of love, defiance, hate, and scorn,
Hoodwinked with fairy fancy; all amort
Save to St. Agnes and her lambs unshorn,
And all the bliss to be before to-morrow morn.

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Save one old beldame, weak in body and in soul. Sudden a thought came like a full-blown pose,

Ah, happy chance! the aged creature came,
Shuffling along with ivory-headed wand,

To where he stood, hid from the torch's flame,
Behind a broad hall-pillar, far beyond
The sound of merriment and chorus bland.

Flushing his brow, and in his pained heart
Made purple riot; then doth he propose
A stratagem, that makes the beldame start:
"A cruel man and impious thou art !

Sweet lady, let her pray, and sleep and dream

Alone with her good angels, far apart

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From wicked men like thee. Go, go! I deem Thou canst not surely be the same that thou didst seem."

"I will not harm her, by all saints I swear!" Quoth Porphyro; "O, may I ne'er find grace When my weak voice shall whisper its last prayer,

If one of her soft ringlets I displace,
Or look with ruffian passion in her face:
Good Angela, believe me by these tears;
Or I will, even in a moment's space,
Awake, with horrid shout, my foemen's ears,
And beard them, though they be more fanged
than wolves and bears."

“Ah! why wilt thou affright a feeble soul?
A poor, weak, palsy-stricken, churchyard thing,
Whose passing-bell may ere the midnight toll;
Whose prayers for thee, each morn and evening,
Were never missed." Thus plaining, doth she
bring

A gentler speech from burning Porphyro;
So woful, and of such deep sorrowing,
That Angela gives promise she will do
Whatever he shall wish, betide her weal or woe.

Which was, to lead him, in close secrecy,
Even to Madeline's chamber, and there hide
Him in a closet, of such privacy
That he might see her beauty unespied,
And win perhaps that night a peerless bride,
While legioned fairies paced the coverlet,
And pale enchantment held her sleepy-eyed.
Never on such a night have lovers met,

Since Merlin paid his demon all the monstrous debt.

"It shall be as thou wishest," said the dame;
"All cates and dainties shall be stored there
Quickly on this feast-night; by the tambour
frame

Her own lute thou wilt see; no time to spare,
For I am slow and feeble, and scarce dare
On such a catering trust my dizzy head.

Where Porphyro took covert, pleased amain. His poor guide hurried back with agues in her brain.

Her faltering hand upon the balustrade,
Old Angela was feeling for the stair,
When Madeline, St. Agnes' charmed maid,
Rose, like a missioned spirit, unaware;
With silver taper's light, and pious care,
She turned, and down the aged gossip led
To a safe level matting. Now prepare,
Young Porphyro, for gazing on that bed!
She comes, she comes again, like ring-dove
frayed and fled.

Out went the taper as she hurried in ;
Its little smoke, in pallid moonshine, died;
She closed the door, she panted, all akin
To spirits of the air, and visions wide;
No uttered syllable, or, woe betide!
But to her heart, her heart was voluble,
Paining with eloquence her balmy side;
As though a tongueless nightingale should swell
Her throat in vain, and die, heart-stifled in her
dell.

A casement high and triple-arched there was,
All garlanded with carven imageries
Of fruits, and flowers, and bunches of knot-grass,
And diamonded with panes of quaint device,
Innumerable of stains and splendid dyes,
As are the tiger-moth's deep-damasked wings;
And in the midst, 'mong thousand heraldries,
And twilight saints, and dim emblazonings,
A shielded scutcheon blushed with blood of
queens and kings.

Full on this casement shone the wintry moon,
And threw warm gules on Madeline's fair breast,
As down she knelt for heaven's grace and boon;
Rose-bloom fell on her hands, together prest,
And on her silver cross soft amethyst,
And on her hair a glory, like a saint;
She seemed a splendid angel, newly drest,
Save wings, for heaven. Porphyro grew faint:

Wait here, my child, with patience kneel in She knelt, so pure a thing, so free from mortal

prayer

The while. Ah! thou must needs the lady wed, Or may I never leave my grave among the dead."

So saying, she hobbled off with busy fear.
The lover's endless minutes slowly passed:
The dame returned, and whispered in his ear
To follow her; with aged eyes aghast
From fright of dim espial. Safe at last,
Through many a dusky gallery, they gain

taint.

Anon his heart revives; her vespers done,
Of all its wreathed pearls her hair she frees;
Unclasps her warmèd jewels one by one;
Loosens her fragrant bodice; by degrees
Her rich attire creeps rustling to her knees;
Half hidden, like a mermaid in sea-weed,
Pensive awhile she dreams awake, and sees,
In fancy, fair St. Agnes in her bed,

The maiden's chamber, silken, hushed and But dares not look behind, or all the charm is

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Soon, trembling in her soft and chilly nest,
In sort of wakeful swoon, perplexed she lay,
Until the poppied warmth of sleep oppressed
Her soothed limbs, and soul fatigued away;
Flown like a thought, until the morrow-day;
Blissfully havened both from joy and pain;
Clasped like a missal where swart Paynims pray;
Blinded alike from sunshine and from rain,
As though a rose should shut, and be a bud
again.

Stolen to this paradise, and so entranced,
Porphyro gazed upon her empty dress,
And listened to her breathing, if it chanced
To wake into a slumberous tenderness;
Which when he heard, that minute did he bless,
And breathed himself; then from the closet
crept,

Noiseless as fear in a wide wilderness,
And over the hushed carpet, silent, stept,
And 'tween the curtains peeped, where, lo!
how fast she slept.

Then by the bedside, where the faded moon
Made a dim, silver twilight soft he set
A table, and, half anguished, threw thereon
A cloth of woven crimson, gold, and jet :-
O for some drowsy Morphean amulet !
The boisterous, midnight, festive clarion,
The kettle-drum, and far-heard clarionet,
Affray his ears, though but in dying tone:

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The lustrous salvers in the moonlight gleam;
Broad golden fringe upon the carpet lies;
It seemed he never, never could redeem
From such a steadfast spell his lady's eyes;
So mused awhile, entoiled in woofèd phantasies.
Awakening up, he took her hollow lute,
Tumultuous, and, in chords that tenderest be,
He played an ancient ditty, long since mute,
In Provence called "La belle dame sans merci ;"
Close to her ear touching the melody;
Wherewith disturbed, she uttered a soft moan: ·
He ceased; she panted quick, and suddenly
Her blue affrayèd eyes wide open shone :
Upon his knees he sank, pale as smooth-sculptured

stone.

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Her eyes were open, but she still beheld,
Now wide awake, the vision of her sleep.
There was a painful change, that nigh expelled
The blisses of her dream so pure and deep;
At which fair Madeline began to weep,
And moan forth witless words with many a sigh ;
While still her gaze on Porphyro would keep;
Who knelt, with joined hands and piteous eye,
Fearing to move or speak, she looked so dream.
ingly.

"Ah, Porphyro!" said she, "but even now
Thy voice was at sweet tremble in mine ear,
Made tunable with every sweetest vow;

The hall-door shuts again, and all the noise is And those sad eyes were spiritual and clear ;

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How changed thou art! how pallid, chill, and

drear!

Give me that voice again, my Porphyro,
Those looks immortal, those complainings dear!
O, leave me not in this eternal woe,
For if thou diest, my love, I know not where to go."

Beyond a mortal man impassioned far
At these voluptuous accents, he arose,
Ethereal, flushed, and like a throbbing star
Seen mid the sapphire heaven's deep repose;
Into her dream he melted, as the rose
Blendeth its odor with the violet,
Solution sweet; meantime the frost-wind blows
Like love's alarum pattering the sharp sleet
Against the window-panes: St. Agnes' moon
hath set.

'T is dark; quick pattereth the flaw-blown sleet: "This is no dream, my bride, my Madeline!" T is dark; the iced gusts still rave and beat : "No dream? alas! alas! and woe is mine! Porphyro will leave me here to fade and pine. Cruel! what traitor could thee hither bring? I curse not, for my heart is lost in thine, Though thou forsakest a deceived thing; A dove forlorn and lost, with sick, unpruned wing."

"My Madeline! sweet dreamer! lovely bride! Say, may I be for aye thy vassal blest?

And the last rays kissed the forehead of a man and maiden fair,

Thy beauty's shield, heart-shaped and vermeil He with footsteps slow and weary, she with

dyed?

Ah, silver shrine, here will I take my rest
After so many hours of toil and quest,
A famished pilgrim, — saved by miracle.
Though I have found, I will not rob thy nest,
Saving of thy sweet self; if thou think'st well
To trust, fair Madeline, to no rude infidel.

"Hark! 't is an elfin storm from faery land,
Of haggard seeming, but a boon indeed :
Arise, arise! the morning is at hand;
The bloated wassailers will never heed:
Let us away, my love, with happy speed ;
There are no ears to hear, or eyes to see,
Drowned all in Rhenish and the sleepy mead:
Awake, arise, my love, and fearless be,

sunny floating hair ;

He with bowed head, sad and thoughtful, she
with lips all cold and white,
Struggling to keep back the murmur,

"Curfew must not ring to-night."

"Sexton," Bessie's white lips faltered, pointing to the prison old,

With its turrets tall and gloomy, with its walls dark, damp, and cold,

"I've a lover in that prison, doomed this very night to die,

At the ringing of the Curfew, and no earthly help is nigh;

Cromwell will not come till sunset," and her lips grew strangely white

For o'er the southern moors I have a home for As she breathed the husky whisper :

thee."

She hurried at his words, beset with fears,
For there were sleeping dragons all around,
At glaring watch, perhaps, with ready spears;
Down the wide stairs a darkling way they found,
In all the house was heard no human sound.
A chain-drooped lamp was flickering by each door;
The arras, rich with horseman, hawk, and hound,
Fluttered in the besieging wind's uproar ;
And the long carpets rose along the gusty floor.

They glide, like phantoms, into the wide hall!
Like phantoms to the iron porch they glide,
Where lay the porter, in uneasy sprawl,
With a huge empty flagon by his side:
The wakeful bloodhound rose, and shook his hide,
But his sagacious eye an inmate owns ;
By one, and one, the bolts full easy slide;
The chains lie silent on the footworn stones;
The key turns, and the door upon its hinges groans.

And they are gone! ay, ages long ago
These lovers fled away into the storm.
That night the baron dreamt of many a woe,
And all his warrior-guests, with shade and form
Of witch, and demon, and large coffin-worm,
Were long be-nightmared. Angela the old
Died palsy-twitched, with meagre face deform;
The beadsman, after thousand aves told,
For aye unsought-for slept among his ashes cold.

JOHN KEATS.

66

"Curfew must not ring to-night."

Bessie," calmly spoke the sexton,

pierced her young heart

every word

Like the piercing of an arrow, like a deadly

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She had listened while the judges read without a tear or sigh:

"At the ringing of the Curfew, Basil Underwood must die."

And her breath came fast and faster, and her eyes grew large and bright;

In an undertone she murmured : —

"Curfew must not ring to-night." With quick step she bounded forward, sprung within the old church door,

Left the old man threading slowly paths so oft he'd trod before;

Not one moment paused the maiden, but with eye and check aglow

Mounted up

the gloomy tower, where the bell swung to and fro

CURFEW MUST NOT RING TO-NIGHT.
SLOWLY England's sun was setting o'er the hill- As she climbed the dusty ladder on which fell no

tops far away,

Filling all the land with beauty at the close of Up and up,

one sad day.

ray of light,

her white lips saying:
"Curfew must not ring to-night."

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