"Come in, come in, Earl Roderick,
Come in or you be late;
The priest is ready in his stole.
The wedding guests await."
And then the stern Earl Roderick
From his fierce steed came down;
The sneer still curled upon his lip,
His eyes still held the frown.
He strode right haughtily and quick
Into the banquet-hall,
And stood among the wedding guests,
The greatest of them all.
He gave scant greeting to the throng,
He waved the guests aside:
"Now haste! for I, Earl Roderick,
Will wait long for no bride!
"And I must in the saddle be
Before the night is gray;
So quickly with the marriage lines,
And let us ride away."
And now shall I tell thee how, as he spoke thus proud and heartlessly, his little bride came into the hall? So white was she, and so trembled she, that many wondered she did not sink upon the marble floor and die.
Her mother held her snow-white hand, weeping bitterly the while.
"If I had my will," thought she, "this thing should never be. Oh, sharp sorrow," sobbed she, "this for a woman: my trouble thou art, and my thousand treasures."
Her father, seeing the frowning Earl, muttered in his beard:
"Would there were some other way. Stern is he and hard, to wear a young maid's heart." And then aloud he spoke, laying his hands upon the yellow curls of his child: "This is the golden link that binds the clans. God's sweet love be upon her head, for she hath healed a cruel and evil quarrel between the two houses. Lift up your voices, my comrades, and make ye merry; it is a good deed you have helped in to-day."