In Vienna, by the Danube,
Feast and dance her youth beguiled.
Till that hour she never sorrowed;
But from then she never smiled.
’Mid the Savoy mountain-valleys,
Far from town or haunt of man,
Stands a lonely church, unfinished,
Which the Duchess Maud began.
Old, that duchess stern began it,
In gray age, with palsied hands;
But she died while it was building,
And the church unfinished stands,—
Stands as erst the builders left it,
When she sank into her grave;
Mountain greensward paves the chancel,
Harebells flower in the nave.
“In my castle all is sorrow,”
Said the Duchess Marguerite then:
“Guide me, some one, to the mountain;
We will build the church again.”
Sandalled palmers, faring homeward,
Austrian knights from Syria came.
“Austrian wanderers bring, O warders!
Homage to your Austrian dame.”
From the gate the warders answered,—
“Gone, O knights, is she you knew!
Dead our duke, and gone his duchess;
Seek her at the church of Brou.”
Austrian knights and march-worn palmers
Climb the winding mountain-way;
Reach the valley, where the fabric
Rises higher day by day.
Stones are sawing, hammers ringing;
On the work the bright sun shines;
In the Savoy mountain-meadows,
By the stream, below the pines.
On her palfrey white the duchess
Sate, and watched her working train,—
Flemish carvers, Lombard gilders,
German masons, smiths from Spain.