‘I knew that those who brought your message laughed
With poison of their own to point the shaft;
And this my one kind sister thought, yet loth
Confessed she feared ’twas true you had been wroth.
But here you are, and smile on me: my pain
Is gone, and Constance is herself again.’
His ecstasy, it may be guessed, was much:
Yet pain’s extreme and pleasure’s seemed to touch.
What pride! embracing beauty’s perfect mould;
What terror! lest his few rash words, mistold,