"Yet stay," he paused awhile, and then—

"Let messengers the country scour

On pain of death forbidding men

To speak, in hut or hall or tower,

Of what I said this night of dread,

Or where I spent its darkest hour."

Swift flew the minions to obey;

The wearied monarch slumbered late;

Yet, in the Capital next day,

Writ large upon his palace gate,