And soon, on a graceful steed and tame,
A sleek Arabian mare,
The lady Juliana came
Riding to take the air,
With many a lord at whose proud name
A Radical would swear.
The Minstrel touched his lute again;
It was more than a Sultan’s crown,
When the Lady checked her bridle rein
And lit from her palfrey down:—
What would you give for such a strain,
Rees, Longman, Orme and Brown?
He sang of Beauty’s dazzling eyes,
Of Beauty’s melting tone,
And her praise is a richer prize
Than the gems of Persia’s throne,
And her love a bliss which the coldly wise
Have never, never known.
He told how the valiant scoff at fear
When the sob of her grief is heard;
How fiercely they fight for a smile or a tear,
How they die for a single word:—
Things which, I own, to me appear
Exceedingly absurd.
The Lady soon had heard enough;
She turned to hear Sir Denys
Discourse in language vastly gruff
About his skill at Tennis;
While smooth Sir Guy described the stuff
His mistress wore at Venice.
The Lady smiled one radiant smile,
And the Lady rode away—
There is not a Lady in all our Isle,
I have heard a Poet say,
Who can listen more than a little while
To a poet’s sweetest lay.—
His mother’s voice was fierce and shrill
As she set the milk and fruit:
“Out on thine unrewarded skill,
And on thy vagrant lute;
Let the strings be broken an they will,
And the beggar lips be mute!”
Peace, peace! the Pilgrim as he went
Forgot the Minstrel’s song,
But the blessing that his wan lips sent
Will guard the Minstrel long,
And keep his spirit innocent,
And turn his hand from wrong.
Belike the child had little thought
Of the moral the Minstrel drew;
But the dream of a deed of kindness wrought—
Brings it not peace to you?
And does not a lesson of virtue taught
Teach him that teaches too?
And if the Lady sighed no sigh
For the Minstrel or his hymn,—
Yet when he shall lie ’neath the moonlit sky,
Or lip the goblet’s brim,
What a star in the mist of memory
That smile will be to him!