In company with you,-I have not dared . . He would maintain, were gray instead of blue— Mil. Guendolen, What have I done. . what could suggest . . Guen. There, there! Do I not comprehend you'd be alone Mil. My brother Did he.. you said that he received him well? Guen. If I said only "well" I said not much— Oh, stay-which brother? Mil. Thorold! who-who else? Guen. Thorold (a secret) is too proud by half,- Mil. You wrong him, Guendolen. Guen. He's proud, confess; so proud with brooding o'er The light of his interminable line, An ancestry with men all paladins, And women all . . Should rise up from such musings, and receive One come audaciously to graft himself Into this peerless stock, yet find no flaw, No slightest spot in such an one . . . VOL. II. I said how gracefully his mantle lay Mil. Brown hair! Guen. Brown? why it is brown-how could you know that? Mil. How? did not you-Oh Austin 'twas, declared His hair was light, not brown-my head !-and, look, The moon-beam purpling the dark chamber! Sweet, Good night! Guen. Forgive me-sleep the soundlier for me! [Going, she turns suddenly. Perdition! all's discovered.-Thorold finds Mildred ! -That the Earl's greatest of all grandmothers My heart-I shall not reach the window! Needs Must I have sinned much, so to suffer! [She lifts the small lamp which is suspended before the Virgin's image in the window, and places it by the purple pane.] There! [She returns to the seat in front. Mildred and Mertoun! Mildred, with consent To dream my soul away and die upon ! [A noise without. Into the Paradise Heaven meant us both? [The window opens softly.-A low voice sings. There's a woman like a dew-drop, she 's so purer than the purest; And her noble heart's the noblest, yes, and her sure faith's the surest : And her eyes are dark and humid, like the depth on depth of lustre Hid i' the harebell, while her tresses, sunnier than the wild-grape cluster, Gush in golden-tinted plenty down her neck's rose-misted marble: Then her voice's music. . call it the well's bubbling, the bird's warble! [A figure wrapped in a mantle appears at the window. And this woman says, "My days were sunless and my nights were moonless, "Parched the pleasant April herbage, and the lark's heart's outbreak tuneless, "If you loved me not!" And I who-(ah, for words of flame!) adore her! Who am mad to lay my spirit prostrate palpably before her— [He enters-approaches her seat, and bends over her. I may enter at her portal soon, as now her lattice takes me, And by noontide as by midnight make her mine, as hers she makes me ! [The Earl throws off his slouched hat and long cloak. My very heart sings, so I sing, beloved! The meeting that appalled us both so much. Mil. What begins now? 'Tis mine! The whole world's best of blisses: we-do we Deserve that? Utter to your soul, what mine Long since, beloved, has grown used to hear, And so familiar now; this will not be! Mer. Oh, Mildred, have I met your brother's face, The truth, as what had e'er prevailed on me |