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But branches current yet in kindred veins.'
'Are you that Psyche,' Florian added; 'she
With whom I sang about the morning hills,
Flung ball, flew kite, and raced the purple fly,
And snared the squirrel of the glen? are you
That Psyche, wont to bind my throbbing brow,
To smooth my pillow, mix the foaming draught
Of fever, tell me pleasant tales, and read
My sickness down to happy dreams? are you
That brother-sister Psyche, both in one?
You were that Psyche, but what are you now?'
"You are that Psyche,' Cyril said, for whom
I would be that forever which I seem,

Woman, if I might sit beside your feet,
And glean your scatter'd sapience.'

Then once more,

• Are you that Lady Psyche,' I began,
'That on her bridal morn before she past
From all her old companions, when the king
Kiss'd her pale cheek, declared that ancient ties
Would still be dear beyond the southern hills;
That were there any of our people there
In want or peril, there was one to hear
And help them? look! for such are these and I.’
'Are you that Psyche,' Florian ask'd, 'to whom,
In gentler days, your arrow-wounded fawn
Came flying while you sat beside the well?
The creature laid his muzzle on your lap

And sobb'd, and you sobb'd with it, and the blood

Was sprinkled on your kirtle, and you wept.
That was fawn's blood, not brother's, yet you

wept.

O, by the bright head of my little niece,

You were that Psyche, and what are you now?' 'You are that Psyche,' Cyril said again,

'The mother of the sweetest little maid

That ever crow'd for kisses.'

"Out upon it!'

She answer'd, 'peace! and why should I not play The Spartan Mother with emotion, be

The Lucius Junius Brutus of my kind?

Him you call great; he for the common weal,
The fading politics of mortal Rome,

As I might slay this child, if good need were,
Slew both his sons; and I, shall I, on whom
The secular emancipation turns

Of half this world, be swerved from right to

save

A prince, a brother? a little will I yield.

Best so, perchance, for us, and well for you.

O, hard when love and duty clash! I fear

My conscience will not count me fleckless; yet— Hear my conditions: promise-otherwise

You perish

as you came, to slip away

To-day, to-morrow, soon. It shall be said,

These women were too barbarous, would not learn; They fled, who might have shamed us. Promise,

all.'

What could we else, we promised each; and she, Like some wild creature newly-caged, commenced A to-and-fro, so pacing till she paused

By Florian; holding out her lily arms
Took both his hands, and smiling faintly said:
I knew you at the first; tho' you have
grown
You scarce have alter'd. I am sad and glad
To see you, Florian. I give thee to death,
My brother! it was duty spoke, not I.
My needful seeming harshness, pardon it.
Our mother, is she well?'

With that she kiss'd

His forehead, then, a moment after, clung
About him, and betwixt them blossom'd up
From out a common vein of memory

Sweet household talk, and phrases of the hearth,
And far allusion, till the gracious dews
Began to glisten and to fall; and while

They stood, so rapt, we gazing, came a voice,
'I brought a message here from Lady Blanche.'
Back started she, and turning round we saw
The Lady Blanche's daughter where she stood,
Melissa, with her hand upon the lock,
A rosy blonde, and in a college gown,
That clad her like an April daffodilly
Her mother's color- with her lips apart,
And all her thoughts as fair within her eyes,
As bottom agates seen to wave and float
In crystal currents of clear morning seas.

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So stood that same fair creature at the door.
Then Lady Psyche, Ah-Melissa - you!
You heard us?' and Melissa, O, pardon me!
I heard, I could not help it, did not wish;
But, dearest lady, pray you fear me not,
Nor think I bear that heart within my breast,
To give three gallant gentlemen to death.'

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'I trust you,' said the other, for we two

Were always friends, none closer, elm and vine; But yet your mother's jealous temperamentLet not your prudence, dearest, drowse, or prove The Danaid of a leaky vase, for fear

This whole foundation ruin, and I lose

My honor, these their lives.' Ah, fear

not,'

Replied Melissa; 'no-I would not tell,

No, not for all Aspasia's cleverness,

No, not to answer, madam, all those hard things That Sheba came to ask of Solomon.'

'Be it so,' the other, that we still may lead

The new light up, and culminate in peace,
For Solomon may come to Sheba yet.'

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Said Cyril, Madam, he the wisest man

Feasted the woman wisest then, in halls

Of Lebanonian cedar; nor should you

me

Tho', madam, you should answer, we would ask —— Less welcome find among us, if you came

Among us, debtors for our lives to you,

Myself for something more.' He said not what,

But Thanks,' she answer'd, 'go; we have been.

too long

Together; keep your hoods about the face;
They do so that affect abstraction here.

Speak little; mix not with the rest; and hold
Your promise. All, I trust, may yet be well.'

We turn'd to go, but Cyril took the child, And held her round the knees against his waist, And blew the swollen cheek of a trumpeter, While Psyche watch'd them, smiling, and the child Push'd her flat hand against his face and laugh'd; And thus our conference closed.

And then we strolled

For half the day thro' stately theatres

Bench'd crescent-wise. In each we sat, we heard
The grave professor. On the lecture slate

The circle rounded under female hands
With flawless demonstration; follow'd then
A classic lecture, rich in sentiment,
With scraps of thunderous epic lilted out
By violet-hooded Doctors, elegies
And quoted odes, and jewels five-words-long
That on the stretch'd forefinger of all Time
Sparkle forever. Then we dipt in all
That treats of whatsoever is, the state,
The total chronicles of man, the mind,

The morals, something of the frame, the rock,
The star, the bird, the fish, the shell, the flower,

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