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And one eye's black intelligence, - ever that glance

O'er its white edge at me, his own master, askance !

And the thick heavy spume-flakes which aye and anon

His fierce lips shook upwards in galloping

on.

By Hasselt, Dirck groan'd; and cried Joris "Stay spur!

Your Roos gallop'd bravely, the fault's not in her,

We'll remember at Aix" - for one heard the quick wheeze

Of her chest, saw the stretch'd neck and staggering knees,

And sunk tail, and horrible heave of the flank,

As down on her haunches she shudder'd and sank.

So, we were left galloping, Joris and I, Past Looz and past Tongres, no cloud in the sky;

The broad sun above laugh'd a pitiless laugh,

'Neath our feet broke the brittle bright stubble like chaff;

Till over by Dalhem a dome-spire sprang

white,

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And after April, when May follows And the white-throat builds, and all the swallows!

Hark, where my blossom'd pear-tree in the hedge

Leans to the field and scatters on the clover Blossoms and dewdrops at the bent spray's edge

That's the wise thrush he sings each song twice over

Lest you should think he never could recapture

The first fine careless rapture!

And, though the fields look rough with hoary dew,

All will be gay when noontide wakes anew The buttercups, the little children's dower, Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!

A FACE

IF one could have that little head of hers!

Painted upon a background of pale gold,
Such as the Tuscan's early art prefers!
No shade encroaching on the matchless
mould

Of those two lips, which should be opening soft

In the pure profile; not as when she laughs,

For that spoils all: but rather as if aloft Yon hyacinth, she loves so, lean'd its

staff's

Burthen of honey-color'd buds to kiss
And capture 'twixt the lips apart for this.

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By the many hundred years red-rusted,
Rough iron-spik'd, ripe fruit-o'ercrusted,
My sentinel to guard the sands

To the water's edge. For, what expands
Before the house, but the great opaque
Blue breadth of sea without a break?
While, in the house, for ever crumbles
Some fragment of the frescoed walls,
From blisters where a scorpion sprawls.
A girl bare-footed brings, and tumbles
Down on the pavement, green-flesh melons,
And says there's news to-day-the king
Was shot at, touch'd in the liver-wing,
Goes with his Bourbon arm in a sling:
- She hopes they have not caught the felons.
Italy, my Italy!

Queen Mary's saying serves for me
(When fortune's malice
Lost her Calais)

Open my heart and you will see
Grav'd inside of it, "Italy."

Such lovers old are I and she:
So it always was, so shall ever be.

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Dead long ago, and I am Bishop since, And as she died so must we die ourselves, And thence ye may perceive the world's a dream.

Life, how and what is it? As here I lie In this state-chamber, dying by degrees, Hours and long hours in the dead night, I ask,

"Do I live, am I dead?" Peace, peace seems all.

Saint Praxed's ever was the church for peace;

And so, about this tomb of mine. I fought With tooth and nail to save my niche, ye know :

-Old Gandolf cozen'd me, despite my

care;

Shrewd was that snatch from out the corner South

He graced his carrion with, God curse the same!

Yet still my niche is not so cramp'd but thence

One sees the pulpit on the epistle-side, And somewhat of the choir, those silent seats,

And up into the aëry dome where live
The angels, and a sunbeam's sure to lurk :
And I shall fill my slab of basalt there,
And 'neath my tabernacle take my rest,
With those nine columns round me, two and
two,

The odd one at my feet where Anselm stands:

Peach-blossom marble all, the rare, the ripe

As fresh-pour'd red wine of a mighty pulse, - Old Gandolf with his paltry onion-stone. Put me where I may look at him! True peach,

Rosy and flawless : how I earn'd the prize! Draw close that conflagration of my

church

What then? So much was sav'd if aught were miss'd!

My sons, ye would not be my death? Go dig

The white-grape vineyard where the oilpress stood,

Drop water gently till the surface sink, And if ye find Ah God, I know not,

I! . . .

Bedded in store of rotten figleaves soft,
And corded up in a tight olive-frail,
Some lump, ah God, of lapis lazuli,
Big as a Jew's head cut off at the nape,
Blue as a vein o'er the Madonna's breast
Sons, all have I bequeathed you, villas, all,
That brave Frascati villa with its bath,
So, let the blue lump poise between my
knees,

Like God the Father's globe on both his hands

Ye worship in the Jesu Church so gay, For Gandolf shall not choose but see and burst!

Swift as a weaver's shuttle fleet our years: Man goeth to the grave, and where is he? Did I say, basalt for my slab, sons? Black

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That's if ye carve my epitaph aright, Choice Latin, pick'd phrase, Tully's every word,

No gaudy ware like Gandolf's second line Tully, my masters? Ulpian serves his need!

And then how shall I lie through centuries,
And hear the blessed mutter of the mass,
And see God made and eaten all day long,
And feel the steady candle-flame, and taste
Good strong thick stupefying incense
smoke!

For as I lie here, hours of the dead night,
Dying in state and by such slow degrees,
I fold my arms as if they clasp'd a crook,
And stretch my feet forth straight as stone
can point,

And let the bedclothes, for a mortcloth, drop

Into great laps and folds of sculptor's work : And as yon tapers dwindle, and strange thoughts

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