Page:Ballads of a Bohemian.djvu/88

86 A week ago she haunted us, we heard her whining cry, We brushed aside the broken blooms she pestered us to buy; A week ago she had not where to rest her weary head… But now, oh, follow, follow on, for Marie Toro’s dead.

Oh Marie, she was once a queen–ah yes, a queen of queens. High-throned above the Carnival she held her splendid sway. For four-and-twenty crashing hours she knew what glory means, The cheers of half a million throats, the délire of a day. Yet she was only one of us, a little sewing-girl, Though far the loveliest and best of all our laughing band; Then Fortune beckoned; off she danced, amid the dizzy whirl, And we who once might kiss her cheek were proud to kiss her hand. For swiftly as a star she soared; she had her every wish; We saw her roped with pearls of price, with princes at her call; And yet, and yet I think her dreams were of the old Boul’ Mich’,