Page:Blackwood's Magazine volume 046.djvu/172

164 But none of all their kin are yet return'd, No, nor shall ever.
 * Ter. Still run thy thoughts upon those hapless women

Of that small hamlet, whose advent'rous peasants To Palestine with noble Baldwin went, And ne'er were heard of more?
 * Aur. They perish'd there; and of their dismal fate

No trace remain'd—none of them all return'd. Didst thou not say so?—Husbands, lovers, friends— Not one return'd again.
 * Ter. So I believe.
 * Aur. Thou but believest then?
 * Ter. As I was told.
 * Ed. Thou hast the story wrong.

Four years gone by, one did return again; But marr'd, and maim'd, and changed—a woful man.
 * Aur. And what though every limb were hack'd and maim'd,

And roughen'd o'er with scars?—he did return. [Rising lightly from her seat. I would a pilgrimage to Iceland go, To the Antipodes or burning zone, To see that man who did return again, And her who did receive him.—Did receive him! Oh ! what a moving thought lurks here!—How was't? Tell it me all:—and oh! another time Give me your tale ungarbled."

Ulrick, the Lord of the Isle, loves Aurora; and, impatient of her inextinguishable Hope, has threatened to Terentia that night to quench the Beacon. On being told of that threat, the spirit of Aurora leaps up and she indignantly cries

Terentia, as well she might, mildly rebukes such wild fancies and warns her against the aggravated sharpness of disappointment.

All the dialogue is full of exquisite touches—bold strokes of nature like these. As, for example, what can be more beautiful than these lines—yet we do not remember to have seen them quoted?

Her soul is up, and she says to Terentia

"Wish'd-for gales the light vane veering, Better dreams the dull night cheering; Lighter heart the morning greeting, Things of better omen meeting; Eyes each passing stranger watching, Ears each feeble rumour catching, Say he existeth still on earthly ground, The absent will return, the long, long lost be found.

"In the tower the ward-bell ringing, In the court the carols singing; Busy hands the gay board dressing, Eager steps the threshold pressing, Open'd arms in haste advancing, Joyful looks through blind, tears glancing;