Page:Poems, now first collected, Stedman, 1897.djvu/47

HEBE To beasts, and the Romans, entrance-free,

Clapped hands;)—that night, as she stood alone,

Florina, Queen of the Lions, called

Sir Marco toward her, while her hand

Still touched the spring of a door that walled

Her subjects safe within Lion-land.

He came there panting, hot from the ring,

So brave a figure that one might know

Among all his tribe he must be king,—

If in some wild tract you met him so.

"Do you love me still," she asked, "as when

You swore it first?" "Have never a doubt!"

"But I have a fancy—men are men,

And one whim drives another out,"—

"What fancy? Is this all? Have done:

You tire me." "Look you, Marco! oh,

I should die if another woman won

Your love,—but would kill you first, you know!"

"Kill me? and how,—with a jealous tongue?"

"Thus!" quoth Florina, and slipped the bolt 27