Page:Romance of the Rose (Ellis), volume 2.pdf/142

114

O let it be, quoth Love; and then

He thus addressed his faithful men:

That we may Jealousy defeat,

At whose fell hands our gallants meet

Such cruel fate, I’ve summoned ye.

’Tis her intention strenuously

To hold the fort she dared to build,

Which with distress my heart hath filled.

A potent garrison therein

Is set, and, ere we entry win,

They’ll fight with desperation rude,

And great is my inquietude;

For there Fair-Welcome is immured,

Whose loving kindness oft hath cured

Our woes, and if he’s rescued not

From thence—oh, hard and evil lot!

Dead is Tibullus, who so well

Knew me, that, when ’neath death he fell,

My bow and arrows did I shiver

In shards, and tare my goatskin quiver,

While on his tomb my broken wings

Fell heaped, as worn and worthless things,

Shattered and spent, and through his death

My gentle mother’s fragrant breath