Page:The poems of Edmund Clarence Stedman, 1908.djvu/113

BOHEMIA Till all the hostel rang again;

But when the day began to wane,

Along the sequel of our way

He kept us pace; and, since that time,

We never lack for song and rhyme

To cheer us, in Bohemia.

XV

And once we stopped a twelvemonth, where

Five-score Bohemians began

Their scheme to cheapen bed and fare,

Upon a late-discovered plan;

By which one pilgrim's wants are met!

And if a host together fall,

What need of any cash at all?"

Though how it worked I half forget,

Yet still the same old dance and song

We found,—the kindly, blithesome throng

And joyance of Bohemia.

XVI

Thus onward through the Magic Land,

With varying chance. But once there past

A mystic shadow o'er our band,

Deeper than Want could ever cast,

For, oh, it darkened little eyes!

We saw our youngest darling die,

Then robed her in her palmer's guise,

And crossed the fair hands pilgrim-wise,

And, one by one, so tenderly,

Came Ambrose, Sibyl, Ralph, and Rose,

Strewing each sweetest flower that grows

In wildwoods of Bohemia.

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