Page:The poems of Edmund Clarence Stedman, 1908.djvu/483

HAREBELL

To nature's heart, and judge him fairly—

Go see his rustic bard, go view

His Man o' Airlie.

From hope to wan despair, from laughter

To frenzy's moan: the image wrought

Will haunt you after.

A guerdon waits the stricken poet,

'T were well, you'll own, to bear as much—

Even die, to know it."

Must feel which thus your blood can waken."

And once I saw upon the bill

That part retaken;

But leagues of travel stretched between

Me and that idyl played so rarely:

And then—his death! nor had I seen

"The Man o' Airlie."

My failure; not the actor's, loved

By all to art and nature loyal;

Not his, whom Harebell's passion proved

Of the blood royal.

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