Page:The poetical works of Matthew Arnold, 1897.djvu/201

Rh He sings how from the chapel

He vanished with his bride,

And bore her down to the sea-halls,

Beneath the salt sea-tide.

He sings how she sits weeping

'Mid shells that round her lie.

"False Neckan shares my bed," she weeps;

"No Christian mate have I."

He sings how through the billows

He rose to earth again,

And sought a priest to sign the cross,

That Neckan heaven might gain.

He sings how, on an evening,

Beneath the birch-trees cool,

He sate and played his harp of gold,

Beside the river-pool.

Beside the pool sate Neckan,

Tears filled his mild blue eye.

On his white mule, across the bridge,

A cassocked priest rode by.

"Why sitt'st thou there, O Neckan,

And play'st thy harp of gold?

Sooner shall this my staff bear leaves,

Than thou shalt heaven behold."

But, lo! the staff, it budded;

It greened, it branched, it waved.

"O ruth of God!" the priest cried out,

"This lost sea-creature saved!"

The cassocked priest rode onwards,

And vanished with his mule;

And Neckan in the twilight gray

Wept by the river-pool.